Ont. business owner burns Russian passport following country's invasion of Ukraine

Andrei Kovalevskii, owner of a massage and sauna business in Windsor, Ont., says he's spent years fighting against the Putin government. Its latest action of invading Ukraine has left him wanting to distance himself from his Russian roots altogether.

A man who was born in the Soviet Union but is now running a business in Windsor, Ont. said he has burned his Russian passport as a way of distancing himself against the country’s invasion of Ukraine.

In fact, Russia’s decision to invade Ukraine has even led him to stop speaking Russian to some of his peers.

“I think I better switch to English, because the Russian language is associated right now with the language of occupation, war and death,” Andrei Kovalevskii said in an interview with CTV News.

Kovalevskii, owner of the Windsor Massage and Steam Sauna, said he came to Canada 11 years ago after he was permitted to enter the country under the federal government’s Federal Skilled Trades Program.

The 50-year-old added he was born in the Kazakhstan portion of the United Socialist Soviet Republic, or U.S.S.R. Following the collapse, he and his family moved to the city of Kaliningrad in Russia. At the time, he said, he was participating in the opposition party against Vladimir Putin.

“After a certain time, I had to leave,” he said. “I tried to change the country from inside but it became too rough to participate in politics. A lot of my colleagues right now either immigrated, are in jail or have already been assassinated.”

For Kovalevskii, one of his goals upon moving to Canada has been to promote “Russian sovereign culture” in his local community.

“The beautiful composers, the classical writers … Anything left untouched by Putin is Russian sovereign culture,” he said, adding he even opened a Russian sauna, also known as a banya, as an addition to his massage business.

But despite wanting to find new ways to promote the culture, Kovalevskii said he’s always wanted to distance himself from the actions of the Russian government.

“I decided to extract my family out of the country because I didn't see the future for my daughter, or myself, or my wife in Russia. Now, I see it was the right decision.”

That decision, he said, has been reinforced by Russia’s recent invasion of Ukraine — which has seen anti-war protesters in Russia be arrested by police, the United Nations voting strongly against the invasion to continue further and many civilian deaths in highly-populated areas of Ukraine.

“It’s very emotional,” said Kovalevskii, adding he’s been monitoring Russian news outlets to see how they “brainwash the population.”

“They use sophisticated propaganda. If I watch the Russian news, I might even start turning to their side. So it's a hybrid war. It's not just a ground operation. It's a hybrid war and also an information war.”

The condemnation to Putin’s invasion of Ukraine has not just emerged through protests around the world and the U.N. voting against it, but also within Russia itself.

Video from Reuters shows Russians in St. Petersburg demonstrating Wednesday against the Putin government’s actions after jailed Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny called for Russians to stage daily protests.

The footage shows many of them being detained and carried away by police.

Following his interview with CTV News on Wednesday, Kovalevskii submitted photos which appear to show him burning his Russian passport in a fire pit.