Foreign Minister Melanie Joly met with her Chinese counterpart Wang Yi in Beijing on Friday as the two countries appeared to be taking steps to ease ongoing tensions that have strained bilateral ties.
After the meeting, a senior government official told CBC News the two ministers had a “constructive and productive meeting” – the first time Canadian foreign ministers have met in person in Beijing in nearly seven years.
The meeting was held [Canada] “We were trying to achieve that in the bilateral relationship,” the source said. “We wanted to express our concerns and we wanted to address issues of common interest to the Chinese people and the Canadian people.”
Shared interests include climate and the environment, tracking fentanyl trafficking and working to improve trade relations, according to the sources.
“This is ‘practical diplomacy’ in action – having a productive dialogue and identifying challenges and concerns,” the source said.
Relations between the two countries soured after China detained Canadians Michael Kovrig and Michael Spavor, which Canada says were arbitrary, but have continued to deteriorate over reports of Chinese political interference and possible Canadian tariffs on Chinese-made electric vehicles.
After the meeting, China issued an official statement saying, “China-Canada relations have experienced difficulties, this is not what China wants and Canada needs to seriously reflect on it.”
“There is no fundamental conflict of interests between China and Canada. The peoples of our two countries have a long history of friendly exchanges,” the translated statement said. “China-Canada relations have long been at the forefront of relations between China and the Western countries.”
The statement did not mention possible trade tensions between the two countries, China’s arbitrary imprisonment of Kovrig and Spavor, or allegations of Chinese interference in Canadian politics.
Those allegations include Chinese interference in elections, efforts to set up “police stations” to intimidate and track Chinese who have moved to Canada, and the role of Chinese diplomats in trying to target the family of Conservative MP Michael Chong, who has been critical of China’s treatment of Uighur Muslims in the Xinjiang Uighur Autonomous Region.
China says it seeks to improve ties but official statements say some issues are off the table.
“All issues relating to Taiwan, Tibet, Xinjiang and Hong Kong are China’s internal affairs and no outside interference will be tolerated,” the statement said.
Human Rights Watch says at least one million Uighurs and other Muslims in Xinjiang have been arbitrarily detained in prisons and “pretrial detention” facilities that China calls “re-education” or “vocational training” camps.
In 2021, a majority of MPs, including the majority of Liberal MPs present, voted in favour of a Conservative motion to declare that China’s actions in the western Xinjiang region meet the definition of genocide set out in the 1948 UN Genocide Convention.
The final vote was 266 in favor and zero against. Two MPs formally abstained. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and almost all of his cabinet were absent from the vote.
The Canadian Department of Foreign Affairs has yet to issue an official statement detailing its views on the meeting.
