This is John Batchel, a conversation with colleague Charles Burton of synopsis, author of the new book The Beaver and the Dragon, about Canadian Chinese diplomatic and security relationships these many years, comes to a question about how China in the 1990s hired the Canadian National Bureau of Statistics to help it understand its miracle recovery and use of capitalism.

However, we learn now from reporting here in 2025.

The Chinese only used the statistics that fit their assumptions of success.

And otherwise, well, Charles explains.

Charles was involved in some aspect of this,

so this is a testimony of somebody who was present for the filtering, he calls it, politely.

Charles Burton, author of The Beaver and the Dragon,

how China outmaneuvered Canada's diplomacyplomacy, Security, and Sovereignty,

also commenting on the Financial Times report of Chinese,

We're only looking for good news, non-reliable statistics.

Much more of this tonight.

I don't think we can tell what really happened, but I think your last point is probably the

most significant.

The Canadians were readily deceived.

There was a reluctance to provide true information to foreigners if it was negative, and then what was done with the information afterwards was subject to central filtering.

I was involved in some of this work earlier in my career when I was a diplomat.

And I think what the central authorities were happy with with the Canadian input was

information that was useful for them to more effectively extract tax from lower levels of

administration. But the rest of it, I think they looked at with interest. And if it didn't fit with what they already, the kind of discourses they already had, they put it in the back of a drawer to be forgotten.