While not everyone invited was able to attend the Summit, the participation of so many influential representatives played well to Carney’s efforts to build Canada’s international partnerships, in a determined effort to counter American influence. As a function of our foreign policy, he rightly erred on the side of our ‘interests’ rather than our ‘values’ as I had advocated in my previous article for Open Canada, when examining the outcome of our 2025 election. This was particularly true for India and Saudi Arabia.
The addition of PM Modi was fraught with controversy, since the RCMP is still investigating whether the Indian government was involved with the murder of a Sikh activist in Canada. Carney received push back from the Canadian Sikh community, and some of his own caucus members, who demanded that the invite be rescinded. But he stood firm.
Certainly, I applaud the PM including India, as it is a prominent rising economic power, and has surpassed China as the most populous country in the world. Moreover, our bilateral ties have been in the deep freeze for far too long. Regularizing our relationship can play a critical role in our strategy to build economic alliances beyond the U.S. Plus, why would the work of the investigation, many months in the making, be thwarted by Modi’s 24-hour visit to Canada?
As it turned out, the two met and had a positive discussion. It was the first bilateral meeting in two years, and they announced that regular diplomatic services would be restored. They also committed to appointing new High Commissioners.
It’s a similar story with Saudi Arabia, where the Crown Prince has been implicated in the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi back in 2018. This episode firmly placed our relations on pause. But again, Carney was determined to reactivate our cooperation, in the pursuit of expanding and diversifying our trade and investment, as well as building our political presence in that part of the world. In the end, the Crown Prince declined the invite, but Carney’s message was crystal clear and a valuable ice-breaking move.
Our PM also had a very good meeting with Ukrainian President Zelensky, as is usually the case, since our two countries enjoy a warm relationship. Carney also announced an additional $2B in military support, and a $2.3B loan to help with the rebuilding of critical infrastructure lost in the war. Furthermore, Canada slapped additional sanctions on a good number of Russian individuals and entities.
In short, our PM dealt with the relationships part of the agenda most astutely. He stuck to his plan, as he had promised Canadians during the election, of extending our global reach, and I believe this will pay off handsomely in the coming months and years.
It’s rather ironic that Trump’s hostilities are pushing other countries and leaders closer together. And citizens are fully onboard. In a Pollara public opinion study, conducted just before the Summit, it found that Canadians have seriously soured on the U.S. Some 71 percent of respondents had a “negative sentiment” towards our neighbour. Meanwhile, European countries (the UK, Italy, Germany, France) and Japan were favourably viewed by over 70 percent of Canadian respondents. And these nations felt the same about Canada.
Even more telling, is a recent global survey of 40 countries, where China emerged as the most disliked nation. In second place was the U.S., followed by Russia and North Korea. How quickly and deeply the world has lost trust in America.
When it came to the consequential issues confronting the Summit, Carney played it calmly and conservatively. By doing so, he kept his domestic political powder dry with Trump. The PM was wise to not push the boundaries and run the risk of upsetting the proceedings. With Trump sitting at the table, it was best to avoid ganging up on him, for it would have resulted in a circus. As a fall-back position, it was preferable to have these matters raised among allies in sidebar meetings, and in their own bilaterals with Trump. In fact, while we will never fully know, at this Summit, the side meetings between the different leaders were probably more impactful than the collective sessions.
In regard to Carney’s three policy priorities, he was able to generate a useful and generally agreeable discussion. The discourse led to a number of individual statements. Although, on the theme of peace and security, I’m not sure the G7 words will bring much comfort to the people caught in the war in Ukraine, the disaster in Gaza, and in the new conflict between Israel and Iran.
Finally, on the unity front, there were no major outbursts that we know of. That’s in part because Carney ably chaired the proceedings. He was also smart in foregoing the traditional communique, in favour of a chair’s statement. Typically, a draft text of the communique is prepared by G7 officials in advance and a copy is ready for the start of the meeting. As leaders deliberate, it then gets negotiated in late night sessions by officials, which can become quite heated. The challenge is to find honourable compromises, while striving to not endlessly water down the commitments so they become meaningless.
Last year, when Italy hosted the G7, there were 22 different ministerial meetings and leaders agreed to a 20,000-word communique, which stretched credibility, given that they only had a fixed number of hours together. It would have been impossible to have consensus on such a lengthy text with Trump as a participant.
By issuing his own statement, and a number of shorter issue-specific statements, the PM avoided the threat of divisions and discord – it was astute stick-handling. As such, Carney’s approach more closely resembled the 2019 meeting in France, where the summit approved a succinct 259-word declaration, as well as several issue-specific statements.
The PM also viewed the different hot-button issues as an opportunity. Rather than trying to bang heads together around a chosen option, and running the risk of failure, he opted for the chance to rethink policies, reframe core messaging, and build new coalitions.
Some observers might well argue that the issues before the Summit were too important for leaders to lay down their swords, and that the U.S. President deserved to be challenged by his peers. I can understand this principled and combative thinking. But, at the end of the day, what would this accomplish, since Trump would never concede? How would the globe benefit from its principal leaders being in complete disarray? And how would that elevate Canadian interests with the U.S., if it came to a complete blowout?
Personally, I thought Carney’s ‘soft’ approach was prudent. Best to bide your time, build your alliances, and live to fight another day.
Carney also released a number of G7 statements on specific items, including a Wildfire Charter; on the Israel-Iran conflict; on critical metals production, on AI; on Quantum Computing; on migrant smuggling; and on transnational repression.
