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The Current Transcript for March 15, 2016

Host: Anna Maria Tremonti

STORIES FROM THIS EPISODE

Listen to the full episode

Prologue

[Music: Theme]

SOUNDCLIP

For having disposed of ash in a public place. In your suit and tie you’re not going to sit there on the side of the street and get a ticket because you ashed your cigarette.

ANNA MARIA TREMONTI: The list of fines was long from that cigarette ash flicked on to the street to sleeping outside. So many fines from Montreal police that he was ten thousand dollars in debt and homeless without the means to even begin paying that down. Advocates for the homeless say such vulnerable people are routinely targeted. And in Montreal it is common to accumulate thousands of dollars in fines. They call the practice ineffective and inhumane and want such ticketing stopped in all Canadian cities. We’ll tell you more in half an hour. Also today, you would be forgiven for thinking the Geneva peace talks on Syria look like a diplomatic sleight of hand. There is a truce but it's partial, ISIS isn't even at the table, and yet everyone wants a deal.

SOUNDCLIP

The only plan B available is return to war and to even worse war than we had so far.

AMT: And quietly in the background in its fifth year of a brutal war a man who has already secured permanent residency in Canada is going back convinced the real peace will happen among neighbours and that they all need to think now about rebuilding. You will meet him in an hour. But we begin just over the Syrian border in Turkey, caught between its NATO allies and its fears of Kurdish separatism, with a polarizing leader and a public both anxious and angry.

SOUNDCLIP

[translation]

Let him come here. I will insult Tayyip Erdoğan to his face. My nephew is 16. He was a young man who went out to have fun. And we took his dead body last night.

AMT: I’m Anna Maria Tremonti. This is The Current.

Will Turkey's growing troubles affect Canadian relations with the NATO ally?

Guests: Dorian Jones, Ferry de Kerckove

SOUNDCLIP

[people shouting]

[sirens wailing]

AMT: Well, the sounds of chaos on the streets of Turkey's capital Ankara on Sunday. At least 37 people were killed, another 125 were injured in a car bomb attack. And that was the second of its kind in three weeks, also a sign of the complications an already troubled state of Turkey. There has been no official claim of responsibility for Sunday's attack, but the government says it suspects the Kurdish separatist group the PKK. Within hours of Sunday's bombing, Turkey launched air strikes against the PKK inside northern Iraq. Turkey claims to have killed 45 Kurdish rebels in that strike. As these tensions mount the potential ramifications are significant for the West's war against ISIS, for the efforts to ease the conflict in Syria, and for the ongoing refugee and migrant crisis. Turkey sits at the centre of all of those critical situations. Freelance journalist Dorian Jones knows Turkey well. He's been based in the country for more than two decades. And we have reached Dorian Jones in Istanbul. Hello.

DORIAN JONES: Hello.

AMT: What is known about those responsible for this bombing in Ankara?

DORIAN JONES: Well, we haven't heard any concrete definitive statement. Most of what we're hearing is from sources from the security. They claim that one of the suicide bombers is believed to be a woman, a student, and they claim to be a member of the Kurdish rebel group the PKK. A second bomber is believed to be a man. There's no details given of that person as of yet. The Turkish prime minister Ahmet Davutoglu speaking after visiting those injured at the hospital said that they are almost certain that the PKK is responsible for these actions. They've already detained 11 people, four of which are believed to have been close to the Syrian border, believed to be trying to cross back into Syria.

AMT: Turkey has already launched air strikes against PKK targets in northern Iraq. What justification did President Erdoğan give for that?

DORIAN JONES: Well, he didn't. And, in fact, this is a normal reaction these days if there’s any bombing, even if it's proved to be the Islamic State. The first action is to bomb PKK bases in Iraq. It has to be said that these military operations are going on nearly every week anyway as part of a major crackdown in Turkey's predominately Kurdish Southeast against the PKK AND primarily towns and cities across that region. There is now a full scale war against the Kurdish rebel group that's been going on since the collapse of the ceasefire last year.

AMT: In the 1990s, there was a full blown conflict between the Kurds and Turkish authority, which killed tens of thousands. How does this conflict with the PKK compare to those days, Dorian?

DORIAN JONES: Well, it is fundamentally different on one scale. In the nineties, this conflict was fought primarily in the countryside where the PKK were based and it was a particularly brutal conflict. It involved, in the end, using scorched policies whereby they burned down over a thousand villages, some people say the figure was possibly 2,000 villages creating over a million to two million refugees, and effectively cleared the area making into a killing zone. And, effectively, that was the factor behind the PKK being ultimately forced to retreat into neighbouring Iraq. Now this time around, these conflicts are primarily focused in towns and cities across the region. What we saw last year was the youth wing of the PKK creating these, what they called, autonomous zones in towns and cities. They dug ditches to prevent the use of armoured cars entering these areas and saying this was a self-declared Kurdish autonomous region. Now, what we've seen is a systematic policy of just clearing out these groups and they are using heavy weapons, they’re using tanks, artillery in the centres of towns and cities across this region. One notable town, Cizre, has been all the centre of it. It’s been almost effectively levelled, very similar to images that you would see in Syria. That went on for at least two months. There's been no reports of civilian casualties. The state don't give figures. All they give is figures of what they say has killed militants of which they say over 1,000, possibly 1,500 have been killed. But human rights groups say at least 200t civilians have been killed, at least half of them are believed to be teenagers and children and the old and elderly. And we are getting systematic reports now, although they're not verified or confirmed yet by international human rights groups, that there have been atrocities. In some cases, basements have been filled with wounded and people seeking refuge have been burned and all those killed and inside it. This still has to be confirmed. I know that there are human rights, international human rights people going to this area to verify these claims, but we're getting very, very alarming reports of serious human rights abuses –decapitations, mutilated bodies are appearing on social media of women rebels, or supposedly women rebels, naked and terrible things have been done. And this is causing a great deal of alarm across the country for those that hear about it. The mainstream media are not reporting this.

AMT: I was just going to say to you, this is off the radar in the West. This crackdown in Turkey isn't solely at the PKK. Academics are being targeted by the Turkish government. What can you tell us?

DORIAN JONES: Well, I've just come back from the court case, the court hearings of the organizer of this petition by Turkish academics where they were calling for the end of this military crackdown and a resumption of the peace process with the Kurdish rebel group, the PKK. Over 1,000 academics signed this petition and it was organized by one of Turkey's elite universities, Bosphorus University, but since that petition the president has absolutely savagely attacked these academics. He’s accused them of being supporters of terrorism. He's repeatedly made some very tough speeches and following those speeches, prosecutors have now been launching investigations. It’s believed that over 500 of the academics are now under investigation. And I know many of the academics who’ve signed this. These are leading academics on the country and they are now facing jail, many of them are very, very scared. They have young children, a couple I know both of them signed it and now they are wondering if they will now face jail. And yesterday the president again made a very tough speech. And then we could quote this, there are titles of Member of Parliament, an academic, an author, a journalist - that does not change the fact that they are actually terrorists. And he's calling for redefinition of the crime of terrorism to include these people. And he gave a message to his Turkey's international allies. He said, some circles at home and abroad are at a junction. They will either side with us or with terrorists. There is no middle way.

