Michael Higgins: Carney’s ‘values-based realism’ is a blatant sham - National Post

Copy URL Facebook Linked In X (Twitter) Loading account options Sign In Manage Account Close account menu Sign Out Prime Minister Mark Carney holds a news conference in Beijing on Jan. 16. (Bloomberg) By Michael Higgins November 5, 2026 at 5:57 a.m. Prime Minister Mark Carney’s “values-based realism” — business first, human rights second — has suffered a reality check by the Chinese government, as it hounds and persecutes a Tibetan activist and Canadian citizen in Toronto.

Gyal Lo, an expert on China’s assimilation policies in Tibet and an eyewitness to its “residential schools,” fled China in 2020, fearing for his life.

China has now served him legal documents in Canada in connection with a civil suit in China.

The chance of China winning any such lawsuit in Canada is slim to none, but that’s not the point. It’s a form of lawfare and transnational repression designed to intimidate and discredit Gyal.

“China conducts the most sophisticated, global and comprehensive campaign of transnational repression in the world,” according to Freedom House, an organization devoted to protecting democracy.

The Tibet Action Institute (TAI), a human rights group of which Gyal is a member, said he was the victim of a concerted attack by China.

“Tibet Action Institute has documented intensifying efforts to discredit, intimidate and silence Dr. Gyal Lo — a former university professor in Tibet and China and one of the most prominent Tibetan human rights advocates in the world today,” reads a press release from the institute.

“The campaign has included harassment of his family members in Tibet; Chinese state media attacks on him by name; efforts to discredit his academic reputation; defamatory depictions online; incidents of suspected surveillance and intimidation in Toronto and Geneva; and now, abuse of international legal processes.”

In September, while Gyal was in Geneva advocating for Tibetan children, his wife was served with legal documents from China’s Ministry of Justice, according to TAI.

Gyal’s former Chinese employer, Yunnan Normal University, is seeking $203,000, a demand that first arose in October 2020 as the university sought to fire him “amid escalating political pressure over his research and advocacy on Tibetan education,” according to TAI.

“Gyal Lo was warned that the case was politically motivated and his life was at risk, prompting him to flee to Canada in December 2020.”

TIA director Lhadon Tethong claims that Gyal was being targeted for his work in exposing China’s “coercive residential schools in Tibet.” Gyal has accused China of using the schools to wipe out Tibetan culture.

Gyal’s case is just one example that gives the lie to Carney’s “principled and pragmatic” approach to dealing with the likes of China, Turkey, Qatar and Saudi Arabia — because those countries don’t care about the principled bit.

In Davos, Carney spoke about the need to be pragmatic when dealing with partners who do not “share all of our values.” And again, after forging a new “strategic partnership” with Chinese President Xi Jinping, Carney said, “We must be pragmatic.”

“We take the world as it is, not as we wish it to be,” he said.

Carney, the pragmatist, sees the opportunity to do business with China. But what about the principled Carney who told Davos about Canada’s “commitment to fundamental values” and “respect for human rights”?

After meeting with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan last month, Carney said, “Engagement is not approval.” Asked about the dangers of moving closer to Turkey, which persecutes gay people, Carney suggested that his only job was to promote human rights in Canada.

“Promoting and ensuring that all Canadians can live their full selves in Canada — first and foremost, that’s our responsibility,” he said.

But people like Gyal — and he’s not alone — are not being allowed to live their full selves because they are being harassed, so Carney is very much failing in his responsibility.

“Canada and other governments have opened the door for these attacks on their own soil by relegating human rights issues to private exchanges and failing to push back as Beijing openly doubles down on repression. They urgently need to reverse course,” Chemi Lhamo, TAI’s advocacy manager, said in the press release.

A similar concern was raised in January by the Canadian Coalition on Human Rights in China, which wrote a letter to Carney saying that in its dealings with China, Canada was “far too often prioritizing trade and investment over human rights.”

The coalition accused Canada of being “inattentive” to human rights in China and urged Carney to “put human rights first.”

And yet, Canada has now gone so soft on China that the country isn’t even named in the latest Canadian national security strategy.

“Only in Canada can you write a national security strategy without mentioning the specific malign actors that seek to threaten Canadian security and interests. China and Russia are omitted altogether,” noted Richard Shimooka, Alexander Lanoszka and Balkan Devlen of the Macdonald Laurier Institute.

Unfortunately, Carney the pragmatist has relegated human rights below business, a decision China will have noted and will most certainly exploit. Values-based realism is less a foreign policy and more a blatant sham.

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