‘Diminishes Melbourne’s standing’: Russia responds after City of Melbourne dumps St Petersburg

The Russian embassy has accused the City of Melbourne of bowing to “arm twisting” and “empty virtue signalling” by cutting its sister city ties to St Petersburg.

Melbourne’s sister city status with St Petersburg has come to an end, but the Russian embassy is not happy. Picture: David Crosling

Russia has hit back at Melbourne’s decision to sever ties with sister city St Petersburg, saying Melbourne’s standing as a renowned culture centre had been disminished.

Russia’s embassy in Canberra accused Melbourne City councillors of bowing to “arm twisting . . . from a few dozen of pro-Ukrainian activists” who held a protest outside Town Hall this week.

“Punished by this act of empty virtue signalling over Ukraine are, in fact, Melburnians,” said an embassy statement posted on social media.

On Tuesday, the council unanimously voted to permanently cut ties with St Petersburg after the relationship was suspended due to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Lord Mayor Sally Capp said councillors had sent “a very, very clear signal” that Melbourne stood with Ukraine and it was unacceptable what was happening there.

However, the Russian embassy said dumping the decades-long link with St Petersburg was wrong.

Protesters called for the council to cancel its Russian sister city relationship. Picture: Mark Stewart

“(It) diminishes the standing of Melbourne as the cultural heart of Australia and a renowned centre of the world’s culture,” it said.

“It was under the sister cities agreement that masterpieces from Hermitage were brought to the National Gallery of Victoria in 2015, or concerts of Russian music and the Dostoyevsky Museum exhibition organised in 2019, to mention but a few events.”

The embassy accused Ukrainians of bringing “evil ways” into multicultural Australia.

Australian Ukrainian leaders have accused Russia of war crimes and genocide during its invasion.

Australia’s honorary consul in St Petersburg, Sebastian FitzLyon, said Melbourne’s decision was understandable but sad.

“While (the relationship) lasted it was very good, there was quite a lot of cultural exchange between the two cities, there were student exchanges as well,” he said.

“Hopefully when this conflict is over the two cities will decide to get closer again because sister city relationships are where you start when you want to build relationships.”

Melbourne’s other current sister city links are with Tianjin in China, Thessaloniki in Greece, Boston in USA, Osaka in Japan, and Milan in Italy.