OTTAWA—Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan has formally apologized for embellishing his role in a key Afghan offensive even as evidence emerged that he had made the false claim before.A beleaguered Sajjan took to social media on Saturday to issue a full mea culpa for his claim to an overseas audience that he was the “architect” of Operation Medusa, a 2006 offensive by Canadian forces to oust Taliban fighters from districts around Kandahar. Sajjan said he had “made a mistake” in describing his role. “I wish to retract that description and apologize for it. I am truly sorry,” he said Saturday in a Twitter post that referred readers to a fuller explanation on his Facebook page.“While I am proud of the role I played during my deployments to Afghanistan, my comments were in no way intended to diminish the roles of my former superiors and fellow soldiers. To them I offer my sincere apologies,” Sajjan said.“What I should have said is that our military successes are the result of the leadership, service and sacrifice of the many dedicated women and men in the Canadian Forces.”It was not, however, the first time Sajjan had made the claim. In 2015 he told the B.C. program Conversations That Matter that Gen. Jonathan Vance, the current chief of defence staff who was previously a commander in Afghanistan, saw him as a key figure in the 2006 offensive.“If I could quote him, he said I was the architect of Operation Medusa, one of the biggest operations since the Korean War that Canada has led. We took the fight hard to the Taliban,” Sajjan said in July 2015, just months before he was elected as a Vancouver MP.Vance’s office was not available Saturday to respond to that claim. Still, the apology is not likely to appease opposition critics who will be pressing Sajjan to provide a better explanation Monday when MPs return to Parliament. “I think the damage is done, unfortunately. ...
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