(Ottawa) Canadian Foreign Affairs Minister Mélanie Joly made a surprise visit to Ukraine on Friday to launch what she hopes will be a global effort to secure the return of Ukrainian children kidnapped by Russia.
“Our support for Ukraine’s independence remains unwavering,” she said at a news conference in Kyiv on Friday.
Those who support Ukraine must stay the course; we cannot afford to lose confidence or falter, not even for a moment.
Mélanie Joly, Minister of Foreign Affairs of Canada
Mme Joly also met his Ukrainian counterpart Dmytro Kouleba on Friday, as well as President Volodymyr Zelensky.
The visit did not include any announcements to increase the $9.7 billion that Ottawa has promised Ukraine through military, development and emigration programs since the start of 2022.
Mme Joly instead launched an initiative with Ukraine to seek global help to pressure Russia to bring back thousands of Ukrainian children it expelled from conflict zones, in violation of international law .
The International Criminal Court issued an arrest warrant almost a year ago for Russian President Vladimir Putin on suspicion of forcing children from eastern Ukraine to be adopted by Russian families. , while attempting to strip them of any Ukrainian identity.
The United Nations has documented cases where Russian armed forces and affiliated armed groups have committed serious violations against children, who have been unlawfully detained, forcibly transferred and illegally expelled.
The new Canadian project aims to raise public awareness of this issue and coordinate awareness campaigns.
“Canada will use its diplomatic network to be able to present and defend these children’s cases, but we will also work with certain countries that have direct contacts with Russia,” explained Minister Joly.
Ottawa says it will also offer all the technical expertise Ukraine needs to help return the children, fewer than 400 of whom have so far returned from Russia.
Before returning to the country on Saturday, Mme Joly also plans to meet with Ukrainians affected by war, including children, as well as organizations that support victims of sexual and gender-based violence and war-related trauma.
Canada and its allies have pledged to support Ukraine “as long as it takes,” including to contain the risk of Russian aggression after the conflict eventually ends.
Yet public support for Ukraine has declined in countries like the United States, amid persistent inflation and war in the Middle East.
Canada has still not signed a formal bilateral security commitment for Ukraine. Negotiations have been ongoing for months over how much Ottawa will commit to help secure the country.
Dmytro Kouleba welcomed Ottawa’s support, saying through an interpreter that “Canada is one of our closest friends” in part because it raises issues at G7 meetings.
He said negotiations on a security engagement were going well and were not clouded by diplomatic niceties. “We can discuss things, in essence, in a very sincere and open way,” he said.
Ukraine is enthusiastic about foreign countries seizing assets owned by Russian state subsidiaries, which would then be managed to help finance Ukraine’s reconstruction effort.
Canada has been encouraging such an approach for more than a year, even if it has not followed through on the confiscation of assets.
It’s been more than a year since Ottawa froze a $26 million bank account held by Russian oligarch Roman Abramovich and last June seized a huge plane that was on the Toronto tarmac.
Mme Joly did not explain why the assets have not yet been confiscated, although she hinted at the need to continue the legal process.
The federal Conservatives said Friday that Ottawa should send surplus weapons to Ukraine and follow through on its promise to increase production of artillery shells.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says Canada will continue sending weapons to Ukraine. He suggested that delays in providing an air defense system to the country were beyond his control.
“We are still there for Ukraine and we have indeed promised to facilitate the sending of these systems. We work with the partners who are necessary to send these systems. And we continue to hope that we will be able to deliver them soon,” Mr. Trudeau said in French on Friday during an event in Waterloo, Ontario.
In English, he indicated that the advancement of this file “does not only concern Canada”.
Next month will mark the tenth anniversary of Russia’s invasion of Crimea, and two years since Moscow began its full-scale invasion of Ukraine.