Canada Has Yet to Decide on Rejoining China-Led Infrastructure Bank
Ottawa has not decided whether to restart its activities at the China-led Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, more than three years after it hit pause.
Finance Minister François-Philippe Champagne's office says Canadian government work at the Bank remains suspended while a review continues, almost three and a half years after the freeze. Press secretary John Fragos told The Globe and Mail that Canada has not unfrozen its membership and the review is underway.
The pause goes back to June 2023. Then-Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland halted Canadian government activity at the Bank and ordered a review of the claims and Canada's involvement. She pointed to serious concerns raised by Bob Pickard, the Bank's Canadian communications chief. Pickard had resigned and said the Bank was dominated by Chinese Communist Party members and was extending Beijing's influence. Freeland said at the time she had ruled out no outcome.
Canada joined the Bank in 2018, putting in US$995-million for a 1-per-cent share. The finance minister acts as Canada's Governor to the Bank, the formal representative.
The Bank now has more than 100 members. China is the largest shareholder, with more than a quarter of the votes. Germany, South Korea and Australia each hold between 3 and 5 per cent. Japan and the United States are not members. Under former president Barack Obama, the United States urged allies not to join, but Britain joined.
The Bank rejected Pickard's account and called the claims about Communist Party control baseless. In June 2023, it said in a statement AIIB that it welcomed Freeland's review and had started its own internal review to ensure transparency. At the time, it said its staff came from 65 countries. More recently, it said it had received 0% risk weight and HQLA Level 1 status in Canada as of June 30, 2026, a technical rating that treats its bonds as very safe for Canadian banks to hold.
On the diplomatic front, Canada-China relations soured in 2018 and frayed further after that. In October 2025, a Canadian official said Ottawa hoped Prime Minister Mark Carney would meet President Xi Jinping in Asia the next week. Reuters Carney and Xi did meet in late October 2025, and Carney agreed to visit China. He went to Beijing in January 2026 to reset the relationship. Reuters
The broader context here is process as much as policy. The file sits with Finance, through the Governor's role, rather than as a straight foreign-affairs file. Paused activity keeps the share but stops normal work. That leaves Ottawa with the full range Freeland left open in 2023, from restarting to staying paused to leaving. The political balance is tight. Restarting would put Canada back with allies that stayed in. Staying paused would keep distance while the Carney government tests whether the Beijing reset leads to lasting cooperation. Allied capitals will watch either choice for a signal on where joint work with others fits in Ottawa's approach to China.
