Mademoiselle Joly was in Tokyo two weeks ago. We hosted her here at the Canadian embassy, and we had an excellent discussion. The Canadians and the Japanese put forward a six-point action plan for co-operation within the region. It focused on environmental co-operation, strengthening maritime domain awareness and supporting a rules-based structure. It focused on non-traditional security areas.
Japan is the most influential country within the region outside of Japan. It is an excellent partner in terms of taking on a nuanced approach in engaging with the Chinese relationship. At the same time, it's been a champion of building alternative partnerships within the region to build a critical mass of countries that will pull China in a different direction. They are doing this through tying infrastructure connectivity to development policies, and through building resilience into supply chains. I think these are potentially areas that Canada can co-operate in directly with Japan and other like-minded countries, again to build resilience in the relationship and pull China in a more positive direction over time.
This is the critical aspect that we're thinking about: how we, with like-minded countries like Japan, can pull China in a more positive direction over time .