Canada’s Conservative leader says he will slash foreign aid to build Arctic military base

Pierre Poilievre vows to expand Canada’s military presence in the Arctic, backing Donald Trump’s call for more defence

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A distant view of the city of Iqaluit, the capital of the Nunavut Arctic territory, Canada. Photo: Shutterstock

Published: 1:48am, 11 Feb 2025Updated: 4:17pm, 11 Feb 2025

The head of Canada’s official opposition party, on track to win an election in the coming months, said on Monday he would slash foreign aid to help build a base in the Arctic and boost regional security.

US President Donald Trump, who is threatening to impose tariffs on Canada, often complains Ottawa does not spend enough on defence. Canada only has a handful of military bases and 2,000 local Inuit rangers to watch over a vast deserted frozen landscape that covers more than 4.4 million sq km (2.73 million square miles).

In recent years, Canada’s military forces have found Chinese monitoring buoys and encountered a Chinese polar vessel in the region, where Russia is also modernising and growing its military presence.

Conservative Party leader Pierre Poilievre, noting the Pentagon had warned of potential Russian action in the Arctic, said he would build at least one new military base, double the number of rangers to 4,000 and buy two more polar icebreakers.

“All of these improvements will be funded by dramatically cutting foreign aid, a lot of which goes to dictators, terrorists and global bureaucracies,” he told reporters in Iqaluit, capital of the Nunavut Arctic territory.