“Only a few kilometers separate Canada and France at their closest point. Our values are even closer.” Prime Minister Mark Carney said that in French on Sunday, Sept. 20, 2026, standing next to President Emmanuel Macron on a small French territory off the Newfoundland coast.
Macron answered with an endorsement. He said France was “very much in favor” of closer ties between Canada and the European Union, as an associate member and, he added, as a full member of the European community, according to AP.
An unusual setting
The meeting took place in Saint-Pierre-et-Miquelon, home to about 5,800 people and, after Greenland’s Hans Island, the European territory closest to Canada. The Canadian Press reported that Macron was due on the islands from Sept. 19 to 21. Carney joined him for a few hours, with a working lunch and a wreath-laying ceremony on the program. Macron’s office said Carney would be the first Canadian prime minister to visit officially, and that Macron was the first French president there in more than a decade.
The timing was deliberate. Days earlier, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen told the European Parliament she wanted Canada to become the first “associate member” of the EU. Carney addressed the Parliament in Strasbourg on the Thursday. He said the name and shape of any new arrangement were undecided, but that it would go to Parliament for debate and a vote.
Canada and Europe already share a free trade deal, though not every EU member has ratified it. Canada also became the only non-European member of the EU’s new defence procurement program last year.
Space, energy and gas
Carney said the space agencies and defense ministries of both countries will be tasked with building shared infrastructure, from launch systems to ground stations that receive satellite data. They also agreed to widen cooperation in energy, telecommunications, climate resilience and economic development, AP reported. Carney’s office listed aerospace, critical minerals, quantum computing, satellites and supercomputing among the topics.
Macron tied the talks to supply worries at home. With the Iran war disrupting global energy markets, he said, France wants “agreements to secure more liquefied natural gas that can be shipped to Europe’s Atlantic coast.” He called Canada a country with “significant resources of critical minerals and rare earths.”
The American backdrop
The backdrop was plain. AP pointed to Donald Trump’s tariffs, his demands for economic concessions and his repeated talk of making Canada the 51st state. Trump had also posted a map that draped the U.S. flag across North America, including Saint-Pierre-et-Miquelon. Carney has argued that deeper European ties give Canada more alternatives and leave it less exposed to coercion by any single country.
Macron’s office framed it in general terms, saying the two countries share “a common ambition” to act independently.
Later on Sunday Carney flew back to Ottawa to meet Norway’s prime minister, Jonas Gahr Støre. On Monday he was due in New York for the UN General Assembly.
Sources
- Carney and Macron to meet in Saint-Pierre-et-Miquelon on Sunday (The Canadian Press, via CityNews)
- Macron backs Canada as EU associate member as Carney turns toward Europe (AP, via Bastille Post)