AMT: Well, you mentioned journalists as well and we've seen the crackdown on journalists. How worried are you about your own future? You've been there more than 20 years working as a journalist.

DORIAN JONES: Well, even when I covered the nineties, which was a particularly difficult period and by and large most foreign journalists were left alone and it still is the case now. But speaking to my colleagues, there is this, this is now the conversation, when will we facing pressure? There is this awareness that most avenues of freedom of expression or voices of criticism, be it academia, be it journalism, in Turkey. Even social media Is facing increasing crackdowns. And one of the last voices are foreign journalists. And there was some alarm at the beginning of the year when very prominent newspapers have been quite critical of government, including New York Times, Guardian newspaper; those correspondents have problems receiving that press accreditation cards without which you can’t stay in the country. We understand now that after several weeks delay they have been given to speaking to sources within the government of the state. There was a battle, apparently, an argument over refusing to give cards as a warning. But the fact that they were delayed, that is seen as a warning and there is this expectation that, sooner or later, foreign journalists will start to feel pressure, very similar to countries like China.

AMT: On top of all of this, there’s a war across the border. The US needs Turkey because it's staging air strikes against Syrian forces from a Turkish air base. It's also arming Syrian Kurds to fight ISIS. How are those conflicting allegiances affecting the relationship between Turkey and the United States?

DORIAN JONES: Well, it’s really— It’s a rock bottom. . It’s why I’m speaking to people in the government and certain American diplomats. They just say that relations are extremely difficult and the centre of this point of tension is over the United States supporting the Syrian Kurdish militia, the YPG. Turkey considers this to be an extension of the PKK, which Turkish security forces are currently fighting in Turkey. Whereas the Americans refuse to accept that and the reason why is because the YPG, the Syrian Kurds are key to fighting Islamic State in Syria. They really are the only basic force that is capable of inflicting defeat on the Islamic State and America doesn't want to lose that card. Add to the concerns of the Americans is that they are aware that the Russians too are courting the Syrian Kurdish militia for their own aim. So there is this point of tension. Now, if it turns out or Turkey claims that those responsible for Sunday’s terrorist attack were linked to the Syrian Kurdish militia in any way, then this could cause a possible showdown with Washington, because Ankara is increasingly becoming assertive and impatient with the US. They see that the US is a main factor for emboldening the wider Kurdish movement, not only in Syria but across the region, and they are determined to get the Americans to withdraw their support.

AMT: Dorian Jones, thank you for your insights.

DORIAN JONES: You're welcome.

AMT: Dorian Jones is a freelance journalist. He is based in Istanbul, that's where we reached him. Well, as the things unravel in Turkey, its NATO allies, including Canada, are faced with a conundrum. On one hand, Turkey's a strategic partner for the West, especially given the war in Syria and the refugee crisis. On the other, it's clawing back human rights, cracking down on Kurdish fighters within its borders and beyond, Even as the US and Canada back other Kurdish factions in the fight against ISIS in Syria and Iraq. To discuss where this tangle leaves Canada, I'm joined now by Ferry de Kerckhove. He's a member of the board of the Conference of Defence Associations Institute, that’s the research arm of the association that lobbies on Canadian defence policy. Ferry de Kerckove is also a Senior Fellow at the Graduate School of Public and International Affairs at the University of Ottawa and a Former Ambassador to Pakistan, Indonesia, and Egypt. . Ferry de Kerckove joins us from Ottawa. Hi.

FERRY DE KERCKHOVE: Hello.

AMT: If there was no war in Syria, would we be having an alliance with Turkey right now?

FERRY DE KERCKHOVE: Well, Turkey is a very complicated country, as Dorian explained it. So, well, you know, I wrote in the paper Strategic Outlook for Canada 2016, which is the publication of our institute that Erdoğan Turkey might be the most difficult ally to manage over the coming years. And I, even without the conflict in Syria, given what he has done on human rights, the fact that there are 40 journalists jailed at the present time, that he closed down a newspaper, that, you know, even the definition of terrorism is being changed, which includes bombers and those who hold the pen against Erdoğan, I think we would still be very, very worried. But if you look at it from the perspective of Turkey, Turkey, as you said from the very beginning, is at the centre of everything in that region and it has been facing terror. Now, of course, Erdoğan has delegitimized some of the moderate Kurds in his own country and therefore is the origin of the crisis. But if you look at it from the perspective of NATO, Turkey has always been one of the most indispensable allies. Joseph Luns, former Secretary General of NATO, used to say that the Turks and the Americans were the only one that had capable armoured force. Turkey is also a bulwark against Russia. And it is with-- The irony is that Turkey is actually the ultimate barricade against Islamism, ironically, despite the fact that the Turkish society has evolved from secularism to a much more religious bent, despite the government being so secular. And if you look at the refugee situation, which of course stems from Iraq and Syria, but Europe is now treating Turkey as the saviour against the refugee flows.

AMT: My—

FERRY DE KERCKHOVE: Sorry. Go ahead.

AMT: We know all of the complications. So let's look at what this means to Canada.

FERRY DE KERCKHOVE: Yeah.

AMT: Where do we start? Let's first start with the fact that Turkey fights the PKK, the Kurdish Workers Party. It designates it a terrorist group, as does the US and the EU. Canada does not? Or do we? Do you know?

FERRY DE KERCKHOVE: I think we do qualify the PKK as a terrorist organization, yes, because no followed in the steps.

AMT: Okay, now. But Canada is training Iraqi Kurds as part of the fight against ISIS. Turkey was bombing Iraqi Kurds this week. We talk about Canada training the Peshmerga. Where in that geographic scenario are the Canadians training versus the Turks bombing?

FERRY DE KERCKHOVE: Okay. It's a very good question because in principle, of course, Canada will be training mainly in Iraq, but, as you know, the front line is so fluid that it wouldn't be impossible for the Turks to actually bomb closer to where we would be training our guys.

AMT: Well, and in fact, Turkey was bombing in northern Iraq—

FERRY DE KERCKHOVE: Exactly.

AMT: --the Qandil Mountains. Yeah.

FERRY DE KERCKHOVE: Yeah, absolutely. So in a way, until we manage to get Turkey to stop that kind of action, which I don't think they will, we are actually in harm's way because of our ally with Turkey. So it's a very complicated situation. If I went through all the various groupings in just between the Kurds, it adds to the complexity, because the Iraqi Kurds are closer to Turkey while the Syrian Kurds are totally opposed to Erdoğan, which means that you all have inner fighting which also has to the fluidity of the front lines that we engage in. And this is why I sympathize with Jon Vance when he said that, you know, when you triple the number of Canadians in the conflict zone, you are actually putting much more people at harm's way than even through our air flight, so I think that's a very important factor. But, you know, if you look at what Canada should be doing, on the one hand, we've got to be realistic because Turkey is an indispensable partner. We've got to learn how to [indecipherable]. The Americans are trying hard. I think we have got to engage the Turks also to cool off with the Turkey/Russia dispute, particularly now that the Russians have moved out, allegedly, of the bombing. But we also need the Turks for the handing of the refugees. You know, the 25,000 have been brought in, but we are expecting more. And I think we also have to realize that even from the Middle East peace process Turkey has started rekindling its relationship with Israel, which is also a very important factor. I think Turkey is also, if you wish, another kind of a barricade against Iran, although it has decent relationship with Iran. But, you know, we are still very worried about what Iran does.

