(Ottawa) Prime Minister Justin Trudeau announced Thursday that Canada plans to meet the North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s (NATO) two per cent target by 2032. Canada was criticized by its allies earlier this week for insufficient military spending at a time of geopolitical instability in the world.
The summit, which took place in Washington, D.C., United States, marks the 75the anniversary of this military alliance. More than two-thirds of the 32 members spend at least 2% of their gross domestic product (GDP) on defense.
Prime Minister Trudeau announced billions in new investments in April as part of the defence policy review, but Canada still missed the NATO target. The government had set a goal of increasing the defence budget from 1.33% to 1.76% of GDP by 2029-30.
PHOTO MANDEL NGAN, AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
Justin Trudeau in discussions at NATO summit in Washington
He then planned to inject 8.1 billion over five years and 73 billion over the next 20 years and indicated that this would put him “on track” to exceed the 2% target set by NATO for major equipment spending.
In a joint statement released Wednesday, NATO member countries acknowledged the increase in Canadian and European military spending. They also stressed the need to go beyond that.
“We reaffirm that, in many cases, it will be necessary to devote more than 2% of GDP to defence expenditure to remedy current shortfalls and meet the needs that have emerged, in all areas, from the rise of contestation of the security order,” they recalled.
With Mélanie Marquis, The Press