Freeland Took Part in Private WEF Davos Session on Ukraine Financing

World Economic Forum founder Klaus Schwab delivers a speech during a session of the WEF annual meeting in Davos on Jan. 17, 2023. (Fabrice Coffrini/AFP via Getty Images)

Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland participated in an undisclosed session on the financing of Ukraine during her visit to the World Economic Forum (WEF) meeting in Davos earlier this year, an official document shows.

The information was revealed in an Inquiry of Ministry tabled by the government on March 29 in response to an order paper from Conservative MP Leslyn Lewis.

The private session attended by Freeland was not listed in her public itinerary and neither did it appear in the public program of the WEF.

The government document says the panel was about “the war in Ukraine and paths for private sector capital to offer support.”

Participants included U.S. climate czar John Kerry, Netherlands Prime Minister Mark Rutte, and former British prime ministers Boris Johnson and Tony Blair, while Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky attended remotely.

Three financiers also took part: Larry Fink, chairman and CEO of BlackRock; Bill Ford, chairman and CEO of General Atlantic; and David Rubenstein, co-chairman of the Carlyle Group.

Fink, who manages the firm holding the most assets on the planet, sits on the WEF board of trustees along with Freeland.

The Epoch Times contacted the Ministry of Finance to find out why the panel was not publicized and what was discussed, but didn’t receive a response by publication time.

Freeland also participated in a public session of the WEF on Ukraine titled “Restoring Security and Peace,” during which she said G7 finance ministers couldn’t control certain global factors to bring down inflation, but that defeating Russia would give a “huge boost to the global economy.”

Government Tight-Lipped

The federal government was tight-lipped about its participation at the WEF meeting in Switzerland in January. At the time, several departments didn’t respond to Epoch Times questions about the size of the Canadian delegation and the government’s objectives.

The Ministry of Finance and Global Affairs Canada (GAC), which both sent ministers, have now answered some of those questions.

Freeland and International Trade Minister Mary Ng were each accompanied by two staff, and two Canadian diplomats stationed in Geneva also participated.

Freeland’s public itineraries were sparse on information, only mentioning meetings with unspecified “business leaders and other participants.”

The Inquiry of Ministry did not provide many additional details, only mentioning meetings with the U.S. congressional delegation, which included senators Chris Coons and Joe Manchin, with International Monetary Fund Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva and President of the European Central Bank Christine Lagarde.

The document says Freeland had meetings with a variety of business leaders and foreign government leaders, but they were not identified.

What her department provided in the Inquiry of Ministry is less detailed than what GAC provided for Minister Ng.

GAC provided a list of meetings with, in some cases, brief agendas and summaries, but the names of non-Canadian participants were mostly withheld citing privacy.

Lewis had asked to be provided with details of any agreements signed during the WEF meetings.

“The WEF public session and side meetings related to the WTO [World Trade Organization] were general discussions, and did not entail any formal agreements,” says the document.

“The bilateral engagements were closed meetings and as such, no information is available regarding their content.”

Lewis also requested information on follow-up action taken after the event. The government replied that “Canada will continue to engage with the WEF on shared priorities.”

Partnerships and Funding

To date, the Trudeau government has entered into at least two partnerships with the WEF.

One was the Known Traveller Digital Identity (KTDI) project to develop a concept of a digital credential to cross borders. This project is now complete, with the Canadian government further developing the concept with the Dutch government, also a KTDI partner.

Canada also signed onto the WEF-initiated Agile Nations charter, which seeks to have countries streamline their regulations to usher in the WEF-promoted “Fourth Industrial Revolution,” with its technological advances such as artificial intelligence and gene editing.

A previous order paper filed by Lewis has also revealed that federal departments have provided $17.4 million in funding to WEF projects in recent years.

Most of the information on the government’s involvement with the WEF has been unearthed through queries made by Lewis.

She called Canada’s participation in the Agile Nations network a “radical policy shift.”