Carney seeks new US-Canada partnership as world undergoes ‘rupture’
Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney called for a “new partnership” with the United States to “help make America great again”, in a speech delivered in New York on Thursday.
Carney said that while the world is undergoing a “rupture” as the US transforms its commercial relationships, working closely with Canada in specific sectors, including aluminium, cars and critical minerals, would strengthen both countries.
Asked about his January trip to Beijing to meet Chinese President Xi Jinping, Carney said they accomplished “a very basic reset of the relationship”. Ties to China had broken down under Carney’s predecessor, Justin Trudeau.
Carney said he told Xi privately that as a rising power, China needs to assume more responsibility for the global monetary and financial system, including the role of China’s currency.
“They need to work more rapidly and more deliberately on it,” Carney said. “We need to help them move away from the margins.”
Amid an ongoing trade war with the US, Carney has vowed to double Canadian exports to other markets in the next decade and signed more than 20 economic and security deals in the past year.
As Carney spoke in New York, US trade officials were in Mexico City in talks with officials there about overhauling the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement on trade. The discussions for now exclude Canada.