{"id":4444,"date":"2021-01-01T12:27:11","date_gmt":"2021-01-01T12:27:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.radiofree.org\/?p=145339"},"modified":"2021-01-01T12:27:11","modified_gmt":"2021-01-01T12:27:11","slug":"canadas-alliances-prove-the-country-is-an-imperialist-power","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/2021\/01\/01\/canadas-alliances-prove-the-country-is-an-imperialist-power\/","title":{"rendered":"Canada\u2019s Alliances prove the Country is an Imperialist Power"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/a>For thousands of years folk wisdom has insisted that \u2018you shall be known by the company you keep\u2019. This is also true of countries.<\/p>\n

A recent United Nations vote condemning the \u201cglorification of Nazism, neo\u2011Nazism and other practices that contribute to fuelling contemporary forms of racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance\u201d generated significant commentary on social media. The US and Ukraine voted against the widely supported resolution while Canada, Australia, New Zealand and most European countries abstained. One commentator tweeted that the countries who failed to condemn Nazism were \u201cmore<\/a> or less the same coalition of stooges that recognized Juan Guaido\u201d as president of Venezuela while another pointed out that it was similar to the coalition of \u201ccountries<\/a> condemning China\u2019s policies in Hong Kong.\u201d Another connected it to NATO.<\/p>\n

These commentators hit on something fundamentally important. It is instructive to consider Canada\u2019s UN votes and position on international issues through the lens of its many alliances.<\/p>\n

Canada is a leading member of North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). Canada participated with the US and Britain in the secret talks on creating a north Atlantic alliance and since NATO was established in 1949 has been one of its most active contributors.<\/p>\n

Canada is a member of the \u201cFive Eyes\u201d intelligence-sharing arrangement. A series of post-Second World War accords, beginning with the 1946 UKUSA intelligence agreement, created<\/a> the \u201cAUS\/CAN\/NZ\/UK\/US EYES ONLY\u201d arrangement. The Five Eyes partnership oozes of white supremacy. Settler colonialism and empire unite an alliance that excludes wealthier non-white nations (Japan and South Korea) or those with more English speakers (India and Nigeria). It\u2019s not a coincidence that the only four countries that originally voted against<\/a> the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP) in 2007 are part of the Five Eyes.<\/p>\n

Canada is a member of the Commonwealth. It was a member of the alliance when it only included Britain, Australia, New Zealand and apartheid South Africa.<\/p>\n

Canada is a member of the Group of Seven (G7) wealthy nations. It also has a permanent (constituency-based) seat on the International Monetary Fund\u2019s executive board (Canada represents<\/a> 10 Caribbean countries and Ireland on the IMF board).<\/p>\n

Canada is part of the Lima Group seeking to overthrow the Venezuelan government. Instigated by Canada and Peru in mid 2017, the Lima Group has successfully corralled regional support for the US-led campaign to oust President Nicolas Maduro.<\/p>\n

Canada is a member of the Core Group that heavily shapes Haitian affairs. Comprising the ambassadors of the US, France, Brazil and Spain, as well as representatives of the EU and OAS, Core Group representatives meet regularly among themselves and with Haitian officials and periodically release collective statements on Haitian affairs. While formally established two months after the 2004 US, France and Canada coup against President Jean\u2013Bertrand Aristide, Radio Canada\u2019s Enqu\u00eate pointed<\/a> out that the Core Group was actually spawned at the \u201cOttawa<\/a> initiative on Haiti\u201d. Held at the Meech Lake Government Resort on January 31 and February 1, 2003, no Haitian officials were invited to the private gathering where US, French, OAS and Canadian officials discussed overthrowing Haiti\u2019s elected government, putting the country under UN trusteeship and recreating the Haitian military.<\/p>\n

Few countries are represented in as many powerful and openly interventionist coalitions. Canada\u2019s different alliances suggests this country sits near the centre of global imperialism.<\/p>\n

This article was posted on Friday, January 1st, 2021 at 4:27am and is filed under G7 Summit<\/a>, Haiti<\/a>, Imperialism<\/a>, NATO<\/a>, Organization of American States (OAS)<\/a>, United Nations<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n

This post was originally published on Radio Free<\/a>. <\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

For thousands of years folk wisdom has insisted that \u2018you shall be known by the company you keep\u2019. This is also true of countries. A recent United Nations\u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":16,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1163,1164,657,731,712,4,963,1165,111],"tags":[1166,658,1098,1167,967,112],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4444"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/16"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4444"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4444\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4445,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4444\/revisions\/4445"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4444"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4444"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4444"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}