Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you all for being here today.
In my short time in Parliament—I was elected in October of 2019—and attending these committees, I don't think I've heard a more damning round of testimony from witnesses regarding the behaviour of our government, a government that prides itself on its transparency in all aspects of its conduct.
It strikes me that this is really the root of the problem here, because we don't know why the export permits for the latest round of the Wescam drones to Turkey were approved. We do know that there was a conversation with the Prime Minister and President Erdogan in late April, and after that permits were approved.
What I'm struggling to understand is that we know there was an issue with diversion already. These Canadian drones wound up in Libya over a year before Canadian drones that were sold to Turkey also wound up in the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. If risk assessments are to be taken seriously, how is it possible that the federal government would approve the sale of these drones to Turkey again, knowing that Turkey had already, as a NATO ally, violated the terms of the agreement by diverting technology to Libya?
Maybe Project Ploughshares could have a go at that one first.