QMI AGENCY
Toronto Sun - Not only will the vodka in Vladivostok be ice cold today, so will the already stirred but now shaken diplomatic relations between Canada and Russia.
Straight up, it's a potent cocktail.
Not many countries support the whacked-out regime of Iran more than Russia and, with Foreign Minister John Baird's closure of the Canadian Embassy in Tehran yesterday and the booting out of Iran's diplomats in Ottawa, ultra-frigidity will likely be the tone of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit underway in Vladivostok, Russia.
This represents the strongest condemnation of Iran since the imposition of international sanctions.
It's a declaration of cold war.
Unless the agenda is rewritten, Prime Minister Stephen Harper is scheduled to have one-on-ones with both China's Hu Jintao and Russian president Vladimir Putin.
Canada's actions against Iran cannot be ignored.
With Baird also in Vladivostok, his announcement to pull our diplomats out of Iran, and kick their out of Ottawa, was perfectly timed.
In the end, he framed Canada's decision around protecting the safety of our diplomats, the final straw being that Iran's thugs cannot be trusted to respect any international conventions.
But with that now in play, the overall issue of Iran will have to be addressed by the two powerhouses who have been using their UN vetoes to assist Iran in supporting the tyranny of Syria's Bashar al-Assad.
Harper has them in a corner, and they will not be able to let it lie, not with the press from 21 Asia-Pacific countries asking for their reaction.
For Harper and Baird, Canada had to demonstrate its disdain for Iran with more than rhetoric, and to condemn its increasing military assistance to Syria, its anti-Israel hatred and its support for terrorism with the kind of action that would capture world headlines.
Mission accomplished.
This comes, coincidentally, at the same time U.S. Rep. Mike Rogers confirmed he was at the meeting in August in which Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, "at wits' end," blew up at U.S.-Israeli ambassador Daniel Shapiro over Barack Obama's lack of clarity on Iran's nuclear program.
Well, Canada has now made itself perfectly clear on all the evils regarding Iran -- and in Putin's own backyard.
All very ballsy.
But necessary.
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