Parliament
Speaker Rebecca Kadaga on Monday defended the country’s stance on
homosexuality, saying Uganda would not accept being bulldozed to permit
this sexual orientation.
Drama
started unfolding when Canada Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird
abandoned host-country niceties Monday as he leveled a blistering attack
against the human rights records of Iran, Syria and Uganda before some
1,400 international parliamentarians gathered for the
Inter-Parliamentary Union in Quebec.
Iranian
and Ugandan delegates at the IPU assembly, including the African
nation’s Speaker of Parliament, protested Baird’s remarks, accusing the
minister of meddling in their sovereign affairs at a collegial forum.
Even
though the Conservative government has cut off diplomatic relations
with Iran and Syria in particular, it could do little to stop the
presence of legislators from those countries at the 127th conference of
the IPU, which Canada is hosting this year.
Metro
News is reporting Baird embraced that bit of awkwardness, seizing on
the IPU assembly’s theme this year: respect for diversity.
The
IPU’s mandate includes the promotion of human rights and democracy, but
its members still include nations such as North Korea and Cuba.
“Sadly,
there are forces of evil in this world that use our differences as
weapons of hate, weapons of hate that marginalize minorities,” Baird
said.
“This is where we as free societies, I believe, have a tremendously important role to play.”
Baird
encouraged the legislators to tell their respective parliaments to
support Canada’s United Nations resolution each year condemning Iran’s
human rights record. He cited examples of violence against religious
minorities.
“There’s
a great principle at stake. While Canada prizes engagement and open
relations, there can be no engagement with a regime that dishonours its
word, repudiates its commitments and threatens to perpetuate crimes
against humanity,” Baird said of Iran.
“This regime stands for everything we parliamentarians should stand against.”
Baird
also took on the Ugandan government again for its treatment of gays and
lesbians. He mentioned the case of a young activist who was recently
beaten to death.
The
criticism didn’t sit well with the speaker of the Ugandan Parliament,
Rebecca Kadaga, who asked for the opportunity to respond. She spoke of
Baird’s “arrogance” and “ignorance” and demanded an apology.
“If
homosexuality is a value for the Canadian people, that’s not a problem
for us, that’s it’s issue, but one shouldn’t force Ugandans to accept
homosexuality because we’re not Canadian citizens,” Kadaga said to
applause from the floor.
“We have our problems, they have theirs.”
The Uganda Parliament is debating a proposed legislation that seeks tough penalties for aggravated homosexual convicts.
Ndorwa
West MP David Bahati says his private members’ bill seeks to safeguard
the country’s moral fabric, the traditional family setting and humanity
from extinction.
However,
the legislator has since come under fire from pro-gay activists who
claim the Bill will violate the human rights of homosexuals.
The small Iranian delegation held up the sign bearing their country’s name during Baird’s speech in protest.
Iraj
Nadimi, chairman of the executive council of Iran’s inter-parliamentary
group, asked reporters whether Canada would like it if Iran began
wading into its domestic affairs, such as Quebec sovereignty.
“This
is not the place for that, that we are asking for the independence of
people who are requesting independence in Quebec,” Nadimi said through
an interpreter.
“We
are saying that every country has its own regulations for itself, so we
cannot receive any interference from any country and we don’t interfere
in another country’s affairs.”
“Sometimes the truth hurts,” Baird said later.
“I
know staying silent is never an option when people stone women, when
they hang gays, when they incite genocide, when they say they want to
wipe the Jewish people and the Jewish state off the map, when they
dishonour their UN obligations, when they spread hateful and racist
rhetoric.”
The
IPU is the oldest multilateral organization in the world, predating the
League of Nations and the United Nations. Canada has been a member for
100 years.http://www.chimpreports.com/index.php/news/6551-kadaga-blasts-canadian-minister-over-homosexuality.html
