Biden Calls Trudeau, Lopez Obrador     01/23 12:43

   

   WASHINGTON (AP) -- President Joe Biden's first calls to foreign leaders went 
to Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Mexican President Andrs Manuel 
Lpez Obrador at a strained moment for the U.S. relationship with its North 
American neighbors.

   Biden's call to Trudeau on Friday came after the Canadian prime minister 
this week publicly expressed disappointment over Biden's decision to issue an 
executive order halting construction of the Keystone XL oil pipeline. The 
long-disputed project was projected to carry some 800,000 barrels of oil a day 
from the tar sands of Alberta to the Texas Gulf Coast, passing through Montana, 
South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas and Oklahoma.

   Biden told Trudeau that by issuing the order he was following through on a 
campaign pledge to stop construction of the pipeline, a senior Canadian 
government official told The Associated Press. The official spoke on the 
condition of anonymity to discuss the private conversation.

   The White House said in a statement that Biden acknowledged Trudeau's 
disappointment with his Keystone decision.

   Biden also spoke with Lpez Obrador on Friday, days after the Mexican 
president accused the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration of fabricating drug 
trafficking charges against the country's former defense secretary.

   While Mexico continues to pledge to block mass movements of Central American 
migrants toward the U.S. border, there has been no shortage of potential 
flashpoints between the two countries.

   Mexico demanded the return of former defense secretary Gen. Salvador 
Cienfuegos after he was arrested in Los Angeles in October, threatening to 
restrict U.S. agents in Mexico if he wasn't returned. U.S. prosecutors agreed 
to drop charges and return Cienfuegos to Mexico.

   But Mexico passed a law restricting foreign agents and removing their 
immunity anyway, and went on to publish the U.S. case file against Cienfuegos, 
whom Mexican prosecutors quickly cleared of any charges.

   Lpez Obrador said in a statement that the conversation with Biden was 
"friendly and respectful." The two discussed immigration and COVID-19, among 
other issues.

   The White House said Biden mentioned "reversing the previous 
administration's draconian immigration policies."

   Trudeau told reporters before the call on Friday that he wouldn't allow his 
differences with Biden over the project to become a source of tension in the 
U.S.-Canada relationship.

   "It's not always going to be perfect alignment with the United States," 
Trudeau said. "That's the case with any given president, but we're in a 
situation where we are much more aligned on values and focus. I am very much 
looking forward to working with President Biden."

   Biden signed the executive order to halt construction of the pipeline just 
hours after he was sworn in.

   "Leaving the Keystone XL pipeline permit in place would not be consistent 
with my Administration's economic and climate imperatives," Biden's executive 
order said.

   Critics say the growing operations increase greenhouse gas emissions and 
threaten Alberta's rivers and forests. On the U.S. side, environmentalists 
expressed concerns about the pipeline--- which would cross the Ogallala 
Aquifer, one of the world's largest underground deposits of fresh water --- 
being too risky.

   But proponents of the project say it would create thousands of jobs on both 
sides of the border.

   The project was proposed in 2008, and the pipeline has become emblematic of 
the tensions between economic development and curbing the fossil fuel emissions 
that are causing climate change. The Obama administration rejected it, but 
President Donald Trump revived it and was a strong supporter. Construction 
already started.

   Biden and Trudeau also discussed the prospects of Canada being supplied with 
the COVID-19 vaccine from pharmaceutical giant Pfizer's facility in Kalamazoo, 
Michigan, according to a second senior Canadian government official, who spoke 
on the condition of anonymity to describe a private conversation.

   Canada has been getting all its Pfizer doses from a Pfizer facility in 
Puurs, Belgium, but Pfizer has informed Canada it won't get any doses next week 
and will get 50% less than expected over the next three weeks. Ontario Premier 
Doug Ford has publicly asked Biden to share a million doses made at Pfizer's 
Michigan facility.

   The U.S. federal government has an agreement with Pfizer in which the first 
100 million doses of the vaccine produced in the U.S. will be owned by the U.S. 
government and will be distributed in the U.S. Anita Anand, the Canadian 
federal procurement minister, has said the doses that are emerging from the 
Michigan plant are for distribution in the United States.

   The two leaders also spoke broadly about trade, defense and climate issues. 
Trudeau also raised the cases of two Canadians imprisoned in China in apparent 
retaliation for the arrest of a top Huawei executive, who was apprehended in 
Canada on a U.S. extradition request, according to the prime minister's office.