Hamilton Quaker Delegation to DFAIT

Hanna Newcombe, Diana Shepard and Dick Preston met with Jim Wright, an assistant deputy minister in Foreign Affairs for over our allotted 30 minutes, followed by a forum for more than our allotted hour with four members of the Division. It was chaired by Robert McDougall, Director; Mr. Baines and Christopher Grout from the IDA section; Mr. Dawson from the NUR section of DFAIT and Mr. Litvak from the IDR section of the Department of National Defense. They had identified five points from our letter requesting the meeting, and spoke to these in very full and informative detail: nuclear weapons abolition, small arms and light weapons, no weapons in space, International Criminal Court, no war in Iraq, and independent Canadian foreign policy. The three of us were able to present the main points of our concern in both meetings, and each of us left a one-page statement at both meetings. We came away very impressed with the degree of their commitment and knowledge, and with their ability to speak directly to our concerns.