CORE’s approach to retaliation

We take retaliation seriously. This includes the threat of retaliation.

We are NOT a court. We can NOT make people or companies carry out our recommendations. Nor can we protect complainants or others from retaliation if they have filed a complaint with us or taken part in the complaint process.

However, we can offer other options.
We work with local and international groups to do 2 things:

• put measures in place to reduce the risk of retaliation
• keep track of those measures and report on how they are working

We base our approach to retaliation on best practices, consultation, research, and guidance from agencies such as Global Affairs Canada.

More information – What is retaliation?

We approach retaliation in 4 steps:

1. Assess
   We assess the risk of retaliation before we work with people and communities. We want to know how we may increase the risk or retaliation by being and working in a place where there has been a complaint.

   If a person or community wants to file a complaint or take part in our review process, then we work with them first to assess the risk of retaliation.

   To assess the risk of retaliation, we ask the kind of questions you can find in our Retaliation Risk Assessment Tool . We do this throughout our review, but we always talk to the complainant before we do this.

2. Reduce
   We work with local and international groups to do 2 things:

   • put measures in place to reduce the risk of retaliation
   • keep track of those measures and report on how they are working

   These groups may be in the best position to assess their own situation and tell us what kind of measures may help them. Before we put any measures in place, we try to have their free, full, and informed consent.

   People should NOT overestimate the power we have for dealing with retaliation. We are NOT an enforcement agency. That is why we urge complainants and others to think about their own safety and take steps to reduce their own risks.

   More information

   • Front Line Defenders
   • Information for individuals and communities

   We may keep some information confidential when it is about those who file a complaint. We may help people to keep their identity secret, to help reduce the risk or retaliation from Canadian companies and others.

   More information

   • How does the CORE protect a person’s information?
   • How does the CORE protect my information?
   • Information for Canadian companies

3. Respond
   When we learn that retaliation has happened, we work with others such as these to deal with the issues:

   • Canadian diplomatic offices
   • human rights organizations from Canada and from other countries and regions
   • local community groups that work with human rights and public rights organizations
   • groups that act on behalf of human rights defenders

   The most important thing is the safety of those affected by retaliation. We stay in contact with those who are affected, or organizations that represent them, if it is safe to do so.

   If we think that the retaliation may be a crime, then we may tell the Minister of International Trade. We may also recommend that they refer the matter to the police. With help from others, we may try to work with the Canadian company linked to the retaliation. Where possible, we will ask a complainant first before taking these actions.

   There may be times when we decide NOT to work with certain people or communities. We may decide to stop working with people we have started to work with. These decisions depend on 2 things:

   • the kind of retaliation that is happening
   • what those affected by the retaliation want

   We will ask a complainant if they want to go ahead with the complaint when there is retaliation or the risk of retaliation.

   We keep track of measures that are put in place to respond to retaliation, and how they are working.

4. Report

   If there is retaliation or the threat of retaliation, then we may report on it publicly at any time, and the threat of retaliation. We report publicly by posting a report on our website.

   We will only report on retaliation and what has been done about it if these people agree:

   • the complainant
   • any person or community that is affected by the retaliation
   • the people and organizations who represent anyone affected by the retaliation

   When we discover that retaliation has taken place, we may conclude that a Canadian company linked to the retaliation is NOT acting in good faith. We can recommend that the Minister of International Trade take measures against that company. This can include these things:

   • stop trade support to the Canadian company
   • NOT give trade or financial support to the company in the future
   • refer the matter to police if the behaviour seems to be criminal

This table shows who can help to stop retaliation and how

Note: We want to recognize the work of the Inter-American Development Bank. It created the Guide for Independent Accountability Mechanisms on Measures to Address the Risk of Reprisals in Complaint Management: A Practical Toolkit, 2019. This toolkit helped us to develop our 4-step approach to retaliation: assess, respond, reduce, and report.