Canada will consider the possibility of sending military instructors to Ukraine, if "certain conditions" are met. However, these conditions "do not exist" at the moment.
This was stated by the Minister of Defense of Canada, Bill Blair, as reported by Global News.
According to him, any Canadian military personnel would only be deployed to perform "non-combat" functions.
The Minister of Defense emphasized that conditions in Ukraine must "change" before Canadian troops can return to the country where they trained Ukrainian soldiers on-site prior to the Russian invasion.
"Right now, circumstances are not appropriate for that training to take place in Ukraine, but we’re going to continue to train," Blair said.
Canada has trained over 40,000 Ukrainian soldiers as part of Operation Unifier, which began in 2015 after Russia's occupation of Crimea. However, after the Russian invasion, Canadian military operations were relocated to the United Kingdom, Latvia, and Poland.
"We have had a number of discussions with Ukrainians that suggest when the conditions are right, we may be able to return," Blair said.
Leaving the possibility of returning to Ukraine open, Blair emphasized that "the Canadian Armed Forces cannot play any combat role or anything that could be perceived as a combat role."
