![](https://d2eehagpk5cl65.cloudfront.net/img/q60/uploads/2023/01/Canada-Flag-300x180.jpg)
![](https://d2eehagpk5cl65.cloudfront.net/img/q60/uploads/2023/01/Canada-Flag-300x180.jpg)
Final week, I wrote in regards to the case of Maria Kartasheva, a Russian immigrant whose utility for Canadian citizenship was blocked as a result of a Russian court docket convicted her of the “crime” of talking out in opposition to Russian atrocities in Ukraine. She might even doubtlessly have been deported again to Russia, the place an eight-year jail sentence awaited her. For causes outlined in my earlier submit, this was a really ridiculous determination. Fortuitously, Canada’s Ministry of Immigration, Refugees, and Citizenship has now introduced a reversal of this earlier motion, and Kartasheva will probably be granted citizenship, in spite of everything:
A Russian antiwar activist residing in Ottawa has been granted Canadian citizenship in spite of everything, regardless of a conviction in Russia that threatened to disqualify her.
Maria Kartasheva, 30, has lived in Ottawa since 2019.
She was convicted below a Russian regulation handed shortly after the full-scale invasion in of Ukraine in February 2022. The regulation prohibits “public dissemination of deliberately false information about the use of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation.”
Her convictions stem from two weblog entries from March 2022, when she posted images and wrote in Russian expressing her horror at the Bucha bloodbath…..
Below Canadian immigration guidelines, if an applicant is charged with against the law abroad that might be indictable below Canada’s Legal Code, their utility will be revoked or refused….
In line with a December letter from Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC), the crime she dedicated in Russia “would equate to false information under subsection 372(1) of the Criminal Code of Canada….”
On Tuesday afternoon, Canadian Minister of Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Marc Miller mentioned in a social media submit that Kartasheva “will not face deportation and has been invited to become a Canadian citizen.”
I’m glad that sanity prevailed on this case. But it surely’s ridiculous the difficulty was ever doubtful within the first place. Talking out in opposition to horrific conflict crimes is unquestionably not the sort of “crime” that may ever justify denial of citizenship or deportation from any liberal democracy worthy of the identify.
For the reason that begin of the battle, I’ve been making the case that the US and different Western nations—together with Canada – ought to open their doorways to Russians fleeing Vladimir Putin’s more and more repressive regime. Even for many who would not go as far on this route as I advocate, the case of a dissenter dealing with imprisonment for talking out in opposition to Putin’s conflict conflict needs to be a no brainer.