Citizenship and Immigration committee  Why the numbers are down for economic...or you said—

Citizenship and Immigration committee  Yes. It's only a guess, of course, but the recession in 2009 did hit Moscow, did hit Russia quite a lot, but if you look at the GDP for last year, it went up 4%. So Russia is doing very well—not all regions of Russia, but a lot of the applications we do get are from the bigger cities, and with the financial situation, people are doing quite well here.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  Unfortunately, I don't have even 2006 or 2007 numbers. I have only looked back to about 2009. Personally I've been in Moscow six months, so I've been concentrating on the last couple of years. The numbers are down from 2009, but I don't know what they're like if compared to those for 2005 or 2006.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  Is your question about processing time?

Citizenship and Immigration committee  You are completely right. The selection has already been done by Quebec, and the percentage of refusal is low. However, I cannot tell you what percentage of applications are refused for medical or safety reasons. I don't have the figures with me. Both reasons may come into play, to some extent, but I don't have that information on hand.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  I can answer in French or in English; it's up to you.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  Very well. Why are there no local decision makers in Moscow? Mr. Gilbert would perhaps be better placed than myself to answer that question.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  Yes.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  We do have many locally-recruited employees, some of whom occupy higher-level positions. Local employees do not make any final decision. They are well-trained and they process cases at a fairly high level. They can provide very practical suggestions, especially because they are themselves Russian.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  Thank you, Mr. Chair.

Citizenship and Immigration committee  Thank you very much. Good morning. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I would like to thank the committee for inviting me to speak. My name is Kathleen Sigurdson, and I am the immigration program manager in Moscow, Russia. I would like to provide a short overview of the program in Moscow, emphasizing topics that I believe are of the most interest to the committee.