The Daily Populous Wednesday January 14th, 2026 night edition
Authored by apnews.com and submitted by pjw724

Add AP News as your preferred source to see more of our stories on Google.

Add AP News on Google Add AP News as your preferred source to see more of our stories on Google. Share

BEIJING (AP) — As Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney arrives in China on Wednesday, his hosts see an opportunity to peel the longtime U.S. ally away from their rival, at least a bit.

China’s state media is calling on the Canadian government to set a foreign policy path independent of the United States — what it calls “strategic autonomy.”

Canada has long been one of America’s closest allies, geographically and otherwise. But Beijing is hoping that President Donald Trump’s economic aggression — and, now, military action — against other countries will erode that longstanding relationship.

The government bristled at former U.S. President Joe Biden’s efforts to strengthen relations with Europe, Australia, India, Canada and others to confront China. Now it sees an opportunity to try to loosen those ties, though it remains cautious about how far that will go.

Carney, for his part, has focused on trade, describing the trip to China as part of a move to forge new partnerships around the world to end Canada’s economic reliance on the American market. Trump has hit Canada with tariffs on its exports to the United States and suggested the vast, resource-rich country could become America’s 51st state.

Stay up to date with the news and the best of AP by following our WhatsApp channel. Follow on

The Canadian leader, who took office last year, is seeking to revive a relationship with China that was marked with acrimony for more than six years under his predecessor, Justin Trudeau.

The downturn in relations started with the arrest of a Chinese tech executive in late 2018 at America’s request and was fueled more recently by the Trudeau government’s decision in 2024 to follow Biden’s lead in imposing a 100% tariff on Chinese-made electric vehicles. China has retaliated for both that and a 25% tariff on steel and aluminum with its own tariffs on Canadian exports including canola, seafood and pork.

“If the Canadian side reflects on the root causes of the setbacks in bilateral relations over the past few years — the previous Justin Trudeau government’s policies to contain China in lockstep with the United States — it will realize that it can avoid the same outcome by upholding its strategic autonomy in handling China-related issues,” the state-owned China Daily newspaper wrote in an editorial this week.

“If Ottawa still chooses to subject its China policy to the will of Washington again in the future, it will only render its previous efforts to mend ties with Beijing in vain,” the English-language paper warned.

The government-run Global Times said: “Perhaps it was the heavy price paid for blindly following the U.S. in imposing high tariffs on China that awakened Ottawa’s sense of strategic autonomy.”

Canadian officials have said they expect Carney’s trip to produce progress on trade but not a definitive elimination of any tariffs.

Chinese experts said the two countries could find common ground over the U.S. military intervention in oil-rich Venezuela that forcibly brought its president to New York to face charges and Trump’s subsequent statements that Greenland, a Danish territory, should come under U.S. control.

“We can also see Canada’s current state of considerable unease towards the U.S.,” said Cui Shoujun, a foreign policy and Latin America expert at Renmin University of China. “If the U.S. can claim Greenland, might it then lay claim to Canada?”

He also predicted that Trump’s move against Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro would strengthen the strategic autonomy of Latin American countries to resist possible American interference in their affairs.

But China remains realistic about how far countries such as Canada could swing in its direction, given their fears of China’s growing economic and military clout as well as their deep historical and cultural ties with the United States. They also have major differences with China over its booming exports and the threat they pose to employment in their countries, as well as over human rights and Taiwan.

Zhu Feng, the dean of the School of International Studies at Nanjing University, cautioned against overestimating the importance of Carney’s visit to China, “because Canada is not only a neighbor of the United States but also an ally.”

Trump’s pressure on traditional U.S. partners may open up some space for China to expand relations with them, but American allies will need to balance that with their continuing dependence on U.S. economic and military strength. They may be able to reduce that dependence somewhat in the short term — but it’s unlikely they will be to eliminate it for the foreseeable future.

TheTomahawk97 on January 13rd, 2026 at 19:45 UTC »

The inevitable consequence of US instability. In threatening his allies, Trump has pushed them closer to his enemies.

As a UK citizen I would love for Europe, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Japan and South Korea to all be able to have strategic autonomy. But the unfortunate reality is we are forced to trade with China or the US, or both, because of their position in global markets and as superpowers.

Hopefully we limit it as much as we possibly can and expand our reliance on each other, instead of authoritarian states.

northernwind5027 on January 13rd, 2026 at 19:15 UTC »

That's the goal. Better to be 1/3 reliant on shitty authoritarian country A and 1/3 reliant on shitty authoritarian country B than just 2/3 reliant on shitty authoritarian country A.

Royal-Hunter3892 on January 13rd, 2026 at 19:11 UTC »

Hope Trump doesnt perceives this as a National security threat otherwise he might start saying

"we have to take control over Canada or we might lose it to China , we don't want Chaina as our neighbour"