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What Do You Get a Canadian Prime Minister? Apparently, a Gun

The loaded politics of diplomatic gift giving

Last month, Prime Minister Mark Carney handed Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan one of Canada’s best-known exports: a bottle of maple syrup. Erdoğan countered with something considerably harder to pack in a carry-on: a personalized .357 Magnum revolver, engraved with Carney’s name, along with six rounds of ammunition.

“Not what I expected,” the prime minister joked. The exchange happened at the close of the 2026 North Atlantic Treaty Organization Summit in Ankara, and he conceded his own contribution seemed a bit underpowered. The comment went viral, but it captured something of the calculus behind the objects exchanged by heads of government.

What may seem mere ceremonial protocol often tells a story about the relationship it is meant to represent and sometimes shape. A gift can project power, flatter a counterpart, signal shared ambitions, or break the ice—literally. Earlier this year, Carney was on a ten-day Indo-Pacific tour to cultivate new trade relationships. Japanese prime minister Sanae Takaichi skipped the classic Hagiyaki pottery and lacquer sake cups in favour of a Japanese-made hockey stick. Her team had done their homework. Carney was a former college goaltender. Within weeks, he was using it to run drills with players from the Professional Women’s Hockey League alongside Finnish president Alexander Stubb.

Carney seemed surprised by Erdoğan’s gun, but it was a fitting choice for a summit devoted to rearmament. Made by a Turkish weapons manufacturer, it doubled as an unusually blunt message to NATO leaders, underscoring the country’s ambition to become a global arms dealer. It also did what all good gifts try to do: leave a lasting impression.

Anthropologists, says Jovan Kurbalija, “found traces as far back as the Stone Age of tribes exchanging gifts as a carrier of the message of trust.” A diplomat in the former Yugoslavia, Kurbalija is founding director of Diplo, a global nonprofit based in Malta and Geneva that trains other diplomats in how technology—from artificial intelligence to internet governance—is reshaping foreign affairs. But even in a digital era, a great deal of statecraft is conducted through items that carry meanings too delicate, or too provocative, to state outright. International relationships, argues Kurbalija, still depend on symbolism, and studying the practice of gift giving can help avoid costly missteps, from cultural faux pas to overlooked political signals.

The gifts themselves amount to a parallel chronicle of modern history. Indeed,........

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