Reaction to Canadian boycott of UN Conference on Disarmament by Dwain Epps and Erich Weingartner

[This discussion was originally posted as comments under “Canada boycotts UN body over North Korea“. However we felt these opinions by CanKor Brain Trust member Dwain Epps and CanKor Editor-in-Chief Erich Weingartner were substantive enough to deserve a blog post of their own. –CanKor.]

Conference on Disarmament - 2011 Session (UN photo/Pierre Albouy)

Dwain Epps writes:

One can only lament this announcement that comes as yet another sign that the present Canadian Government has no mind of its own and is apparently either unaware of or repudiates Canada’s distinguished past in international relations. Though Canada has never been a declared Non-Aligned nation, in the midst of the Cold War it played a critical role as one of the “Middle Powers” serving as a bridge between the two great nuclear powers. It was widely recognized as a constructive player in the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe in the 1970s, and again in the early 1980s it provided a bridge during the nuclear weapons standoff when the great powers stubbornly refused to negotiate.