(Ottawa) Landed at the Sports Ministry three days ago, Pascale St-Onge does not know if she will go to the Beijing Olympics in three months to cheer on Canada’s athletes. But for the Bloc Québécois, the case has been heard: it would be “indecent” for her to go to China.
The new minister asks for a little time before saying whether or not she will attend this great event. “I took office about 72 hours ago, so there are still a lot of briefings to have, but also a lot of discussions to have in Cabinet and in caucus,” she said in an interview.
The Beijing Games will open on February 4, against a backdrop of controversy, as Xi Jinping’s regime is accused of committing genocide against the Muslim minority of Uyghurs. Last February, elected members of the Commons unanimously recognized its existence in a vote in which members of the Trudeau cabinet did not take part.
The elected representative of Brome – Missisquoi, who is the only new Member to have acceded to the Council of Ministers, was not there. In a conversation with Press, she affirms that she has “no position to announce for the moment” on her presence in the Chinese capital, but that the liberals have “always denounced the non-respect of human rights”.
Mme St-Onge did not want to give a personal opinion on the matter. “There is surely a lot of information that I do not have in hand at the moment, so I am not comfortable giving a personal position today, because I still lack a lot of information. She pleads.
It would be “completely indecent”, says the Bloc
The Bloc Québécois MP Alexis Brunelle-Duceppe can hardly explain this hesitation and the “non-response” of the new minister. “I understand that she has just arrived in her functions,” he tempers. But it would be completely indecent to send a delegation of Canadian diplomats to Beijing. ”
He recalls that the motion adopted in the Commons is accompanied by an amendment of his own, which “asks the International Olympic Committee to move the 2022 Olympic Games if the People’s Republic of China continues this genocide”. So he believes the decision should already have been made.
“That the minister even has to think about it today is worrying. “And on the other hand, if the Trudeau government, which” presents itself in the costume of Superman of rights [de la personne] everywhere on the planet “, sends a delegation where a genocide is in progress, it would be a” new liberal contradiction “, pleads Mr. Brunelle-Duceppe.
Canada has sent ministers to the last three Olympic Games. Former Paralympic athlete Minister Carla Qualtrough traveled to Tokyo in 2021, and Rio de Janeiro before that, in 2016, for the Summer Games. Former Minister Kirsty Duncan attended the PyeongChang Winter Games in 2018.
In 2008, former Prime Minister Stephen Harper refused to attend the opening ceremony of the Beijing Summer Games, which was criticized at the time by the liberal camp. Two ministers from his government, however, came to take part in the event.