A potential leadership contender for the federal Conservative Party says the Liberal government is right to end airstrikes against the Islamic State.
Celebrity investor Kevin O'Leary, the chair of O'Leary Financial Group and a Bell Media on-air contributor, told CTV鈥檚 Power Play Wednesday that Canada should stick to peacekeeping.
鈥淜illing people is easy. Keeping the peace is very hard,鈥� he said.
Interim Conservative leader Rona Ambrose has slammed the Liberal government for saying it will end the airstrikes by Feb. 22.
She has called it a 鈥渟hameful step backward鈥� for Canada.
O鈥橪eary said Canada has a moral authority in the Middle East to be a peacekeeper -- a reputation gained in the 1960s and 1970s from United Nations peacekeeping missions in Jordan and Syria.
鈥淐ertainly to gain that trust, and to gain that moral authority, took decades and decades,鈥� he said.
鈥淲e share that with the Finnish people. For us to suddenly decide we鈥檙e going to start killing people, and sharing in destruction and death, when we already have the moral right to be peacekeepers, is a unique situation that every country would honour.鈥�
O鈥橪eary said he doesn鈥檛 care if the Conservative Party disagrees with his position -- or any other federal party.
鈥淚t squares with the Canadian people. That鈥檚 what matters,鈥� he said.
鈥淚f you ask 10 Canadians would they rather be global peacekeepers or would they rather be warmongers, I know their answer. And I鈥檓 one of them.鈥�
