Canada and France will deepen their defence and industrial co-operation through a brand new general security of knowledge agreement, Prime Minister Mark Carney said while in Paris on Friday.
Carney made the announcement in a joint statement alongside French President Emmanuel Macron on the Palais de l’Elysée.
“Businesses in each of our countries are doing more together, in energy, defence, critical minerals and now in (artificial intelligence),” Carney said.
“What this implies is a capability to exchange classified information between our defence, our space, our AI and our aerospace sectors.”
Macron said he and Carney are discussing trade, defence and security in a closed-door meeting, and he hailed Canada as a friend to Europe and France.
The meeting, which comes ahead of next week’s G7 summit, may very well be one in all the last between the 2 world leaders. Macron’s second term in office is about to finish next spring.
France, which is hosting the G7 this 12 months, says the priorities for this 12 months’s summit include addressing major geopolitical crises and G7 support for Ukraine.
Sen. Peter Boehm, who served as personal representative for prime ministers Stephen Harper and Justin Trudeau for six G7 summits, said Carney’s pre-summit visit with Macron offers a possibility for the 2 leaders to strategize.
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He added that Carney is anticipated to reveal “pragmatic diplomacy” on the international event, given how his Davos speech drew widespread international attention.
In that speech on the World Economic Forum in January, Carney said the world has entered a dangerous latest age of great power rivalries and that Canada is working to expand non-U.S. trade within the face of U.S. President Donald Trump’s trade war.
Boehm said the G7 summit in Évian-les-Bains will likely be Macron’s tenth and final G7 summit as president.
Macron also said Friday that he and Carney are discussing how one can protect children online, adding the 2 countries share the identical objectives.
Earlier this 12 months, French lawmakers approved a bill banning social media for kids under 15. The thought of setting a minimum age to be used of the platforms has gained momentum across Europe.
The Liberal government introduced its own online safety laws this week. If passed, it will require social media firms to dam access for teenagers under 16, though platforms will have the option to acquire an exemption in the event that they put sufficient safeguards in place.
Bill C-34, introduced Wednesday within the House of Commons, would also regulate the businesses behind AI chatbots by imposing on them an obligation to act responsibly. That features measures to lower the chance of chatbots communicating harmful content and putting in crisis intervention protocols for cases involving self-harm, suicide or violence.
Macron applauded the move on social media Thursday, saying, “Thanks for joining the movement.”
Looking forward to the summit, Boehm said there’s all the time some carry-on elements from previous years.
“The discussions at Kananaskis on artificial intelligence, for instance, and on the worldwide economy could have an impact on the discussions at Évian as well,” he said.
A Canadian government official said this week there likely won’t be a comprehensive final communiqué from leaders at the top of the summit.
They predicted the assembled leaders will as an alternative put out issue-specific statements throughout the event.
Boehm said the choice to publish several individual declarations, reasonably than one, is probably going on account of Trump.
“I believe that’s a really big factor, because what’s the purpose of attempting to get consensus when what you’re doing is watering down what you’ve got and then you definitely’re not credible,” he said, adding that individual statements could address online harms, AI or various other global issues.
Boehm said the broader geopolitical scene will factor into talks on the summit, with a war still raging within the Middle East and with the world still grappling with the fallout from the Trump administration’s deep cuts to foreign aid.
France is Canada’s third-largest merchandise export market within the European Union and its fifth-largest source of foreign investment.
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