Canada mocks Russia by suggesting edits to letter sent to the United Nations

Russia and Canada are in a spat after Canada annotated some scathing suggestions on Russia's letter to the United Nations, with Russia slamming it as childish.

In the letter, Russia is seeking support for its draft resolution on providing aid access and civilian protection in Ukraine.

Canada's UN Mission channelled teacher grading energy when it added in some changes to the letter in red text annotations - and they didn't hold back.

"I am reaching out to you with regard to an urgent matter related to the dire humanitarian situation in and around Ukraine," the original letter reads.

Sign up to our free Indy100 weekly newsletter

But Canada felt this didn't explain the full context of Russia's actions of invading Ukraine and added in: "INSERT: 'which we [Russia] have caused as a result of our illegal war of aggression.'"

In another part of the letter, it originally read: "Like other members of the international community, we are gravely concerned about its deterioration."

Again, Canada made some edits of their own as they crossed out the first few words and then added: "We are not gravely concerned about its deterioration," and included at the end of the sentence: "because we are the primary cause."

Russia accused its western colleagues of "choosing to promote the anti-Russian line by politicizing the humanitarian issue," to which Canada responded: "Do you think the UN membership actually believes this?"

At the end of the letter, Canada suggested an alternative paragraph to sign things off which blasted the Russian invasion to Ukraine: "We want you to know just how little we care about the human life we have destroyed."

Since sharing their heavily edited version with feedback, Canada's response has received over 59,000 likes and 20,000 retweets - but of course not everyone was amused with the response.

Dmitry Polyanskiy, first deputy permanent representative of Russia to the United Nations, retaliated to the suggestions on Thursday:

"Thank you @CanadaONU for this kindergarten-level Russophobic libel!" he tweeted.

"It only shows that your diplomatic skills and good manners are at lowest ebb and gives an idea why your country’s bid for a non-permanent seat in #SecurityCouncil was voted down twice in 20yrs by UN membership," Polyanskiy said, and included a thumbs-down emoji.

The Independent has a proud history of campaigning for the rights of the most vulnerable, and we first ran our Refugees Welcome campaign during the war in Syria in 2015. Now, as we renew our campaign and launch this petition in the wake of the unfolding Ukrainian crisis, we are calling on the government to go further and faster to ensure help is delivered. To find out more about our Refugees Welcome campaign, click here. To sign the petition click here. If you would like to donate then please click here for our GoFundMe page.

Have your say in our news democracy. Click the upvote icon at the top of the page to help raise this article through the indy100 rankings.