Thank you, Mr. Chair.
Thank you to my colleagues here for understanding where I'm coming from. It's important for us to understand, when we talk about a banana republic.... Like I said earlier, I'm not sure what backgrounds they had in their prior lives before becoming members here.
The police services are independent. I want to re-emphasize that part. They are not beholden to the government, nor do they listen to what the government has to say.
I'll carry on. The report continues:
In reply to another question about timing, Minister Sajjan remarked that Canada's “evacuation started as soon as we felt the situation was deteriorating.”
Ambassador Sirrs provided further details about the government's contingency planning and the core assessments that were informing decision-making at the time. He said:
Up until a few days before the decision to temporarily suspend embassy operations, Canada and the international community were expecting difficult times in August and September, but not a complete takeover of the capital. In fact, we expected the Afghan military to defend the city until the onset of winter, allowing time for negotiations to continue.
With this in mind, we were considering options to maintain a skeletal—