Montreal to host talks on new defence bank backed by Canada

By Tahani Elghazaly
Published March 19, 2026

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Montreal is set to host an international meeting next week to begin negotiations on the charter of the Defence Security and Resilience Bank, a proposed multilateral defence lender that Canada has been championing for months. Reuters reported, citing Foreign Minister Anita Anand, that the group will meet in Montreal on Monday to begin work on the governance and legal framework that would underpin the institution.

The proposed bank is designed to pool capital from participating countries to help strengthen their defence industries. Ottawa is presenting the idea as both a security and industrial policy tool, aligning it with a broader push by Prime Minister Mark Carney’s government to deepen defence cooperation among NATO members and other allies while helping domestic firms respond to rising demand for military equipment.

Reuters also reported that Anand said about 90 percent of defence firms in Canada are small or medium-sized businesses that currently lack the capital needed to meet the surge in demand. That makes the proposed bank potentially significant not only for allied defence planning, but also for smaller manufacturers that might otherwise struggle to scale.