Summoning the Australian Chargé d’affaires to the Russian Foreign Ministry

The war in Ukraine on February 24, 2022, following the heavy sanctions imposed by the United States and its allies against Russia, has greatly increased the gap between Moscow and the West. The occasional interventions of the Western Front in this matter bring the reaction of the Kremlin officials.

According to the Reuters news agency, the Russian Foreign Ministry announced today (Monday) the summoning of the Australian Chargé d’Affaires in this country due to the interventionist statements of the Canberra Embassy in Moscow on social networks.

This summons takes place after the account of the Australian embassy in Moscow published an article condemning the holding of the Russian presidential elections in four regions of Zaporizhia, Donetsk, Luhansk and Kherson. Russia annexed these four regions from Ukraine during the September 2022 referendum. The Crimean Peninsula was also annexed to Russia in 2014.

The Australian embassy wrote on its channel on the Telegram social network: holding elections in the territories belonging to Ukraine is a violation of international law.

In response to this issue, the Russian Foreign Ministry issued a statement saying: We have expressed our highest level of protest against Canberra’s action by summoning the Australian Chargé d’Affaires and demanded that this embassy delete its message on this social network.

The Russian presidential election, which was held on March 15-17, was associated with the decisive victory of Vladimir Putin, the current president of Russia, with more than 87% of the votes. However, Western countries called these elections unfair and undemocratic.