Canada-US relations

Carney responds to Trump's provocations with silence

In the shadow of the Greenland crisis, Canada and the US have also had a thorny week, writes the Toronto Star.

In addition to a repeated threat of American takeover, Donald Trump has scaled back NATO operations in which many Canadians have been killed, said that Canada will be "eaten up" by trading partner China, criticized Prime Minister Mark Carney's speech in Davos and claimed that Canada is opposing US plans for the "Golden Dome" missile defense system.

Carney has responded to the provocations with silence. On Thursday, he dismissed reporters' Trump questions as "boring" and on Friday he left a cabinet meeting without answering a single question. 

Expert: “The relationship is on the brink of the abyss”

It’s hard to see any fine-grained friendships being forged between US President Donald Trump and Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney after the past week.

Mark Carney took to the stage at the World Economic Forum in Davos and said that the world order is about to change as a result of Trump’s hard-line diplomacy. Trump hit back and also chose to withdraw Canada’s invitation to the newly established “peace council.”

Aaron Ettinger, an associate professor of political science at Carleton University in Ottawa, tells The Hill that the relationship between the US and Canada is now “on the brink of the abyss.”

“We don’t know if this is going to end well for Canada. In the past week, we have realized that Canada is not dealing with a reliable or even rational leader in the US,” he says.