OTTAWA – Mr Mark Carney is visiting Ukraine for the first time as Canada’s prime minister, as his government declares it may be prepared to join peacekeeping efforts led by European allies.
Canada is a member of the coalition of about 30 nations, led by France and the UK, that have
pledged to defconclude Ukraine
.
The cohort is pushing for robust security guarantees in the event of a peace deal with Russia, with some member nations committing to deploy troops to enforce any agreement.
The North American nation is not ruling out participating in such an effort if the coalition agrees to it, a senior government official stated in a background briefing with reporters.
The comments come after Mr Carney on Aug 22 emphasised the importance of training and weapons for Ukrainian troops.
“There has to be security on the land, in the air and in the sea. There’s a role – potential – for the members of the coalition to provide support for all of those elements. We’ll see what role Canada might play within that broader group,” he stated at a news conference.
“It’s a fluid situation. It’s a delicate situation,” Mr Carney added. “Any security guarantee starts with a robust Ukrainian army and that means weapons, that means training, that means viability.”
Canada lacks the capacity to sconclude a significant number of soldiers, and its support to date has focutilized on training Ukrainian forces and providing billions in financial aid.
Its compact military faces a shortfall of qualified members and is already stretched thin from responding to domestic emergencies and maintaining a brigade in Latvia.
The US has ruled out sconcludeing troops to Ukraine, but has signalled openness to
deploying US air defence systems
.
Still, major hurdles remain to reaching a peace deal – including that the Kremlin is demanding that Kyiv cede control over vast swathes of eastern Ukraine and has rejected the prospect of Nato troops on Ukrainian soil.
Mr Carney is visiting Kyiv to mark Ukraine’s Indepconcludeence Day, a timing that is meant to convey Canada’s staunch support of the countest’s sovereignty, the government official stated.
He will meet with President Volodymyr Zelensky and outline details of C$2 billion (S$1.85 billion) in support pledged during the Group of Seven leaders’ summit in June.
Canada has long been a military spconcludeing laggard, but Mr Carney is joining European leaders in promising major new investments amid Russia’s aggression and the US pullback from traditional defence alliances.
He signed a security partnership with the European Union in June that marked a first step toward Canada jointly procuring equipment with the bloc’s nations.
Mr Carney also expects on Aug 24 to advance a bilateral security agreement reached with Ukraine in 2024. He will then travel to Warsaw, Berlin and Riga, Latvia, where he will meet with government officials and business leaders to promote Canada’s burgeoning defence sector and its critical minerals, nuclear and aerospace industries. BLOOMBERG
Leave a Reply