AMT: Okay. So, Ferry, my head is spinning.

FERRY DE KERCKHOVE: Yeah. (laughs)

AMT: So how—Okay. As Canada tries to manoeuvre and play its limited role, I mean-- You and Dorian are both outlining Turkey's very complicated place. They've got to-- They're trying to move and navigate in there. They have their own security concerns, whether people agree with them or not, but how does a country like Canada work with Turkey when part of what Turkey is doing would be, on any other level, offensive to Canada?

FERRY DE KERCKHOVE: Well, on the human rights side, of course, we have to hold them to account, but on the other hand if we don't engage with Turkey, if we don't actually have a full liaison even on the ground, we might face greater damage then if we didn’t.

AMT: And let me also ask about the-- I'll just interrupt you just for time here-- But also about the Kurds, because Canada and the United States are working with Kurdish troops. It was known before that the Kurdish leaders want an independent state.

FERRY DE KERCKHOVE: Well, yes—

AMT: And that this kind of scenario can also be seen as an opportunity for them, so how does Canada navigate those competing interests?

FERRY DE KERCKHOVE: Well, I think there's one thing that has to be said right from the beginning is that unfortunately, ever since 1918, we never created a Kurdistan, which is a great mistake of history. But I think that if we want to continue to have the Turks on board, in one way or another, we have to assure the Turks that we are not there to create a Kurdistan, but at the same time we've got to tell the Kurds that we're going to try and ensure the greatest autonomy possible. And we should try and see if there's, further down the road, a way to have the Kurds from Iraq and the Kurds from Syria to get along, because they're totally at loggerheads. So, for a Canadian leader this is probably one of the most complex relationships and this is why the engagement and even, for instance, we committed to engage with Russia. Well, I think that we can also engage on the relationship between Turkey and Russia, because it adds to the complexity and the fact that the Russians have withdrawn doesn't change the fact that you could still have quite a problem between the two countries, because Russia is still in Latakia on its air base and it is still in Tartus with its naval base in Syria, so we're still talking about of heavy, heavy presence and a very conflictual relationship.

AMT: So if you, when you leave the studio, were to walk into the PMO, what, very briefly, would you tell Prime Minister Trudeau to watch for—

FERRY DE KERCKHOVE: Essentially—

AMT: -- in the coming months?

FERRY DE KERCKHOVE: Yeah. Essentially, I would tell the Prime Minister to ensure that in Geneva and following up to Vienna that we do the maximum to make sure that Turkey is on board and that there is no further bombing that would disrupt the peace process, including with the opposition. That, I think, is the first one. The second one, as I said, is holding them to account on human rights. And the third one is really engage to a key on on the refugee situation and probably be much more engaging in talking to the Europeans on the refugee situation so there is no void that would require to be filled. But I think that we also have to spend a lot of time, Mr. Prime Minister, to understand what goes on because if you don't even have a sense of the variation between the Kurds and all that, sometime you may not realize how important Turkey is, despite its horrifying human rights behaviour.

AMT: Okay. We have to leave it there. Ferry de Kerckove, thank you.

FERRY DE KERCKHOVE: Thank you very much.

AMT: Ferry de Kerckove, executive vice president of the- or actually – a member of the board of the Conference of Defence Associations Institute. He’s also a Senior Fellow with the Graduate School of Public and International Affairs, and a former Canadian Ambassador to Pakistan, Indonesia, and Egypt. We reached him in Ottawa. I'm Anna Maria Tremonti. This is The Current on CBC Radio One, Sirius XM, and online on cbc.ca/thecurrent.

Homeless in Montreal charged thousands of dollars in tickets

Guests: Emilie Guimond Belanger, Marie-Eve Sylvestre

ANNA MARIA TREMONTI: Hello I'm Anna Maria Tremonti and you're listening to The Current. Still to come millions of refugees have fled Syria since the conflict began five years ago this week. In half an hour I'll be joined by two people who move in the other direction going into Syria to help those caught in the crossfire. But first the rights and wrongs of writing tickets…

SOUNDCLIP

Okay, hi. My name is Daniel Boucher. I had with the fees included, I had $10,000 in fines.

AMT: You heard that correctly, $10,000 in tickets. All of those fines were racked up while Daniel Boucher was living in Montreal, or to be more precise, living on the streets of Montreal.

SOUNDCLIP

Drinking in public, sleeping outside, being in a park at night, having a dog without a leash, dog without a medal, and squeegeeing, squeegee tickets too.

AMT: Daniel Boucher spoke with CBC Montreal reporter Ryan Hicks about living with thousands of dollars’ worth of tickets, while being homeless in the city.

SOUNDCLIP

RYAN HICKS: How did that make you feel having so many tickets?

DANIEL BOUCHER: It's a big weight. Now that I don't have the tickets on my shoulder, I feel I can go forward. I have my driver's license now which I couldn't have because the squeegy tickets were road, traffic tickets. It's a big weight. Every day you wake up you tell yourself I'm in debt. I got $10,000 in debt. It's really heavy.

RYAN HICKS: Do you still have that debt, or has it been dealt with?

DANIEL BOUCHER: No. I don't have the tickets anymore. I went to a clinic which helped me deal with my tickets. And now they've been taken away. My tickets have been cleared.

RYAN HICKS: So how do you feel now?

DANILE BOUCHER: I feel great, I feel great. It’s a big relief.

AMT: Well Daniel Boucher is 24 years old and he is no longer homeless, he has an apartment, he has stopped drinking, he has plans to finish high school and then he wants a full-time job. According to the legal clinic that helped him get back on his feet, that predicament the pile up of tickets and fines, is far too common among homeless people. Emilie Guimond Belanger is a social worker with the Clinique Droits Devant and she joins us from Montreal, hello.

EMILIE GUIMOND BELANGER: Good morning.

AMT: $10,000 in tickets? Are you shocked at that number?

EMILIE GUIMOND BELANGER: Absolutely. I would say that every time there's a homeless person that comes to our service and then we ask the court to send us their file and we see the pile of tickets that they continue to receive, every time it's very shocking because you have to tell people that are on welfare and most of the times don't really have much resources, that they have 10 or 20 thousand dollars in tickets. It's horrible.

AMT: You've got to be fined an awful lot of times to get that many--to be that many thousands of dollars in tickets. What are they fining them for?

EMILIE GUIMOND BELANGER: Well a lot of times they received tickets for their occupation of the public space. So for example, there's a lot of jaywalking, there's a lot of tickets for squeegee, loitering, sleeping in parks at night when the parks are closed, drinking in public space. Those kinds of things I would say are the ones I see most often.

