Canada ‘abandoning’ international law with support for U.S. strikes on Iran, say former diplomats -- Hill Times

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               The Hill Times                                                                                                                                      March 1, 2026

Canada ‘abandoning’ international law with support for U.S. strikes on Iran, say former diplomats

Though Canada's approach to Iran has been 'well-aligned' with the United States for many years, Prime Minister Mark Carney's government has been reluctant to condemn any suspected violations of international law by President Donald Trump, note foreign policy experts.

Prime Minister Mark Carney, left, and Foreign Affairs Minister Anita Anand have declared their support for the U.S. 'acting to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon, and to prevent its regime from further threatening international peace and security.' The Hill Times photograph by Andrew Meade

BY NEIL MOSS

With Canada’s endorsement of American and Israeli air strikes on Iran, past Liberal foreign ministers and former international law practitioners are signalling alarm over what they call the federal government’s indifference to international law.

On Feb. 28, the United States and Israel launched air strikes on Iran, which led to the killing of Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and other senior Iranian officials. Iran responded with strikes throughout the Middle East, including in a handful of countries that host the U.S. military. 

In response to the strikes on Iran, Prime Minister Mark Carney (Nepean, Ont.) and Foreign Affairs Minister Anita Anand (Oakville East, Ont.) declared that “Canada supports the United States acting to prevent Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon, and to prevent its regime from further threatening international peace and security.” 

Statements put out by Canada’s G7 counterparts in Europe took a more middle-ground approach, avoiding explicit support for the strikes. 

“We did not participate in these strikes, but are in close contact with our international partners, including the United States, Israel, and partners in the region,” said a joint missive from the the French, German, and United Kingdom governments, which also condemned “Iranian attacks on countries in the region in the strongest terms.”

Canada’s Feb. 28 statement said that “despite diplomatic efforts, Iran has neither fully dismantled its nuclear program, halted all enrichment activities, nor ended its support for regional terrorist proxy groups.”

It also “reaffirmed Israel’s right to defend itself and to ensure the security of its people.”

Former foreign minister Lloyd Axworthy says Parliament needs to have an input over Canada’s military integration with the U.S. The Hill Times photograph by Sam Garcia

Former foreign affairs minister Lloyd Axworthy said Canada is “abandoning” its historic commitment to preventing the illegal use of aggression. 

He said it has become a pattern for Carney to show U.S. President Donald Trump that Canada can be a “complicit partner.” 

“It’s an abandonment of a long-standing element of our foreign policy,” said Axworthy, who served as Canada’s top diplomat under then-Liberal prime minister Jean Chrétien from 1996 to 2000. 

Axworthy said the best way to protect Canada as a middle power is to ensure there are laws enforced that stop great powers from “throwing their weight around.” 

“What we’re simply endorsing is Trump’s sort of new obsession with becoming an imperial power,” he said. “That’s the worst kind of situation for Canada.”

Axworthy said that Parliament—including the Defence and Foreign Affairs committees—needs to have a “serious examination” of the degree to which Canada is being integrated with the U.S. at a time when our southern neighbour is becoming “a rogue state” and “breaking international law at the whim of the president.” He said that would include a look at whether there are Canadian soldiers embedded with the American military who are involved in planning the strikes. The CBC reported that up to 18 Canadians were deployed with U.S. units in Bahrain and Qatar at the time of the strikes. Carney has said that Canada wasn’t involved in the military buildup or planning of the attacks, according to a CTV report. 

“Canadians have not been given much of a chance to comment,” Axworthy said. “There’s not been any serious debates in Parliament.”

Unlike Canada’s statement following the U.S. raid on Venezuela in January—a military action to which Canada did not object—the statement after the strikes on Iran made no mention of international law. In a subsequent statement on March 1, Anand said that Canada continues to “urge a diplomatic resolution to the situation in the interest of civilian lives.”

Last November, Anand said that it was up to U.S. authorities to decide if its strikes on alleged drug boats in the Caribbean violate international law, as previously reported by The Hill Times.

‘A silent bystander’

Former Canadian diplomat Sabine Nölke called Carney and Anand’s Feb. 28 statement “quite problematic,” remarking that Canada’s description of the situation does not have “a logical connection to why we are now supporting a prima facie illegal act of war of aggression.”  

“Iran is … an oppressor state. They have committed a huge ream of unlawful acts themselves, but you have to ask yourselves as a matter of principled foreign policy—if we still have such a thing, and I’m beginning to doubt that now—if two wrongs make a right, and they don’t,” said Nölke, who advised the Canadian government on international law throughout her career in the foreign service, including as co-counsel at the International Court of Justice on the legality of the use of force. 

She said that the hits on Iran aren’t a war of “necessity or justification,” but are a “war of choice.”

“This is support for a doctrine of pre-emptive strike, which Canada has not traditionally supported,” said Nölke, who also served as Canada’s ambassador in the Netherlands from 2015 to 2019. 

