France and Canada announce closer ties amid US strains

French President Emmanuel Macron and Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney announced closer ties on Sunday in Saint Pierre and Miquelon, France's North Atlantic territory just off Canada's coast, as both countries face strained relations with the United States.

At a joint news conference, Macron said France and Canada were “two great, independent nations” that wanted to remain so. Carney said the time had come for Canada to tighten links with France and the European Union, after a Brussels visit in which the EU offered Canada “associate member” status.

Macron said the two countries would work together on fishing, security and energy. Carney proposed cooperation on artificial intelligence involving France, Canada, the United States and China.

Carney was described as the first Canadian prime minister to visit Saint Pierre and Miquelon. Earlier on Sunday, Macron welcomed him at the airport, and the two leaders paid respects at a monument honouring islanders who volunteered for the Free French forces during World War II.

The meeting carried symbolic weight because Saint Pierre and Miquelon is France's only remaining possession in North America. Macron's three-day visit to the territory, an archipelago of fewer than 6,000 people near Newfoundland, is the first by a French president in more than a decade.

The visit also came after repeated remarks by US President Donald Trump about making Canada the 51st US state, which Ottawa has rejected. Macron reaffirmed after arriving in the territory that Saint Pierre and Miquelon is French, dismissing “strange ideas” on the subject.

Neither Macron nor Carney named Trump at the news conference, but both stressed sovereignty, democracy, rule of law and strategic autonomy. “In a world in crisis, our friendship is a strength,” Macron wrote on X above a video of him greeting Carney.