By Lynette Ong

January 25, 2026

More than a week after Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney’s visit to Beijing re-establishing ties after a tumultuous decade, a picture has emerged of how the visit and its economic and geopolitical implications have been processed by the Chinese government and the country’s commentators.

Ahead of Carney’s visit, a familiar warning had resurfaced in Canada: pivoting toward China is perilous.

This cautionary camp — comprising some Conservative politicians, figures within the security and intelligence establishment, national security experts, and human rights organizations — argues that China constitutes both a serious security threat and a systemic challenger to Canadian interests.

An examination of official statements from the Chinese government, commentary by Chinese intellectuals specializing in Canada–China relations, and reactions on Chinese social media surrounding the Prime Minister’s visit, illuminates how these Canadian concerns are interpreted—and contested—from the Chinese side.

Critics of deeper engagement contend that China threatens Canadian security through electoral interference, cyber-enabled disinformation campaigns, and the transnational repression of the Chinese diaspora on Canadian soil.

They frequently cite the 2018 detention of the “two Michaels” and China’s subsequent trade coercion against Canadian imports as emblematic of Beijing’s willingness to weaponize economic interdependence and employ hostage diplomacy to extract political concessions — in that case, the release of a Huawei executive.

These security concerns are further compounded by longstanding unease over Beijing’s treatment of Uyghurs in Xinjiang and its sweeping crackdown on political dissent in Hong Kong.

China hawks also contend that deeper economic engagement with Beijing would weaken Canada’s relationship with the United States—which, despite the current tariff war and President Trump’s threats to Canadian sovereignty, remains Canada’s largest trading partner and most important strategic ally.

This perspective sees China’s authoritarian political system making closer economic ties an implausible hedging strategy for safeguarding Canadian interests.

For its part, Beijing has sought to reframe the debate. A press release from China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs laid out four principles articulated by President Xi Jinping for advancing bilateral relations.

First, China and Canada should be “partners based on mutual respect.” While acknowledging differences between the two countries, Xi emphasized mutual respect for sovereignty and territorial integrity, as well as for each other’s political systems and development paths. This first principle reaffirms China’s position regarding Taiwan and reasserts its longstanding doctrine of non-interference in domestic affairs, including issues in Xinjiang and Hong Kong.

Second, the two sides should be “partners in shared development,” deepening and broadening cooperation to reinforce converging economic interests.

Third, they should be “partners grounded in mutual trust,” with an emphasis on people-to-people ties and expanded exchanges in education, culture, tourism, sports, and travel.

Fourth, China and Canada should be “partners in cooperation,” committed to multilateralism and the construction of a shared international community.

In China, Trump is popularly nicknamed “Trump the Nation-Builder” (川建国) — an ironic epithet that captures his contribution to building China as a great nation.

These principles also emphasize expanding bilateral trade, as well as education, cultural, and travel exchanges between the two countries.

Perhaps most notable — particularly in the context of the United States’ withdrawal from international organizations and its increasingly adversarial posture toward traditional allies, including Canada — is China’s recommitment to multilateralism and its expressed vision of a shared future. In effect, this diplomatic positioning draws Canada closer to Beijing while nudging it away from Washington.

Overall, both the Chinese government and the country’s intellectual community appear receptive to Canada’s so-called “recalibration” toward China.

Much of the commentary aligns with domestic Canadian sentiment per a Spark Insights poll published January 25th showing that 78% of Canadians said they felt Carney’s rapprochement with China is   the right thing to do, and framing the visit as a pragmatic shift that returns bilateral relations to the “right track” after years of turbulence.

Other commentators interpret it as part of a broader pattern in which Western countries, frustrated by U.S. unilateralism and mercantilist policies, are reconsidering their alliances and recalibrating their foreign relations.

In the wake of Carney’s Beijing visit and rousing speech at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Trump is now insisting — unironically and perhaps not without projection — that China is taking over Canada, despite assurance from the Canadian government it does not intend to sign a trade deal with China.

A more cynical — less mainstream — view holds that Canada is turning to China primarily because it faces “mounting internal and external pressures.”

In an article titled “China’s great-power diplomacy has helped drive a positive turnaround in China–Canada relations,” Huang Zhong, chair of the Canada Research Centre at Guangdong University of Foreign Studies, argues that Trump’s return to power has posed serious challenges to the traditional U.S.–Canada alliance, forcing Ottawa to confront the stark reality that “it is dangerous to be America’s enemy, but fatal to be America’s ally.”

Under such intense pressure, writes Huang, Carney has sought support from traditional partners such as Europe, though Europe itself is mired in difficulties and unable to provide meaningful assistance.

By this logic, he writes, Carney had little choice but to turn to China, which, setting aside past grievances, exercised what Huang calls its “magnanimous great-power diplomacy” (雪中送炭) to offer Canada a timely lifeline.

This hawkish perspective has long circulated in Chinese intellectual circles and has been revived under President Xi, framed by the vision of the “China Dream” and the principles of “great-power diplomacy” (大国外交).

It reflects a nationalist belief that China must reclaim its rightful place as a global power. Within this worldview, the West — traditionally led by the United States — is cast as an adversary intent on thwarting China’s rise. Recent U.S. export restrictions on semiconductors and other high-tech products reinforce this narrative.

Yet, the self-defeating policies of the Trump administration have pushed Canada and other traditional U.S. allies toward China for pragmatic reasons, despite fundamental differences in values and political institutions. In China, Trump is popularly nicknamed “Trump the Nation-Builder” (川建国) — an ironic epithet that captures his contribution to building China as a great nation.

If Chinese reactions are any guide, Ottawa should expect more of the same in the years ahead: a relentless focus on maximizing economic gains in trade relations, strict insistence on political non-interference in domestic affairs, and occasional outbursts of “wolf-warrior diplomacy” rhetoric — that often undermine rather than enhance China’s international image.

Lynette Ong is Distinguished Professor of Chinese Politics at the University of Toronto and Director of the China Governance Lab at the Munk School of Global Affairs and Public Policy.