Trudeau and Chinese Premier Li Keqiang agreed to annual meetings and the eventual establishment of a mechanism to discuss national security and rule of law.
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China is Canada’s top export market for the oilseed, and Ottawa has taken an increasingly strong line in talks on a new standard, which industry participants say would significantly raise costs for exporters.
“What China is proposing to do is have a government mandated one per cent limit on dockage, which is lower then anywhere else in the world”, says Canola Council of Canada vice president of government relations Brian Innes, “in fact, no where in the world is lower then 2.5 per cent”.
Prime Minister Trudeau vowed that the Canadian new government will continue the friendship tradition with China.
Negotiating teams from the two countries were now meeting in Beijing, Canada’s Trade Minister Chrystia Freeland said. “China blames his predecessor for the current poor relations but still believes Trudeau could bring changes”.
During his remarks, Trudeau noted that his father, former prime minister Pierre Elliott Trudeau, played an important role in establishing a partnership between the two countries and he is “very happy to be extending that effort now”. A September 1 deadline will see new restrictions come into force that will prevent Canadian canola exporters from accessing their number-one customer, the Chinese market.
Given that the Liberal Party owes much of its electoral success to women and young voters, he said the government can not ignore concerns over China’s treatment of minorities and dissidents.
“Any economic strategy that ignores China or that treats that valuable relationship as anything less than critically important is not just short-sighted, it’s irresponsible”, he said.
A senior Canadian official said Wednesday that some technical discussions related to free trade with China have been held and will continue, but the official stressed that there have been no negotiations.
Trudeau has also submitted Canada’s application to join a controversial new global infrastructure bank led by China.
A week later, Michael Chan, a Chinese-Canadian who was Ontario’s provincial minister of citizenship, immigration and global trade, defended China’s human rights practices in a column on a Canadian Chinese-language website, 51.ca.
China founded the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank to provide other countries in the region access to cash for such areas as transportation, power and telecommunications.
Negotiating teams from both countries were meeting in Beijing, Canada’s Trade Minister Chrystia Freeland said.
Closer ties, Trudeau says, would release untapped prosperity at home and promote Canadian values like good governance and the rule of law in China.
Chinese state media said in January that Garratt had been indicted in Dandong, a city in China’s northeast right on the border with North Korea, where the Garratts had operated a Christian coffee shop since 2008.
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Trudeau is seeking deeper ties with China but a the canola spat, government divisions over China policy and the case of a detained citizen could limit his gains.
