Canada needs new Indo-Pacific strategy as it seeks deeper Asia ties: Anand

As Prime Minister Mark Carney sets off for his first official trip to Asia, Foreign Affairs Minister Anita Anand says Canada’s regional policy is outdated.

Anand says she has told her department to update the Indo-Pacific strategy that the Trudeau government released three years ago.

Anand told the Canada 2020 think tank this week that the strategy no longer reflects Canada’s economic ambitions in the region nor evolving relations with China and India, both of which the Carney government has reset.

The plan Ottawa released three years ago branded Beijing as a “disruptive global power” whose values don’t align with Canada, but Anand now calls China a strategic partner.

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She also says the Carney government has an economic pragmatism “that has not been present in diplomacy” in recent years.

Anand also says her next region of focus will be the Gulf, just days after Carney said he plans to visit the United Arab Emirates next month.