Vladimir Kara-Murza, Yulia Navalnaya and Ilya Yashin in Berlin on Nov. 17, 2024. The three will visit Canada in an effort to convince Ottawa to offer asylum to anti-war Russians being held in U.S. detention centres.Markus Schreiber/The Canadian Press
One of Russia’s most prominent opposition figures is visiting Canada next week, hoping to push Ottawa to open its doors to Russian dissidents who are at risk of being deported from the United States and back into the arms of the Vladimir Putin’s security services.
The lobbying mission by Ilya Yashin, one of Mr. Putin’s loudest critics, is a follow-up to a letter to Prime Minister Mark Carney that was published in September.
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That plea called on Canada to offer asylum to anti-war Russians being held in U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention centres ahead of their expected deportation back to Russia. The letter was written by Mr. Yashin, along with fellow opposition leaders Yulia Navalnaya and Vladimir Kara-Murza.
Mr. Yashin said Mr. Carney’s office hadn’t formally replied to the letter, which was first published in The Globe and Mail on Sept. 3, though other Canadian officials had since reached out regarding the issue. The 42-year-old – who was released from a Russian prison last year after spending two years there for criticizing the invasion of Ukraine – was nonetheless optimistic about his three-day trip to Ottawa.
Mr. Yashin will be accompanied by Natalia Arno, president of the Free Russia Foundation, a Washington-based non-profit organization. The pair will hold meetings with MPs and senators, as well as Global Affairs Canada.
Ilya Yashin, pictured in Berlin in November, 2024, is an anti-Putin activist and former Moscow city councillor.Jacobia Dahm/The Globe and Mail
“I know it’s a difficult request. We knew we wouldn’t just write the letter, and they would reply ‘Yes of course!’ It’s a political process, a political question,” Mr. Yashin said in a video interview from his home in exile in Berlin.
He nonetheless hoped the Canadian government would grasp the urgency of the situation. “Many people are in detention centres, many have already received their decisions, and could now be deported at any moment.”
Mr. Kara-Murza plans to separately raise the issue when he travels to Canada in the coming months to receive the honourary citizenship he received while he was also in jail for speaking out against the war in Ukraine. Mr. Kara-Murza told The Globe he would press “the need for Canada to use its strong voice in international affairs, including within the G7 and the OSCE, to defend democratic principles that the U.S. government in its current form sadly no longer defends.”
Mr. Yashin, a longtime anti-Putin activist and former Moscow city councillor, and Mr. Kara-Murza, a former aide to the assassinated opposition leader Boris Nemtsov, were both released from prison in August, 2024, as part of a Cold War-style prisoner exchange between Russia and the U.S.
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Ms. Navalnaya, meanwhile, is the widow of Alexey Navalny, who was Mr. Putin’s most prominent critic until he was found dead in his prison cell in February, 2024, in what many Russians believe was another political murder.
The trio have since emerged as the de facto leaders of Russia’s opposition in exile, amid a harsh Kremlin crackdown on almost all forms of dissent inside the country.
The September letter called for Canada to assist “several hundred opposition-minded Russians” who were in danger of being deported from the U.S. However, Ms. Arno said the opposition was now focused on getting Ottawa to open a special immigration channel for a list of 30 well-known anti-Putin activists.
“There are, I would say, over 1,000 Russians in ICE detention, if not more, but we cannot vouch for all of them. But we can vouch for those who are core activists, journalists and human rights defenders,” she said.
Two planeloads of Russian nationals – carrying more than 80 people total – flew from the U.S. to Moscow over the summer. Some were detained upon arrival.
While Ms. Arno said there had since been a pause in such mass deportation flights, it may only have been a function of the 43-day U.S. government shutdown that ended on Nov. 12.
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Ms. Arno said the Free Russia Foundation, which maintains an office in Kyiv, was also pushing for Canada to assist Ukrainian nationals being held in ICE detention and at risk of being deported back to a country that has been at war since Mr. Putin launched his invasion almost four years ago.
After the meetings in Ottawa, Mr. Yashin plans to visit Montreal and Toronto, where he will meet with members of the Russian-Canadian diaspora and urge them to do more to oppose Mr. Putin and his war.
“People can engage in different forms of political activism. Some can go to protests. Some can donate money to buy generators for Ukraine. Some can volunteer with opposition organizations,” said Mr. Yashin, who has organized a series of similar meetings with the Russian diaspora around Europe since his release from prison.
“I want these groups of Russian diaspora, from different cities around the world, to become one movement – a movement against the war in Ukraine, a movement for Russia to become a free, peaceful and democratic country.”