On 22 September 2023, Yaroslav Hunka, a Ukrainian Canadian who fought in the SS Division Galicia of the military wing of the Nazi Party, the Waffen-SS, was invited to the House of Commons of Canada to be recognized by Speaker Anthony Rota, the Member of Parliament for Hunka’s district. Hunka received two standing ovations from all house members, including Canadian prime minister Justin Trudeau, other party leaders, and visiting Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
Hunka’s membership in the Waffen-SS was reported initially by The Forward, which quoted a tweet by the academic Ivan Katchanovsk. The story was picked up by the Canadian media, receiving international attention.
The incident, seen as a political blunder and a scandal, such that it drew comparisons to the most embarrassing moments in Canada’s history, was leveraged by the Russian establishment to further its justifications for waging war in Ukraine, which had been started under a pretext of “denazification”, among other stated reasons. Rota resigned as speaker five days later, and the House unanimously adopted a motion to condemn Nazism and withdraw its recognition of Hunka. Prime Minister Trudeau and Canadian government officials apologized to the worldwide Jewish community. The handling of suspected World War II war criminals in Canada became a renewed matter of public interest.