Prime Minister Mark Carney, right, says Canada was not involved in the U.S. airstrike on Iran ordered by U.S. President Donald Trump. White House photograph by Gabriel B. Kotico

“We may have entered a phase where international law is background noise and hauled out when necessary and desired, and shoved in the back drawer when inconvenient,” she said.

Nölke said the Feb. 28 statement represents an “abdication” of the tools that Canada has used in its foreign policy, citing diplomacy and negotiation. 

“We’ve assumed the role of Pontius Pilate washing his hands. We’re now basically a silent bystander. Authoritarian takeovers have succeeded because there are more bystanders than there is resistance,” she said. 

Former diplomat Jon Allen, who served as Canada’s ambassador to Israel from 2006 to 2010, said he was “a bit surprised” at the speed at which the Carney-Anand statement was released to show support, as well as how “clear and direct” that support was.

Allen, who worked in the foreign ministry’s legal bureau during his diplomatic career, said that international law is being “largely ignored.”

“That’s a dangerous path,” he said. “It’s great to talk about how we are going to end a terrible regime, but that basically gives the United States free rein to go wherever it wants, wherever it deems that there is a nasty regime and to topple it if it wants.” 

U.S. relationship guiding Canada’s support of strikes

University of Ottawa professor Thomas Juneau, an expert on the Middle East, said that the difference between Canada’s show of support and the Europeans’ response is only one of rhetoric, since no parties on either side of the Atlantic have indicated they are offering material support. 

“The difference between us and the Europeans is that we’re neighbours to the U.S. and that they aren’t,” he said. “We are much more reliant on the U.S. than they are, [and] we are much more vulnerable. So I am assuming that the calculus here is one of managing the relationship with Trump.”

Rhetorically backing the strikes without tangibly supporting them is the “safer way” to protect Canada’s interests as it heads towards the review of the Canada-U.S.-Mexico Agreement this year, Juneau said. 

University of Ottawa professor Thomas Juneau says Canada is protecting its interests by backing the strikes on Iran. The Hill Times photograph by Stuart Benson

Former diplomat Dennis Horak, Canada’s last chargé d’affaires in Tehran before it closed its embassy in 2012, said he wasn’t surprised that the Carney government was supportive of the strikes, remarking that Ottawa’s position on Iran has been “well aligned” with the U.S. for “some time.” 

“We have very much the same concerns on human rights, nuclear program, Iran’s regional activities [and] its destabilizing impact in the region,” he said. “There’s a logic in supporting the attack.” 

“There’s also the bilateral relations aspect as well that Canada doesn’t want to be offside with the Trump administration on an issue like this,” he said. 

He noted another distinction in the European response is that—unlike Canada—they maintain diplomatic relations with Iran, meaning they will have security concerns for their embassies in Tehran if they are seen to be fully backing the U.S. 

Horak said the international law dimension is “a point of discomfort for Canada,” but it is being overridden by the other factors that led to a show of support. 

Conservatives support strikes, Bloc and NDP concerned  

Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre (Battle River–Crowfoot, Alta.) also backed the strikes in a post on X, adding that the party supports the “courageous people of Iran in toppling this terror regime, and reclaiming their destiny after 47 years of the regime’s occupation.” 

Bloc Québécois Leader Yves-François Blanchet (Beloeil–Chambly, Que.) said in a post on X in French that the party recognizes the “persistent threat” the Iranian regime posed to regional security and to Iranians, but noted “serious concern” about the use of force by the U.S. without prior support of American lawmakers, European allies, and Canada. He added that endorsing the attacks is “premature.” 

NDP interim leader Don Davies (Vancouver Kingsway, B.C.), said in a post on X that the strikes “violates UN rules Canada has agreed to uphold,” adding that it “contradicts numerous values” that Carney had set out in his Jan. 20 speech in Davos, Switzerland.

“Endorsing illegality, violence, [and] destruction over dialogue and peaceful resolution is not what Canadians were promised, or support,” Davies said.

Carney’s much-lauded speech at the World Economic Forum has produced a series of interpretations of whether Canada’s support for the strikes fit within the worldview he articulated. 

Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre backed U.S. and Israel’s air strikes on Iran. The Hill Times photograph by Andrew Meade

During the speech, Carney remarked that the basis for the rules-based international system was “partially false.” 

“We knew that international law applied with varying rigour depending on the identity of the accused or the victim,” he said.

The speech set out a Canadian foreign policy that is both “principled and pragmatic.” It included an appeal for middle powers to build an order that encompasses values, which include sovereignty and territorial integrity. 

Juneau said Carney’s Davos speech highlighted competing priorities, some of which contradict themselves. 

“Trump’s attacks on Greenland are something that is against our interests. In the case of Iran, it is completely different,” Juneau said. “It’s not to say that sovereignty doesn’t matter, it’s not to say that international law doesn’t matter, but pragmatism was the overall point of the Davos speech.” 

nm...@hilltimes.com