AMT: Okay, I mean, some of those like jaywalking. Do citizens who are not homeless rack up fines for jaywalking?

EMILIE GUIMOND BELANGER: No, that's the thing; it feels like there really is a justice that has like two different ways of its application. So for you and I, if we do jaywalking or we just are sitting in the park in the day we would not receive a ticket but a homeless person has a lot more chances to receive tickets for those same attitudes in the public space. Like they would be doing the same thing but for them being in a park is loitering but for you and I it's just spending time in the park.

AMT: Now what's the worst situation you've ever seen in terms of the number of dollars in tickets people have accumulated?

EMILIE GUIMOND BELANGER: There is one man that came to our services that had $110,000 in tickets.

AMT: $100,000?

EMILIE GUIMOND BELANGER: Yes.

AMT: What happened? How is that possible?

EMILIE GUIMOND BELANGER: Well to be honest with you I wish this was not possible but it actually happened to him. This person was pretty much living in the subway for a few years. We're talking about someone that was very old and also had some mental health issues, so he's received so many tickets of anything that you can imagine around being in the subway. Being in the subway when it's closed, sleeping in the subway, drinking alcohol in the subway, begging for money is one that he's received a lot. So what we observe here is that he would receive a lot of times, many tickets in the same day and in the same week and often by the same police officers also. We can question like why is it that police would give so many tickets to a person that they know? And to be honest, I mean if the guy is begging for money in the subway and he's homeless, how is he ever going to pay for any kind of tickets we're going to give him?

AMT: Well if you know that instinctively, why does this happen?

EMILIE GUIMOND BELANGER: I would say that we could ask the police why do you do that, but in my understanding it feels like they really want to repress them from the public space. It's kind of like as if they would treat them as second class citizen and it's like we don't even want to see you in public space go away. So we're going to get them as much as possible so that eventually they would avoid some parts of this city and there are some homeless people that really, frankly tell me, I'm not going to these places anymore because these cops, they always target me. So at some point they even avoid going to certain places in this city, which does not really make sense because they're citizens as anyone else. But it really pushes them away from public space. That's one of the effects it's having.

AMT: Some people have suggested they're ticketing them to reach quotas, do you see any evidence of that?

EMILIE GUIMOND BELANGER: Well, what I observe is definitely that they are being targeted, homeless people are being targeted to give them tickets that is for sure. And then what is it that happens in the public are they told that it's a good idea to do that, that they should be giving them as much as possible tickets so that they can reach quota. One thing I can say is that homeless people don't have power. I mean I'm talking to you right now about this issue but most people don't know what it's like for them, their life in the streets. Most people don't know that they received so many of those tickets. And when they receive them they don't really have a chance to do anything about it, to say how this is a problem for them and how it's a systematic problem for them. So I would say that they are an easy target for bullies to give tickets to them because what are they going to do? They're going to rip it and throw it away because it the ticket that is $150 for example, the amount is such an [indecipherable] amount of money that they could not even think about being able to pay that, so it just does not make sense.

AMT: If they rip it up does that mean the end of it? What do they tell you about the idea of getting these tickets? Do they feel any kind of a burden? What are they thinking when they get all of these tickets from police all of the time?

EMILIE GUIMOND BELANGER: Well it definitely is a burden. I would say that when they come to my office a lot of times they don't even remember or know exactly where their legal situation is at and they really come to our services to ask for information, that's the first need I think they have. And then they're like I think I have for about 20,000 or I think I have for about 5,000. And then we ask the court to send them their file and we can give them the information about where it's at really. And the thing is also it's--every ticket goes through to the court eventually. So if the person contests it or does not contest it, it has a whole process in the municipal court. That is also going to increase the fees because most of the time they don't, well they don't have an address, so how are they going to even receive the letter from court in order to be able to contest them? So they just completely lose track of all that situation and then there's sometimes a moment in their life where they want to get things better for themselves or look for something different , look for an apartment, look for a job, they think about their rehabilitation and then they think oh my God I have such a huge debt, so I should definitely look into this situation before I even start to do anything. Then when you let them know how their debt is, sometimes it feels like, it refrains them. You could see their shoulders are feeling so heavy from all this debt, they're thinking oh my god, how am I ever going to deal with this situation?

AMT: We asked the Montreal Police to speak to us about this, no one was available. We did reach the president of the Ottawa Police Association. His name is Matt Skof, listen to what he told us.

SOUNDCLIP

In regards to homeless people, we’re looking at more nuisance complaints around repetitive activity. He may be looking at pan handling, if you look at urinating in a public area, anything where members of the public are calling in. We’ve been given that mandate, tasked by either community groups or calls to 911 or dispatch, business improvement agencies, which task us and demand us to perform our duties to prevent these nuisances from continuing. And when you look at it from all those perspectives, the frustration is obviously we all realise the futility of issuing a ticket…

AMT: Okay, I should just add, we tried to get interviews with police in Toronto, Vancouver, Victoria, Winnipeg, all of them either said no or did not get back to us. We also reached out to the Canadian Federation of Independent Business, it declined to say anything. Are police just doing their job, is there--how do you see this?

EMILIE GUIMOND BELANGER: Well if that's the way they do their job, they definitely lack judgment. Because it's not useful for anyone, it's not useful for society, it's not useful for taxpayers, it's not useful for homeless people themselves because It's such a big amount of money that it is required from the city to even deal with all those tickets that when they arrive in court there is a--I cannot give you a number, but it definitely is a lot of tickets that have to be dealt with in court afterwards. So, I think that giving repetitive tickets to the same homeless people to a point where they have $10,000 debt and even like up to a $110,000, that is really a problem because the police they know that person they know that person is homeless and then giving them tickets, it's not going to help them to get out of the streets. And worse, it's even going to reinforce that they would stay in the streets because they don't even have money to be able to pay all those debts off.

AMT: So in other words if it's a method to get people to move away or to behave differently, it doesn't work.

EMILIE GUIMOND BELANGER: No it's not working. Repression does not work. Their criminalization is just making the problem worst I would say.

AMT: And when your organization helps homeless people get off the streets, what impact does having all of this debt, have on them?

EMILIE GUIMOND BELANGER: It has a huge impact. I would say one of the first thing people say sometimes is that they feel like they're not treated like a citizen. They have this sensation that they are second class citizen, there are the people and then there's them. They definitely feel that different treatment from the police, repressing them from doing things that really other people do and don't have a ticket for. It gives them the impression that they're not worth it. That they are--they don't have as much value. So I would say there's the first one which is definitely, how to say--it has a big impact on them and then the anxiety. Some of them think about calling, even calling us and then takes them months before they actually have the courage to come and be like facing this situation, this legal debt that they have. It takes a lot of courage for them, but also a lot of a lot of anxiety that they have. Here we have in Montreal--there's no more warrant for imprisonment for people when they don't pay off their tickets. But it's an exception, everywhere else in the province people can still, they can still be imprisoned for not paying off tickets.

