Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and European leaders have signed Canada's free trade deal with the EU in Brussels.
The Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement, known as CETA, was reached after seven years of negotiation.
"What patience," exclaimed European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker as he embraced the arriving Trudeau at EU headquarters in Brussels.
In a brief exchange together in French, Trudeau said "difficult things are difficult, but we were able to succeed." He declined to speak to reporters.
Trudeau had initially expected to sign the deal in Brussels days ago, but the restive Belgian region of Wallonia nearly killed the deal because of its opposition to the pact's investor-state dispute settlement mechanism.
The Prime Minister's Office says Trudeau spoke on Friday with European Council president Donald Tusk, who confirmed the texts of the deal, along with a side agreement known as the Strategic Partnership Agreement, had been approved for signature.
The EU needed unanimity among all its 28 members and Belgium needed the backing of all its regions to approve the pact. Trudeau had been due to sign CETA on Thursday, but was forced to cancel his flight when the country could not sign on because of opposition from the Wallonia region.
After several rounds of talks late into the night Belgium formally gave its endorsement on Saturday morning.
Smaller than the U.S. state of New Jersey, Wallonia region blocked the deal between more than 500 million EU citizens and 35 million Canadians for several weeks. Politicians there argued the deal would undermine labor, environment and consumer standards and allow multinationals to crush local companies.
The EU says CETA will remove more than 99 percent of tariffs and boost trade with Canada by 12 billion euros ($13.2 billion) a year, creating economic growth and jobs on both sides of the Atlantic.
It insists the deal will not prevent governments from moving to protect environmental and social standards if they believe action is needed, despite concerns in Wallonia and elsewhere that big companies would have free rein.
"This is an important day for the EU and Canada too, because we setting international standards which will have to be followed by others with whom we are in negotiations as far as free trade is concerned," Juncker told reporters Sunday.
Work on the agreement was launched in 2009 and the text was actually finalized two years ago but sat in limbo awaiting endorsement.
With files from Associated Press