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Concerns about election interference, espionage, and economic coercion are not just theoretical. Intelligence officers, parliamentarians, and investigative journalists have repeatedly flagged incidents of the PRC [People's Republic of China] targeting Canadian Chinese diaspora communities, attempting to sway local elections, and even infiltrating institutions of higher learning.

But responses have been fragmented, and at times, politically muted. What’s needed now is a nationwide inquiry with subpoena power and full transparency alongside active criminal investigations, where warranted.

To understand the PRC’s strategy in Canada, we must also look globally at its Belt and Road Initiative (BRI)—a trillion-dollar geopolitical project that combines infrastructure investment, debt diplomacy, and soft power influence.

Under the BRI, China has secured critical infrastructure assets—including ports, energy grids, and telecommunications networks—in dozens of countries. As a result, many nations have found themselves economically beholden to Chinese state-owned enterprises, with strings quietly but firmly attached. This has compromised sovereignty, influenced policy-making, and increased susceptibility to authoritarianism.

Canada may not be an official BRI partner, but the tactics of economic leverage, academic espionage, and political manipulation are here nonetheless, dressed up as research partnerships, real estate investments, and threats to MPs and diaspora activists.

The implications for national security, civil liberties, and democratic integrity are immense.

That Canada’s smallest province—notably, the birthplace of Confederation—has had the foresight and courage to raise the alarm is both a credit to its leadership and an indictment of federal hesitation. Many islanders have also called for reforms of the Island Regulatory and Appeals Commission, the body that should have investigated the Buddhist organizations back in 2018.

P.E.I.’s call for an inquiry should be viewed as a national call to action—proof that even provinces removed from the country’s geopolitical epicentres are feeling the ripple effects of foreign influence.

Now it’s up to the federal government to act decisively.

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