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Regina Qu’Appelle MP Andrew Scheer lambasted Prime Minister Justin Trudeau for the invitation of Yaroslav Hunka to Parliament last week.
Hunka is a 98-year-old Ukrainian-Canadian veteran who served in Nazi Germany’s Waffen-SS Galicia Division during the Second World War. On Friday, he was introduced as a “war hero” and received a standing ovation from Parliament during a visit by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
Hunka was invited by House Speaker Anthony Rota, who has since resigned that post.
“(It was a) completely avoidable international disgrace that happened last week, because nobody in the government vetted or did background checks on the speaker’s guest,” Scheer said on Wednesday morning.
“While it’s a good step for the speaker to take responsibility, the next piece is for Justin Trudeau to take responsibility.”
On Wednesday morning, Andrew Scheer, MP for Regina Qu’Appelle, demanded that Prime Minister Justin Trudeau take responsibility for the invitation of a Nazi veteran to Parliament last week. Trudeau apologized later on that day. (980 CJME file photo)
Later on Wednesday, Trudeau addressed the incident with reporters, though he stressed that Rota was solely to blame.
“This was a mistake that has deeply embarrassed Parliament and Canada,” Trudeau told reporters before Question Period.
“All of us who were in this house on Friday regret deeply having stood and clapped even though we did so unaware of the context. It was a horrendous violation of the memory of the millions of people who died in the Holocaust and it was deeply, deeply painful for Jewish people.”
Trudeau issued a formal apology during Question Period.
“On behalf of all of us in this house, I would like to present unreserved apologies for what took place on Friday and to President Zelenskyy and the Ukrainian delegation for the position they were put in,” the prime minister said.
Scheer, who served as speaker from 2011 to 2015, said the incident damaged Canada’s reputation on the world stage.
“For this to happen at that time is just an incredible insult to Ukraine, to people who survived the Holocaust, for people who fled Nazi Germany or any of those atrocities that happened in the ’30s and ’40s,” Scheer said.
“(It was) a completely avoidable incident if somebody in the Prime Minister’s Office had just done their basic due diligence to find out who is going to be in the room with President Zelenskyy.”