VANCOUVER—The most influential Canadian policy-maker of the year is not even Canadian.

That’s because he’s Chinese president Xi Jinping, according to the Ottawa-based Macdonald-Laurier Institute.

Every year, the Ottawa-based think-tank names the person or organization that has had the greatest impact — positive or negative — on Canadian public policy.

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“We hope this makes more people realize that the leader of China is the most important influence on what’s happening in this country,” MLI Managing Director Brian Lee Crowley told the Star.

“The centralization of power which Xi has gathered under himself is tremendous. He’s the guiding mind of a regime that clearly wants to project its power into the world,” Crowley added.

Last year, the institute named Canada’s foreign minister at the time and current deputy prime minister, Chrystia Freeland, as the most influential.

Ottawa and Beijing have been locked in a bitter relations crisis since last December, when Huawei’s chief financial officer was arrested in Vancouver at the request of U.S. authorities. Meng Wanzhou is awaiting extradition proceedings, which could send her to the U.S. to face charges partially related to accusations Huawei violated sanctions on Iran.

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Two Canadians, diplomat-on-leave Michael Kovrig and businessman Michael Spavor, were subsequently arrested in China in what many have described as retaliation against Canada for Meng’s arrest. This week, China was hinting the pair may face “national security” charges.

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Since the diplomatic spat began, Canada has faced limitations on China-bound agricultural exports of canola seed, pork and beef that have cost farmers millions.

Canada’s intelligence community is also conducting a review into Huawei’s potential participation in the country’s next generation 5G wireless infrastructure.

On Tuesday, Canadian opposition parties banded together to force the creation of a special committee on Canada-China relations tasked with investigating national security issues, diplomatic ties, economic issues and consular affairs.

Crowley said the Liberals’ votes against the initiative showed the office of Prime Minister Trudeau still has its head “buried in the sand”.

“I think there’s a lot of wishful thinking that the difficult issues with China will just go away and we could get back to the status quo before Meng got off the plane in Vancouver.”

Chinese President Xi Jinping is seen on a TV. (Mikhail Klimentyev / The Associated Press)

Charles Burton, a senior fellow at MLI, said showing complaisance to Beijing’s actions threatens to put people in Canada at risk while undermining the country’s values as a liberal democracy.

Last month, Global News reported that Richard Lee, an MLA in B.C. at the time, was detained by Chinese authorities in Shanghai in 2015; the officials searched his Canadian government-issued cellphone. Lee received no assistance from the federal government, he alleged.

However, some experts say that taking more assertive steps, such as the new parliamentary committee, will not necessarily lead to the desired outcomes — such as freedom for detained Canadians Kovrig and Spavor.

Beijing has been given concessions by Western nations for so long and is now living in “denial” because those same countries are no longer willing to grant them, said Yaxue Cao, the founder of the Washington-based digital publication China Change.

Beijing hasn’t recognized the groundswell of opposition to its actions in other nations and will “continue to be hardline” against Canada, she told the Star.

With files from Jeremy Nuttall and Alex Boutilier