Photo of multiple soldiers sit on top of a tank holding weapons and large Ukrainian national flag.
Operation in Eastern Ukraine. Credit: Ministry of Defence of Ukraine / Flickr Credit: Ministry of Defence of Ukraine / Flickr

Anyone who believes in peaceful and diplomatic international relations must condemn Russia’s invasion and bombing of Ukraine.

When criticizing Russia’s imperialist impulse, we should not lose sight of Canada’s significant role in today’s crisis. Non-interference in other countries’ affairs is an important principle of international law, yet Ottawa has long sought to destabilize the relationship between Russia and Ukraine.

President Vladimir Putin claims the invasion is in part to protect Ukrainian-Russian speakers in the Donbass. Obviously, there are other geopolitical dynamics also at play, but the 2014 coup in Ukraine is key to understanding the current horrific violence. 

Canada’s role in the ‘Maidan revolution’

In 2014, Ottawa actively assisted the ouster of President Viktor Yanukovych who was oscillating between allying with the European Union and Russia. The revolution, or as others see it – the coup- divided the Ukraine politically, geographically and linguistically (Russian is the mother tongue of 30% of Ukrainians and as much as 75% of those in eastern border cities). The largely Russian speaking east protested the ouster of Yanukovych, who was from the region. The post-coup nationalist government immediately eliminated Russian as an official language. After conflict and a referendum, the Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republics were proclaimed in the eastern Donbass region. Moscow recognized this territory as independent on Monday. 

Canada played a role in Euromaidan – a wave of pro-European Union (often far-right) protests in Kyiv from November 21, 2013 to February 22, 2014. Some groups behind the Euromaidan protests were funded by Canada. Ottawa and the Ukrainian Canadian Congress have ploughed significant resources into anti-Russian, nationalist, elements of Ukrainian civil society since the 2004 Orange Revolution. At the time of the protests against Yanukovych and his Party of Regions, the Canadian embassy’s local spokesperson, Inna Tsarkova, was a prominent member of AutoMaidan, an anti-government group. 

A week into Euromaidan, Canada released a statement criticizing government repression of the protests. Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird said, “Canada strongly condemns the deplorable use of force today by Ukrainian authorities against peaceful protesters.” Six days later, Baird visited Maidan square with Paul Grod, president of the ultranationalist Ukrainian Canadian Congress. From the stage, Grod announced Baird’s presence and support, as many in the crowd chanted ‘Thank you, Canada.’ Baird called on Ukrainian authorities to respect the protests and bemoaned “the shadow that Russia is casting over this country.” 

A few months later, Canada’s chargé d’affaires visited protest leader and journalist Tetyana Chornovol in the hospital after she was violently attacked. Three weeks earlier, Chornovol was widely reported to have participated in seizing Kyiv City Hall. A former member of a far-right party, Chornovol was arrested on numerous occasions and was charged with murder for throwing a Molotov cocktail at the Party of Regions headquarters.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper repeatedly expressed support for the protesters and criticized Yanukovych. He slammed the Ukrainian president for “not moving towards a free and democratic Euro-Atlantic future but towards an anti-democratic Soviet past.” The then Immigration Minister Chris Alexander doubled down: “you [Yanukovych] are not welcome in Canada and we will continue to take strong action until the violence against the people of Ukraine has stopped and democracy has been restored.” Ottawa followed with travel bans and economic sanctions on dozens of individuals aligned with Yanukovych, a democratically-elected president.

At the height of the protests, activists used the Canadian embassy, adjacent to Maidan square, as a safe haven for at least a week. The protesters gained access to a mini-van and other Canadian resources. One year after the coup, the Canadian Press quoted officials from allied European nations accusing Canada of being an active participant in regime change.

At least some of those who used the Canadian embassy were from the far-right. University of Ottawa professor Katchanovski writes that a leader of the far-right group C14 admitted that his group took refuge in the Canadian embassy in Kyiv on February 18 and stayed there during the Maidan massacre. On February 19 and 20, more than 50 people were killed in violence that was widely blamed on government security forces. But Katchanovski shows that far-right activists were in fact responsible for many of these deaths.

The killings eventually caused the collapse of the government. 

Unconstitutional removal of former President Yanukovych

A leaked tape between Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland and U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine, Geoffrey Pyatt, showed that U.S. officials midwifed Yanukovych’s unconstitutional replacement. Ottawa quickly recognized the post-coup government, with little investigation, despite having sent election observers to monitor the 2010 presidential and 2012 parliamentary elections, both of which won by Yanukovych and the more pro-Russian, Party of Regions. 

The appointment of a new government was welcomed in Canada. Minister Baird applauding ‘the appointment of a legitimate government is a vital step forward in restoring democracy and normalcy to Ukraine.’ But the country’s constitutional provisions dealing with impeachment or replacement of a president were flagrantly violated. 

Days after the coup, Baird led a delegation of Conservative members of Parliament and Ukrainian-Canadian representatives to meet acting president, Oleksandr Turchynov and new prime minister, Arseniy Yatsenyuk. Canada announced an immediate $200,000 in medical assistance for those injured in the political violence and $220 million in aid to the interim government. Former Prime Minister Stephen Harper said: “I think we really have to credit the Ukrainian people themselves with resisting the attempt to overturn their democracy and to lead their country back into the past.”

Harper was the first G7 leader to visit the interim government. Alongside Baird and then-Justice Minister Peter MacKay, Harper told the acting president: “you have provided inspiration and a new chapter in humanity’s ongoing story of the struggle for freedom, democracy and justice and accused Putin of seeking to destabilize international security and return the world to the ‘law of the jungle.'”

Canadian officials stayed mum about the significant influence far-right nationalists had within the interim leadership. In the weeks after the instalment of the new government, a wave of violence swept Ukraine with right wing nationalists behind many killings, including a massacre that left 48 dead.

Russia invades, troops push into Kyiv

Over the years fighting intensified and waned in the Donbass region. The Ukrainian military is responsible for the bulk the deaths in recent years.

Fighting escalated again over the past couple of weeks. 

In his investigation of Euromaidan activists’ use of the embassy in Kyiv reporter Murray Brewster writes, “Canadians are not very popular in some quarters and occasionally loathed by pro-Russian Ukrainians.”

We must condemn Russia’s invasion but understand that Canada has often not been a force for good in that part of the world. It is important now, as war hysteria inevitably grows, that we do not fall into the trap of uncritically supporting ‘our side.’ That way leads to the escalation of violence. 

Yves Engler

Dubbed “Canada’s version of Noam Chomsky” (Georgia Straight), “one of the most important voices on the Canadian Left” (Briarpatch), “in the mould of I. F. Stone” (Globe and Mail), “part...