As part of the UNIFIER training mission, 50 Canadian soldiers arrived in Ukraine, the press service of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine has reported with reference to Canadian Ambassador to Ukraine Roman Vashchuk.

"We are strengthening our Canadian presence - 50 additional military servicemen arrived in the UNIFIER mission. We support the Ukrainian Defense Ministry in its efforts to maintain Ukraine's sovereignty, security and stability," the press service of the Ukrainian Armed Forces quoted diplomat as saying on its Twitter account.

According to Head of the Canadian military training mission in Ukraine, Lieutenant-Colonel Kristopher Reeves, upon the arrival of military instructors, the mission became the largest since its start in Ukraine.

As reported, Canada in March 2017 decided to extend the UNIFIER training mission of the Ukrainian military for two years – until March 2019. The mission involves about 200 military instructors from Canada.

Operation UNIFIER is the Canadian Armed Forces (CAF) mission to support Ukrainian armed forces in Ukraine. The operation's focus is to assist them with military training. This will help them improve and build their military capacity.

The CAF's primary focus in Ukraine is on tactical soldier training. This is also known as small team training. It consists of individual weapons training; marksmanship; movement in areas of potential conflict; explosive threat recognition; communication in troop movement and command and control; survival in combat; ethics. Other training includes, among other things, explosive device disposal training and military police training.