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OTTAWA — When Canada signed on to a massive Asia-Pacific trade deal last year, the Liberal government faced some mockery for insisting on putting the term “progressive” in the title.

A few months later, bureaucrats were quietly instructed to drop the word in favour of describing it as an “inclusive approach to trade” instead, newly released documents show.

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In addition to being stripped from Trade Minister Jim Carr’s mandate letter in August, “progressive” was being scrubbed from internal documents, bilateral statements and meeting notes, too.

“Progressive” was just too “politically-loaded” an adjective, explained one email to Global Affairs Canada officials, which the National Post obtained with an access-to-information request.

The subtle shift in tone followed worries, particularly as a new version of the North American Free Trade Agreement was being ironed out last year, that Liberals were prioritizing “progressive” at the expense of hard economic interest.