Canadian attitudes towards China have undergone a dramatic shift – from ambivalence to distrust – since the two countries became locked in a diplomatic dispute in late 2018. This paper argues that these hardened sentiments are unlikely to dissipate and Canada–China relations seem to have entered a new, warier phase.
A thumbnail history of Canada–China relations
Canadian Prime Minister Pierre Elliott Trudeau, the father of the current prime minister, was one of the first Western leaders to establish diplomatic relations with the People’s Republic of China in 1970, nine years before the US did the same. Canada’s policy towards China has more or less tracked that of the US since then. Like Washington, Ottawa pursued a policy of engagement that rested on hopes for the commercial potential of the relationship, and on the expectation that China would gradually liberalize its domestic affairs and become a responsible member of the international community. This approach persisted even after the indiscriminate killing of protesters in response to the Tiananmen Square demonstrations in 1989. In the aftermath of that event, Canada condemned the Chinese leadership and suspended cooperation in several areas, but as Joe Clark, then secretary of state for foreign affairs, put it: ‘We have not become, and will not become, anti-China […] We must try to avoid measures that would push China towards isolation.’3 Canada quickly resumed cooperation with China, again aligning with the US stance.
Prime Minister Stephen Harper briefly abandoned this policy when he gained power in 2006, accusing previous Liberal and Conservative governments of failing to defend human rights and democracy in China. Among other gestures indicating a shift in the Canadian approach, Harper pledged that he would not sell out important Canadian values ‘to the almighty dollar’;4 met the Dalai Lama in his Ottawa office (with a Tibetan flag displayed upon his desk); and announced pointedly that he would not attend the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing. By 2009, however, Harper was travelling to China and promoting bilateral cooperation and trade, prompting one commentator to write of his ‘Damascene conversion to the importance of Asia’.5 The conversion seemed complete in 2012, when Harper praised the two countries’ ‘strategic partnership’ and announced, jointly with his Chinese counterpart Wen Jiabao, the successful negotiation of a bilateral foreign investment promotion and protection agreement.6 The two leaders also launched a joint study to examine ‘the feasibility and some of the potentials of a free-trade agreement’ (FTA).7
By late 2017 Canada and China appeared poised to announce the formal start of negotiations towards an FTA. However, the two countries were ultimately unable to agree on the ground rules for the negotiations, leaving further discussions in limbo.
Justin Trudeau, who replaced Harper as prime minister in 2015, was also interested in expanding Canadian trade with China. President Xi Jinping and other Chinese officials greeted Trudeau’s election by proclaiming a ‘golden era’ in bilateral relations, but the Canadian leader was more circumspect. Before authorizing exploratory discussions on a possible Canada–China FTA, he pressed China to remove import restrictions on certain Canadian agricultural products and to release Kevin Garratt, a Canadian resident in China since 1984 who had been detained by Chinese authorities in 2014 and falsely accused of military espionage. Following Garratt’s release and return to Canada in September 2016, exploratory discussions proceeded, and by late 2017 Canada and China appeared poised to announce the formal start of negotiations towards an FTA. However, the two countries were ultimately unable to agree on the ground rules for the negotiations, leaving further discussions in limbo. Meanwhile, US President Trump’s threats to disrupt trade with Canada had become the focus of the Canadian government’s attention.
Such was the status of Canada–China relations in late 2018, when the US Department of Justice formally requested that the Canadian authorities detain Meng Wanzhou as she was changing planes at Vancouver airport, pending an extradition request that accused Meng of the federal crimes of bank fraud and wire fraud. In addition to being the chief financial officer of Huawei, China’s foremost telecommunications company, Meng is the daughter of its founder Ren Zhengfei, a former member of the People’s Liberation Army who reportedly has strong connections to the Communist Party of China. As reported in The Globe and Mail, Trudeau insisted that there was no political involvement in the Canadian decision to arrest Meng.8 Indeed, such decisions fall to career law-enforcement officials in Canada’s Department of Justice, and ultimately to Canadian judges, who review extradition requests. The justice minister technically has the power to suspend such proceedings, but typically plays a role only at the final stage: deciding whether to surrender the suspect to the requesting state.9 Nevertheless, the Chinese government accused Canada of making a politically motivated arrest.
