Getting a customized revolver together with his name engraved on it from Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan was “not what I expected,” Prime Minister Mark Carney said on Thursday.
Carney said he “never saw it” until British Prime Minister Kier Starmer told him in regards to the presents.
“We were having a conversation, just a few of us, and he [Starmer] identified to me that he received this and [it] had his name on it,” Carney told reporters in Saudi Arabia Thursday.
“I learned about it after which after all my colleagues told me, ‘Yeah, we had this.’ And it’s not what I expected,” he added.
Get breaking National news
Get breaking Canada news delivered to your inbox because it happens so you will not miss a trending story.
Erdogan offered the engraved handguns as a present to Carney and other NATO leaders on the NATO summit in Ankara, Turkiye.
Carney said he gave Erdoğan a bottle of Canadian maple syrup in return.
Canadian government officials haven’t said what type of handgun Carney was gifted, but say the pistol will probably be decommissioned and the gun will probably be placed in a museum. Officials also said the ammunition was left in Turkiye.
“I definitely don’t have a licence for it,” Carney said.
Any gift received by a politician price greater than $200 have to be publicly declared, and any gift price greater than $1,000 have to be forfeited to the Crown under Canada’s conflict of interest rules.
A placard within the gift box says this was the primary kind of revolver manufactured in Turkiye within the Nineties and that the commemorative firearms were made by Turkish firm MKE.
A spokesperson from Nauseda’s office said that his gifted revolver is planned for exhibition within the Presidential Palace, like many other gifts given to the top of state.
–with files from The Canadian Press
© 2026 Global News, a division of Corus Entertainment Inc.