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opinion

Omer Aziz is a Radcliffe Fellow at Harvard and author of the forthcoming memoir Brown Boy.

In November, 2017, when I was still a foreign policy adviser in the federal government, the big topic of discussion was Beijing’s pursuit of a free-trade deal with Canada. Officials in Ottawa seemed almost giddy about the idea. In meetings, people repeated common assumptions about China being more or less a benevolent actor, and how it was in Canada’s economic interest to lock in more deals with Beijing.

But our business community, academics and foreign policy gurus got China completely wrong. Beijing was not trying to be our friend, much less our partner: It was trying to split apart the Western alliance, starting with Canada. When Prime Minister Justin Trudeau went to Beijing that December, he was, unsurprisingly, given the cold shoulder. Canada had been baited.

Last week, Foreign Affairs Minister Mélanie Joly gave a major speech in Toronto that offered a preview of a radically different – and much needed – approach to China. For the last two years, a new Indo-Pacific strategy has been in the works and apparently will be released soon. In her speech, Ms. Joly called China “an increasingly disruptive global power.” This comes after a report that earlier this year, the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) briefed the Prime Minister’s Office about Chinese interference in the 2019 federal election.

The delay in this foreign policy change has been troubling, and not just because the world is changing rapidly. If the same false assumptions about China continue to underlie the new policy, Canada will suffer.

To put it simply: The People’s Republic of China is the No. 1 economic, strategic, technological, political and security threat to the Western world for the next century – and it’s not even close. The Chinese Communist Party will continue to pose a direct threat to not just the Western world’s interests, but also our values. The challenge has existed for years now, but academics, business leaders, and policymakers too often looked away, because there was always more money to be made.

Now, we must be clear about what this threat represents. Last month, the White House released its National Security Strategy, and explicitly declared that China had both “the intent to reshape the international order and, increasingly, the economic, diplomatic, military and technological power to advance that objective.” Despite being the greatest beneficiary of that same system of rules, China seeks to create an entirely different world – one in which autocracies thrive, the powerful subdue the powerless, and the citizen – including the more than a million Uyghurs in Xinjiang who have been detained in “re-education” camps – is indoctrinated and then decimated by a surveillance state that never stops watching.

Canada’s foreign policy needs to address China and the world as it is. The core components of our coming strategy should include shoring up democratic alliances in the region and playing a leadership role rather than acting as a bystander. Canada should work with China where there are mutual interests – such as on climate and public health – but it should do so cautiously and prudently. We should deepen ties with countries in South America and Africa, where China has been active, and support democratic efforts to check China on every front. On all other issues – such as elections, human rights and the rule of law – Canada must unapologetically champion its values.

At home, Canada must ensure the integrity of its elections, help businesses safeguard their trade secrets, and strengthen its cyber infrastructure. There should be a life-in-prison penalty for any citizen or resident found guilty of passing off intelligence to Beijing, and a ban on the export of any high-tech equipment to China. More importantly, institutions such as universities, businesses and the Department of Foreign Affairs must free themselves of the groupthink that has dominated discussions about China for three decades. The Foreign Affairs Minister and Prime Minister, in particular, should be receiving objective advice on China and the Indo-Pacific that is untainted by bias. At a minimum, we must have the knowledge and foresight to compete in this new world of rising autocracies – and that requires having a clear strategy backed by action.

China is one of the world’s cradles of civilization, but it is now run by a cabal that has absorbed the lessons from totalitarian dictatorships of the past. This will be a long struggle that will require patience. “Let China sleep,” goes a quote attributed to Napoleon Bonaparte, “for when she wakes, she will shake the world.” China has already awoken, bided its time, and built its strength. Now the real challenge begins.

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