AMT: Okay, we have to leave it there Emilie, but thank you for outlining all of this for us.

EMILIE GUIMOND BELANGER: Thank you so much.

AMT: That is Emilie Guimond Belanger, she's a social worker with Droits Devant and she joined us from Montreal. Well no matter the city it is probably inevitable that living on the streets will lead to more interaction with law enforcement than other citizens experience. For more and what those interactions can and should look like, I'm joined by Marie-Eve Sylvestre. She's been tracking and studying homelessness across Canada for more than a decade. She is the Associate Dean of Research and a professor in the Faculty of Law at the University of Ottawa. Marie-Eve Sylvestre joins us now from Ottawa, hello.

MARIE-EVE SYLVESTRE: Hello, good morning.

AMT: So you are listening in on this to hear about homeless people in Montreal racking up thousands, tens of thousands of dollars in fines. What's your reaction to that?

MARIE-EVE SYLVESTRE: Well for sure this has come as no surprise to those of us who have been documenting and observing just the criminalization and regulation of homelessness across Canada. You know if you just want numbers, we have numbered the amount of tickets that were issued in cities like Montreal or Toronto in the last decade. And Montreal is over 65,000 tickets that have been issued to homeless people in fifteen years including 30,000 in the last five years of our studies. In Toronto, the numbers of tickets that are issued as a result of the enforcement of the safe street act for instance has gone up from 700 to 15,000 in 2010, so this is really not a surprise. And we know that law enforcement officers are going to ticket homeless people. It's part of their arsenal I would say, in terms of law enforcement.

AMT: Now police say that they are enforcing by-laws that municipalities and provinces have enacted. What do you say to that?

MARIE-EVE SYLVESTRE: Well for sure they are some political requests and political commands. I remember in Ontario when Premier Harris enacted, adopted the safe street act, there was a real call for tracking, cracking down on squeegee people and panhandlers in the cities. You hear all sorts of the declarations from city mayors including here in Ottawa, the former mayor comparing homeless people to pigeons and people who are just parasites in the in public spaces. So for sure there are political requests and we believe that as long as we ask police officers and law enforcement agencies to deal with homeless people, then we'll get that kind of results.

AMT: Last week the Saskatchewan government bought one way bus tickets to BC for two homeless men. How prevalent are displacement tactics by police or government officials in tackling or in dealing with the homeless issue?

MARIE-EVE SYLVESTRE: So ticketing the homeless is a very important strategy but it's only one strategy as you're mentioning displacements, removals, stops, arrests, ID checks, physical violence in some cases. In some municipalities groups and the homeless people reported skylight tours which means like police are driving them around and dropping them away in more remote areas of towns. And this has been documented in remote communities such as Val-d’or in Quebec or in Manitoba and we don't know how prevalent these techniques or strategies are. We were unable to account for them but we have multiple examples that this was happening.

AMT: So how would you like to see communities tackle the issue of homelessness?

MARIE-EVE SYLVESTRE: Well, there's certainly no one size fits all solution when it comes to homelessness. There are different forms and causes for homelessness from poor households getting evicted, to indigenous communities, to veterans, to youth getting out of foster care at 18 years old because you know they have to get out at 18 and take care of themselves.

AMT: Or youth fleeing abusive homes?

MARIE-EVE SYLVESTRE: Right. To chronic homeless people who were dealing with mental health issues. So there are really multiple faces of homelessness and we should think about different solutions to that, and for sure law enforcement in punitive strategies are the most costly, inefficient, counter-productive and discriminatory solutions that we can think of.

AMT: You've used the phrase criminalization of homelessness

MARIE-EVE SYLVESTRE: Oh yeah, I do. I think this is exactly what's happening. You have to remember and I think Emilie was clear about that, that homeless people are ticketed or repressed, not necessarily for violent or threatening act, but really for survival strategies and very banal acts. And they are completely pushed out and banished from public spaces. We would like to think that homelessness can just disappear and end like that and as much as we would like that, we have to consider that homelessness is not about to disappear. And we have to think about public spaces as a place where first of all homeless people as citizen have are entitled to be. But also how we can accommodate and make space for them in those very public spaces, whether it is by creating some safer spaces where they can fulfill their basic needs, whether it's daytime space such as sobering centers in some cases. There's a sobering center that just opened in Montreal two to three years ago and this has helped a lot.

AMT: You're even talking about public washrooms?

MARIE-EVE SYLVESTRE: Public restrooms, yeah exactly. Many cities in the world have public restrooms. This is something that community groups have been asking in multiple cities across Canada for years. It's just so simple right? It's just one of those measures that could be implemented very quickly while we're thinking about tackling bigger problems such as poverty, eviction, housing and so on.

AMT: In Medicine Hat Alberta, there were headlines around the globe last year. It announced it had eradicated homelessness. Basically found apartments for homeless individuals, gave itself a deadline, I think in terms of people who would come to shelters. What's behind their success?

MARIE-EVE SYLVESTRE: Well, I'd say two things about that, and I don't know a lot about this example besides what has come out in the media. But, first of all, it all depends of how you define homelessness. You know it all starts with that because it's easy to define it very restrictively and then say that you have ended it. So that's the one thing, the other thing is it's a part of the housing first movement which has been founded a lot by the previous federal government in the last years. Trying to find some permanent housing for people and I think it has had some level of success in certain cities for certain categories of people. But for a lot of them, there's a big gap between having a house or having an apartment and actually living in the apartment and actually being in a house, and having your home. There is lots of research and studies showing that for certain populations including youth, Indigenous people, that housing first is not working and that other solutions have to be think of.

AMT: And so what would you like to see happen?

MARIE-EVE SYLVESTRE: Well I would like to see first an end to the criminalization and regulation of homeless people, because this is really counter-productive. It's very costly, just think about the cost of like police, courts, enforcement and collection agencies that are involved in the criminalization, so, really ending it. You know the criminal justice system is creating homelessness. You know when you incarcerate people for default payment of fines and they spend a couple of months in prison and then they get out, there are still homeless. So we have to stop aggravating the situation and then think about the different faces of homelessness and how we can address the different issues that are underlying the visible face of it that we have on the streets.

AMT: And you make the point that 65,000 tickets in Montreal in the last decade? Are you talking all cities?

MARIE-EVE SYLVESTRE: Well, we have been tracking about eight cities across Canada. Our study ended in 2012, so we don't have like the very recent numbers. But for Montreal in particular, we have been tracking the numbers since 1994.

AMT: And again, a lot of homeless people have mental health challenges. So, maybe that's the way to deal with it as opposed to tickets?

MARIE-EVE SYLVESTRE: Yeah. It's part of the issue, you know, when it comes to mental health we never know whether it was there before it got to the streets or it aggravated while they were on the streets and so on and so forth, but that's definitely one of the issues and more investments in health and social services dealing with mental health is certainly part of the solution. I just feel that police officers and law enforcement officers when they're asked to deal with the problems of the occupation and uses of public space by cities, they're just use the tools that they have. I think we should shift the institution and the people who are responsible for helping the homeless.

