Moscow accuses Ottawa of leading lockdown effort amid disputes over tweets and subpoenas

Russia’s ambassador to Canada says Ottawa is at the forefront of an effort to isolate his country, following a series of spats on social media and back-and-forth salutes in which each country summons the other’s top diplomat.

Oleg Stepanov told Russian state media he is exasperated by Canada’s foreign affairs department tweeting unflattering information about the war in Ukraine, particularly recent tweets about Russian men fleeing conscription.

“When there is no real diplomacy on the Canadian side, no ability or appetite to deal with serious issues for Russia, they turn on this Twitter megaphone,” Stepanov told RIA Novosti last week, in Russian.

He added that Canada appears to be leading an effort by Western countries to isolate Russia.

Relations between Ottawa and Moscow have been tense since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February.

Moscow began recruiting men with no military experience in September and rejects claims by the governments of Georgia and Kazakhstan about a subsequent surge in people moving from neighboring Russia.

Last week, Global Affairs Canada tweeted that the draft “targeted ethnic minorities, sparked protests and caused thousands of Russian citizens to flee.”

In a rebuttal, Stepanov described the citizens who fled Russia as “cowards”. He said that true Russians would defend the country “regardless of one’s political views.” He said there is no “moral alternative” to supporting the national army.

“Those who left are just a dry shell of a man, dust in the wind. It is the same case when history separates the wheat from the chaff, ”he wrote in statements to the TASS news agency, which the embassy translated. in English.

Earlier this month, Russia summoned the Canadian ambassador to Moscow, protesting that Ottawa did the same thing to Stepanov five times this year.

Summoning an ambassador is normally a rare occurrence in which countries agree to formally object to the foreign country’s policies or the conduct of its diplomatic mission.

Ottawa first summoned Stepanov shortly after the February invasion, and then after the April massacre in the town of Bucha, followed by the October bombing raids on central Kyiv. The fourth citation came after the embassy tweeted anti-LGBTQ messages in November, and again this month for arguing that the 1930s famine in Ukraine, known as the Holodomor, was not the result of Soviet policy.

Russia returned the favor this month, summoning Canadian ambassador Alison LeClaire for what the Russian Foreign Ministry called “numerous unwarranted instances” of Ottawa summoning Stepanov.

The five subpoenas “go far beyond normal diplomatic practice,” the ministry argued in a Dec. 9 press release.

Moscow previously summoned LeClaire in September, over allegations that Global Affairs Canada had not taken incidents involving the Ottawa embassy seriously, such as security video of a Molotov cocktail thrown on mission grounds.

Both countries say they want to maintain diplomatic relations, even if Ottawa has backed out of working with Moscow on numerous files.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published on December 18, 2022.