Canada and the European Union are in talks for a closer alliance

According to Bloomberg, the European Union and Canada are preparing a partnership of unprecedented scope, set to cover both trade and security. Ursula von der Leyen is expected to outline the key points on 16 September in Strasbourg, during her State of the Union address, according to people familiar with the preparations. Mark Carney will attend this address, before addressing MEPs the following day.

The Canadian government has made this partnership a priority and is now examining all possible options short of full membership, according to a Canadian official speaking on condition of anonymity. Discussions are focusing in particular on “strategic capabilities”, namely defence cooperation, space exploration and scientific research. It remains to be seen whether new legal instruments will be needed to formalise the arrangement – a question that remains open, as Ottawa plans to consult its provinces and industry.

The project is intended to encompass the entire relationship, from supply chains to critical raw materials. The two partners already have an ambitious trade agreement and a security and defence partnership, and Canada was the first country outside the EU to join the €150 billion European military procurement fund last year. Cooperation through the Trans-Pacific Partnership, of which Ottawa is a member, has also been discussed.

The stated aim is to forge closer ties as far as the law allows, without taking the step of full membership, which involves striking a delicate balance between access to the single market and the obligations that come with it. Relations between Ottawa and Washington have deteriorated significantly, with the two neighbours imposing tariffs on one another, whilst Donald Trump has stepped up his criticism of European trade policy whilst expressing an interest in Greenland.

Mark Carney set the tone earlier this year at the World Economic Forum, declaring that the rules-based international order was well and truly dead, and calling on middle powers to build a new architecture in the face of pressure and intimidation from the major powers. He did not mention the US President by name, but described these new alliances as the last line of defence. A summit bringing together the two sides will take place in Canada in October. Bloomberg

🇺🇸 United States - 🇷🇺 Russia - 🇺🇦 Ukraine • Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump spoke on the phone for an hour, a conversation the Kremlin described as “constructive” and “extremely frank”, following the tour of US envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner to Moscow and Kyiv. The US President called for a swift end to the fighting, promising a full restoration of economic ties with Moscow, whilst his Russian counterpart set out his conditions and gave assurances that he harboured no aggressive plans towards Europe. The two leaders also discussed a possible trilateral meeting with Xi Jinping, according to the Kremlin. Volodymyr Zelensky, for his part, is counting on a resumption of talks with Moscow and Washington as early as September, describing the ideas put forward by the US envoys as “quite good”.

🇲🇩 Moldova - 🇷🇺 Russia - 🇺🇦 Ukraine • Russian drones killed two civilians and injured three others at the Starokozatche border post in the Odessa region, one kilometre from Moldovan territory – a crossing point used by thousands of people every day. Kyiv sees this as a strategy targeting logistics routes, with five border posts having been struck in recent weeks. The Ukrainian capital has once again been targeted by jet-powered drones, capable of flying at 600 km/h and up to 5 km in altitude – a threat against which existing interceptors remain largely ineffective. In response, Ukraine has bombed the naval base at Novorossiysk, where Russian authorities report four deaths, including a child, and 29 injured.

🇩🇪 Germany • The victory of the far-right AfD party in the regional elections in Saxony-Anhalt has undermined Friedrich Merz’s reform agenda, with the Social Democrats calling for a relaxation of the pension and sickness benefit reforms, as well as a review of the 2027 budget. Speaking before the Bundestag, the Chancellor stood firm, reaffirmed his support for Ukraine and accused the far-right party of serving Russian interests, arguing that the “remigration” it advocates would amount to “ethnic cleansing”.

🇨🇳 China - 🇪🇺 European Union • The European Commission is proposing to allow local authorities to automatically exclude companies from countries that do not open up their own public procurement markets – a move that would effectively target Chinese suppliers. The reform would reduce the regulatory text from 900 to 200 pages and require that at least 30 per cent of the criteria be based on factors other than price. Public procurement is worth 2,000 billion euros a year in the EU, representing 15 per cent of its gross domestic product.

🇷🇸 Serbia • President Aleksandar Vucic has dissolved Parliament and called a snap general election for 25 October, a long-standing demand of the protest movement that emerged following the deadly collapse of Novi Sad railway station in 2024. The nationalist president, who has been in power for over a decade, intends to resign to stand for the post of Prime Minister. The student protesters will put forward their own list of candidates.

🇭🇺 Hungary – 🇷🇺 Russia • Budapest has expelled 10 Russian diplomats, deeming their activities incompatible with their status – the first such expulsion since 2018. The decision illustrates the shift in policy that has taken place since Viktor Orbán’s electoral defeat in April, with his successor, Peter Magyar, placing the European Union and NATO at the heart of Hungarian foreign policy. Moscow has condemned an “unjustified and unprecedented escalation” and promised retaliation.

🇺🇸 United States – 🇮🇸 Iceland • Reykjavik summoned the US ambassador after Donald Trump posted a map on Truth Social showing Iceland, Canada, Greenland, Mexico and Central America covered by the US flag, with the caption “United States of America”. The Icelandic Ministry of Foreign Affairs deemed the post “entirely inappropriate”. The image was shared a few hours after the European Commission announced a €200 million investment in Greenland.

🇺🇦 Ukraine • Attorney General Ruslan Kravchenko has resigned following the launch of an anti-corruption investigation into his office, with one of his subordinates accused of accepting bribes to cover up a fraudulent call centre. He is not personally implicated in any case and has described the move as a “political decision”. Volodymyr Zelensky must submit this resignation to Parliament.

