LILLEY: China launches interference campaign to help Carney

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China isn’t done messing with our elections or trying to keep the Liberals in power. Federal officials announced Monday that a campaign on WeChat, the Chinese social media platform, has been targeting Mark Carney.

Now, by targeting, it appears that they are supporting Carney based on the stories posted and promoted.

“The information operation was launched by Youli-Youmian, WeChat’s most popular news account. Intelligence reporting links the Yoli Yong account to the PRC, Chinese Communist Party, central political and legal affairs commission,” said Laurie-Anne Kempton, assistant secretary to the cabinet and part of the task force charged with overseeing election integrity.

The task force said they noticed campaigns pick up steam with unusual posting and sharing patterns in the days after the election was called.

“The site Task Force assesses that the foreign state backed information operation was intended to influence Canadian Chinese communities and look to mold perceptions about the candidate,” Kempton said.

While this isn’t the first time China has interfered in a campaign this way, it is the first time officials have come out to talk about such campaigns. Being bureaucrats, they all went to pains to say they couldn’t speak to the intent of China’s actions here or the desired outcome of the campaign.

And while they said there were negative and positive stories shared about Carney; the examples of the campaign provided were in fact glowing endorsements of the Liberal leader. They did, though, say that this was “information that is out there, the interest at the behest of a foreign government.”

In the election 2019, the Chinese government targeted a number of ridings across Canada attempting to ensure MPs whose views on China aligned more with Beijing were elected. After the 2021 election, a Chinese diplomat boasted about having had success in ensuring certain voices were elected and others defeated.

Conservative Kenny Chiu was defeated in 2021 in the Vancouver riding of Steveston—Richmond East. Chiu, originally from Hong Kong, said that a malicious campaign against him had spread on WeChat and he believed it was due to his support for a foreign agent’s registry.

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Now, we have a clear campaign with direct ties back to Beijing supporting — not targeting — Mark Carney.

“I read the WeChat document in question. It is not ‘targeting Mr. Carney.’ It is strongly supporting him ‘The only adult in the room’, ‘Rock star economist,’” wrote Charles Burton in a post on X.

Burton is a Canadian diplomat and academic who spent years in China and has written extensively on Canada-China relations.

Carney has had extensive business ties with China over the years.

When he was governor of the Bank of England, Carney oversaw the move to work more closely with China and Chinese banks. In 2016, Carney worked with Zhou Xiaochuan, then governor of the People’s Bank of China on green finance initiatives.

That was a theme he picked up on when he moved to the private sector at Brookfield Asset Management. Carney helped Brookfield dramatically increase their investments in China and just last October, during a visit to Beijing, Carney helped the company secure a $276 million loan from a state-owned bank.

Carney’s ties to China are deep, of course President Xi Jinping would want him to be elected to lead Canada.

The question is will Canadians decide to elect someone favoured not only by Xi in Beijing, but also by President Donald Trump in Washington.