Foreign Affairs committee  Mr. Fonseca, that's precisely the strategic approach that we encourage all of us to take on this. Let's speak, for example, about Canada and the U.S. You already do a lot to coordinate through the Five Eyes mechanisms. Also, both Canada and the U.S. are part of the Quint group, those five countries that the Ukrainian armed forces co-operate most closely with, and we expect to see even better co-operation.

Foreign Affairs committee  Imperative number one is a strong, reliable and sustainable ceasefire. That has never happened. We could start with that.

Foreign Affairs committee  Mr. Chairman, if you would allow, I would invite Colonel Siromakha to start on that.

Foreign Affairs committee  The Minsk agreement helped us to slow down the major escalation we witnessed in 2014 and 2015, but it never laid down a clear way on how we could move forward. It's well known that our view is that we should start with the ceasefire and de-escalation along the front line, and then proceed towards political settlement and eventually the election in the occupied territories.

Foreign Affairs committee  Indeed, we believe that Canada is very supportive of Ukraine, not just because of this wonderful Ukrainian-Canadian community but also because Canada believes that it is in its long-term interests to have a stable democratic country, as Ukraine is struggling to be. Today, I think many people in Canada realize that Ukraine is fighting on behalf of the whole free world.

Foreign Affairs committee  Reform of the judiciary is of paramount importance. Fortunately, we do not have too many worrying situations now, but even one is one more than we should have. It's very clear that we want to make sure that Canadian investors experience rule of law and fair judicial decisions.

Foreign Affairs committee  When you see Ukraine succeeding in modernizing the country, you should be aware that this is happening because of the strong support we are getting from countries like Canada. If Canada is serious about advancing its values, its approach to the international order and to domestic things, Ukraine is the right country to apply those efforts.

Foreign Affairs committee  We have seen a lot of hostile activities in trying to use the pandemic situation in terms of propaganda and information wars. There is one country that tries to explain that all the vaccines are bad except for the Sputnik. There are some other ways that this country is trying to undermine our government's activities to fight the pandemic.

Foreign Affairs committee  It's our everyday routine to fight cyber-attacks from the aggressor. We are following very closely the developments in other countries, including those in the west. Obviously, the situation with the Colonial Pipeline was very alarming. That is another reason for us to work harder on our intel exchange and have closer co-operation between our armed forces and our security organizations.

Foreign Affairs committee  If the chair allows, I'll probably pass the floor to Colonel Siromakha on this.

Foreign Affairs committee  Those are some very good questions. I'll start from the end. There are many schools of thought on that, but I believe that Putin is not, in many ways, the source of the problems we see. In many ways, he is a reflection of the agenda of the Russian political class and he is a reflection of the state of Russian society.

Foreign Affairs committee  Well, Mr. Diotte, I think if we tried to make a short list of big, huge problems that the world faces right now, it might not be such a short list. I think we can understand that. Also, we should not neglect the fact that Russia has been working for many years trying to create myths and trying to split the west.

Foreign Affairs committee  Mr. Diotte, I'll just say that we very much appreciate the support we already get from Canada, across party lines and from the wider public, but I would say that with the knowledge, the expertise and the resources that Canada has invested in Ukraine, your country should be a very strong voice in a conversation about Ukraine and the wider Europe, and specifically about NATO's deterrents to Russia and NATO's partnership with Ukraine.

Foreign Affairs committee  You can find some of the steps that we suggest in the final slides of the presentation that was circulated among you, but I can just mention that the renewal of Operation Unifier until 2022 is very important. Sanctions against Russia using all different avenues are very important.

Foreign Affairs committee  That's not the way we see it. When Poland and our Baltic brothers and sisters started their conversation with NATO about entering NATO, many people thought it would be a very long story. Actually, it wasn't. I think we're in a position to start moving forward, and we hope to do so.