Trudeau to co-host United Nations meeting as vote for Security Council seat nears

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau will co-host a virtual United Nations meeting on the COVID-19 pandemic this week, as Canada enters its final stretch of campaigning for a UN Security Council seat.

Thursday’s meeting will focus on the international development emergency caused by the pandemic and will be convened by Mr. Trudeau, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres and Jamaican Prime Minister Andrew Holness. Mr. Trudeau has been reaching out to world leaders for support ahead of the Security Council vote on June 17. Canada is seeking one of 10 rotating, non-permanent seats in 2021-22 on the UN’s most powerful branch, which has responsibility for maintaining international peace and security.

“To address this pandemic, to keep people safe, to help our economies weather the storm, we need to collaborate. And with this forum, Canada will be there to help lead the way forward,” Mr. Trudeau said during his daily press conference on Tuesday.

Canada’s ambassador to the UN, Marc-André Blanchard, said the meeting is a demonstration of Canada’s leadership on the global response to the pandemic.

“The world needs Canada to help at the moment,” Mr. Blanchard said in an interview from New York.

The UN says the pandemic will put more than 300 million people out of work and force another 30 million into extreme poverty. Mr. Blanchard said he is concerned about the effects on developing and small-island states, which anticipate cash-flow problems because the pandemic has devastated crucial sectors such as tourism.

During Thursday’s meeting, world leaders and the heads of multilateral institutions, including the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank, will address debt concerns for developing countries, the need to expand liquidity in the global economy, and measures to align recovery policies with the UN sustainable development goals (SDGs), among other challenges. Mark Carney, former governor of the Bank of Canada and the Bank of England, will also take part.

The SDGs are an ambitious set of UN objectives focused on ending poverty, fighting inequality and tackling climate change by 2030. Without a rapid response from the international community, the UN says the pandemic will “derail” the chances of achieving the goals by 2030.

The meeting will give Mr. Trudeau time with world leaders at the UN after weeks of near-daily phone calls with his counterparts. A spokesperson for the Prime Minister’s Office said that while the global response to COVID-19 has been the focus of Mr. Trudeau’s bilateral calls, the Security Council campaign has come up in some conversations.

Allan Rock, a former Canadian ambassador to the UN, said it is normal for Mr. Trudeau to call his counterparts before the vote. He said Mr. Blanchard has probably shared his “tally card” of which countries have indicated how they will vote, so Mr. Trudeau doesn’t waste his time calling leaders who have already decided.

Mr. Rock said Mr. Trudeau is likely calling leaders who have regional influence, such as his Jamaican counterpart, with whom Mr. Trudeau spoke on May 13. Mr. Rock said Canada can rely on its strong relationship with Jamaica to seek support from CARICOM, a Caribbean alliance of 15 countries.

“We will probably not only ask them [Jamaica] to support us, but we’re probably also asking them to go to the CARICOM table on our behalf and make the case for Canada."

Mr. Blanchard says Canada will not use Thursday’s meeting as an attempt to boost the Security Council campaign. He predicts a “competitive” three-way race with Norway and Ireland.

Experts agree Norway is the front-runner.

“Everybody recognizes that Norway is a shoo-in, and that’s because Norway over the years has been such an exemplary multilateral member,” said Stephen Lewis, a former Canadian ambassador to the UN.

If Canada does win, Mr. Lewis said it will be due in “significant measure” to Mr. Blanchard. Canada’s ambassador has a reputation as well-regarded, charismatic and accessible. Mr. Lewis said about 15 to 20 per cent of UN ambassadors vote against their leaders’ expressed preferences, as it is a secret ballot. That could make the difference for Canada.

“I suspect you’re going to get a number of ambassadors who are voting for Blanchard as Canada’s representative rather than vote as they’re told by their capital,” Mr. Lewis said.

Former prime minister Stephen Harper’s Conservative government withdrew Canada’s candidacy for a Security Council seat in 2010, when it became clear it would lose to Portugal. Canada last sat on the Security Council in 1999-2000.

Canada’s current run for a seat has been a cornerstone of Mr. Trudeau’s foreign policy since he declared “Canada is back” in 2015. Mr. Lewis said that declaration will no longer stand if Canada loses next month.

“If we lose, the world has a measure of Canada. ... We have to look hard at our multilateral and international policies, which clearly have not resonated with the rest of the world if we were to lose.”

Conservative foreign affairs critic Leona Alleslev said combating the spread of COVID-19 is important, but Mr. Trudeau needs to focus on helping Canadians right now.

“The need to fulfill a partisan campaign promise should never supersede the interests of Canadians during a pandemic," she said in a statement.

NDP foreign affairs critic Jack Harris said the UN meeting might be “too little, too late” to help Canada’s bid for a Security Council seat.

“The Liberal government has had years to take more meaningful, concrete steps to improve our standing by contributing our fair share of [international] development assistance, especially when compared to our rivals for the seat.”

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