Canadian Armed Forces personnel serving on the United Nations Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission listen as Prime Minister Justin Trudeau speaks to them in Gao, Mali, Saturday December 22, 2018. It is easy to love your country. The messages encouraging patriotism are everywhere, and they fulfill a need to belong. But
Continue readingAuthor: Yves Engler
Canadian Dimension: Canada’s membership in the Five Eyes alliance promoting conflict with China
China is currently preparing for a stronger pushback from the Five Eyes intelligence alliance including Canada, the United Kingdom, New Zealand, Australia and the United States. Image from Flickr. In recent weeks movements in different countries have toppled statues and put the police and other institutions upholding systemic racism on
Continue readingCanadian Dimension: Should Canadian foreign policy be enmeshed with mining interests abroad?
The Essakane Mine pit in Burkina Faso. Photo from Wikimedia Commons. Should Canadian foreign policy continue to be enmeshed with mining interests abroad? That is one of ten questions put forward in an open letter calling for a “fundamental reassessment of Canadian foreign policy” following Canada’s second consecutive defeat for
Continue readingCanadian Dimension: International community rejects Canada’s bid for a seat on UN Security Council
June 17, 2020 – Canada lost its high-profile bid for one of the rotating seats on the United Nations Security Council. A total of 128 votes were needed to secure a two-thirds majority. Norway secured 130 votes while Ireland got 128. Canada received just 108 votes. The international community’s rejection
Continue readingCanadian Dimension: Trudeau’s path to a UN Security Council seat runs through Africa
Acacia Mining (formerly African Barrick Gold plc) is Tanzania’s biggest gold producer and operates three major mines in the country—Bulyanhulu, Buzwagi (pictured) and North Mara. Image courtesy of Acacia Mining. Justin Trudeau understands that his path to a United Nations Security Council (UNSC) seat runs through Africa. The continent shouldn’t
Continue readingCanadian Dimension: Do black lives in Haiti matter to the Canadian government?
People march during a protest in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, on February 13, 2019. Photo by Hector Retamal. Do black lives in Haiti matter to the Canadian government? At the time of writing, Justin Trudeau continues to back the neo-Duvalierists who are currently subjugating that country’s impoverished masses, leading to a total
Continue readingCanadian Dimension: #NoUNSC4Canada thrusts critical discussion of Canadian foreign policy into mainstream
A Canadian soldier takes part in a simulated battle during Exercise Maple Resolve 17 at Camp Wainwright in Alberta, Canada, May 16, 2017. Photo by Sgt. JF Lauzé. The #NoUNSC4Canada (No To Canada on UN Security Council) campaign has thrust critical discussion of Canadian foreign policy into the mainstream. It
Continue readingCanadian Dimension: Ottawa’s ties with far-right Colombian president undermines human rights rhetoric on Venezuela
Justin Trudeau speaks with Colombian President Iván Duque at the United Nations, Tuesday, September 25, 2018. Photo from the Twitter account of Justin Trudeau. One week ago, a former Canadian soldier instigated a harebrained bid to kidnap or kill Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro. Launched from Colombia, the plot failed spectacularly
Continue readingCanadian Dimension: ‘Same Old, Same Old’: How Corporate Canada Puts Profit Above All Else
President Trump delivers remarks with Justin Trudeau, and then Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto at the signing the USMCA trade agreement on the margins of the G-20 Leaders’ Summit in Buenos Aires, Argentina on November 30, 2018. State Department photo by Ron Przysucha/Wikimedia Commons. The following is an excerpt from
Continue readingCanadian Dimension: Why Isn’t Canada Treating Climate Change With the Same Urgency as COVID-19?
