Protesters gather outside the Canadian embassy in Quito on March 4, 2026. “Free Trade Agreement with Canada—More extractivism,” reads the banner. Photo by Acción Ecológica/@AcEcologic.

Two decisions by Prime Minister Mark Carney’s government, made just weeks apart, lay bare Canada’s approach to corporate accountability.

In June, Carney announced the abrupt closure of the Canadian Ombudsperson for Responsible Enterprise (CORE), a federal office mandated to review allegations of human rights abuses linked to the overseas conduct of Canadian extractive and garment companies and report on its findings. A month later, Canada signed a free trade agreement with Ecuador that grants sweeping protections to Canadian mining investors—at a time when Ecuadorians face a deepening human rights crisis linked, in part, to existing Canadian mining investments.

The message is clear: Canada is strengthening legal protections for Canadian investors abroad while abandoning any pretense of holding those same corporations to account at home for their conduct. It’s Carney’s “principled and pragmatic” approach to global engagement in action.

A trade deal that violates Ecuador’s constitution

The Canada-Ecuador Free Trade Agreement was officially signed on July 24 in Ottawa by Canadian Minister of International Trade Maninder Sidhu and Ecuadorian Minister of Production, International Trade and Investment Luis Alberto Jaramillo.

The agreement was and continues to be widely opposed by Ecuadorian civil society, which was left out of consultations, and by Indigenous and campesino organizations, which were neither informed nor gave their consent to the deal. A cross-section of organizations and leaders in Canada representing Indigenous communities, trade justice, labour, environmental, and corporate accountability advocates have also been vocal in their opposition.

Ecuador has long been a destination for Canadian mining investment. But over the two years of formal trade negotiations, Ecuador adopted a series of regressive laws aimed at attracting and facilitating more mining investment—including the Law for the Strengthening of the Strategic Mining and Energy Sectors, which removes key environmental licensing requirements to fast-track mining projects, and the Law on Social Transparency, which imposes sweeping restrictions on civil society organizations and effectively makes it illegal to protest mining projects authorized by the government.

Canadian projects have already been allowed to advance in ecologically sensitive areas of Ecuador, putting vital water sources for millions of Ecuadorians at risk. In farming communities, the military has been deployed to fast-track and rubber-stamp environmental consultations and violently suppress peaceful protests. Projects have advanced despite suspension orders by local courts for failing to ensure the free, prior, and informed consent of affected Indigenous peoples.

In one example, Canadian company Dundee Precious Metals is attempting to advance its copper-gold Loma Larga........

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