Carney's new love-in with EU has everything to do with Trump

"Wouldn't it be lovely if Canada was the 28th state of the European Union rather than the 51st state of the United States?" asked Finland's President Alexander Stubb this summer.

The question was rather tongue-in-cheek. US President Donald Trump, who is currently locked in an escalating tariff tussle with Ottawa, has, on a number of occasions, declared his ambition to make Canada the 51st American state - causing deep offence amongst many Canadians.

Finland is one of the EU's 27 member states and a close ally of Canada as a fellow Arctic nation. Teasing tones aside, President Stubb put his finger squarely on the pulse of deepening EU-Canadian relations. "Canada is more Europe-minded than most Europeans!" is a smiling retort you often hear in Brussels at the moment.

On Sunday, Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney told reporters Canada was seeking a "unique alliance" with the EU.

The catalyst for this very public, ardent new love-in is Donald Trump. Just the other day, the US president posted a map of North America on his Truth Social site, including Canada and Greenland - a territory that's part of EU country Denmark - all overlaid with the US flag.

Trade negotiations between the US and Canada broke down late last month. European countries, which have been hit by their own Trump tariffs, have privately watched the spat play out with a mixture of interest and, for many, admiration.

While the EU, led by the European Commission, simply accepted new blanket Trump tariffs without fighting back, Carney has prominently stood up to the US president, swiftly imposing counter-tariffs on the United States.

When it comes to courting the EU, Canada appears to some to be even keener than one of the bloc's closest neighbours.

"Canada right now seems more interested than the UK to get as close to Brussels as possible, as a non member state" says Mark Lowen, director of the European Council of Foreign Relations think tank. "It's remarkable."

Canada, but not the UK, successfully joined the European Union's Security Action for Europe (SAFE) defence fund earlier this year. The UK remained on the sidelines following a row over costs and political tensions. A summit designed to reset and improve EU-UK relations has just been delayed - again - over cross-Channel differences.

By contrast this week, Carney is invited as a special guest to the European Commission President's annual State of the Union address in Strasbourg, France on Wednesday. Carney will hold a speech in the European Parliament there on Thursday, a day after President von der Leyen outlines the EU's political and policy priorities.

Officials on both sides insist this is more than just "blah blah politics", as one EU diplomat put it to me. He was speaking on condition of anonymity so as to be able to discuss the subject freely. Carney and von der Leyen are both expected to mention plans to forge closer ties. "As close as you can get without (Canada) actually becoming an EU member," the diplomat told me.

The US president is by now infamous amongst US allies for what they view as his unpredictability and his penchant to use trade or security ties as leverage.

There's a growing sense in Europe - which has, since World War Two, looked to the US as its closest ally abroad - and in Canada, whose economy has been intertwined with the US for decades, that neither can any longer fully rely on Washington. They believe it's time to diversify.

"The Canadian government is committed to trade diversification, doubling non-US trades in the next 10 years, and doing more with the European Union will be very key to achieving that target," Mark Camilleri, president of the Canada EU Trade and Investment Association (CEUTIA) told the BBC.

An even tighter Canadian-EU alliance, covering far more sectors than trade alone, would continue a recent trend of both parties to form new association agreements around the world. In Canada's case, this includes a sectoral deal with China, which raised international eyebrows earlier this year.

EU insiders put all of this down to the "Trump effect".

But decoupling from the US altogether would seem unrealistic - for both Canada and the EU.

The US is the EU's largest overall trading partner, if you take goods and services together.

Canada and the US have the largest bilateral trading relationship in the world, valued at nearly US$900bn (£668bn) last year. This dwarfs the $130bn of total EU-Canada bilateral trade during the same timeframe.

The vast majority of Canadian exports head to the US.

So, Ottawa could sign new trade agreements, but replacing customers and supply chains built around America's massive market would be a tall order.

This week, I hear, Carney and von der Leyen will vociferously defend a global system of rules-based trade.

"This is not about trying to keep the past alive. We need to forge a new rules-based future in trade and beyond. With or without Washington," diplomats tell me.

There's an EU-Canada summit scheduled for the end of next month. After that, working groups are expected to start the less-than-sexy task of tackling the legal and technical details in the different areas in which the EU and Canada now hope to establish closer ties.

A huge turning point for Europe in its attitude towards Washington came early this year when Trump refused to rule out taking Greenland from fellow Nato power, Denmark, by force.

Around that time, Carney - who's also the former governor of the Bank of England - gave a speech at the World Economic Forum in Davos, calling on middle-sized countries to stick together against economic coercion by global super-powers. Europe sat up and took notice.

Why then, you might ask, haven't Europe's leaders been more outspoken in their support for the Canadian prime minister during the current escalation in trade tensions with the US? Carney has been defiant, declaring that Canada was "at war" with the US over trade.

He swiftly imposed counter-tariffs on the US in the name of "sovereignty".

Paolo Gentiloni, a former EU economy commissioner and former Italian premier, commented on social media: "Here is a speech I would like to hear in Europe."

Yet - in public - Europe's leaders have remained cautiously quiet.

Though not, it seems, out of any lack of support for Mark Carney.

A number of Europe's leaders, like Finland's president - but also French President Emmanuel Macron and Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, herself once a true Trump fan - are involved in behind-the-scene chats with Carney about deepening relations, I'm told.

But - and it's a big but - no leading European politician wants to stick his or her neck out for Carney in public right now and risk having voters at home blame them for possibly incurring the wrath of - and fresh punitive tariffs from - the US president.

Over the coming months, every large country in the EU holds key elections. Germany's took place just over a week ago. France chooses a new president in April and early May. Italy, Spain and Poland have yet to set a date for their parliamentary elections.

When it comes to applauding Carney right now, Europe's leaders are hiding behind the EU institutions.

Under EU rules, the European Commission deals with trade on behalf of the member states. The EU Commission and EU parliament presidents invited Carney to Strasbourg this week.

But some officials I speak to in Brussels warn that Carney should also wake up and smell the European coffee.

Brussels may feel warmly towards Canada, and believe Ottawa shares many of the same values and priorities, but there are still loud EU voices, like France, that prefer to prevent non-member countries from getting too favourable a deal.

That's despite pressure on the EU to show more flexibility when it comes to accommodating allies, considering the turbulent times we live in.

It's a conundrum the UK faces too.

Carney flies to Liverpool later this week, after leaving the European Parliament, for his first face-to-face meeting with new UK prime minister, Andy Burnham.

As well as discussing UK-Canada ties, who knows - might the two men end up debating ways to best woo the EU, too?