Zero Consequences = Zero Results":
Day While Canadian waits in Lebanese jail, Graham won't threaten to end aid
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
August 1, 2003 OTTAWA-

Canadian Alliance Foreign Affairs Critic, Stockwell Day, joined with a leading Lebanese Human Rights organization in demanding that Foreign Affairs Minister, Bill Graham, immediately threaten to cut off aid to the Lebanese government if prisoner of conscience, Bruce Balfour, does not get justice.

So far the Minister has refused to notify the Lebanese authorities that a planned $200 Million in Canadian aid is contingent upon Mr. Balfour receiving fair treatment. "The only thing these tyrannical regimes understand is serious consequences," said Mr. Day.
"Authorities in Lebanon will not adhere to Canadian demands unless those demands are backed with consequences. A demand without consequences is like a car without fuel. You can press the pedal, but you will get nowhere. "Once again Bill Graham is obsessed with the same "soft power" strategy that has accomplished literally nothing in the Zahra Kazemi case."

Mr. Day predicted in a press release on July 16, 2003, before Mr. Balfour's case became known, that the government's soft power strategy in the Kazemi file would embolden other despotic regimes to attack Canadians traveling abroad. "If we fail to respond, we signal to regimes like Iran's that they can murder our people with impunity," he said.

Elias Bejjani, spokesman for the Canadian Lebanese Human Right Federation, had this to say: "The CLHRF strongly urges our Canadian government to adopt a more aggressive policy towards the Syrian appointed Lebanese regime in regard to their attacks on Canadians. It is well known from contemporary and past political experience that dictatorships, like the one imposed by Syria on the Lebanese, do not respond except to serious consequences."