Crisis Management

"To put it bluntly, it was never a major concern to me or to Moscow."
"It was never antagonistic or an aggressive intent to do something. To use a vulgar expression, we never fished."
"[Spying] is the game that every country is involved in [but Canada hasn't been of much interest for Russian espionage]."
"So you're not at the centre of our concern. There are other countries that are probably more tempting targets for our intelligence, like we are a more tempting target for their intelligence."
"Russia gained nothing whatsoever. If you ask your special services, they will say it was mostly their problem and not our adventure."
Russian Ambassador to Canada Georgiy Mamedov

THE CANADIAN PRESS/Chris Young   Georgiy Mamedov, Russian ambassador to Canada: there will be no intervention. Promise.

Ambassador Mamedov happens to be the dean of the diplomatic corps [senior] foreign diplomat in Canada, but he's now on his way, assigned elsewhere, as a seasoned representative of his country. He's the man who scoffed at reporters' questions several months back with respect to Russia's intentions over Ukraine, when he asserted with the authority that his position places in him that his country had no intention whatever of claiming Crimea and/or conspiring against the government in Kyiv, or mounting a military incursion into Ukraine.

"Whoever discusses rumours about Russian military intervention in Ukraine is committing an insult to the intellect of the Canadian public, full stop."

Nothing, it appears, fazes him. Calm and collected, he has a firm grip on relationships and knows intimately how the Kremlin will act and react. Intelligence that he keeps confined beyond the reach of inquisitive journalists, let alone his Canadian counterpart and in this manner he serves his country well as a loyal servant. His bland assertions tinged with cynical humour are meant to be taken with a grain of salt, and they most certainly are.

On the matter of espionage when a Canadian naval officer initiated contact with the embassy claiming he could deliver high-impact secret data to them for a fee, he is dismissive. Nothing ventured, nothing gained goes that old adage but in this case something was certainly ventured, gaining claims the ambassador, nothing whatever. Spurning the value of Canadian intelligence, which embarrassed Canada with its Five Eyes partners?

Or simply acknowledging that Jeffrey Delisle was incapable of delivering assets of any true value to Moscow? He was willing to betray his country's trust in him as a loyal Canadian in return for cash, and the relationship worked for him for awhile. In the final analysis what he gained was transitory and hardly worth the effort, as in all likelihood was the data he imparted to those who paid for his efforts to avail himself of cash in trade of honour.

On the other hand, in characterizing the affair as a distracting sideshow from the vastly more serious intelligence-sharing operations that is capable of ensuring countries remain safe from terrorist attacks and other threats, he's probably right. To a degree, that is. There is also the not-insignificant effect of principle, devotion to country and patriotic duty, all of it deliberately besmirched through the avails of a pathetic turncoat.