Hats off to Canada, which has announced it is pulling out of next year’s UN conference on racism in Durban, South Africa. The last such conference, held in 2001, deteriorated into venomous Israel-bashing and anti-Semitism, causing the U.S. and Israel to walk out in protest. That conference was a “circus of intolerance,” says Canada’s secretary of state for multiculturalism and Candian identity, Jason Kenney. ”Canada is interested in combating racism, not promoting it,” he said. ”We’ll attend any conference that is opposed to racism and intolerance, not those that actually promote racism and intolerance.”

What could make Canada think the organizers have not learned from their past errors? Perhaps it is the fact that Libya is chairing it. Or that Cuba is vice-chair. Maybe the presence of Iran on the organizing committee gave them the creeps? Foreign Minister Maxime Bernier said that the Canadians “had hoped that the preparatory process for the 2009 . . . conference would remedy the mistakes of the past. Despite our efforts, we have concluded that it will not. Canada will therefore not participate.”

This kind of clear thinking and refusal to bend to diplomatic nicety is a rare thing in the international arena. Let’s hope that American and European leaders will have the sense to follow suit, and we can finally put the Durban fiasco to bed.