Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney welcomed several new trade deals, pledging to further diversify Ottawa’s partners while saying he “hopes” the United States will respect Canada’s sovereignty.

Carney discussed the trade deal at a meeting with provincial and territorial leaders on Thursday.

“Our country is more united, ambitious and determined than it has been in decades, and we all have a responsibility to seize this moment and build great things together,” Carney said, welcoming the 12 new economic and security agreements reached in the past six months.

His remarks come as U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration has been pushing for Canada to become the “51st state.”

Carney particularly emphasized new agreement Lower trade tariffs with China. The deal was condemned by Trump last week. threatened Impose 100% tariff on Canada.

Responding to Trump’s accusation that Canada would serve as a “landing port” for Chinese goods, Carney clarified that Ottawa was not seeking a free trade agreement with Beijing.

But on Thursday, he still highlighted the benefits the deal would bring to Canada’s agricultural sector.

“Part of this agreement opens up more than $7 billion in export markets for Canadian farmers, ranchers, fish harvesters and workers,” Carney said.

Carney added that Ottawa would soon seek to advance “trade relationships with global giants” including India, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and South American trade bloc Mercosur.

“We will work to restore our most important economic and security relationship with the United States through a joint review of the Canada-U.S.-Mexico Agreement later this year,” he said, referring to the regional free trade agreement that is due to expire in July.

“Respect Canadian sovereignty”

Carney’s speech came just eight days after he pledged to diversify Canada’s trade and security partners. compelling speech World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.

In his speech, Carney warned that the “rules-based” international order was a disappearing fiction, replaced by “an era of great power competition where might makes right.”

“We know that the story of an international rules-based order is partly wrong, that the powerful will exempt themselves when it’s convenient and that the enforcement of trade rules is asymmetric,” Carney told an audience in Davos.

“We know that international law is applied with varying degrees of rigor depending on the identity of the defendant or victim.”

He ultimately called on the world’s so-called “middle powers” to unite in these unpredictable times.

The speech was widely seen as a rebuke to Trump, who has launched an aggressive campaign of tariffs against global trading partners, including Canada.

In early January, Trump also kidnapped Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro, a move that critics said violated international law.

After pledging to “manage” Venezuela, he made a series of aggressive remarks about Greenland, an autonomous Danish territory, and threatened to seize it.

The threats have chilled the NATO alliance, whose members include the United States and Denmark.

Since before the start of his second term, Trump has also pushed for expanded U.S. control over Canada, repeatedly referring to the country as a “state” and its prime minister as a “governor.”

Trump responds to Carney’s Davos speech quit Carney invited him to join what he called a peace committee.

However, Carney publicly stood by his statement, rejecting Treasury Secretary Scott Bessant’s assertion that he “aggressively” retracted his position during a private call with Trump.

In another exchange on Thursday, Carney was asked about reports that U.S. officials were meeting with separatists seeking independence for the oil-rich province of Alberta.

State Department officials have held three meetings with the Alberta Prosperity Project, the group pushing for a referendum on whether the energy-producing western province should secede from Canada, the Financial Times reported.

“We want the U.S. government to respect Canada’s sovereignty,” Carney responded.

“I’ve made that clear throughout my conversations with President Trump.”