Ottawa says it will cease all activity at the China-led Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) while it investigates allegations made by the bank’s global communications director after announcing his resignation.
“The Canadian government will also discuss this issue with its allies and partners who are members of the bank. China, as the world’s second-largest economy, needs to play a role in solving global problems which affect every country,” Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland told reporters on June 14.
Freeland said the federal government would launch a review of allegations made by Bob Pickard, a Canadian, who resigned as AIIB’s director general of global communications earlier in the day. Pickard alleged that the bank, which was founded in 2016 to finance railways and other infrastructure, is “dominated” by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).
“As a patriotic Canadian, this was my only course,” Pickford said while announcing his resignation on Twitter. “The Bank is dominated by Communist Party members and also has one of the most toxic cultures imaginable. I don’t believe that my country’s interests are served by its AIIB membership.”
The finance minister said that the review of Pickard’s allegations would be untaken “expeditiously” and that she would not be “ruling out any outcome following its completion.”
CCP ‘Runs the Joint’
When announcing his resignation on Twitter, Pickard made a number of subsequent posts alleging Beijing’s control over the AIIB.“The [CCP] runs the joint, but that’s not transparent. It’s only after working there for many months that I became aware of how that’s where the true power is concentrated inside the bank – the CCP crowd who operate like a secret police,” he said.
“The Communist Party hacks hold the cards at the Bank. They deal with some board members as useful idiots,” he said in another post. “I believe that my Government should not be a member of this PRC instrument. The reality of power in the bank is that it’s CCP from start to finish.”
Pickard added that he became increasingly concerned for his safety, and as a result, did not tender his resignation until he was back in the “free world” of Japan.
The AIIB said in a press release on June 14 that it accepted the resignation of Pickard, and had “supported and empowered him” to perform his role. It called Pickard’s comments about the AIIB’s leadership “baseless and disappointing.”
Tories Call on Liberals to Withdraw
Reacting to the news, Conservative MP Michael Chong said on Twitter that the latest development surrounding AIIB had “confirmed” what Tories had been saying for years, that the bank is “a tool of Beijing to export its authoritarian model of governance throughout the Indo-Pacific region.”Chong noted that the Liberal government paid $256 million to join the AIIB in 2017, and since then has made payments of $40 million in each of the last three years. He also said Global Affairs previously warned the Liberals that the AIIB was being used by the CCP to promote its perspective on governance, economic security, and human rights, which “diverge in fundamental ways from Canada’s.”
“In light of today’s new revelation, Conservatives reiterate our call for the Trudeau gov’t to withdraw from the bank and repatriate the public funds invested,” Chong said.
Back in 2021, the Tories demanded the government stop its funding of the AIIB, given the detention of two Canadian citizens in the country.
“When the AIIB was first proposed it was criticized by the Obama administration as a political tool that the Chinese government would use to expand its influence throughout Asia,” then-leader Erin O'Toole wrote. “Furthermore, concerns about the AIIB’s environmental records, labour standards, and overall commitment to human rights continue to this day,” he said.
