{"id":122097,"date":"2026-07-08T23:10:11","date_gmt":"2026-07-08T23:10:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/122097\/"},"modified":"2026-07-08T23:10:11","modified_gmt":"2026-07-08T23:10:11","slug":"carney-visits-saudi-arabia-first-visit-by-a-canadian-leader-in-26-years","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/122097\/","title":{"rendered":"Carney visits Saudi Arabia, first visit by a Canadian leader in 26 years"},"content":{"rendered":"

TORONTO (AP) \u2014 Canada\u2019s Prime Minister Mark Carney arrived in Saudi Arabia<\/a> on Wednesday \u2014 the first visit to the kingdom by a Canadian leader in 26 years \u2014 as he seeks to expand his country\u2019s economic ties<\/a> beyond its heavy reliance on the United States. <\/p>\n

Carney is to meet Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman \u2014 the kingdom\u2019s de facto ruler \u2014 on Thursday, and he will also address the Saudi Arabia-Canada Investment Forum and attend a signing ceremony. <\/p>\n

The trip underscores Ottawa\u2019s effort to diversify trade and attract investment as U.S. President Donald Trump\u2019s tariffs and threats to the U.S.-Mexico-Canada trade agreement highlight Canada\u2019s dependence on the U.S., its largest trading partner.<\/p>\n

For its part, Saudi Arabia has sought to attract foreign investment as Prince Mohammed pursues an ambitious plan to diversify the kingdom\u2019s economy beyond oil.<\/p>\n

Nelson Wiseman, professor emeritus at the University of Toronto, said \u201cTrump\u2019s erratic trade and foreign policies\u201d have forced Carney to reach out \u201cto others in a new and evolving world order.\u201d <\/p>\n

Canada and Saudi Arabia restored full diplomatic ties in 2023, ending a yearslong rift sparked by Canada\u2019s criticism of the kingdom\u2019s human rights record.<\/p>\n

The rift erupted in 2018, when Saudi Arabia expelled Canada\u2019s ambassador and recalled its own after Canada\u2019s Foreign Ministry called for the release of jailed women\u2019s rights activists. Riyadh froze new trade and investment, sold some Canadian assets and ordered thousands of Saudi students in Canada to study elsewhere. The activists have since been released.<\/p>\n

Also in 2018, Prince Mohammed\u2019s reputation was tarnished by the killing of Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi at the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul. A U.S. intelligence assessment declassified in 2021 concluded the crown prince had likely approved the operation.<\/p>\n

Daniel B\u00e9land, a political science professor at McGill University in Montreal, said the timing of Carney\u2019s visit matters not just because of his push to \u201cdiversify trade and help attract new foreign investments to Canada\u201d but also \u201cbecause of the ongoing geopolitical uncertainty in the Middle East\u201d and the war in Iran<\/a>. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt seems increasingly clear that, for Mark Carney, trade and security are much more pressing concerns than human rights,\u201d B\u00e9land said.<\/p>\n

But Wiseman stressed that \u201cCarney says he is taking the world as it is.\u201d <\/p>\n

\u201cIt doesn\u2019t mean looking beyond human rights; it means being realistic about what preaching about it to authoritarian leaders can accomplish,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"TORONTO (AP) \u2014 Canada\u2019s Prime Minister Mark Carney arrived in Saudi Arabia on Wednesday \u2014 the first visit…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":122098,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[525,17,1806,596,162,8522,592,9409,434,111,41211,2942,12961,113,14826,30363,41212,218],"class_list":["post-122097","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-canada","tag-business","tag-canada","tag-daniel-bland","tag-diplomacy","tag-donald-trump","tag-energy-industry","tag-general-news","tag-human-rights","tag-international-trade","tag-mark-carney","tag-mohammed-bin-salman-bin-abdulaziz-al-saud","tag-nelson-wiseman","tag-oil-and-gas-industry","tag-politics","tag-royalty","tag-saudi-arabia","tag-saudi-arabia-government","tag-world-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/122097","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=122097"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/122097\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/122098"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=122097"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=122097"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=122097"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}