Canada's Green Party in turmoil, leader resists calls to step down

Reuters
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OTTAWA (Reuters) - Canada's Green Party was increasingly mired in an internal dispute over its position on Israel on Tuesday, and a news report said the bloc would hold a vote next month on whether to oust its leader, Annamie Paul, who was elected just eight months ago.

The Canadian Broadcasting Corp (CBC) reported that the Greens had triggered a process that could remove Paul, the first black person to head a mainstream Canadian party, beginning with a vote next month.

A Green Party spokesperson declined to comment on the report, but said the party's "federal council" would meet later on Tuesday. Earlier in the day, Paul, 48, rejected calls from the Quebec wing of the party for her to resign after a member of parliament left the Greens due to the Israel controversy.

"I believe that I have been given a strong mandate. I believe that I have been given the instructions to work on behalf of Canadians for a green recovery," Paul said at a news conference in Ottawa.

Paul herself is not a member of parliament. The Greens - who champion the environment and the fight against climate change - had only three legislators in the 338-seat House of Commons and one, Jenica Atwin, abandoned the party last week to join the governing Liberals.

Atwin has said that her exit was in large part due to a dispute over the party's stance on Israel. Atwin on Twitter has criticized Israel's treatment of Palestinians, while a senior adviser to Paul, Noah Zatzman, has posted on Facebook that some unspecified Green members of parliament are anti-Semitic.

The party's executive committee voted last week not to renew Zatzman's contract, local media reported. Paul converted to Judaism some two decades ago after she married a Jewish man.

While the Greens are the smallest faction in parliament, they perform well in British Colombia and hold two seats there. The current turmoil may favor their rivals ahead of a national election that senior Liberals say could be just a few months away.

The Greens would win about 6.7% of the vote nationally if a vote were held now, according to an average of recent polls aggregated by the CBC.

(Reporting by Steve Scherer and Julie Gordon; editing by Jonathan Oatis)