23
Peruvians Rise Up For Democracy: Canadian Government Supports Human Rights Abuses In Peru
(thenorthstar.media)
What's going on Canada?
🍁 Meta
🗺️ Provinces / Territories
🏙️ Cities / Local Communities
🏒 Sports
Hockey
Football (NFL)
unknown
Football (CFL)
unknown
Baseball
unknown
Basketball
unknown
Soccer
unknown
💻 Universities
💵 Finance / Shopping
🗣️ Politics
🍁 Social and Culture
Reminder that the rules for lemmy.ca also apply here. See the sidebar on the homepage:
"Supports" is stretching things way out of shape. "Ignores" or "does not attempt to prevent" might be accurate, depending on what's actually taking place in Peru (about which I have no idea, nor do most Canadians), but to what degree is it acceptable to interfere in another country's politics? Do they expect Canada to enact a trade embargo with Peru to get mining companies headquartered here to stop investing there? This is not stuff we do casually, nor should we.
A new government came into power in Peru through a coup and has violently repressed protesters. During this time, the Canadian government has "met with almost every different minister of the usurper government" (most likely an uptick in their communication with the Peruvian government) and they increased their military exports 2 months after the coup.
How does that not qualify as Canada supporting human rights abuses? Grant_M
(Edit: You two are doubling down hard on your own misunderstanding or denial)
There's a difference between ignorance—even willful ignorance—and active malice.
If the Peruvian government lied about why it wanted the weapons, and our government believed them, then our government is guilty of ignorance and stupidity, but not malice.
If the Peruvian government lied about why it wanted the weapons, and our government knew there was a possible issue but sold them the weapons anyway, that's willful ignorance, but still not malice. Consider the following scenario: Your neighbour borrows a kitchen knife from you, saying he needs to chop some vegetables. Instead, he uses it to kill his wife. You knew that he and his wife had a bad relationship, and you've told him off when you've seen her with suspicious bruises, but you weren't expecting anything like this. Still, you provided the weapon, and you didn't try to step between them. To what degree are you guilty? Should you have interfered in their relationship? That's where I suspect we're at: our government not agreeing with or encouraging the Peruvian government's behaviour, but not shunning the perpetrator or making any real attempt to stop what's going on. Like it or not (and I don't like it), this is really common in international relations. If the original headline had used "ignores" in place of "supports", I would agree with it 100%.
If the Peruvian government told the truth: "We want these weapons to kill and maim our own people," and our government still sold them, then that's malice and would make the headline accurate as it stands. But I doubt that's what actually happened.
^ Willful ignorance
In the case of a usurper government that was massacring citizens within 8 days of taking power, under the veil of "removing human obstacles" and eliminating "hostile groups"... I would argue that support and willful ignorance are one in the same. Unwillingness to refuse supply of arms or materials to the government that is undertaking these actions does nothing but strengthen their campaign of violence.