Canada and EU unveil 'Alliance for the Future' at Montreal summit

Montreal — Canada and the European Union have announced a new alliance of like-minded countries, unveiled at the close of a two-day summit in Montreal and left open for other nations to join.

Prime minister Mark Carney and European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen called the partnership the Alliance for the Future and described it as the deepest possible partnership between Canada and the 27-member bloc, the Guardian reported. Carney said societies had been shaken by what he called new storms, citing the climate emergency, the erosion of democratic norms and the weaponisation of trade.

The summit produced concrete commitments alongside the rhetoric. Canada agreed to contribute to a €90bn support loan for Ukraine, and the two sides said future talks would pursue a more integrated market worth tens of billions of dollars, reduced trade and travel restrictions and new educational opportunities. Brussels and Ottawa also announced an agreement bringing Canada into Europe's supercomputing network, giving Canadian researchers access to European machines to train AI models.

The backdrop is a trade war between Canada and the United States and Ottawa's unease at relying on American companies for defence technology. Carney pointed to a planned merger between Canadian AI firm Cohere Inc and Germany's Aleph Alpha GmbH — with dual headquarters in Berlin and Toronto and a federal stake in Cohere of up to C$1.6bn — as a step away from dependence on US AI giants.

More contentious is the revival of the idea of Canada becoming an "associate member" of the EU. Von der Leyen, who first floated the term, conceded it was uncharted territory but said the ambition and creativity existed to shape it. Some EU member states are less enthused: Germany and others worked behind the scenes to strip the phrase from a draft of the summit statement, fearing a legally meaningless designation would confuse countries actually seeking membership. Both leaders used the term anyway.

European Council president Antonio Costa called Canada "by far the most European of the non-European countries" and promised the closest association ever between the EU and a non-European country. Not everyone was celebrating: Quebec's premier, Paul St-Pierre Plamondon, boycotted the event after Ottawa refused to let him speak publicly, accusing the federal government of offering his separatist-led province a ceremonial seat rather than influence.

For now the alliance is a statement of intent rather than a treaty. The next marker is the 2027 summit, where leaders say the scope of Canadian associate membership — and what, if anything, it legally means — will be defined.