Chinese President Xi Jinping accused Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau of behaving inappropriately and leaking to the media the contents of a previous meeting between the two leaders during the G20 summit in Bali.
«Everything we discussed was leaked to a newspaper; that’s not appropriate,» Xi told Trudeau through an interpreter during an informal meeting at the G20 summit in Bali, adding that the previous conversation did not go «that way,» Canadian broadcaster CBC has picked up.
For his part, Trudeau replied that Ottawa believed in «free, open and frank dialogue». «We will continue to seek to work together constructively, but there will be things we will not agree on,» he said.
Xi shouted back that «the conditions» for such a dialogue had to be created first, after which he shook his hand and walked away. The interaction was recorded by journalists and posted on Twitter by a CTV National News reporter, according to Bloomberg.
Afterward, Trudeau assured a press conference that talks with Beijing were not going to be easy. «We know that China is a major global player in the economy and has a very big impact on events around the world,» the prime minister said.
In that sense, he explained that Ottawa would be in the international arena «to challenge Human Rights and values that are important to Canadians», as reported by ‘The Globe and Mail’ newspaper.
In the leaked meeting in question, prior to this tense exchange between the two leaders, Canadian media reported that the Canadian prime minister had raised «serious concerns» of interference by Beijing in Canada’s internal affairs with the Chinese president.
Specifically, according to the CBC, Trudeau expressed his disagreement over the arrest and detention of two Canadians, as well as reports published on the Global News television network about the clandestine financing of at least a dozen candidates in the 2019 presidential election.
Ottawa, which has been reluctant to criticize Beijing in the interest of promoting economic and trade ties, has toughened its rhetoric against China after accusing Beijing of «aggressively interfering» in Canadian politics.
