(Ottawa) The Trudeau government is waiting to have more information in hand before reacting to the missile strikes that hit NATO member Poland, an offensive that Russia is accused of having perpetrated.
“I am aware of the information. It would be imprudent of me to comment on them at this stage. I am in close contact with our Polish allies and we are monitoring the situation very closely,” Defense Minister Anita Anand said at the start of question period in the House on Tuesday afternoon.
She would not say what Canada would do if the missiles turned out to be Russian.
“We are monitoring the situation,” said the minister.
Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland said she had no “specific comments”, while assuring that Canada was “in contact with all its international allies”, and that Justin Trudeau was also with them at the G20 Summit in Bali, like the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Mélanie Joly.
PHOTO ADRIAN WYLD, THE CANADIAN PRESS ARCHIVES
Coming out of question period in the House on Tuesday, Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland said she had no “specific comments”, while assuring that Canada was “in contact with all its international allies” .
At the office of the head of Canadian diplomacy, we also said “to follow the situation closely” on Tuesday.
Conservative MP Pierre Paul-Hus also insisted on the need to be cautious, especially since a direct military attack against another NATO member country can have very serious consequences.
“We need the experts there to start by confirming whether it was intentional or not. This is the first question to be answered. If there was an intention, then it becomes critical, ”he argued in a press scrum in parliament.
Under Article 5 of the treaty, if an Alliance country is attacked, the others must come to its defence. Article 4 of the same pact, however, provides that “any ally may request consultations whenever it considers that its territorial integrity, its political independence or its security is threatened”.
In Washington, the Pentagon was unable to confirm that Russian missiles ended up in Poland after crossing the border with neighboring Ukraine. The Polish government, for its part, called an emergency meeting of the National Security Council on Tuesday evening.
Russia fired dozens of missiles into Ukrainian territory on Tuesday, according to Kyiv.
In the past, debris from Russian missiles has already fallen in Moldova, another country neighboring Ukraine.
With Agence France-Presse