Canada will host the 70th annual session of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) Parliamentary Assembly from November 22 to 25 in Montreal, Quebec. The announcement was made by the Canadian NATO Parliamentary Association in a press release on Thursday.
The event will feature a delegation of Canadian senators and members of Parliament (MPs), led by MP and Chair of the Canadian NATO Parliamentary Association Julie Dzerowicz. Nearly 300 delegates from 57 NATO PA Member, Associate, Regional Partner, and Observer states are expected to attend.
This will be the first time Canada has hosted the event since 2018 in Halifax. Julie Dzerowicz noted the increasing instability of the global security environment since then. “The international security environment has deteriorated,” Dzerowicz remarked during the 2024 spring session in Sofia, Bulgaria. She highlighted new forms of disruption from both state and non-state actors and the threats to the international rules-based order and democracy.
During the session, Canada will discuss its contributions to NATO operations and its commitment to the Alliance. In June, NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg emphasized the need for increased defense spending from Canada, stating, “We live in a more dangerous world, and therefore we need to invest more in our defence and our security.”
According to a NATO report, Canada is not among the countries that will reach the agreed-upon target of spending two percent of its GDP on defense this year.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau will attend next week’s leaders’ summit in Washington, D.C., where the 32 NATO countries will mark the alliance’s 75th anniversary in the same city where the initial treaty was signed.