The federal cabinet could issue a directive to the CRTC.
You know, there are parallels, in my view, between the two authoritarian governments, the two largest authoritarian governments in the world, Russia and China. There are parallels between their two state broadcasters, RT and CGTN. CGTN, the Chinese state broadcaster, has also been granted a licence to broadcast here in Canada by the CRTC. There's evidence that they are spreading Beijing's propaganda, and there's evidence that they are committing violations of international law by airing forced confessions, which is against international human rights law.
I'll also add this. In 2017, when a media inquiry went to the CRTC about RT, the CRTC indicated that it had not and was not reviewing RT's presence in Canada, despite the fact that at that time, U.S. intelligence agencies had identified RT as a propaganda tool of the Russian government, and despite the fact that the President of France, Emmanuel Macron, said that RT France was spreading disinformation.
Subsequent to this, the U.S. intelligence community concluded, in the spring of 2020, that Russia had interfered in the 2016 U.S. presidential election through various means, particularly through RT, and also concluded that Russia had interfered in Canadian democracy by targeting Canadian elected officials, in particular the current Deputy Prime Minister, Chrystia Freeland.
Inexplicably—to me—the cabinet allowed the CRTC, in August of 2020, to approve the broadcast of RT France over Canadian airwaves, in its decision 2020-281. Perhaps you could comment on this inexplicable action on the part of the government and the CRTC to allow RT France to be licensed in August of 2020.