Canada spent day one of the UN General Assembly doing what it has all year: building relationships that don’t revolve around its southern neighbour.
What happened: Mark Carney and a group of world leaders announced a new coalition yesterday, called Partners for Multilateralism (P4M), aimed at bringing together middle powers and developing countries to take action on everything from international law reforms to AI.
Though few details were offered, P4M is designed to boost cooperation on security, improve how the world manages its economy, and find collaborative ways to tackle global challenges like supply chains and climate change.
Why it’s happening: In a Financial Times op-ed, Carney and the presidents of Brazil, Kenya, and the European Council wrote that, with the highest number of armed conflicts since 1946, international collaboration must be strengthened. They also took some not-so-subtle shots at the White House for hurting orgs like the UN.
As Carney said last week in his EU address, he wants to create “an alliance strong enough so that no one can dictate our choices.”
Why it matters: With Carney championing this middle power strategy, Canada has become the face of a global push away from Washington. The ‘strength-in-numbers’ approach outlined in the PM’s Davos speech was largely theoretical at the time, but many countries have since decided to take him up on his offer.
Following Davos, Carney has signed a slew of trade and security deals with countries including the UAE, Japan, and Ecuador. And now, Ottawa has a first-of-its-kind EU associate membership offer on the table.
Yes, but: As Canada and its allies cozy up, retaliation from the U.S. is likely. Donald Trump already described Canada and the EU’s closer ties as a “hostile act” and threatened punitive tariffs on both countries, depending on the nature of their membership pact.
Our take: Those off-the-cuff threats from Trump prove exactly why Carney and the rest of these world leaders are seeking the path that they are.—LA
