The head of Canada’s election-monitoring mission in Ukraine says allies, including the Canadian government, should be ready to respond to a possible escalation of tensions in eastern Ukraine as the incoming president attempts to end a five-year war with Russian separatists.
Speaking to reporters on Wednesday, Lloyd Axworthy said Ukrainian president-elect Volodymyr Zelensky is expected to reach out to Russia in the coming weeks in an attempt to find a resolution to the war in the eastern Donbass region that has killed more than 13,000 people. Mr. Zelensky, a comedian and actor with no political experience, won Ukraine’s presidential election in a landslide victory Sunday.
“Friends and allies of Ukraine and international organizations should be ready to have in effect a quick response because … everybody suggests that [Russian President Vladimir] Putin will be making a move in the next two or three weeks,” Mr. Axworthy said.
“I think Mr. Putin just has one basic ambition and that is to destabilize Ukraine so that he can bring them under the orbit and also not have them as a front-line border example of a democratic system working. So I think he’s 24/7 on this file.”
Mr. Axworthy, a former Liberal cabinet minister, said Canada needs to continue to be a strong ally of Ukraine, as it has been under the leadership of Foreign Affairs Minister Chrystia Freeland. Ms. Freeland, who is of Ukrainian descent and a harsh critic of Mr. Putin, was blacklisted by Russia in 2014 for advocating for Western sanctions against the country.
A senior Canadian government official, who was not authorized to speak publicly on the matter, said the Group of Seven recently discussed concerns about Mr. Putin testing the new Ukrainian president. The source said Canadian embassy officials have been working hard to establish a relationship with Mr. Zelensky’s team so Canada can support his government if Mr. Putin attempts to further interfere in Ukraine.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau spoke with Mr. Zelensky on Tuesday, congratulating him on his victory and reiterating “Canada’s unwavering support for Ukraine’s sovereignty and territorial integrity,” according to a statement from Mr. Trudeau’s office. A spokesperson for Ms. Freeland’s office said Canada condemns Russia’s illegal occupation of Crimea and the violence in eastern Ukraine.
Mr. Zelensky stars in a popular television show in which he plays a schoolteacher who becomes president after a video of him blasting corruption goes viral. He named his political party after the TV program: Servant of the People. Last weekend, he defeated incumbent President Petro Poroshenko, whose message fell flat with Ukrainian voters struggling to survive on meagre wages and pay soaring utility bills.
Mr. Axworthy said there are questions about how the celebrity president-elect, who made few promises in his vague campaign platform, will lead Ukraine.
“With governments that are elected with these very large populist movements behind them, I think there’s always a risk that they may end up trying to limit the constitutional and the democratic principles,” Mr. Axworthy said.
Mr. Axworthy led a group of 160 Canadian volunteers who monitored Ukraine’s presidential elections, visiting more than 2,300 polling stations across the country on April 21. He said the mission reported a 95-per-cent voter satisfaction rate across the polls and saw very few irregularities outside of Crimea and the Russian-backed Donbass region, where people were unable to vote.
The Canadian monitoring mission set up voting stations near the Donbass and Crimea border but internal obstruction by the Russians, including landmines, border delays and online propaganda, prevented Ukrainians in those regions from casting a ballot, Mr. Axworthy said. He recommended the voter deterrence problem be addressed before Ukraine’s parliamentary elections later this year.
Outside of the Kremlin-backed regions, Mr. Axworthy said the Ukrainian government’s foreign-interference-detection system prevented any major attempts to undermine the election; he plans to take his findings back to Ottawa as it attempts to tackle similar interference concerns when Canadians head to the polls this fall. Mr. Axworthy said he was also impressed by Ukraine’s adoption of mail-in ballots and mobile voting, which increased voter participation among people with disabilities and the elderly.
With a report from the Associated Press