Canada Seeks Closer EU Ties, Rules Out Membership: Mark Carney
Prime Minister Mark Carney says Canada is “looking for a closer partnership” with the European Union — but not to become a member.
While speaking from the NATO summit in the Netherlands — where he announced Canada’s promise to spend five per cent of gross domestic product on defence by 2035 — Carney was asked whether he has given any thought to trying to join the bloc of European nations.
“The short answer is no,” he said. “That’s not the intent. That’s not the pathway we’re on.”
“We co-operate much more clearly and broadly to our mutual benefit,” he said. “Not as a member, but along that continuum.”
Defence partnership
These comments come days after Carney took steps to draw Canada closer to Europe. On Monday, he signed a strategic defence and security partnership with the EU — seen as a move toward making Canada less reliant on the United States.
A joint EU/Canada statement says the two parties agreed to a “new ambitious and comprehensive partnership” to “promote shared prosperity, democratic values, peace and security” that goes well beyond security co-operation.
To do that, the statement says, Canada and the EU launched a process that “will move Canada and the EU closer together” on a number of fronts such as trade, supply chains, aligning regulations, artificial intelligence, climate change, justice and international crisis response on top of security and defence.
From the NATO summit, Carney reiterated some of those values that he says make Canada “the most European of non-European nations” — a line he has repeated since becoming prime minister.
He highlighted Canada and the EU’s shared values of “liberty” and “democracy” as well as the importance the two parties put on “solidarity” and “sustainability.
Before a meeting with French President Emmanuel Macron during that trip in March, Carney said in French that “it is more important than ever for Canada to strengthen its ties with its reliable allies, such as France.”
He said France “shares our values and lives them through action, during this age of economic and geopolitical crisis.”
