Canada, Germany and Norway discussing a security pact to cover the North Atlantic and Arctic

Canada, Germany and Norway are discussing the possibility of a trilateral defence and security partnership covering the North Atlantic and the Arctic — an arrangement that could be broader and deeper than previously thought.

When German Defence Minister Boris Pistorius was in Ottawa early last month, he made reference to a letter delivered to his Canadian counterpart, Bill Blair, offering co-operation in the maritime domain. The letter was co-signed by Norwegian Defence Minister Bjørn Arild Gram.

On Wednesday, Blair acknowledged he had follow-up discussions with both of his counterparts at the recent NATO defence ministerial.

The partnership — if it comes to pass — would be wide-ranging and would include defence-industrial cooperation on certain projects in order to create interoperable combat platforms.

«I think the opportunity to work closely with allies is always a welcome one, but there are a number of things that also require other research and decisions to be made,» Blair said following a meeting with the Liberal caucus.

«It was primarily a letter about working more closely together on various military procurements. It mentioned specifically a submarine that [Germany and Norway] are working on together.

»I've advised them that Canada is definitely going to be in the market for submarines, but we have some market research to do before we could enter into making any decisions with respect to the choices we will have available to us."

The Liberal government's recent defence policy promises to «explore options» for replacing Canada's aging fleet of Victoria-class submarines. When the policy was released, both Blair and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau insisted that buying new submarines was not a matter of if, but of when and