Russia's ambassador to the UK used a photo from the stoner flick Harold & Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay to make a point about U.S. foreign policy on Wednesday, in a bizarre tweet about terrorism.
Alexander Yakovenko posted an image of actor Kal Penn from the 2008 comedy Harold & Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay in a Twitter rant criticizing the U.S. for its policy against the Islamic State in Iraq.
Yakovenko tweeted that "terrorists must be rejoicing" after the U.S. gave Iraq an ultimatum, saying that it would not aid Baghdad in the fight against the extremist group if the country took any aid from Russia.
US threatens to stop helping Iraq against ISIL if Baghdad asks Russia for help. The terrorists must be rejoicing pic.twitter.com/aKDaf1ae7q— Alexander Yakovenko (@Amb_Yakovenko) October 21, 2015
In the scene from the movie, an elderly woman sitting behind Penn's character, Kuman, on a plane reimagines him as a terrorist, getting him kicked off a plane and sent to Guantanamo Bay prison. Watch the clip in a scene below.
Penn thought the tweet, which essentially labelled him a terrorist, was hilarious, made all the more so by the fact that the scene was poking fun at racism in the U.S. He tweeted that he couldn't stop laughing after seeing the flub.
The Russian Federation ambassador to the UK tweeted this Harold & Kumar pic with seriousness. I can't stop laughing. https://t.co/ZsR041AAVJ— Kal Penn (@kalpenn) October 21, 2015
After Penn, who was once a White House staffer, called the ambassador out for his odd photo choice, the Russian embassy got involved. They rationalized that its difficult to find photos of "an actual terrorist laughing" and they had been thoroughly convinced by his performance in the slapstick comedy.
@kalpenn it is rather hard to spot an actual terrorist laughing. Your performance is convincing and therefore fit to illustrate the idea.— Russian Embassy, UK (@RussianEmbassy) October 21, 2015
Bizarre Twitter rants are nothing new for Yakovenko, who has found himself in hot water before for breaching diplomatic protocol and weighing in on the UK election.
After the embassy's attempt to smooth things over with Penn, the actor tweeted back his own approximation of what he thought a Russian Ambassador might look like:
.@Amb_Yakovenko thank you, Mr. Ambassador. pic.twitter.com/Df1d1wSGX4— Kal Penn (@kalpenn) October 21, 2015