Three
major departments in the federal government have been actively
co-ordinating a communications strategy with Alberta and its
fossil-fuel industry to fight international global-warming policies
that “target” oilsands production, newly released federal documents
reveal.

The documents, obtained by Postmedia News, suggest that
Environment Canada, Natural Resources Canada as well as the Department
of Foreign Affairs and International Trade, have collaborated on an
“advocacy strategy” in the U.S. to promote the oilsands and discourage
environmental-protection policies.

“The activities of the
oilsands sector has emerged as one of the high priority files for the
federal government,” wrote Natural Resources Canada policy adviser Paul
Khanna in an email, on behalf of Kevin Stringer, the director of
Petroleum Resources in the same department. “As a result we have
developed several products that provide the department’s views on
oilsands development … and we have contributed (along with EC) to a
DFAIT led ‘Advocacy Strategy’ on oilsands for the U.S.”

The
email, dated Dec. 1, 2008, is part of hundreds of pages of documents
released through an access-to-information request by Climate Action
Network Canada.

Read full Montreal Gazette article here