Mr. Speaker, last week, I was part of the Canadian delegation to the NATO Parliamentary Assembly in Brussels. NATO is a multilateral organization committed to global peace and freedom and to meeting the security challenges of terrorism and cyber-attacks.
Canada has participated in nearly every NATO mission since its founding in 1949 and is currently leading the following key initiatives: Forward Presence battlegroup in Latvia, led by Colonel Eric Laforest; NATO Defense College, led by Lieutenant-General Christine Whitecross; Standing NATO Maritime Group Two, until recently led by Commodore Josée Kurtz; and the NATO training mission in Iraq, led by Major-General Jennie Carignan. We are proud of Canada's excellent leadership and note that until the end of December 2019, three of our four operations were led by women.
I saw first-hand how vital an organization NATO is to ensuring peace and stability in the world. We can never waiver in our commitment to NATO and to supporting the amazing women and men who step up every day to defend our values, our liberty and our democracy.