The legal action over the lease came as Russia announced another 48 Australians would be banned from travelling to Russia, including Victorian Deputy Premier Jacinta Allan, former spy chief Duncan Lewis and former senator Stephen Loosley, the latter two sit on local board of defence company Thales.
The notice from Russia’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said the travel bans were in response to Australian sanctions against Russian figures and said the 48 were helping create the “anti-Russian agenda” in Australia.
A spokesman for Home Affairs Minister Clare O’Neil said the government had been notified of the legal case on Friday afternoon.
“Russia’s challenge to the validity of the law is not unexpected. This is part of the Russian playbook,” he said.
The Albanese government last week rushed laws into Parliament terminating the lease on the advice of security agencies. The legislation does acknowledge compensation may need to be paid. The changes received bipartisan support.
Russia signed a lease in 2008 to build a new embassy on the land, which is next to Parliament House.
While Australia has not expelled Russian diplomats following Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine, the National Capital Authority, which manages land use in Canberra, in August last year terminated the lease because of a failure to develop the site in the timeframe required.
However, Russia successfully challenged that decision in the Federal Court, prompting the Albanese government’s bid to use legislation to strip Russia of the land.
According to court documents, Russian Ambassador to Australia Aleksey Pavlovsky said the Russian government had already spent about $8.2 million ($US5.5 million) and completed a consular building and fencing around the block.
Much of the rest of the block, though, is littered with builders’ rubble, while it emerged a Russian diplomat has been living in a temporary workers’ hut on site since the law came into effect.
As media maintained a vigil around the block on Friday, the unknown diplomat remained inside the portable hut with the blinds closed for much of the day. When AFR Weekend visited about mid-afternoon, a lone Federal Police officer was keeping watch over the block.
Mr Albanese was dismissive of the diplomat camping out and expressed confidence the matter would be resolved in Australia’s favour.
“When we considered this, of course, we anticipated that Russia would not be happy with our response,” he said.
“We’re very confident of our position and processes are under way for the Commonwealth to formalise possession of the site.
“But can I make this point? The national security threat that was represented by a Russian Embassy onsite is not the same as some bloke standing on a blade of grass on the site.”
But opposition foreign affairs spokesman Simon Birmingham said the PM’s comments made it seem like he was not taking the matter seriously.
“He seems to want to cast it aside as a bit of a joke, a bit of a laugh. This ultimately is a simple case of whether the law of the land is being complied with, and the Prime Minister ought to expect that to be the case and he ought to take that seriously,” Senator Birmingham said.