Canada's Role in International Affairs

Participant: codc01

Date: 2003-03-19 07:21:09

". Canada needs to strengthen its multilateralism; and not subject it to US dictats. "

I think the current Canadian government is going in the right direction by stating that in the current situation the Iraq war has not justification. But in all cases, the government must be careful not to infuriate our US allies too closely, we really rely heavily on them. The current Canadian approach is once again the correct one (Continue the war against terrorism, and not participate in any war related to Iraq)...

"Economic and trade relations with US under NAFTA need to be separated, as never before, from other foreign policy pursuits. "

I utterly and absolutely agree, NAFTA should be entirely independent on Foreign Policy of either Canada or the US. Actually any trade agreement shoud be independent of foreign policy, except maybe for the cases of horrible human rights violation.

"May be it is time to re-experiment with the 'third option': promote multipolarity both at the political and economic levels; develop closer trade relations with Latin America and the Caribbean; develop closer trade as well as political relations with Asia-Pacific through APEC; look for likeminded partners especially from among the emerging powers/markets. "

I think Canada will always remain the US's main trading partner, that will probably never change, due to geographic considerations. The current Canadian government should first try to make more trade agreements with the EU (that is what they are trying to do), and then or in parallel work hard to make more trade with emergent countries, as you suggested. The important thing is to decrease (as much as possible) our economic dependence on the US.

"...I sincerely believe that Canada,alongwith some of the above likeminded countries including India must work to promote a new international understanding"

I agree with you, but do not forget that Canada is not a non-aligned country, and i think it will never be (We are in NATO after all, we share more values culturally with the US and Europe than with emerging countries, etc)... We need to dialogue with non-aligned countries so that we can close the gap between our differences of views, but i don't think we should become a non-aligned country.

"For this,if need be, Canada must come down from the high pedestal of being a 'developed' economy, a G-7 country and a close ally of US. "

I think we should stay in the G7, because we can promote more liberal trade with emerging countries, i think that is the best place to do this (we are one of the rare G7 countries which wish to remove with insistence, trade barriers with Africa).. But i do agree that we think of ourselves as more important than we actually are (this is a sad fact... I'd like it if we had more voice internationally)...

Due to our geographic location and our shared fondamental values, we will always be a close ally of the US, even though i agree with you Canada should not be scared to publibly disagree with the US government... We are an independent country after all.