Canada should leave United Nations, politician says
Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper addresses the 65th General Assembly at the United Nations headquarters in New York on Sept. 23, 2010.
After two stinging rebukes, a Canadian politician says Canada should become the first country to leave the 193-member United Nations.
Larry Miller, a Conservative backbencher representing Bruce-Grey-Owen Sound in Ontario, said the UN wasted time criticizing Canada’s food and immigration record.
“If this is the type of action that the UN will be taking, then I think that it is high time that we review our participation in the United Nations,” Miller wrote in a press release.
No country has ever permanently left the UN, The Globe and Mail reported.
Syria shared a space with Egypt from 1958 to 1961, and Indonesia left in 1965-66 during a conflict with Malaysia.
Only Vatican City has declined offers to join, while the UN has blocked countries such as Kosovo and Taiwan because of sovereignty questions.
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Dominic Leblanc, the foreign affairs critic for the Liberal Party, said Miller is in over his head.
“(Conservative) foreign policy … has damaged our international reputation, and affected our ability to work collaboratively with other governments and multi-lateral organizations,” he told the Globe.
A UN Committee on Torture report released last week said Canada should prosecute suspected war criminals rather than deport them.
It also chastised the Canadian government’s handling of Guantanamo prisoner Omar Khadr’s case and changes to its refugee system.
That report came on the heels of UN rapporteur Olivier De Schutter’s 11-day tour of Canada.
He chided Canada for high poverty rates among children and aboriginal populations, Canada.com said.
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