Justin Trudeau turns to Weibo and WeChat to reach Chinese audience

Aug 25 China opposes Canada’s stance that bilateral ties can not be improved until a dispute over Canadian canola exports has been settled, the Chinese embassy in Ottawa said in a statement on Thursday. British Columbia instituted a tax on foreign real estate buyers, a move aimed nearly exclusively at wealthy Chinese driving up the Vancouver housing market, while Trudeau’s government has moved to collect more data on foreign home ownership.

To start his week-long trip, Trudeau is set to attend a host of business-related meetings in Beijing, Shanghai and Hong Kong with the aim of building the economic connection between China and Canada.

Stephen Harper used to make annual visits to Canada’s Arctic but it doesn’t appear his successor is going to follow his lead.

The visit will once again put Trudeau in the footsteps of his father, Pierre, whose government re-established diplomatic relations in 1971 with China, 20 years after they were broken during the Korean war. China’s ambassador to Canada was sounding a conciliatory tone in advance of the visit, acknowledging his country has more work to do in the area of human rights.

“The great role Canada played in our own small way bringing China in from the cold – that was appreciated by China and is still appreciated by China”.

It is not always easy to broker deals with China, according to former Canadian diplomat Colin Robertson, who was at one time was posted to China. A Canadian official said the invitation is “unusual” for a Canadian leader but also “a good sign” the Chinese are serious about getting to know Mr. Trudeau. “But at the end of the day, they’re very hard-nosed and business-oriented”.

On the issue of Human rights, the Canadian Prime Minister said that his country has earned a reputation for standing up strongly for human right issues, and China with its increasing influence on the world stage need to take responsibility for its action. No, it’s very challenging. Chaired by Jack Ma, head of the Alibaba e-commerce giant, the group of young millionaires and billionaires says it represents the “first generation of modern Chinese entrepreneurs”. Ritz offered Trudeau some advice when broaching China’s less-than-stellar human rights record: don’t do it in public.

The detention of Canadian citizen Kevin Garratt in 2014 on espionage charges also looms over the visit.

Canada has stood its ground and canola farmers are now at risk of losing more business with their biggest export market – where they sold $2 billion worth of the crop past year.

Trudeau will raise the issue with Chinese leaders next week, a senior Canadian official said.

The Conservatives made progress with China, Ritz added, and still held them to account on labour standards, the environment and human rights.

Wang berated the journalist’s question as “full of prejudice against China and arrogance” and as “totally unacceptable”, to the visible discomfort of global affairs minister of Stephane Dion, who stood next to him.

China effectively halted imports of US corn and corn products for more than a year beginning in late 2013 as the country rejected shipments of an unapproved biotech variety. “Much more mature than any possible negotiations with China is a bilateral trade agreement with Japan. And it’s in our interest to maximize the upside and minimize the downside of that inevitable relationship”, he said.