What international institutions does Canada belong to?

Canada is a member of many of the world's principal international institutions, reflecting the country's commitment to multilateralism, international law, and global governance. Canadian membership in international institutions began with the 1919 Treaty of Versailles signing (which Canada signed independently from Britain, a milestone in Canadian sovereignty) and has expanded continuously since. Canada's membership in international institutions is administered by the federal Department of Foreign Affairs (now Global Affairs Canada).

The principal United Nations institutions Canada belongs to include the United Nations General Assembly (Canada was a founding member, the UN Charter signed June 26, 1945 in San Francisco), the United Nations Security Council (Canada has served six terms as a non-permanent member: 1948-1949, 1958-1959, 1967-1968, 1977-1978, 1989-1990, and 1999-2000; an attempt to win a seventh term in 2020 was unsuccessful), the International Court of Justice, the International Criminal Court (Canada signed the Rome Statute in 1998), the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), the World Health Organization (WHO), and many other UN specialized agencies. Lester B. Pearson's 1956 to 1957 work creating the United Nations Emergency Force (UNEF) earned him the 1957 Nobel Peace Prize.

Canada is a founding member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO, signed April 4, 1949 in Washington), the principal military alliance of Western democracies. Canada has served in every major NATO operation including Afghanistan (2001 to 2014, with about 158 Canadian deaths), Operation Reassurance (Eastern European NATO deployments since 2014), and various peacekeeping and stabilisation missions. The federal Department of National Defence and the Royal Canadian Navy, Royal Canadian Air Force, and Canadian Army contribute to NATO operations.

Canada is a member of the Group of Seven (G7) industrialised democracies (joined 1976 as the G7), the Commonwealth of Nations (a founding member, with Canada's distinct status confirmed by the 1949 London Declaration), La Francophonie (joined 1970), the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD, joined 1961), the Organization of American States (OAS, joined 1990 after a long debate), the World Trade Organization (WTO, joined 1995 as a founding member), the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD, established with the United States in 1958), the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC, joined 1989), the G20 (joined 1999 as a founding member), and the Arctic Council (joined 1996 as a founding member). Canada is currently the host of the G7 Leaders' Summit in 2026 (the seventh time Canada has hosted).