LILLEY: Trudeau’s position on Putin is right one but it took a while

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Justin Trudeau could also be in the correct place on Ukraine, making the correct strikes and saying the correct issues, nevertheless it took him some time to get right here.

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The stand Trudeau’s Liberal authorities is taking now can be unrecognizable to the naive sunny methods group that was first elected in late 2015.

That group, backed by Ottawa’s overseas coverage institution, was sure that Stephen Harper’s powerful stance on Russia’s 2014 invasion of Ukraine to take Crimea amounted to little greater than battle mongering. They opposed isolating the Vladimir Putin regime, they usually favoured elevated engagement with Russia.

Truly, that was their second place.

In the course of the 2015 election marketing campaign, Trudeau made positive that nobody might accuse him of being tender on Putin’s Russia. With a couple of million Canadians of Ukrainian heritage, he went via the election saying he’d inform off Putin simply as Harper had.

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“Canada must proceed to face strongly with the worldwide neighborhood pushing again towards the bully that’s Vladimir Putin,” Trudeau mentioned throughout a marketing campaign cease in Toronto days earlier than the 2015 election.

Shortly after that, issues modified.

Prompted by voices on the Toronto Star, in academia and among the many cadre of former diplomats who inhabit Ottawa’s higher neighbourhoods and nonetheless maintain sway, Canada’s coverage modified. Quickly, standing as much as Putin was a foul concept. Speaking to him, partaking with him, was an awesome concept.

Trudeau’s first overseas minister, Stephane Dion, referred to as the Harper authorities’s coverage of punishing Russia for invading Ukraine in 2014 ineffective.

“I might say that the method of the previous authorities was ideological and irrational,” Dion mentioned in January 2016.

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He began to re-establish relations with Russia and stopped offering very important satellite tv for pc imaging of Russian troops to Ukraine. Dion was against a Liberal promise to cross laws to enact a Magnitsky regulation in Canada to focus on belongings of Russian human rights abusers.

Such a regulation solely got here to cross when a Conservative senator launched a invoice which the Home of Commons voted on after Dion had left to take a diplomatic appointment.

Dion even dropped sanctions on Putin’s mini-me henchman Alexander Lukashenko, the president of Belarus. The Might 7, 2016 information launch even used “Canada is again” language to advertise the transfer.

“Pursuant to the Authorities of Canada’s dedication to diplomatic re-engagement with the worldwide neighborhood,” the discharge mentioned within the opening line as the federal government applauded itself for cozying as much as a dictator.

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Canada by no means left the world stage below Stephen Harper — that’s a fable. We didn’t even quit on multilateralism. Our overseas coverage merely switched the emphasis from teams just like the United Nations to the G7, G20, NATO and powerful bilateral relationships. We stood with allies like Ukraine, Israel, the US and Britain, and we signed and engaged in a number of world commerce offers.

After they have been first elected, the Trudeau Liberals had a rose-coloured glasses view of overseas affairs, particularly when it got here to the world’s most belligerent international locations — Russia, China and Iran. These have been the international locations Trudeau and his crew needed to maneuver us nearer to whereas promising to re-engage with the UN and bolster Canada’s peacekeeping.

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Apart from appointing Bob Rae as Canada’s ambassador to the world physique, a smart appointment, the remainder by no means occurred. Ultimately, Trudeau would appoint his first overseas affairs minister Dion, the Putin apologist, to be Canada’s ambassador to Germany, a place he holds to this present day however shouldn’t.

Now, Trudeau is firmly on the facet of Ukraine, together with the remainder of the world and that’s the proper place to be. It took prompting and plodding for him to get right here. He wanted to beat his earlier naive view, his dependence on Ottawa’s overseas coverage institution, and even his reluctance to offer deadly assist to Ukraine.

That he received to this new place must be applauded, that it took him so lengthy shouldn’t be forgotten.

blilley@postmedia.com