AIIB/Canada Rift Reveals Western Unease Over Chinese Multinationals

MNI London: The recent headline that Canada has moved to cut ties with the Chinese-headquartered Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank has demonstrated serious tensions in multilateral institutions operating between China and the West.

• Canadian Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland told reporters a short time ago that Canada will immediately halt all activity with AIIB and launch a review into Canada's AIIB membership and allegations of control by Chinese Communist Party.
• Earlier today, the FTreportedthat the Canadian director-general for communications of AIIB, Bob Pickard, had fled China after accusing the development bank of infiltration by the CCP party members.
• According to FT, Pickard said: "...the institution is run by Communist party members who 'operate like an internal secret police.'”
• Pickard told FT: "These people are like an invisible government inside the bank and this is what I can’t be part of. I don’t want to be a useful idiot.”
• AIIB responded in a statement that Pickard’s, “recent public comments and characterisation of the Bank are baseless and disappointing.”