Mark Carney, the new Canadian prime minister, has arrived in Paris on his first stop of a visit to France and the UK as he seeks to bolster European alliances to deal with Donald Trump’s attacks on Canada’s sovereignty and economy.

Speaking at a press conference alongside French president Emmanuel Macron, Carney said Canada was “the most European of non-European countries, determined like you, to maintain the most positive possible relations with the United States”.

“Canada is a reliable, trustworthy and strong partner of France, which shares our values and lives them through action during this age of economic and geopolitical crisis,” he said.

Carney is deliberately making his first foreign trip to the capital cities of the two countries that shaped Canada’s early existence.

A senior government official briefed reporters on the plane before picking up Carney in Montreal and said the purpose of the trip was to double down on partnerships with Canada’s two founding countries. The official said Canada was a “good friend of the United States but we all know what is going on”.

Carney, a former central banker who turned 60 on Sunday, will then travel to London to sit down with the UK prime minister, Keir Starmer, in an effort to diversify trade and perhaps coordinate a response to Trump’s tariffs.

He will also meet King Charles III, Canada’s head of state. The trip to England is something of a homecoming, as Carney is a former governor of the Bank of England, the first non-citizen to be named to the role in its more than 300 years.