Government

Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney has hailed several new trade agreements, pledging to further diversify Ottawa’s partners while saying he “expects” the United States to respect his country’s sovereignty.

Carney discussed the trade deals during a meeting on Thursday with provincial and territorial leaders.

“Our country is more united, ambitious and determined than it has been in decades, and it’s incumbent on all of us to seize this moment, build big things together,” Carney said, as he hailed 12 new economic and security accords reached over the last six months.

His comments come amid ongoing frictions with the administration of US President Donald Trump, which has previously pushed to make Canada a “51st state”.

Carney highlighted in particular a new agreement with China to lower trade levies. That deal prompted a rebuke last week from Trump, who threatened to impose a 100 percent tariff on Canada.

In the face of Trump’s accusations that Canada would serve as a “drop-off port” for Chinese goods, Carney clarified that Ottawa was not seeking a free-trade agreement with Beijing.

But on Thursday, he nevertheless played up the perks he said the agreement would offer to Canada’s agriculture sector.

“Part of that agreement unlocks more than $7bn in export markets for Canadian farmers, ranchers, fish harvesters and workers across our country,” Carney said.

Carney added that Ottawa would soon seek to advance “trading relationships with global giants” including India, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), and the South American trade bloc Mercosur.

“And we will work to renew our most important economic and security relationship with the United States through the joint review of the Canada-United States-Mexico agreement later this year,” he said, referring to the regional free trade agreement, which expires in July.

‘Respect Canadian sovereignty’

Carney’s pledge to diversify Canada’s portfolio of trade and security partners comes just eight days after he delivered an attention-grabbing speech at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.

During the address, Carney warned that the “rules-based” international order was a fiction that was fading, replaced by “an era of great power rivalry”, where might makes right.

“We knew the story of the international rules-based order was partially false, that the strongest would exempt themselves when convenient, that trade rules were enforced asymmetrically,” Carney told the audience in Davos.

“We knew that international law applied with varying rigour depending on the identity of the accused or the victim.”

He ultimately called for the so-called “middle powers” of the world to rally together in these unpredictable times.

The speech was widely seen as a rebuke to Trump, who has launched an aggressive tariff campaign on global trading partners, including Canada.

In early January, Trump also abducted the leader of Venezuela, Nicolas Maduro, in what critics describe as a violation of international law.

His pledge to “run” Venezuela was followed by a series of aggressive statements towards the self-governing Danish territory of Greenland, which he threatened to seize.

Those threats have sent shudders through the NATO alliance, which counts both the US and Denmark as members.

Since before the start of his second term, Trump has also pushed to expand US control into Canada, repeatedly calling the country a “state” and its prime minister a “governor”.

In response to Carney’s speech at Davos, Trump withdrew Carney’s invitation to join his so-called Board of Peace.

Carney, however, has publicly stood by his statements, dismissing US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent’s claims that he “aggressively” walked back his position during a private call with Trump.

In a separate exchange on Thursday, Carney was asked about reports that US officials had met with separatists seeking independence for the oil-wealthy province of Alberta.

The Financial Times reported that State Department officials have held three meetings ​with the Alberta Prosperity Project, a group that pushes for a referendum on whether the energy-producing western province should break away from Canada.

“We expect the US administration to respect Canadian sovereignty,” Carney replied.

“I’m always clear in my conversations with President Trump to that effect.”

Interior Minister says multiplication of political parties has fuelled divisions and weakened social cohesion.

Burkina Faso’s military-led government has issued a decree dissolving all political parties that had already been forced to suspend activities after a coup four years ago.

The West African nation’s council of ministers passed the decree on Thursday amid the government’s ongoing crackdown on dissenting voices as it struggles to contain insurgencies linked to al-Qaeda and ISIL (ISIS).

Burkina Faso‘s Interior Minister Emile Zerbo said the decision was part of a broader effort to “rebuild the state” after alleged widespread abuses and dysfunction in the country’s multiparty system.

Zerbo said a government review found that the multiplication of political parties had fuelled divisions and weakened social cohesion.

The decree disbands all political parties and political formations, with all their assets now set to be transferred to the state.

Before the coup, the country had more than 100 registered political parties, with 15 represented in parliament after the 2020 general election.

Burkina Faso is led by Captain Ibrahim Traore, who seized power in a coup in September 2022, eight months after an earlier military coup had overthrown democratically elected President Roch Marc Kabore.

The country’s military leaders have cut ties with former colonial ruler France and turned to Russia for security support.

In 2024, as part of its crackdown on dissent, the government ordered internet service providers to suspend access to the websites and other digital platforms of the BBC, Voice of America and Human Rights Watch.

As it turned away from the West, Burkina Faso joined forces with neighbouring Mali and Niger, also ruled by military governments, in forming the Alliance of Sahel States (AES) in a bid to strengthen economic and military cooperation.

France is moving closer to banning social media for users under the age of 15, citing growing concerns over young people’s mental health. The move comes as other European countries consider similar restrictions. Al Jazeera’s Aly Zein Mohamed explains.

US Representative Ilhan Omar of Minnesota was sprayed with an unknown substance by an assailant during a public meeting in Minneapolis, where she called for immigration agency ICE to be abolished. She was unharmed, and police arrested the man on third-degree assault charges.

Al-Maliki has been nominated by the largest Shia bloc in parliament as its candidate for PM.

President Donald Trump has threatened that the United States will end support for Iraq if Nouri al-Maliki, a former prime minister with ties to the US’s longstanding foe Iran, is reinstated to the post.

Trump, in his latest intervention in another country’s politics, said on Tuesday that Iraq would be making a “very bad choice” with al-Maliki, who just days previously was nominated by the Coordination Framework, the largest Shia bloc in parliament, as its candidate.

“Last time Maliki was in power, the Country descended into poverty and total chaos. That should not be allowed to happen again,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform.

“Because of his insane policies and ideologies, if elected, the United States of America will no longer help Iraq,” he said.

“If we are not there to help, Iraq has ZERO chance of Success, Prosperity, or Freedom. MAKE IRAQ GREAT AGAIN!”

Trump’s comments are the starkest example yet of the Republican president’s campaign to curb Iran-linked groups’ influence in Iraq, which has long walked a tightrope between its two closest allies, Washington and Tehran.

In a letter, US representatives said that while the selection of the prime minister is an Iraqi decision, “the United States will make its own sovereign decisions regarding the next government in line with American interests”.

As part of Trump’s pressure campaign, Washington has also threatened senior Iraqi politicians with sanctions on the country should armed groups backed by Iran be included in the next government, the Reuters news agency reported last week.

Al-Maliki, 75, is a senior figure in the Shia Islamist Dawa Party. His tenure as prime minister from 2006 to 2014 was a period marked by a power struggle with Sunni and Kurdish rivals and growing tensions with the US.

He stepped down after ISIL (ISIS) seized large parts of the country in 2014, but has remained an influential political player, leading the State of Law coalition and maintaining close ties with Iran-backed factions.

The US wields key leverage over Iraq, as the country’s oil export revenue is largely held at the Federal Reserve Bank in New York in an arrangement reached after the 2003 US invasion that toppled Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein.