Canada and the European Union: An Alliance Forged in Washington

On 17 September 2026, Mark Carney stepped onto the podium of the European Parliament in Strasbourg and accepted the proposal that Ursula von der Leyen had put to him the day before: making Canada the first “associated member” of the European Union. He cautioned that the status itself remains undefined and outlined what he is actually proposing – deeper integration in trade, defence, critical minerals, artificial intelligence, energy, space and financial services. The reception was enthusiastic: a standing ovation, MEPs taking photos with him, one in a Canadian hockey jersey. Yet over the entire speech hung the threat of Donald Trump, who the previous day had called the proposal a potentially “hostile act” and announced very serious tariffs against the Union itself – further evidence that it is not the shared will of Ottawa and Brussels, but pressure from Washington, that most strongly drives this rapprochement.

Foundations before the crisis:

Canada–EU relations rank among the oldest formalised relationships of the European Communities with an industrialised country, yet for most of their history they remained politically secondary to the transatlantic axis with Washington. Their institutional framework was built gradually, in small steps, over nearly half a century:

1976 – Framework Agreement for Commercial and Economic Cooperation – the first agreement of its kind between the European Communities and an industrialised country, signed under the government of Pierre Trudeau.

1990 – Transatlantic Declaration establishes the first framework for regular political consultations between Ottawa and the Communities.

1996 – Joint Political Declaration and Action Plan – commitments to cooperation, inter alia, in promoting democracy in post-communist Europe.

2004 – Canada–EU Partnership Agenda opens talks on a full free-trade agreement – suspended as early as 2006 in the face of resistance from some Member States.

2009 – Launch of CETA negotiations and signature of the air transport agreement.

October 2016 – Walloon crisis: the regional parliament of Wallonia blocks Belgium’s consent to the signing of CETA for ten days, forcing the EU Council to postpone the ceremony and exposing how deeply divided the Union can be even towards a close partner.

30 October 2016 – Signature of CETA and of the parallel Strategic Partnership Agreement (SPA), covering political dialogue on human rights, security and migration.

September 2017 – Provisional application of CETA eliminates almost all tariffs between the parties.

Canada, as a founding member of NATO, had for decades also participated in the European security architecture as an ally from outside the continent, though without institutional anchoring comparable to membership. Even the SPA negotiations themselves exposed an asymmetry of priorities: Brussels wanted to link the trade agreement to binding commitments on human rights and climate – a standard element of EU agreements with developing countries – while Ottawa resisted such conditions, pointing to its own long democratic tradition. Even after CETA entered into force, Canada’s economic and strategic weight remained overwhelmingly continental – the United States accounted for roughly seven out of every ten dollars of Canadian exports, and the transatlantic bond was complementary rather than central.

The catalyst: the second Trump administration

The turning point was the Trump administration’s policy towards Canada. In early 2025 Washington imposed 25-percent tariffs on Canadian imports and 10-percent tariffs on energy, citing a “state of emergency” related to fentanyl. This was accompanied by repeated presidential suggestions that Canada should become the fifty-first state of the USA – rhetoric that Mark Carney made the centrepiece of his victorious election campaign in April 2025, announcing the end of the “old relationship of integration” with Washington. At a meeting in the Oval Office in May 2025, Carney replied briefly to Trump: Canada “is not for sale.”

The trade war escalated over the following months: trade talks collapsed in October 2025 and were resumed only in March 2026, without a breakthrough. In the summer of 2026 Washington applied tariffs of up to 50 percent to Canadian goods worth some 28–30 billion dollars; Ottawa responded symmetrically, imposing tariffs of up to 50 percent on around 700 categories of American products. On 1 July 2026, during the mandatory review of the CUSMA agreement, Canada and Mexico declared themselves in favour of extending it for a further sixteen years – the United States refused, triggering a regime of annual reviews. The agreement formally remains in force until 2036, yet its long-term architecture has become a matter of dispute.

The scale of the phenomenon:

131 billion € – total trade in goods and services between the EU and Canada in 2025 (Eurostat data); the EU is Canada’s second-largest trading partner;

150 billion € – ceiling of the EU’s SAFE defence instrument, to which Canada obtained preferential access;

81.8 billion CAD – Canadian defence spending announced in the 2025 budget over five years;

~70% – the US share of Canadian exports despite the rapprochement with Brussels.

Institutional response: from declarations to defence-industrial integration

Against the backdrop of collapsing trust in Washington, Ottawa and Brussels accelerated the construction of a parallel architecture of cooperation:

23 June 2025 – 20th Canada–EU Summit: signature of the Security and Defence Partnership (signatories: Kaja Kallas on the EU side and Canadian ministers Anita Anand and David J. McGuinty) together with the declaration of a “New Strategic Partnership of the Future.”

2025 Budget – Carney’s government announces 81.8 billion CAD over five years for the rebuilding of the Canadian Armed Forces, aligning itself with the logic of the EU’s Readiness 2030 defence plan (formerly ReArm Europe), worth 800 billion euro.

1 October 2025 – Carney appoints John Hannaford as his Plenipotentiary Representative to the EU, responsible for trade, economic security and defence cooperation.

1 December 2025 – Canada becomes the first non-European country to conclude negotiations on participation in SAFE – the EU loan instrument for defence investments, which in parallel supports the integration of the Ukrainian defence industry into the European base. Participation requires a financial contribution from Ottawa; the 35-percent threshold for components from outside the EU, EEA-EFTA and Ukraine is partially relaxed for Canadian entities.

19 December 2025 – EU Member States formally approve the agreement on Canada’s participation in SAFE.

September 2026 – The European Parliament announces the opening of its liaison office in Ottawa – a rare form of direct institutional presence vis-à-vis a non-EU country.

16 September 2026 – During the State of the Union address in Strasbourg, von der Leyen, addressing Carney who was present in the chamber, opens the door to granting Canada the status of the “first associated member” of the EU.

17 September 2026 – Carney, in his speech to the European Parliament, accepts the proposal and announces an EU–Canada summit in Montreal.

29–30 October 2026 (announced) – Planned summit of EU leaders in Montreal, at which the parties are to refine the shape of the new relationship.

Carney’s doctrine: “a rupture, not a transition”

Carney sketched the intellectual framework of this turn in January 2026 in Davos, speaking of “a rupture, not a transition” in the international order and arguing that sovereignty increasingly depends on a state’s capacity to withstand pressure rather than on negotiating alone with great powers. He warned then that when states negotiate alone with a dominant power: “we negotiate from a position of weakness, we accept what is offered to us” – Trump replied to him the next day. Instead of a choice between blocs, Carney advances the logic of “variable geometry” – building separate coalitions for separate purposes, depending on shared interests and values and on the solidarity of so-called middle powers in the face of economic pressure.

“A rupture, not a transition” – that is how Carney described the present moment in the international order.
World Economic Forum, Davos, January 2026.

The breakthrough in Strasbourg: from leak to proposal

In early September the Wall Street Journal reported that Carney was considering “associated member” status for Canada – a category that formally does not exist in EU law. Canadian officials quickly denied any pursuit of full membership, and the prime minister himself began to speak more cautiously of a “unique alliance” based on shared values after some EU capitals reacted coolly to the very idea. All the more significant, therefore, was what happened on 16 September: it was not Carney who repeated his request, but von der Leyen herself who revived and publicised the idea of associated membership, opening the door wider than anyone in Ottawa had expected.

“Dear Mark, I said that we must urgently reimagine our partnerships, so I would like, together with you, to open the door for Canada to become the first associated member of the European Union.”
Ursula von der Leyen, State of the Union address, Strasbourg, 16 September 2026.

This decision marks a real turn in Brussels’ policy, which earlier the same year had rejected a similar proposal – when German Chancellor Friedrich Merz had advocated a comparable status for Ukraine. Legally speaking, “associated membership” does not exist in the EU treaties – the category would have to be built from scratch and approved unanimously by all 27 Member States. Reactions within the European Parliament itself were divided: the leader of the Left group, Manon Aubry, asked directly who had given von der Leyen a mandate to announce such a decision unilaterally, while the leader of the Patriots for Europe, Jordan Bardella, criticised it from protectionist positions. The market assessed it more favourably – Berenberg’s chief economist Holger Schmieding called it “a major step” in Europe’s building of a network of partnerships with like-minded countries, aimed less at the United States than at reducing dependence on them.

Symbolically this clashes with unfinished business from a decade ago: CETA itself, signed in 2016, is still only provisionally applied, because ten Member States – including France, Italy and Poland – have never formally ratified it. Before the Union defines what “associated membership” is supposed to be, it will have to confront the fact that it has not even completed a far more modest trade agreement from almost ten years ago.

Carney accepts the offer, Trump threatens Europe

On 17 September Carney accepted the offer in the European Parliament, cautioning that the very notion of “associated membership” still awaits definition. He outlined what he actually means: deeper integration in trade, defence, critical minerals, artificial intelligence, energy, space, scientific research and financial services – so that both sides become less vulnerable to economic and geopolitical pressure. Later he told journalists outright that he is not seeking full membership of the EU. The welcome in the hemicycle was enthusiastic – a standing ovation, MEPs asking him for joint photos, one dressed in a Canadian hockey jersey.

“We do not seek power in order to dominate others. On the contrary – we seek resilience, thanks to which no one will be able to control our open markets, violate our sovereignty, threaten our territorial integrity or undermine our freedoms, our democracy, our rule of law.”
Mark Carney, European Parliament, Strasbourg, 17 September 2026.

Von der Leyen for her part proposed that both sides go beyond the existing free-trade agreement and build an “Alliance for the Future” – a common space of prosperity and economic security. Carney also announced that on 29–30 October 2026 he would host an EU leaders’ summit in Montreal, at which the parties are to refine the shape of the new relationship.

The threat arrived even before the speech: Trump suggested that the proposed arrangement could be a “hostile act” and announced very serious tariffs on Europe if he judged its intentions unfriendly. A European Commission spokesperson replied that strengthening the partnership with Canada “is not aimed at anyone, but serves our common strength.” Asked about Trump’s words, Carney replied: “Canadians agree that no one will dictate to us what language we speak. No one will impose our culture or with whom we may conclude international agreements.” It is worth noting the difference in strategy: while Ottawa responded to Trump’s tariffs with retaliatory tariffs, the Union has so far chosen the path of concessions, accepting tariffs of up to 15 percent on most of its exports to the USA – which makes its sudden openness towards Canada all the more telling.

Asymmetries and doubts

Analytically speaking, the shift is real at the institutional and defence-industrial level, yet remains legally undefined and aspirational at the level of trade or mobility. Even MEPs do not hide their uncertainty about the content of the proposal: according to Sandro Gozi of Renew Europe it could mean Carney’s inclusion in EU leaders’ summits and regular ministerial meetings, but – as he himself admits – it is hard to guess what exactly von der Leyen had in mind. The structure of Canadian exports – still dominated by the United States – is changing more slowly than political declarations, and according to reports from some EU officials Brussels is not certain whether Ottawa treats the rapprochement as an end in itself or rather as a bargaining chip in negotiations with Washington. Critics in Canada itself point out that the Union is growing more slowly than the US economy and does not possess comparable military potential, while closer regulatory integration with Brussels may impose costs disproportionate to the benefits of a geographically distant market. SAFE remains, moreover, a loan instrument, not a fiscal transfer – Canada’s participation is paid for, not subsidised.

What this means for the European security architecture

The inclusion of Canada in SAFE – alongside the parallel strengthening of the integration of Ukraine’s defence industry within the same instrument – fits into a broader pattern: the European security architecture is ceasing to be a simple arrangement of a transatlantic centre and periphery and is becoming a network of coalitions of variable composition depending on the threat. An additional signal of this direction is the “Security Council” with the participation of like-minded countries announced by von der Leyen, as well as the announcement of deepened cooperation with Canada and the United Kingdom in assessing the security of the most advanced artificial-intelligence models. The policy and rhetoric of the Trump administration are clearly pushing both Canada and the EU to imagine a world without strong American leadership – and to act in accordance with that vision. For Canada the turn towards Europe, forced by Trump’s pressure, is therefore less a rupture with the transatlantic order than an attempt at diversification within it – a form of hedging against an ally whose own commitment to the institutions of that order has become unpredictable.

The next concrete step in refining what “associated membership” would actually mean is to be the EU–Canada summit in Montreal on 29–30 October 2026.