OTTAWA — Bureaucrats working for Prime Minister Justin Trudeau had diplomats push Denmark to speed up the appointment of former cabinet minister Carolyn Bennett as ambassador to that country — a change most embassy staff learned of through a media leak.

The government has not offered a rationale for asking Denmark to expedite its approval of Bennett’s appointment, which came a week before her resignation as MP. In a major upset, the Liberals lost Bennett’s former seat of Toronto-St. Paul’s in a byelection last year.