🇳🇴 Norway • Norway bid farewell to King Harald V at a state funeral, attended by Volodymyr Zelensky, Prince William and numerous European leaders.

🇨🇦 Canada - 🇫🇷 France - 🇮🇱 Israel - 🇬🇧 United Kingdom • Twelve countries, including France, the United Kingdom and Canada, have announced restrictions on trade in goods from Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank, in response to the expansion of settlement activity and the rise in violence committed by settlers. London, Paris and Ottawa have described this as a “turning point” in their approach to preserving the two-state solution, and will co-chair a meeting at the United Nations General Assembly this month. The British Foreign Secretary, Ed Miliband, has described the occupation as illegal and stated that ethnic cleansing is taking place. The exchanges in question remain limited, making the measure largely symbolic. Israel has retaliated by ordering the closure of the British consulate in East Jerusalem within a month, banning twelve British officials from its territory, demanding the departure of diplomats currently in the West Bank, and excluding London from the training of Palestinian security forces.

🇺🇸 United States – 🇮🇷 Iran – 🇯🇴 Jordan • The Revolutionary Guards claim to have attacked 10 vessels in the Gulf, including two US ships and eight oil tankers, and to have fired 20 ballistic missiles at a base used by the US military near al Azraq, in Jordan, 18 of which were intercepted. These strikes were in response to the destruction of five Iranian oil tankers by the United States, which has been imposing a blockade on Iranian ports since the closure of the Strait of Hormuz.

🇸🇦 Saudi Arabia – 🇾🇪 Yemen • The Houthis have launched the largest attack on Saudi territory in years, with dozens of drones and missiles targeting Aramco sites in Abha, Najran and Jizan, as well as King Khalid Air Base. 73 civilians were injured, and Riyadh has vowed to retaliate. Fighting in Yemen has claimed more than 500 lives since last Thursday, around the strategic Strait of Bab el-Mandeb.

🇮🇱 Israel • Benjamin Netanyahu is seeking to merge right-wing lists to avoid the defeat predicted by the polls in the 27 October general election. Likud could lose a third of its seats, and both Itamar Ben-Gvir and newcomer Ofer Winter have refused to join the alliance. Former Chief of Staff Gadi Eisenkot, whose Yashar party is steadily gaining ground, appears to be his most serious rival.

🇮🇱 Israel - 🇸🇾 Syria • Members of the United Nations Commission of Inquiry on Syria believe that Israeli operations in the south of the country could constitute war crimes. They describe repeated ground incursions, checkpoints and permanent military infrastructure, as well as the interrogation and detention of hundreds of residents, including minors. A full report will be presented in the spring.

🇮🇱 Israel - 🇵🇸 Palestine • A 28-year-old Palestinian man was killed by the Israeli army during a night-time raid in Aqraba, in the north of the occupied West Bank. The army claims that he threw a Molotov cocktail and an explosive device before being found in possession of a knife. The town’s mayor, however, insists that he was unarmed and describes the incident as an execution.

🇨🇦 Canada - 🇺🇸 United States • Ottawa has imposed surcharges of 15 per cent, 25 per cent and 50 per cent on around 20 billion dollars’ worth of US goods, ranging from steel to dairy products – a sum that matches “to the dollar” the US tariffs in force since 22 August. Mark Carney warned his compatriots that the country’s economic independence would come at a cost, arguing that the cost of inaction would be far greater.

🇧🇷 Brazil • A Supreme Court judge has suspended the head of the Federal Police, Andrei Rodrigues, who is accused of having his own judicial activities spied on, less than a month before the presidential election on 4 October, which will see Lula face Flavio Bolsonaro. The crisis erupted following the revelation of messages sent by a banker suspected of fraud to Judge Alexandre de Moraes. Eleven heads of police divisions have stepped down.

🇨🇮 Ivory Coast - 🇳🇬 Nigeria - 🇸🇳 Senegal • According to the International Labour Organisation, nearly 83 per cent of the African workforce is employed in the undeclared informal sector, compared with around 60 per cent in the early 1970s; this proportion approaches 90 per cent in Côte d’Ivoire, Senegal and Nigeria. Street vendors, mechanics and motorbike taxi drivers say they turned to these jobs for lack of choice. The IMF estimates this economy accounts for up to 65 per cent of the continent’s gross domestic product, a shortfall in tax revenue that governments are struggling to make up.

🇨🇩 Democratic Republic of the Congo • The World Health Organisation is calling for 5,000 additional healthcare workers to tackle the Ebola outbreak, which has caused 3,175 deaths from over 6,600 confirmed cases since mid-May. Some 1,400 beds are available across 59 treatment centres, with a further 1,600 yet to be opened. There is currently no approved vaccine or treatment for the Bundibugyo strain responsible for the outbreak.

🇧🇩 Bangladesh • The country is experiencing the worst measles outbreak in its history, with 999 deaths and over 166,000 suspected cases since March – the largest outbreak in the world, according to the US CDC. Experts attribute this to the suspension of the routine vaccination programme in 2024 and 2025. At the same time, a dengue fever outbreak is overwhelming hospitals.

🇨🇳 China – 🇰🇵 North Korea • Pyongyang has completed the “New Yalu River Bridge”, a three-kilometre road link connecting Sinuiju to Dandong, which had been at a standstill for 12 years but was completed in four months, according to the South Korean consultancy SI Analytics. Work resumed following Xi Jinping’s visit in June, after the two neighbours had re-established rail and air links between their capitals.