Leaders address crisis in Syria, Mulcair says Canada needs to take in more refugees

BROSSARD, Que. – NDP Leader Tom Mulcair says more war would not have saved the young Syrian boy with Canadian connections whose body was photographed washed up on a beach in Turkey.

The Syrian refugee crisis remained a key issue in the federal election campaign today after the photograph of three-year-old Alan Kurdi put a human face on the worst migrant crisis in Europe since the Second World War.

His aunt lives in the Vancouver area and says her brother was devastated as Alan and his five-year-old brother died in his arms after they tried to get from Turkey to Germany in a migrant boat that capsized.

Conservative Leader Stephen Harper said yesterday that he couldn’t understand how anyone could look at the photo and not support the military coalition fighting what he said is the cause of suffering — the self-proclaimed Islamic State.

But in Quebec, Mulcair repeated that his party sees no role whatsoever for Canada’s military in the conflict in Syria and Iraq.

He says the conflict is the result of the attempted overthrow of a government coupled with misguided military policies of Western powers — which he says proves more bombs are not the answer.

But Mulcair says Canada can do more to help Syrian and Iraqi refugees and the government should deploy people to Turkey to fast-track asylum applications.

Liberal leader Justin Trudeau also spoke of the crisis while campaigning in the Greater Toronto area — saying Canada must cut the red tape and ensure refugee applications are processed as quickly as reasonable.