Trudeau rebuffs Trump’s threat to annex Canada using ‘economic force’

Ottawa: Justin Trudeau, who has officially announced his resignation as prime minister the other day, rejected US president elect Donald Trump’s threat of using ‘economic force’ to annex Canada saying there is ‘there isn’t a snowball’s chance in hell,’ The Guardian reported.

Responding to Trump’s threats, Trudeau wrote on social media that people in both countries ‘benefit from being each other’s biggest trading and security partner’.

Departing from what appeared to be light banter of calling Canada 51 state of the US, Trump on Tuesday issued threats to impose tariffs on Canada in order to cow down the country to accept his proposal.

Relishing the idea of annexing his country’s biggest trading partner, Trump said in Florida that ‘Canada and the United States: that would be really something.’

However, the incoming president expressed frustration over what he was frequently saying ‘subsidies’ for Canada.

Trump was quoted as saying: ‘We’ve been good neighbours, but we can’t do it forever, and it’s a tremendous amount of money.’

Reacting to Trump, Canada’s foreign minister, Mélanie Joly said that Canada ‘will never back down in the face of threats’.

Trump’s remarks could further deepen the political turmoil happening in Canada due to leadership vacuum since Trudeau’s resignation.

Meanwhile, Trump in a press conference did not rule out using military force to seize Panama Canal and Greenland alongside promising to rename the Gulf of Mexico as the “Gulf of America”.

Trump called the border between Canada and the US established some 230 years ago as ‘artificially drawn line’.

When asked if he would use military power, Trump said he would use ‘economic force’ and claimed that the US spends too much alongside ‘subsidies’ to defend Canada.