Mr. Speaker, the leader of the NDP made a mistake this week. Earlier this week he said, “All that was ever asked for of Canada by the Iraqis was that we help with the humanitarian crisis”.
This is completely false. The Minister of Foreign Affairs was recently in Iraq and was thanked by the Iraqi government for all of Canada's efforts, including our air strikes and military training efforts. In fact, Iraq's foreign minister made a formal request for assistance to the UN in order to “...support the effort to eradicate [ISIL] and restore stability to our country.”
I call on the leader of the NDP to apologize for this inaccurate comment. Our government will never back down from protecting Canadians from the threat of ISIL at home and abroad.