AMT: Well, Marie-Eve Sylvestre, thank you for your thoughts today.

MARIE-EVE SYLVESTRE: Thank you.

AMT: That is Marie-Eve Sylvestre, she's the Associate Dean of Research, a Professor in the Faculty of Law at the University of Ottawa and she joined us from Ottawa. Let us know how you think homelessness should be tackled, what you think of writing tickets as an effective tool or is it an effective tool you can tweet us. We are @thecurrentcbc. Find us on Facebook to comment on the story or e-mail us from our website cbc.ca/thecurrent.

Peace deal urgently needed as Syria's humanitarian crisis persists

Guests: Conrad Sauvé, Elias Sadkni

ANNA MARIA TREMONTI: Hello, I'm Anna Maria Tremonti, and this is The Current. This is a grim anniversary in Syria this week. Five years since the pro-Democracy protests against the regime of Bashar al-Assad began, and the beginning of a seemingly now intractable conflict. In Geneva, yesterday, leaders from some warring sides sat down again for talks aimed at resuming a stalled peace process. Of course, there’s a crucial warring side that isn’t there, and that is the leadership of ISIS. Russian armed forces have begun a partial withdrawal from Syria, we don’t know how far that will go. While the voices of leaders and diplomats are making headlines, we're going to strain to hear the voices of Syrian people whose lives have been upended by the ongoing conflict.

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My message is please help the Syrian. The Syrians need help now. You just stop the war now. We don't want to go to Europe. Just stop the war in Syria. Just that.

AMT: That is Kinan Masalmeh, who is 13 years old, and one of the millions of refugees who have fled Syria. Another quarter-million, at least, have been killed. In fact, the UN Agency for Children says that 80 per cent of Syria’s children have been harmed by this five-year conflict. And for those still caught in the middle of the fighting, life is an ongoing humanitarian crisis. Conrad Sauvé has just returned from that reality. He is the CEO of the Canadian Red Cross, which is helping Syrians both inside the country and in neighbouring Turkey and Lebanon. And Conrad Sauvé joins me from Toronto. Hello.

CONRAD SAUVÉ: Hello, Anna Maria.

AMT: Where were you in Syria?

CONRAD SAUVÉ: I was in Damascus and the suburbs of Damascus; in Homs, and the region around Homs; and Tartus, on the border.

AMT: So it's really restrictive, on where you can go?

CONRAD SAUVÉ: Yes, yes. But you know, it's interesting, I think your opening segment with the young child illustrates very much the situation there. I think we've seen a lot, actually, while we were in Syria. And it's a situation within Syria of extreme

ELIAS SADKNI: from a lot of coping, in terms of dealing with the situation, to some situations of extreme suffering.

AMT: So tell me a little bit more about the individuals, the individual Syrians who you met? What struck you most about them?

CONRAD SAUVÉ: There’s two messages: there's a lot of despair, and there’s some hope. I think on the despair, on the rural area around Homs we visited. Now, we’ve come, I was in Syria two years ago, and at the time, the situation was very dire. And especially in some of the camps, had absolutely no medical support, from those little settlements, and we funded a number of mobile clinics. And I think on the positive side, we're seeing the follow-up and actually, those mobile clinics were active and we've visited with a number of them serving these populations. But when one of those-- and it's hard to call them camps, really, they're really little settlements around villages where people set up their tents-- an elderly gentleman came to me, and he said to me, listen, I'm 75, it's been four winters now I've been here. My home's only two hours away in the battle area. I just can't take it anymore. And I think we've seen a lot of that desperation.

AMT: So tell us a little bit more of what the Red Cross is actually doing, then?

CONRAD SAUVÉ: We've been supporting the Syrian Arab Red Crescent, is the equivalent of the local Red Cross. It has been gaining, has access, is doing a lot of work, both on the medical side and on the relief side. It’s managing a lot of the relief. So, we've been supporting them in, as I said, part of the challenge, of course, when you meet Syrians and part of their struggle, some of them you meet in different areas have moved sometimes three, four, five, six times, you know, because the conflict has been dynamic. And so setting up mobile clinics, going to them where those pockets are, has been a key aspect of the help we provided. And supporting the infrastructure in terms of delivery of the Syrian Red Crescent. So that's being achieved. It's minimal, I think, and I'm stressing all the time that humanitarian aid is not a solution, but it's an essential part of coping for those people, and providing hope that something will get better. Now that said, the other part of it, of course, is there are besieged areas by all sides. And we saw a bit of those images two weeks ago with Madaya, which was one of those areas where access is extremely difficult, it's fragmented. It's offered once in a while, and a bit of a last minute, and those are one of the areas that are critical. But there is needs everywhere, basically.

AMT: Well, speaking to some of that, The Current heard from a Ertharin Cousin, the executive director of the World Food Program a couple of weeks ago, listen to what she told us.

SOUNDCLIP

There are hard to reach and besieged areas in Syria, where over two million people don't have access to regular food assistance from either WFP or any of the other partners working across the country because of this conflict. The Munich Agreement has opened up many of those areas, giving us the ability to reach over 100,000 people, that we had not been able to reach some of them for more than two to three years. Unfortunately, in the areas that are besieged by Daesh, we haven't had the ability to reach those people.

AMT: Okay, so she talks about these hard-to-reach areas, you're talking about areas that are ostensibly easier to reach, but it comes down to the same thing, too. Like, if you can't even get basic food supplies in, if that's the struggle, then there's so many, it's just so layered.

CONRAD SAUVÉ: I think it's layered, it's complex, it’s dynamic, as you said. I mean, I think we're both working on the, at the end of the day, we're working both on the general areas that are easy to access in terms of delivering. And the World Food Program is delivering through the Red Crescent who gets the access, that the local Red Cross will get the access at the end of the day, in some of those besieged areas. But it's not just about, first of all, even besides the Daesh area, the other ones are open only sporadically. They're open at the last minute, and it's not clear why some are open or not. So there's a lot of work in terms of guaranteeing access, which is a key point in those areas. And it's not just about delivering aid, but it's also about delivering the right aid and making sure it gets to the right people there, as well. So you need to be there on the ground with the delivery. And that is not happening often enough. You know--

AMT: [interposing] And Conrad, I guess the other point is that you have staff and volunteers who are killed doing that work.

CONRAD SAUVÉ: Well, exactly, Anna Maria. I think they that the local Red Cross, Red Crescent organization has had over 60 of its volunteers killed delivering, and this is killed by all sides. So you negotiate with, sometimes, multiple parties, and at the end of the day, you think you have an agreement to be able to deliver the aid, because, you know, it's not done in a protected convoy, it’s done by [unintelligible], and then when you get there, somebody shoots at you. And so the choices of going in, those negotiations are always sensitive, but. But as you said many of those volunteers have paid by their lives. Notwithstanding that, I think, I don't want it to be all grim. I think in all these war situations when we’re there, we're seeing tremendous resilience by Syrians themselves. The Red Crescent, notwithstanding the fact that they’ve lost over sixty volunteers, have been recruiting more and more people who want to have a positive impact, who want to help. And we’ve seen the work of doctors, of course, a lot of them left the country, those that are staying there, doing a tremendous amount of work, helping each other. Reaching out with technology across the lines, and providing medical advice. So, you know, there's a lot of all of that, and they're seen, of course, by our presence, by the little we can give to them. They're seeing hope. And what keeps them through until there is a settlement, is hope that things will get better.

