Canada halting activity at Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank
OTTAWA — Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland says Canada will halt all government-led activity at the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank after a Canadian citizen tendered his resignation from the financial institution.
Bob Pickard said in a tweet today that he resigned as the bank’s global communications chief because the bank is “dominated” by members of the Chinese Communist Party.
I have tendered my resignation as the global comms chief of <a href=«https://twitter.com/AIIB_Official?ref_src=» https:>@AIIB_Official
. As a patriotic Canadian, this was my only course. 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…
“The government of Canada will immediately halt all government-led activity at the bank and I have instructed the Department of Finance to lead an immediate review of the allegations raised and of Canada’s involvement in the AIIB,” Freeland told reporters on Wednesday.
The finance minister said the review would be conducted “expeditiously” and that she wasn’t ruling out any outcome following its completion.
In a statement, the AIIB called Pickard’s allegations “categorically false.”
“We are an independent multilateral development bank guided by our board of governors and board of directors, and no one state or political party has any say over the strategic or operational direction of the bank,” the statement said.
China founded the US$100-billion Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank in late 2015 to provide other countries in the region access to capital for investments in projects in areas such as transportation, power and telecommunications.
Canada joined the bank in 2017 and holds less than one per cent
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