How Should Canada Deal With China?

At first blush, Harper's statement on China today appears reasonable:

“I think Canadians want us to promote our trade relations worldwide. We do that,” Mr. Harper said Wednesday. “But I don't think Canadians want us to sell out our values, our beliefs in democracy, freedom and human rights. They don't want us to sell that out to the almighty dollar.”

Pity he doesn't apply the same beliefs to the Maher Arar situation, who is still waiting for an apology from this government for the human rights abuses he endured while the Tories worry how much that might impact their pending financial settlement with him.

Regardless, the fact that China's president has refused to even meet with Harper means the diplomacy door has been slammed in his face, thus lessening Canada's position to influence the Chinese government to actually remedy some of its human rights violations. This Tory stance also smacks of the Bushco tradition of not speaking to leaders such as those in North Korea, Syria and Iran in order to resolve conflicts.

As Chinese in Vancouver blog notes, the Canadian Chamber of Commerce has serious concerns about the Tories approach to dealing with China:

In a report published by the Chamber just before its annual general meeting, the Chamber said: "Policy decisions affecting China cannot be taken in isolation from their impact on trade and investment and are best dealt with through ongoing senior-level engagement between both countries."

Peter MacKay hasn't exactly been acting very diplomatically either:

08.09.06 Vancouver's Chinese community was shocked to learn that the Conservatives have not officially met with China's ambassador to Canada even after nine months into office. Community leaders strongly criticize the Tories for jeopardizing a good China-Canada relationship built over many years.
[...]
Yung Kwun Yu, chairman of the Chinese Benevolent Assn, said Canada has maintained a very good relationship with China for so many years. Tories' delay in meeting with the Chinese ambassador cannot help foster this relationship. "And it's not even polite."

While it's true that Canada can afford to get away with being more critical and confrontational with China than the US can, since China owns so much of their debt, we still need to be able to find a way to do so that will have the maximum desired impact. I may be a liberal whose main concern is human rights, but I also know that you have to be pragmatic and ensure that you have open communication with those you are trying to change. Snubbing the Chinese and having their president do the same to our prime minister will leave us in a stalemate which neither country can benefit from.

A spokeswoman for Mr. Harper wouldn't say Tuesday whether Canada considers the rejection an insult and did not say what reason the Chinese gave for not meeting with the Prime Minister.

We deserve to know exactly what happened and why. Now is not the time for secrecy. If the Tories are so concerned about the rights of the Chinese people, they ought to be honest with Canadians about what's going on so we can figure out the best way to deal with it.

Update: 16.11.06 China's president has now agreed to a meeting with Harper but the spokeswoman for the foreign ministry offered this caution:

"We always hold that we should maintain dialogue on the basis of equality and mutual respect to expand common ground and narrow differences," Jiang said.

"But we firmly oppose other nation's using China's human rights and other problems to make irresponsible remarks on China's internal affairs."