Photo: The Canadian Press The Rev. Brent Hawkes, the pastor who performed the first legally recognized same-sex marriages in Canada, drives a car during the Toronto Pride Parade on Sunday, June 28, 2015. Russia today imposed sanctions on a number of Canadian public figures, including of Lt. Gen. Michael Wright, Chief of the Canadian Forces Intelligence Command and the well-known Toronto pastor. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Chris Young Russia imposed sanctions on a number of Canadian public figures on Friday, including Lt.-Gen. Michael Wright, head of the Canadian Forces Intelligence Command, and the pastor who performed Canada’s first same-sex weddings. Moscow’s latest round of sanctions targets multiple officials of Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland, who has been an outspoken critic of Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine and is of Ukrainian heritage. The media team of Foreign Minister Mélanie Joly, Maeva Proteau and Adrien Blanchard are also banned from entering Russia. Also on the Kremlin’s list are Ian Scott, head of the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission regulator, which banned Russian state broadcaster RT from Canada’s airwaves this year, and retired general Rick Hillier, a former chief of the defense staff. Russia has also sanctioned pastor Brent Hawkes, the LGBTQ activist who performed the first legal same-sex marriages in Canada, and Juno-winning singer-songwriter Chantal Kreviazuk, who is of Ukrainian and indigenous heritage. The Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement that it was taking the measures in response to Canadian sanctions, including those against Patriarch Kirill, head of the Russian Orthodox Church, which the ministry said was an insult to Orthodox believers around the world.
