Canada opposition head says he will cut foreign aid to build Arctic base

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

This was reported by Reuters.

U.S. President Donald Trump, who threatens to impose tariffs on Canada, often complains that Ottawa does not spend enough on defense. 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 square km.

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.