Prime Minister Mark Carney shakes hands with Nunatsiavut Government President Johannes Lampe before a meeting of the Inuit-Crown Partnership Committee, in Inuvik, N.W.T., on Thursday.DARRYL DYCK/The Canadian Press
Prime Minister Mark Carney has appointed Inuk leader Virginia Mearns as Arctic ambassador, asking her to represent Canadian interests in a region that’s become a strategic frontier as climate change opens new shipping routes through waters rich with natural resources.
Ms. Mearns will divide her time between Ottawa and her hometown of Iqaluit, where most recently she served as senior director of Inuit relations at the Qikiqtani Inuit Association (QIA), one of several regional Inuit organizations in Nunavut. More than half of the QIA’s funding comes from the federal government.
The Prime Minister’s Office in a statement said Ms. Mearns’s post, which starts Sept. 15, will focus “on reinforcing Canada’s Arctic engagements with like-minded partners and multilateral forums, bolstering Arctic sovereignty, and advancing opportunities for security and growth.”
The position revives a Jean Chrétien-era ambassadorial appointment that was later axed by former prime minister Stephen Harper in 2006. Mary Simon, now Governor-General, served as Canada’s Ambassador for Circumpolar Affairs between 1994-2004.
During her time in office, Ms. Simon helped set up the Arctic Council, an intergovernmental forum made up of the eight countries that border the Arctic including Russia.
Fen Hampson, chancellor’s professor and professor of international affairs at Carleton University, said the Arctic Council has been severely affected by Russia’s 2022 military assault on Ukraine – an event which has thwarted the ability of Western countries to work with Moscow on co-operation in the North.
“The Arctic Council is certainly – I wouldn’t say, a hollow shell – but it’s not what it used to be.”
He said one of the jobs of this new envoy should be to keep the Arctic Council and its various forms of co-operation alive. “It’s really the only kind of circumpolar forum that exists and it’s important to Canada.”
Foreign Affairs Minister Anita Anand said the Arctic ambassador position arose from Ottawa’s consultation with Indigenous people.
She said Ms. Mearns’s work will complement that of other Canadian diplomats and will “ensure that the Indigenous voice is represented at the table when we are speaking about our Arctic foreign policy, and she’ll ensure that we’re doing the proper engagement with Indigenous peoples.”
Ms. Anand noted that the Canadian Arctic comprises 40 per cent of Canada’s land mass and 70 per cent of its coastline and, citing Russia and China, said “we’re at this critical moment in the global geostrategic environment where we need to reassert our sovereignty and defend our Arctic.”
The Arctic ambassador, Ms. Anand said, “adds to our existing work to ensure that this goal is met.”
China, though it has no territory fronting the Arctic, is building up its presence in the region through its alliance with Russia. Moscow is facing a severe budget crunch from its military attack on Ukraine, and increasingly relies on Beijing and unprecedented levels of Chinese corporate and state investment to develop the region.
Ms. Anand said China is expanding its activity in the Arctic and is sending “dual-use research vessels into the region more often and continues to seek economic inroads into the region.” This month, the Canadian military tracked the Chinese polar icebreaker Xue Long 2 as it entered Arctic waters. Western militaries say these trips serve both civilian and military purposes.
“The importance of ensuring our Arctic presence by way of infrastructure investments, by way of an Arctic ambassador who will have an office in the North has never been more important,” Ms. Anand said.
Artur Wilczynski, a former public servant whose career included serving as ambassador to Norway and a senior post at Communications Security Establishment, welcomed the new appointment but said his concern was that the role “not simply be a way of engaging northern and Indigenous Canadians.”
He said his interpretation of Canada’s new Arctic policy, released last year under then-prime minister Justin Trudeau, framed the ambassadorial role as “disproportionately focused on reaching out to domestic audiences.”
Canada’s ambassador for the Arctic should have very good international connections and be able to reach out to foreign contacts in Arctic states and the Arctic Council, Mr. Wilczynski said.
He said Canadian diplomats including Ms. Mearns must find a way to engage with Russia despite the illegal war Moscow is fighting in Ukraine.
“Russia still has half the Arctic in its purview,” he said. “You can’t have effective management of the complexity of the Arctic issues without Russia around the table.”
Ms. Mearns previously held several senior positions in the government of Nunavut, including principal secretary to former premier Joe Savikataaq, and deputy minister of executive and intergovernmental affairs, where she oversaw strategic planning for the territorial government.
Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami President Natan Obed told reporters in Inuvik, NWT, that he is very pleased about the appointment.
“I think Virginia Mearns is going to be an incredible contributor in diplomacy at this point in time for Canada,” he said, adding that she is an Inuk from Nunavut and will bring that perspective to the role.
Mr. Obed said he had hoped that the appointment process would be co-developed between the federal government and Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami, but that did not end up happening because of the April federal election and other factors.
He said he did have informal conversations with the previous Liberal government about possible names, and Ms. Mearns was on that list.
With a report from Emily Haws in Ottawa