Days after Meng’s arrest, Chinese authorities detained Michael Spavor, a Canadian business executive, and Michael Kovrig, a former Canadian diplomat working as a policy adviser for the International Crisis Group think-tank, arresting both men on ‘suspicion of engaging in activities that endanger national security’.10 They have reportedly been held under harsh conditions in Chinese detention facilities,11 whereas Meng has been afforded due process and is living in one of her two Vancouver mansions for the duration of her extradition hearing, where she is represented by a team of lawyers. It was not the first occasion on which China had detained Canadians in an apparent bid to pressure Canada.12
Two weeks after the detention of Kovrig and Spavor, in January 2019, Canadian Robert Schellenberg, who in November 2018 had been sentenced by Chinese courts to a 15-year jail term for drug-trafficking, was retried at short notice. Judges at the second hearing deliberated for barely an hour before ruling that Schellenberg’s previous sentence was too light and sentencing him to death – proceedings so extraordinary and rapid that even Chinese legal experts openly expressed surprise. In March, China also restricted imports of certain Canadian agricultural goods – firstly canola, and subsequently beef and pork. The new restrictions proved painful to the agricultural sector: Canada’s exports to China of canola seeds, alone, amounted to C$2.7 billion in 2018.13 Taken together, China’s actions seemed intended to coerce the Canadian government into suspending the extradition proceedings against Meng and releasing her.
3 Quoted in Evans, P. (2014), Engaging China: Myth, Aspiration, and Strategy in Canadian Policy from Trudeau to Harper, Toronto: University of Toronto Press, p. 40.
4 Laghi, B. (2006), ‘Harper promises he won’t “sell out” on rights’, The Globe and Mail, 16 November 2006, https://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/national/harper-promises-he-wont-sell-out-on-rights/article971520/ (accessed 19 May 2020).
5 Ibbitson, J. (2009), ‘A new era for Canada rises in the East’, The Globe and Mail, 8 December 2009, https://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/
politics/a-new-era-for-canada-rises-in-the-east/article1346340/ (accessed 19 May 2020).
6 CBC News (2012), ‘Harper’s “strategic partner” China yields investment deal’, 8 February 2012, https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/harper-s-strategic-partner-china-yields-investment-deal-1.1137462 (accessed 8 Jun. 2020).
7 MacCharles, T. (2012), ‘Harper in China: Free trade agreement with China in Canada’s sights?’, The Star, 11 February 2012, https://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2012/02/11/harper_in_china_free_trade_agreement_with_china_in_canadas_sights.html (accessed 19 May 2020).
8 Fife, R. and Chase, S. (2018), ‘Trudeau says he knew about the arrest of a top Huawei executive’, The Globe and Mail, 6 December 2018, https://www.theglobeandmail.com/politics/article-canada-prepared-for-possible-chinese-cyber-retaliation-over-arrest-of/ (accessed 19 May 2020).
9 Government of Canada (2020), ‘General Overview of the Canadian Extradition Process’, Department of Justice, https://www.justice.gc.ca/eng/cj-jp/emla-eej/extradition.html (accessed 8 Jun. 2020).
10 Fifield, A. and Coletta, A. (2018), ‘Second Canadian detained in China amid row over Huawei extradition’, The Washington Post, 13 December 2018, https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/asia_pacific/beijing-suggests-think-tank-that-employed-analyst-they-arrested-is-operating-illegally-in-china/2018/12/12/74847c42-fdec-11e8-ba87-8c7facdf6739_story.html (accessed 19 Jun. 2020).
11 Vanderklippe, N. (2019), ‘365 days of detention in China: What life is like for Canadians Michael Spavor and Michael Kovrig’, The Globe and Mail, 9 December 2019, https://www.theglobeandmail.com/world/article-michael-kovrig-michael-spavor-china-detained-canadians-huawei/ (accessed 19 May 2020).
12 Paris, R. (2019), ‘Canada Is on the Front Lines of Challenges to Rule of Law’, Chatham House Expert Comment, 25 January 2019, https://www.chathamhouse.org/expert/comment/canada-front-lines-challenges-rule-law (accessed 19 May 2020).
13 Canola Council of Canada (2019), ‘Challenges persist for canola seed exports to China’, 21 March 2019, https://www.canolacouncil.org/news/challenges-persist-for-canola-seed-exports-to-china (accessed 8 Jun. 2020).