Heavy industry in Suzhou, China. Photo by DaiLuo/Flickr. While governments’ responses to the COVID-19 pandemic have proven that significant resources can be marshalled quickly in a crisis, there is little evidence that Canada sees global warming as a comparable emergency. Even though Justin Trudeau’s Liberals say they take climate change
Continue readingCanadian Dimension: Canada re-embraces Saudi monarchy by lifting freeze on arms exports
Canadian light armoured vehicles, developed by General Dynamics, move in a convoy in the Wainwright Garrison training area during Exercise Maple Resolve. Photo by Sgt. Jean-Francois Lauzé/Garrison Imaging Petawawa. As many Canadians remain isolated in their homes due to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, the Trudeau government quietly announced it was
Continue readingCanadian Dimension: How Canada’s patronage-driven defence lobby is abetting US arms manufacturers
In this July 7, 2006 file photo, the Lockheed Martin F-35 Joint Strike Fighter is shown after it was unveiled in a ceremony in Fort Worth, Texas. Photo by LM Ottero. More politically dependent than almost all other industries, arms manufacturers play for keeps in the nation’s capital. They target
Continue readingCanadian Dimension: Trudeau government deepens ties to repressive Kuwaiti monarchy
Canadian Minister of National Defence Harjit Sajjan meets with Prime Minister of Kuwait, Sabah Al-Khalid Al-Sabah, December 2019. As parents often warn their children, real friends do not encourage stupid, embarrassing, or life-threatening behaviour. Unfortunately, this aphorism rarely applies to Canada’s foreign policy. Because of our “friend” to the south,
Continue readingCanadian Dimension: Trudeau government enabling corporate mining exploitation in Africa
Wealthy companies often use the governments of rich countries to enact rules on poorer countries to squeeze more profits out of them. Corporate mining interests in Canada are partnered with Justin Trudeau’s Liberal government—as they have with Stephen Harper’s Conservatives in the past—to enact Canadian foreign policy that protects their
Continue readingCanadian Dimension: Canada is celebrating the agents of Palestinian misery
IDF Soldier in the Golan Heights. Photo from Flickr. Last month the Canadian embassy in Tel Aviv held an event to celebrate Canadians fighting in the Israeli military. The embassy invited all 78 Canadians in the IDF to the ambassador’s residence to demonstrate their appreciation. Referring to non-Israelis who join
Continue readingCanadian Dimension: What is shaping Canada’s foreign policy: human rights, democracy or bankers’ bottom-line?
Self-proclaimed Interim President of Venezuela, Juan Guaidó, speaks with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau in Ottawa. Photo by Dave Chan/AFP. Last week, Venezuelan politician Juan Guaidó was fêted in Ottawa. The self-declared president met with Justin Trudeau along with a number of other high ranking cabinet ministers including Foreign Affairs Minister
Continue readingCanadian Dimension: On Iran, Canada toes the imperial line
Prime Minister Trudeau speaks to media about the fatal plane crash in Iran. Still image from YouTube. While the current Liberal government claims to be progressive and in favour of democracy, peace, and a rules-based international order, its actions regarding Iran demonstrate that the primary drivers of Canadian foreign policy
Continue readingCanadian Dimension: Remembering the Haiti earthquake, 10 years on
A woman prays amid the wreckage of Notre Dame de l’Assomption—the main cathedral in Port-au-Prince—on January 9, 2011. Image by Allison Shelley. Ten years ago Sunday an earthquake devastated Haiti. In a few minutes of violent shaking hundreds of thousands perished in Port-au-Prince and surrounding regions and many more were
Continue readingCanadian Dimension: Sun never sets on Canadian military
Canadian Armed Forces (CAF) personnel participate in a training exercise as part of Operation REASSURANCE in Central and Eastern Europe. Photo courtesy of the Government of Canada. Most Canadians would be surprised to learn that the sun never sets on the military their taxes pay for. This country is not
Continue readingCanadian Dimension: Canada backs coup against Bolivia’s president
Bolivian President Evo Morales speaks from the presidential hangar in El Alto, Bolivia, Sunday, November 10, 2019. Photo by Enzo De Luca/AFP. In yet another example of the Liberals saying one thing and doing another, Justin Trudeau’s government has supported the ouster of Evo Morales. The Liberals’ position on Bolivia’s
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