Table of Contents
WHAT JUST HAPPENED
• Saudi Arabia and Canada – full-on diplomatic crisis.
• In the past two days, Saudi Arabia has declared the Canadian ambassador “persona non grata” and given him 24 hours to leave the country.
• The Saudis have also called their ambassador back from Canada, suspended “all new businesses transactions and investments linked with Canada,” and cancelled direct flights to Toronto by Saudi’s state airline.
THE SAUDI-CANADA SPAT STARTED OVER A TWEET
• Amnesty International learned that several prominent female Saudi human rights activists, including Samar Badawi and Nassima al-Sada, had been detained by Saudi authorities.
• Badawi, an internationally acclaimed activist in her own right, is the sister of Raif Badawi, a Saudi dissident blogger who has been imprisoned by the Saudi government since 2012 on charges of apostasy and “insulting Islam through electronic channels.”
THE TWEET
• Canada’s foreign minister, Chrystia Freeland, tweeted that she was “Very alarmed to learn that Samar Badawi, Raif Badawi’s sister, has been imprisoned in Saudi Arabia,” adding that “Canada stands together with the Bad
WHAT HAPPENED NEXT?
The Saudi government also froze all new trade with Ottawa, ordered around 16,000 students in Canada to either return home or complete their studies in another part of the world and cancelled all direct flights to Toronto via its state airline.
NOTES
Saudi Arabia stopped all medical treatment programs in Canada and is coordinating for the transfer of all Saudi patients currently receiving care in Canadian hospitals to be moved outside of the country. The Saudi central bank and state pension funds ordered overseas asset managers to offload their Canadian equities, bonds and cash holdings “no matter the cost,”
WHAT IS AT STAKE
• Trade between Canada and Saudi Arabia came in at slightly over $4 billion last year, with a significant portion stemming from a controversial deal to sell combat vehicles with machine guns and cannons to the Saudis
• The arms deal, which received a critical stamp of approval from Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s government in 2016, could now be under treat amid Saudi Arabia’s imposed trade freeze.
• In terms of trade volume, Saudi Arabia is Canada’s 17th largest trade partner
WHAT HAS THE RESPONSE BEEN AROUND THE WORLD?
•The United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and the Palestinian Authority have all stood by Saudi Arabia amid the country’s spat with Canada, according to the kingdom’s state media.
•Yet, the U.S. — traditionally one of Canada’s most important friends — has stayed on the sidelines of the dispute thus far
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