Diplomats warn Canada of Russia meddling

Ukrainian translator arrested

• Foreign Affairs Minister Chrystia Freeland planned to use a Friday meeting in Ukraine to get more information on reports that a man arrested there on suspicion of spying for Russia sat in on a meeting in the Prime Minister’s Office this fall.

But Canadian officials refused to say how seriously they take the incident, and that while Freeland would be raising it, it’s not planned to be a major topic of discussion.

Multiple media outlets say Stanislav Yezhov worked as a translator during Ukrainian Prime Minister Volodymyr Groysman’s visit to Canada earlier this year, and was part of meetings with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.

Yezhov also travelled with Groysman on trips to the U.S. and U.K.

But even Groysman is now accusing him of working for a “hostile state,” following Yezhov’s arrest this week on accusations he’s a long-time Russian agent.

On Friday, a Ukrainian court ordered Yezhov to remain in custody until Feb. 17 while an investigation into the allegations proceeds.

Canada does have several things to worry about when it comes to the potential for Russian meddling, said Andrzej Kurnicki, Poland’s ambassador to Canada, in a recent interview. Among them: attempts to use advanced technology to disrupt its financial system, including using misleading information to affect markets and technological tampering with information, including stored data.

The underlying reason for such an attack, said Kurnicki, would be to sow uncertainty, particularly in Canada’s natural resources sector so the turmoil would increase the value of Russia’s energy assets on world markets.

“The price of oil and gas tends to increase when there is uncertainty in the economy. A cyberattack can also increase the price of oil and gas, and Russia is very dependent on (its) supply of gas to the western world,” he said.

Karlis Eihenbaums, the Latvian ambassador to Canada, said that in addition to the ongoing controversy over potential Russian meddling in the U. S. presidential campaign in 2016, there have been allegations of the Kremlin inserting itself into elections in Sweden, Denmark, France and Germany.

“I would not be surprised that the same ideas in one or another way will be tried here when the elections come,” he said.

Elections Canada has said it is taking steps to safeguard the integrity of Canada’s voting system.

Former senior Canadian Forces officer Brett Boudreau, a retired colonel whose postings included NATO HQ in Brussels. says the government isn’t taking the threats posed by Russia’s so- called “hybrid war” on the West seriously enough.

For the past decade, Russia has tried to build its diplomatic, information and military branches into “instruments of national power” to offset a weakness in its economic sector, said Boudreau.

“They have made brilliant strategic investments in those three fields that are reaping returns far in excess of the cost,” he said.