AMT: And if these negotiations fail?

CONRAD SAUVÉ: Well I think, you know, you have to hang on to hope. I mean, we have no control over that, and, you know, keep supporting people. When I'm there, it's interesting. There is that the aid and the medical supplies we bring, and the support bring to the local Red Cross, but the key message they keep telling us is thank you for what you're doing, thank you for being here, and make sure people don't forget us. And you heard that, exactly that, in the voice of the young child. They're saying don't forget. And sometimes you feel that what you're doing is just a drop there, but those who receive the help, it means everything to them.

AMT: Okay, well, Conrad Sauvé, thank you for speaking with us today.

CONRAD SAUVÉ: Thank you, Anna Maria.

AMT: Conrad Sauvé, CEO of the Canadian Red Cross, spoke to us on the line from Toronto. Conrad surveys C.E.O. of the Canadian Red Cross. Spoke to us. On the line from Toronto. Well, despite the deteriorating conditions, some Syrians who have the option to leave the region choose to stay to do what they can to help. Elias Sadkni is a pharmacist from Aleppo, who is now based in Lebanon. Last week, he got his papers to reside in Canada. Hello.

ELIAS SADKNI: Hi.

AMT: Well, congratulations to have your papers in Canada, but you're not actually moving here yet. You're the founder of a non-profit organization called House of Peace, a grassroots peace initiative for Syria?

ELIAS SADKNI: Right.

AMT: So Elias is with me in Toronto. First of all, why aren't you ready to leave Syria behind, why aren’t you ready to come here full time?

ELIAS SADKNI: Well, because I feel that I'm doing the thing that I believe in, and the thing that I feel that I want to do. And being with my friends there, doing what we are doing, working with people in need, that's exactly what I feel doing now.

AMT: Tell us about the House of Peace, what is it?

ELIAS SADKNI: Well, actually, it's a project I established less than a year ago. It's a social peace building project. We try to work with local N.G.O.s and local communities, the refugees in housed communities, to help them develop social initiatives, initiatives that would create spaces for them to come together to work together on solving some social conflicts in their areas.

AMT: So again, there is a peace process going on right now, ostensibly, but you’re not talking about that, you’re talking about people working in neighborhoods.

ELIAS SADKNI: Exactly.

AMT: And what kind of conflicts are you talking about?

ELIAS SADKNI: Social conflicts, raised because of the arrival of Syrians to Lebanon, for instance, because now we are working in Lebanon. So we focus more on tensions raised because of, for example, competition over work, the tensions raised because of mixed marriages. We don't exactly, we don't directly tackle these conflicts, because it's much bigger than our capacity. But we try to help people to develop a new understanding of their new realities, in order to support them and encourage them to be more engaged within their new communities.

AMT: Okay, so Lebanon is a good example. You have a lot of Palestinian refugees in refugee camps that are decades old.

ELIAS SADKNI: Right.

AMT: And some of the Syrians are going into those same places?

ELIAS SADKNI: Yeah.

AMT: And there's conflict there between two different kinds of refugees.

ELIAS SADKNI: In one example, we were holding a workshop with Syrian refugees in Shatila Camp in Beirut, which is a--

AMT: [interposing] A famous Palestinian refugee camp.

ELIAS SADKNI: Exactly. And at the beginning of the workshop, we were working with a group of women, and they were expressing their frustration of how some Palestinians are treating them. But then, after three days of discussion and analysis, they suggested an initiative towards Palestinians to show gratitude and appreciation of hosting them. So they went to a Palestinian school to distribute some educational materials to Palestinian kids, in order to reach out to their parents in later stages and work with them. And this is kind of the work that we encourage, to bring people together.

AMT: And so you end up, suddenly, they understand each other a little better. They're no longer the “other.”

ELIAS SADKNI: Yeah it does, exactly.

AMT: Okay, and inside Syria itself, how easy is it for you to get back in there?

ELIAS SADKNI: So far, I go to Damascus, like, on a monthly basis. I go to [unintelligible] in Lebanon. It’s going well so far.

AMT: Mhm. And how old are you?

ELIAS SADKNI: 31.

AMT: So you're 31 years old, you're a male going back and forth over the border. You know there are people who think that's just, like, right away their head goes to somewhere else. You're a young man going across the border, you must be up to no good. Instead, you're there trying to make people's lives a little easier. How hard is that, to make people understand what you're doing?

ELIAS SADKNI: Well, it depends on who we are working with, and with whom we have to convince that our work is important. It's not always easy, especially when you work with, not directly work, when you have to interact with people who are very engaged in what’s going on now. For them, talking about social peace is something that is stupid.

AMT: Hmm. It's interesting, because talking about social peace carries with it the optimism that there will be a time to be neighbors again. A time to live lives in Syria again.

ELIAS SADKNI: Exactly.

AMT: And we hear about how devastated it is, and how futile that seems to be for so many people, but you don't see it is futile, you have hope.

ELIAS SADKNI: We have to have hope, and that's what we're trying to do. We are looking for hope, and we're trying to make hope for us and for others. Of course, it is not a perfect image, and it’s not like, straightforward there. But we are trying to do our best, otherwise what else can we do?

AMT: So you're already thinking about rebuilding as well?

ELIAS SADKNI: I think it's a bit early, because, to be realistic, as well, not to leave in our fairy-tale world. To think about rebuilding and reconstruction and reconciliation, the war has to stop. And we are relying on anything that could stop the war. You've been asking your previous host about the negotiations now in Geneva, we have to hope in that, even if it's not perfect.

AMT: And I want to ask you your view on that, then. So if you have a bunch of leaders around the table, but you don't have ISIS, is there still a kind of an agreement that would, that you think could move Syria forward?

ELIAS SADKNI: Well, it is much complicated that. ISIS wants it on the table [chuckles] no matter what. And yeah, of course, it is one of the problems that would hinder reaching an agreement. But I think that as long as everyone says that they are against ISIS, so it won't be the main obstacle towards having a peace agreement. But of course, it's something that we have to deal with, not only in the short term, like to reach a peace agreement, but also to work on the long term with the kids that have been raised by them, by their methodologies, by their ideology, sorry, and their curriculum for the past two years in Raqqa, in other places in suburb Aleppo. We need to work with these kids to, like, rehabitation, I don’t know.

AMT: Mhm, re-educate, or just like, show them another reality.

ELIAS SADKNI: Yeah.

AMT: In other words. And so, in places like Aleppo, where you have been living, but you also were living in Damascus at one point?

ELIAS SADKNI: No, no.

