Before pulling Canadian diplomats out of Ukraine weeks before the Russian invasion, Global Affairs Canada received information confirming that Russia intended to wage war on its neighbor and that Ukrainians working for the Canadian embassy were likely on lists of people the Moscow intended to hunt. Despite the seemingly dire situation, Ottawa told Canadian embassy leaders in Kyiv to withhold this information from these Ukrainian staff members and leave them behind. Those events were described to The Globe and Mail by three Canadian diplomats with direct knowledge of what happened, who say they are troubled by the way Canada left its Ukrainian employees at risk. The Globe is not naming the diplomats because they were not authorized to speak publicly on the matter. The revelations highlight the inconsistency of Canada’s treatment of its local embassy workers, who have at times been offered federal assistance in crises and at other times left to find their own escape routes. In January, the sources said, diplomats working at the embassy in Kyiv received a secret briefing from the intelligence alliance known as the Five Eyes (the other members are the United States, Britain, Australia and New Zealand) in which they they said Russia was not bluffing about its intention to invade Ukraine. But there was something else: Russia had prepared lists of Ukrainians whom the alliance believed Moscow intended to pursue, detain or perhaps kill. While it was unclear exactly whose names appeared on the lists, diplomats were told that Ukrainians working for Western embassies in Kyiv were likely to be included. At the time, most international observers expected Russia to quickly seize Kyiv and take control of the Ukrainian government within days of launching an invasion, putting anyone on the Russian roster in immediate danger. Before Canadian staff members withdrew from the embassy ahead of the February 24 invasion, they received instructions from Ottawa on what to do with the warning that their Ukrainian colleagues could be arrested or executed. The instructions were clear: Don’t tell them. The 50 or so Ukrainian employees, many of whom had worked with Canadians at the embassy for years, were left to fend for themselves, oblivious to the danger. The sources told The Globe that, after the briefing, several embassy officials raised concerns about the Ukrainian staff members with their superiors in Ottawa. They were told by two senior Global Affairs officials that Canada had no responsibility – known in policy terms as a “duty of care” – to local officials in this situation and that Ottawa did not want to set a precedent of protecting local embassy staff. No evacuation plans were made for Ukrainian personnel likely to be on the lists. Instead, they were told to flee to their homes if Russia attacked Kyiv. Canadian diplomats at the embassy left for the relative safety of the western Ukrainian city of Lviv on February 12 and then fled to Poland on February 24, hours post the Russian invasion began. Ukrainian staff members asked if they could work remotely from Lviv or Poland as Canadian staff planned to evacuate, a source said, but Global Affairs officials denied their request. Ukrainian embassy staff were horrified and angry after the Canadians left, the three sources said. They had learned of the threat to their lives because United States embassy staff had tipped off some of their local employees about Russian target lists and helped some of them flee Ukraine. None of the Ukrainians working for the Canadian embassy in Kyiv have been killed in the war so far, the sources said, but many remain angry. Canada has since returned its ambassador, Larisa Galadza, to Kyiv, along with several other top diplomats on rotation, although the embassy has yet to reopen. Most Canadian embassy staff remain in Poland, where the consular services are previously offered by the Kyiv embassy are still provided. Ukrainian staff members are still being paid, the sources said, although many are not working and most of the women have left Ukraine. The decision to leave without informing local staff members or providing them with security was based on a Canadian policy laid out in a Harper government memo in 2014. According to one of the diplomats who spoke to The Globe, the document said there should be no obligation care for local staff when an embassy is abandoned. Another of the diplomatic sources said the memo was written as justification for Canada’s decision in 2012 to close its embassy in Iran without evacuating local staff there. When asked about that policy and the events at the embassy in Ukraine, Global Affairs Canada spokeswoman Sabrina Williams said in an e-mail that department staff “are taking all appropriate measures to ensure the safety of staff and our businesses abroad”. Ms Williams also said Global Affairs does not “discuss the operational details of overseas missions for security reasons”. Ms. Galaja did not respond to a request for comment. Neither does Foreign Minister Mélanie Joly. The duty of care owed by diplomatic staff to local staff members has been interpreted in different ways by Canada over time. Halvard Leira, a fellow at the Norwegian Institute of International Affairs, wrote in a recent article in The Hague Journal of Diplomacy that, during the fall of Saigon in 1975, while the United States evacuated thousands of Vietnamese personnel and their families, including embassy staff , “Canadian embassy in Saigon evacuated with souvenirs and cars, but no local staff”. Conversely, when the Canadian embassy in Beirut was vacated in 1985, local staff members were allowed to immigrate to Canada. The United States, Mr. Leira noted, has often created special visa programs for local embassy staff who are potentially at risk. When Canada evacuated its embassy in Kabul as the Taliban seized control of Afghanistan in August 2021, the federal government offered resettlement to local staff through a special immigration program for Afghan nationals who had assisted the Canadian mission there. In Ukraine, male embassy staff working locally were stuck in the country once the war started because Ukrainian men of combat age were prohibited from leaving. Several Ukrainian personnel have high public profiles, one source said, which puts them at constant risk of prosecution if captured by Russian invasion forces. Ukrainian staff members told diplomatic sources that they found it particularly distressing to watch Canadian embassy staff try to evacuate the pets while the local officials stayed behind. Although the Ukrainian officials were not officially assisted by the Canadian government, their Canadian colleagues assisted them unofficially. An online fundraising initiative by Canadian embassy staff member Alexandra Formanek, circulated primarily among Canadians who had worked in Ukraine, raised nearly $90,000 for local staff. The fund helped many to move out of the country on their own. One of the listed donors is Oksana Smerechuk, wife of a former ambassador to Ukraine, Roman Waschuk. “Some of these employees have been working for Canada since the early 1990s,” he wrote on the fundraising website, “often going above and beyond to help Canadians. Now is the time to join in and help them.” The Morning Update and Afternoon Update newsletters are written by Globe editors, giving you a concise summary of the day’s most important headlines. Sign up today.
