Canada, under pressure to spend more on its military, vowed on Monday to boost funding for the armed forces and hit NATO's 2% military spending target this fiscal year, five years earlier than promised.

Canada will meet NATO’s military spending guideline by early next year and diversify defense spending away from the United States, Prime Minister Mark Carney said Monday, asserting that Washington no longer plays a predominant role on the world stage.

Saying that the era of the United States' dominance on the world stage is over, Prime Minister Mark Carney committed his government on Monday to meeting the NATO benchmark target of two per cent of the country's gross domestic product by the end of the current fiscal year in March.