AMT: You’re from Aleppo.

ELIAS SADKNI: I’m from Aleppo.

AMT: Okay, so in a place like Aleppo, if you could have a peace deal where at least the other factions could all agree, that would be very significant. Would it not?

ELIAS SADKNI: For now, for instance, with the cessation of hostilities that have been announced like ten days ago, it was enough for some of my friends to write on their Facebook that they feel that they are in heaven now. Because they have electricity, they have water, and they can listen to bird singing again. So just for like, a short truce, it makes change for people's life. So, of course, if different factions manage to reach an agreement there, at least to stop the war, I'm not talking about lasting peace. That's something different, that needs a lot of things to be discussed, justice, reconciliation, many other procedures. Of course, it's going to make change for people’s life.

AMT: You make a good point, stopping the war or even just stopping the fighting for a little while, makes a difference to the people who are being bombarded.

ELIAS SADKNI: Yeah, it would save lives. And that's exactly what we need. We need to end the misery of, our misery.

AMT: Talk to me a little bit more, then, about the kinds of negotiations you do with individuals. Because when it comes to battles, and there are many layers of that, too, and people who have lived alongside each other who might have to go back to places will have to carry the burden of what has happened with them. How does what you're doing help people come to a greater understanding of each other?

ELIAS SADKNI: To make it clear, we don't work with people, like, from different political backgrounds, trying to--

AMT: [interposing] Right, you’re being apolitical. You’re talking about life, as opposed to politics.

ELIAS SADKNI: Exactly. Things that are related to people's daily life: how they interact through the new circumstances they are facing now, because of this placement. So it's not that we try to convince them that, okay, now you have to deal with each other. We work with them to regardless of their political point of view, not because we are like not giving a side to that, and we’re ignoring what's going on. No, but because some people, even those who are on the same side, political side or point of view, and living in a certain camp or area in Lebanon, they have their own problems, daily issues they have to deal with. So what we try to do, as I said, we provide the space, the tools, for them to do the kind of analysis to understand what are the conflict, who are the actors, what are the dynamics, the causes, the effects. What are the positive traits in that area that they might not be aware of? And through this analysis, we try to draw what are the factors that affect, that have impact on their relationships in that area.

AMT: You talk about we, how big an organization is this?

ELIAS SADKNI: Very, very small. Tiny. [chuckles] We are just a team of five, but it’s not that, we don't work just on our own, it all depends on partnerships with other local NGOs, and that's our big. assets. We partner and network with other people working on Syrian...

AMT: And why did you want to do this? Because you could just come here, and I don't mean just, because that's an adjustment, as well, but you could come here. You don't have to go back and do this, why do you want to do this?

ELIAS SADKNI: I can come and stay here, but as I told you, this is the right thing, I feel, that I'm doing now. This is what gives me hope, and that's what gives me a sense for life.

AMT: Your parents are here now, are they?

ELIAS SADKNI: Not yet.

AMT: But they have been accepted as refugees in Canada?

ELIAS SADKNI: They have applied, and they have underwent their medical examinations, but they're still waiting.

AMT: Mhm. And how do you see your future unfolding, with this war and what you're doing now?

ELIAS SADKNI: Well, we learned during the past few years not to think a lot about in the future. We learned to live day by day. But still, I have some dreams for the future. I can see myself and hopefully working for development projects for reconstruction in Syria, and what I'm doing now would give me more experience in this regard, to work with people and touch the essentials that are needed for the future.

AMT: Did you ever think this war would go on as long as it has? It’s five years now.

ELIAS SADKNI: No [chuckles] No, I never, ever imagined that we were going to reach such a point.

AMT: And you talked about children, the statistics on children are stark, we hear them all the time. But I mean, the latest ones, 80 per cent of children have been harmed by this conflict. A whole bunch of kids haven't gone to school at all, some have had only basic schooling. What worries you about the next generation coming up behind you?

ELIAS SADKNI: It's one of the major issues we have to deal with, because that will determine the future of Syria, the future of these kids. Because they to present the future. It sounds cliché, but this is the reality. They represent the future of Syria, and we have to fight for these people. And it's not only an education program; it is a vicious circle of different obstacles. For instance, in Lebanon, when men are not allowed to work, and they don't have proper papers to stay in Lebanon. So they cannot move around, they cannot work. So they, their kids are forced to work to support their families, and that's why the school dropout rates increased a lot. So it's not about only supporting schools to host more students, we have to work on different parts of the problem. And, of course, we should start by stopping the war, and providing protection for civilians and civilian infrastructures. When schools are still bombed, when they are still targeted, of course, kids won't go.

AMT: Lots to think about, thank you for coming in. Good luck with your work.

ELIAS SADKNI: Thank you very much.

AMT: That is Elias Sadkni, he is the founder of House of Peace, an organization dedicated to peace building in Syria. He joined me in our Toronto studio. That's our program for today. Today is a big day for voting in the U.S.; not solely in the Republican race, where Donald Trump is hoping to come closer to clinching the Presidential nomination, but also among the Democrats. Last week, Bernie Sanders had a big upset win in the Michigan primary. So, as states including Ohio and Florida go to the polls today, Hillary Clinton will be hoping to stall his momentum. Last weekend, people at Saturday Night Live aired this mock-Hillary Clinton television ad. It speaks to the frustrations of former Secretary of State, the frustrations she must be feeling, or everyone believes she’s feeling, as the socialist senator, Bernie Sanders, continues to rack up support, especially among Millennials. So we’ll leave you with that. I'm Anna Maria Tremonti. Thank you for listening to The Current.

SOUNDCLIP

[Crowd applause]

[Music: Acoustic guitar, lively]

VOICE 1: As millennials, your voice is important. You're the ones who will decide this election because there are so many of you. So, so many. And luckily, I, Hillary Clinton share all of your exact same beliefs and I always have. Since the beginning of my campaign, I have constantly said we need a revolution in the streets. Millions of people coming together, because America should be for everyone, not just a handful of [posh accent] millionaires and billionaires. I know you millennials: you're fired up, you're angry, and... I'm angry, too! [Bernie Sanders accent] Because the top 10 per cent of the top 1 per cent control 90 per cent of the wealth in this country.

[Crowd laughter]

VOICE 1: And I've always said that, ever since I was a young boy growing up in Brooklyn.

[Crowd laughter]

VOICE 1: Oh, Brooklyn. And when it comes to that darn Wall Street, I’ve always believed no bank can be too big to fail, [Bernie Sanders accent] no executive too… [returns to normal accent] you know the rest.

[Crowd laughter]

VOICE 1: It’s that famous, mobilizing sentence that works on you guys that I’ve been saying this whole time: there's a lot of work to be done, and that is why I am sick [Bernie Sanders accent] and tired of hearing about my own damn emails!

VOICE 2: This message was paid for by Hillary Clinton. Feel the Bern for her.

[Crowd applause]

VOICE 1: I’m whoever you want me to be, and I approve this message. I’m trying here, guys.

[Music: Sting]

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Mar. 15, 2016 Episode Transcript

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