Mr. Chair, it is indeed an honour to speak about Operation Unifier. I want to thank the minister for her comments, and I want to thank the Liberal government for extending the Conservative Party's original Operation Unifier. It is the same in size and scope, and has the same ideal, which is to provide the training that so many military in Ukraine need.
We have to remember that when this battle broke out, when Russia invaded and illegally occupied and illegally annexed Crimea, Ukraine's military had been somewhat decimated under the leadership of President Yanukovych. Yanukovych had taken away their ability to train and their ability to fight. He had sold the Ukraine military equipment and machine behind it.
To hear the member for Saanich—Gulf Islands talk about a coup, she is completely discrediting the students, the citizens of Kiev, the citizens of Lviv, the citizens right across Ukraine who took to the streets to protest against the corrupt government of Viktor Yanukovych and everything that he stood for.
He turned his back, after negotiating a comprehensive economic free trade agreement and co-operation agreement with Europe that actually was the catalyst for the people of Ukraine, especially the youth, tired of being lied to by Viktor Yanukovych and his regime. He was there, propped up by Vladimir Putin, propped up by illegal money coming in from the Russian mafia, funnelled through Donbass, especially through Donetsk. That individual robbed the treasury of the people of Ukraine. He took all of the gold reserves, all of the cash reserves, and fled to Rostov-on-Don in Russia.
That was not a coup. It was not orchestrated by anyone in the west. This was a citizens' revolution of dignity on the Euromaidan that took place in Kiev and across Ukraine. We must never, ever forget that. For anyone to come in here with fake news from RT television, Russia Today television, I can say upsets me, as members can tell, to no extent of my better judgment.
I have to say that as Conservatives, although we are happy that the government has extended Operation Unifier, we did present the government a couple of weeks ago with our own Ukrainian defence and aid package, because there is so much to be done. There is so much that Ukraine has asked for. There is so much that the Ukrainian community has called upon the Government of Canada to continue to do. The Ukrainian Canadian Congress sent out a great briefing to all members of Parliament for tonight's debate talking about what needs to happen, what the background is for those members who are not familiar with everything that has taken place in Ukraine, of the interference that is coming from Vladimir Putin and the regime in the Kremlin.
I have to share my sentiments with the Minister of Foreign Affairs. I know she is sincere. She is as passionate as I am about Ukraine and everything that Ukraine stands for. As prairie farm kids of Ukrainian heritage, she and I share that ideal and connection to the homeland of our baba and gido and want to make sure that our families' roots of the old country, as we always called it out in the Prairies, are never forgotten, and that we stand with the people of Ukraine.
As is being demonstrated tonight in the debate here, we are in solidarity with the people of Ukraine. We stand with them in their support of democracy. We stand with them as they want to have reform of their judicial system, of their economy. As the minister alluded to, the negotiation of the Canada-Ukraine free trade agreement started under the previous Conservative government of Stephen Harper and was finalized by the minister herself. I thank her for carrying the ball over the goal line and making sure that this deal happened to ensure that Ukraine has that opportunity for economic prosperity. That will be the telling tale at the end of the day, that Ukraine has succeeded.
On top of expanding and continuing Operation Unifier, I have to thank the brave men and women of the Canadian Armed Forces. Even though the government just announced a week and a half ago that it was extending the mission for another two years, fresh troops, fresh trainers out of the Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry stationed in Edmonton were deployed more than three weeks ago. They are on the ground doing the training. They have taken over from the troops that are returning to Canada. I thank all members of the Canadian Armed Forces who are over there helping Ukraine.
As a former parliamentary secretary to the minister of defence I had the opportunity to accompany our delivery of non-kinetic defensive equipment for the military of Ukraine. I am talking 70,000 pairs of boots, winter coats, jackets, night vision goggles, and also the supply of RADARSAT imagery which is so important. Unfortunately, last year the government cancelled that program. I still call upon the Liberals to reinstate RADARSAT 2 imagery. It was saving lives. When he visited here two years ago, President Poroshenko said in the House that RADARSAT 2 imagery was saving lives. We shared that data so Ukraine knew what the Russian-backed rebels were doing in Donbass. When it could see the movement of troops and heavy artillery across the Russian border into Ukraine, Ukraine's troops were able to reposition themselves accordingly. Without those radar images from RADARSAT 2, we are putting those troops in danger.
As we have witnessed since the end of 2016, the Minsk agreements are not at all being enforced. They are not being respected by Russia. They are definitely not being respected by the Russian-backed rebels in Donetsk and Luhansk, and Ukraine is paying the price.
It is contingent upon us, especially the Government of Canada, to resupply Ukraine's military with RADARSAT images so it knows what the Russians are up to and what equipment they are providing and it does not just rely on intel.
We called on the government to add Ukraine to the automatic firearms country control list so that officials could come to Canada and buy Canadian-made weapons. They have to be able to defend themselves. If we could supply them with sniper rifles, Javelin missiles, anti-tank missiles, if we could provide them with the equipment to take out any short-range mortar attacks and defend their sovereignty, defend their troops, defend civilians in Ukraine, they would be better off. Canada would be better off and all of NATO would be better off if Ukraine was better able to defend itself. If the Ukrainian military had the equipment it needs to stop the advancement of Russia and its imperialistic advancement into eastern Ukraine, and who knows how far it is willing to go, Ukraine would be able to slow down the progress and prevent us some point down the line from having to put our troops in harm's way to stop this war in Ukraine. We definitely do not want to see it spread to other NATO members.
I do appreciate that Canadian troops are going to Latvia as part of Operation Reassurance, that our CF-18s are going to be redeployed in NATO, as the Conservative government did, to do Baltic air policing and air policing in Romania, Iceland, and other countries. I also appreciate that our frigate from the Royal Canadian Navy is always in the Mediterranean, in the Black Sea and in the Baltic Sea.
In the past, the Minister of Foreign Affairs has called for Magnitsky-style legislation. I tabled a bill in the House. Our colleague Conservative senator Raynell Andreychuk has Bill S-226 in the Senate, which is at third reading stage. I call upon the government to support that bill when it comes to the House of Commons so that we can have Magnitsky-style legislation to put in place the proper sanctions for corrupt foreign officials and stop the abuse that is happening at the hands of the people of Ukraine and the people of Russia and other countries around the world.
I just wish the minister would put in place the sanctions that she herself had called for. When she was in the opposition as a member of the third party, she used to call repeatedly for the government to sanction Igor Sechin and Vladimir Yakunin and still they are not sanctioned. The minister will have to explain that one herself.
As a Conservative government, we did provide a pile of support. The minister talked about $700 million of support for Ukraine. Some $600 million of that was provided by the Conservative government.
Again, we stand united for Ukraine in this House of Commons, and I just have to say, Slava Ukraini.
