Canadian officials walk out of G20 meeting in protest of Russia's participation

A group of Canadian officials, led by Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland, were among a larger group staging a walkout during a G20 meeting on Wednesday, protesting Russia's continued involvement in the organization.

Freeland, who is also Canada's Minister of Finance, walked out of a meeting of finance ministers of the G20, later saying that she was accompanied by "a number of our democratic partners."

"The world’s democracies will not stand idly by in the face of continued Russian aggression and war crimes. Today Canada and a number of our democratic partners walked out of the G20 plenary when Russia sought to intervene," Freeland tweeted shortly after the walkout.

According to CTV News, some of the individuals shown in solidarity with the walkout on Freeland's photo posted on Twitter include such prominent high-ranking officials and central bankers as:

• Tiff Macklem, the Bank of Canada Governor
• Jay Powell, the Chairman of the US Federal Reserve
• Serhiy Marchenko, the Ukrainian Finance Minister
• Paolo Gentiloni,  the European Commissioner for the Economy

CTV further reports that an anonymous source present at the meeting tells them that Freeland directly criticized Russian officials present, telling them that they were "complicit in war crimes," and that they had a moral obligation to convince the Putin administration to stand down and end the war against neighboring Ukraine.

Failing this, they should simply resign from their positions, allegedly continued Freeman.