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Prime Minister Mark Carney has named retired Supreme Court justice Louise Arbour as Canada’s next governor general.
The accomplished former jurist is fluently bilingual, and has served as UN human rights commissioner and chief prosecutor at The Hague.
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Arbour, 79, was chief prosecutor for the International Criminal Tribunals for the former Yugoslavia and Rwanda, and made history when she became the first to indict a sitting head of state, president Slobodan Milosevic, for crimes against humanity.
Carney said Arbour gave voice to the powerless and “those whose dignity was denied, in places where the powerful preferred silence.”
“Across more than five decades, in every role she has held, the honourable Louise Arbour has carried the same conviction: That a free society depends on institutions being properly held to account,” Carney said at an announcement in Ottawa.
He said Arbour will bring to Rideau Hall the conviction that institutions are the “load-bearing walls of a civil society” and that they remain “trustworthy only as long as someone is willing to hold them accountable.”
The governor general is appointed by the Sovereign on the advice of the prime minister and represents the Crown in Canada. Arbour will become Canada’s 31st since Confederation. She is expected to be installed as Governor General in early June.
“Canada is shaped by a common respect for strong institutions and the rule of law,” Arbour said Tuesday. “We all try to provide for each other in the spirit of equality and generosity.”
Arbour will replace Mary Simon, who became Canada’s first Indigenous Governor General when Justin Trudeau tapped her for the role in 2021.
Governors general typically only hold office for five years, and Simon will reach the five-year mark of her tenure in July.
Simon speaks English and Inuktitut but attracted controversy for not being fluent in French.
Carney had promised the next governor general would speak both official languages.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published May 5, 2026.
