CTV.ca News Staff
Canada's Foreign Affairs Minister Maxime Bernier has embarrassed this country and it should be for the last time, says Deputy Liberal Leader Michael Ignatieff.
The House of Commons resumes Monday after a week-long break. The official opposition is expected to ask Bernier to resign from his cabinet post after the minister made an empty-handed promise to an aid agency.
Bernier told an aid agency giving relief to cyclone-stricken Burma that Canada would provide one of the military's C-17 cargo planes to help airlift World Food Program helicopters to the region. However, the military did not have one available. A Russian aircraft had to be rented for almost $1 million to deliver on Bernier's promise. The Tories spent $3.4 billion on acquiring C-17s to avoid such situations.
Ignatieff said Bernier has damaged Canada's international reputation.
"He's lost the confidence of his own department," he told CTV's Question Period on Sunday. "You can't make promises on the international stage if you can't deliver. This was a serious mistake."
Bernier's aides claimed the minister had been given faulty information. But some opposition MPs said Bernier should lose his job.
This wasn't Bernier's only mistake, Ignatieff said. The minister was wrong to ask for the resignation of Kandahar's Governor Asadullah Khalid in April.
"It was an unwarranted interference on the affairs of our allies and friend and undermined our department's efforts to improve human rights in Afghanistan," he said from Vancouver.
Canada has not emerged as a leader on the international front in the wake of the natural disasters that have ravaged China and Burma, Ignatieff said.
Shortly after the disaster, which struck Burma on May 2-3, Canada pledged $2 million in aid -- a figure that was criticized as being too low. Ottawa then announced it would match private donations made by Canadians to aid groups, but that promise only extends to donations made between May 15 and June 6.
Ignatieff blamed what he called Bernier's lack of understanding of Canada's role in offering humanitarian aid.
"Where you've got a regime that was denying food aid to its people, Canada developed a doctrine called 'responsibility to protect' which says that other states should step in and try to help," said Ignatieff. "(Bernier) wouldn't even use those words. He doesn't even appear to be familiar with the long history that Canada has developed in terms of "responsibility to protect."
Ignatieff also blasted Bernier for responding to the Chinese earthquake with a news release rather than action.
"We were nowhere to be seen when Canadians across the country were seeing on their screens images of suffering, images of grief, images of horror," he said.
The Conservatives are to blame for Bernier's mistakes as it reflects the party's overall leadership skills, Ignatieff said.
"The Prime Minister Stephen Harper chose this guy so it calls into question his judgment in personnel," he said.
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