A large crowd was present on Sunday to welcome the first chartered flight of Ukrainian refugees by the federal government expected at Montreal-Trudeau airport.
Posted at 7:38
Updated at 12:23 p.m.
The Quebec Minister of Immigration, Jean Boulet, and the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Canada, Mélanie Joly, are notably present.
The latter spoke to the media after meeting some families in the arrivals area at the airport. “It’s very emotional, to say that you’re leaving Europe, that you’re crossing the ocean, it’s a lot of consequences”, she said, describing the refugees as, for the most part, “women women, children and grandmothers.
The approximately 300 refugees who will arrive in Montreal have been selected after a long process, says Orysia Krucko of the Ukrainian Canadian Council.
“We have designated a church where they can collect clothes, it’s almost a Walmart,” she says, visibly delighted to finally be able to welcome her compatriots.
PHOTO PHILIPPE BOIVIN, THE PRESS
The second of three
The flight from Poland landed at Pierre-Elliott-Trudeau airport shortly before 11 a.m.
This is the second flight of its kind to arrive in Canada this week. Last Monday, an aircraft landed in Winnipeg carrying Ukrainian nationals fleeing the Russian invasion.
Federal Immigration Minister Sean Fraser said the three flights are expected to take a total of nearly 900 refugees who have received emergency clearance.
The federal government has already taken in thousands of Ukrainians since the start of the invasion launched by Vladimir Putin’s regime at the end of February.
According to government data, Canada received more than 259,000 applications for temporary residence as of May 25. A total of 120,668 applications have been approved so far.
With The Canadian Press