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House Hansard - 190

44th Parl. 1st Sess.
May 3, 2023 02:00PM
  • May/4/23 12:00:13 a.m.
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Madam Speaker, I rise tonight to pursue a question that was originally asked on February 6, and I have to say that the circumstances have changed substantially since it was asked. I wear the Ukrainian flag colours every day. I decided to put on this pin on February 24, when Putin launched his brutal and illegal attack on Ukraine. I want to make it very clear that I personally, and the Green Party as a party, fully support the Government of Canada's actions in supporting Ukraine, both with humanitarian aid and military aid. It is an unthinkable thing that Russia could invade a country. They have been using drones. They have bombed. They have shelled. Today was a terrible day in Ukraine, particular for the city of Kherson. There was a deadly attack that targeted civilian targets, including a supermarket and a railway station. On this day, as I rise to speak about Ukraine, 21 more innocent civilians were killed and 48 were injured. The situation in Ukraine is a desperate one. It is very hard for Canadians, with such a large Ukrainian diaspora here, to see friends, neighbours, relatives and family sheltering in air raid shelters and listening to the air raid sirens. Things have gotten much worse within the last week, not that anything has been good since Putin attacked Ukraine. We need to be thinking about not only winning the war but also winning a peace for the people of Ukraine. Yes, they must win. They must protect all territory. We must be with them as long as it takes, but there is a point where we can also look beyond to see a country that has been fractured and violated through an illegal, brutal war for over a year. The more time it takes to win the war, the more it will be difficult to create a peaceful situation throughout a country that includes some people who identify more with Russia. I hope we will be soon be talking about looking back at what has occurred and not looking forward to an endless war. We have to continue to support those humanitarian efforts. We have to do more, of course, in a postwar period, to think about stability. We have to think about the environmental damage that this war is doing, the reckless dangerous actions of Putin's army in attacking nuclear power stations. We are in a very dangerous time. Supporting Ukraine is essential, and I think virtually every Canadian understands that. We need to also be looking at what the humanitarian needs will be postwar. Of course, we had a debate in a late night emergency debate on Sudan, and one of the things that became so clear is that, when there was any hope of looking the other way and leaving Sudan, there was a complete failure to invest in civil society, a complete failure to help keep that society whole. Whatever happens, we must stay with the people of Ukraine, support them, their military, their NGOs and the civil society. Please the Lord, this will be over, with Ukraine victorious, and we will be able to invest in a peace.
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