Canada’s former deputy prime minister Chrystia Freeland has said she will leave parliament to accept a job as adviser to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.
Freeland said her role as an economic development adviser for Ukraine would be unpaid. In July, she will also take on a position to lead the Rhodes Trust, an educational charity, in the UK.
She was elected in 2013, and served in key roles such finance, foreign affairs and international trade minister under former Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.
She broke from Trudeau in late 2024, accusing him in a public resignation letter of failing to take the threat of US tariffs seriously, which helped force his political exit.
Freeland posted on X on Monday: “Ukraine is at the forefront of today’s global fight for democracy, and I welcome this chance to contribute on an unpaid basis as an economic adviser to [Zelensky].
“In the coming weeks I will also leave my seat in Parliament. I want to thank my constituents for their years of confidence in me. I am so grateful to have been your representative.”
As well as stepping down as an MP for Toronto’s riding of University-Rosedale, a Liberal safe seat, she said she would quit her other role as Canada’s special representative for the reconstruction of Ukraine.
Earlier on Monday, Zelensky announced on X that Freeland would be taking on the role as adviser.
The Ukrainian president said she had “extensive experience in attracting investment and implementing economic transformations”.
Zelensky’s announcement had spurred calls from opposition politicians for her to step down.
Conservative foreign affairs critic Michael Chong said “one cannot be a Canadian MP and an adviser to a foreign government”.
“She must do one or the other,” he added.
In November it was announced that this summer Freeland would become CEO of the Rhodes Trust, which administers Rhodes scholarships to Oxford University.
In September, she stepped down as Carney’s minister of transport and internal trade to take on the new role as Canada’s special envoy to Ukraine, and announced she would not be running in the next federal election.
A former journalist who is of Ukrainian heritage, Freeland has long been a vocal supporter of Kyiv in its war with Russia.
In 2014, she was placed on a Kremlin list of Westerners banned from entering Russia in retaliation for sanctions against Moscow.
In 2020, Freeland became the first woman to be appointed as finance minister in Canada’s history, where she managed Canada’s financial response to the Covid pandemic.
She is also credited with helping renegotiate the current free trade agreement between Canada, the US and Mexico during President Donald Trump’s first term in 2018. Trump later called her “toxic”.
The USMCA trade deal – or CUSMA in Canada – has been credited with helping the country largely avoid a stiff 35% tariff rate imposed by Trump, who granted Canada an exemption for goods covered by the free trade agreement.
That deal is now up for another round of renegotiations this year.
By BBC News
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