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Thank you for following our coverage on the resignation of Canada's Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.

The 53-year-old said he will step down as leader of the country's ruling Liberal Party, which he has led since 2013.

He said it will allow his party to choose a new leader as he suspends parliament until March due to political deadlock.

You can scroll back through the blog to follow the events as they unfolded.

Here is a recap of what Trudeau said...

Justin Trudeau came in with a huge mandate and a large majority nine years ago but his popularity has slid during that time, our international correspondent Diana Magnay says.

"What he does now is stay on as prime minister until the party chooses a new leader," she says.

"And then there will be a vote of no confidence as the opposition parties have said they don't want to stand by this government anymore.

"And then Canadians will elect a new leader.

"It looks likely it will be the nationalist and conservative Pierre Poilievre."

Canada's Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre has released a statement following Justin Trudeau's resignation.

Repeating calls for a general election, he said the "only way to fix what liberals broke is a carbon tax election".

Poilievre is a career politician who rose to prominence in early 2022 when he supported truck drivers who took over the centre of Ottawa as part of a protest against COVID-19 vaccine mandates.

Sir Keir Starmer has wished Justin Trudeau "well for the future" after his Canadian counterpart announced his resignation.

Number 10 was asked about the decision of Canada's prime minister to quit, having seen his ratings plunge in the polls.

We're already seeing some reaction to Justin Trudeau's decision to stand down as prime minister. 

Some of those paying tribute to the outgoing politician are frontrunners to replace him (see previous post).

That includes the former head of both the Bank of Canada and the Bank of England, Mark Carney... 

And the former premier of British Columbia Christy Clark... 

Justin Trudeau has just finished taking questions from the media in Ottawa after he announced he will step aside.

Now we know he's set to leave office, let's take a quick look at the frontrunners to replace him.

This list is just of Liberal politicians who could run to replace him as leader of the party (and therefore be prime minister), not an exhaustive list of other party leaders who could become premier at the next election (which could be as late as October). 

Chrystia Freeland

Readers may remember that Chrystia Freeland made headlines just a few weeks ago, when she announced her stunning resignation from Mr Trudeau's cabinet. 

The former finance minister had previously been a fierce ally to the long-serving PM, but she left citing disagreements with him amid rumours he was set to replace her.

She leads polling to take over as Liberal leader now Mr Trudeau has stood aside. 

Mark Carney 

Here's one our UK readers may be more familiar with. 

The former head of both the Bank of Canada and the Bank of England is a Liberal who has been serving most recently as a special adviser to Mr Trudeau.

Some experts view him as a potentially unifying figure in a turbulent time for his party, although some MPs are said to be sceptical, seeing as Mr Carney is not currently an elected official. 

He's said to have spoken to dozens of Liberal MPs in recent weeks as he weighs up his future. 

Christy Clark

The former premier of British Columbia has recently expressed an interest in any potential Liberal leadership contest.

While she's been out of the limelight in recent years, Ms Clark has been a vocal critic of the Trudeau administration, saying: "Canadians are tired of divisive politics and want leaders who offer practical solutions to pressing issues such as the cost of living, housing, healthcare, and climate change."

Dominic LeBlanc

Canada's minister of finance and intergovernmental affairswas one of the outgoing PMs closest political allies and friends. 

He took over from the aforementioned Chrystia Freeland as finance minister when she resigned. 

It's not clear whether Mr LeBlanc is interested in taking over from his friend, but he previously ran for leadership in 2008, losing out to Michael Ignatieff. 

Melanie Joly

The sitting minister of foreign affairs studied at Oxford University in the UK, and has impressively navigated some political challenges with India and China in recent months. 

By Diana Magnay, international correspondent

Few one-time golden boys manage to retain their lustre long into political office.

Barack Obama just about held on to his, leaving the US presidency with his approval rating high despite his party's 2016 loss to Donald Trump.

But Emmanuel Macron is faltering in France and Justin Trudeau steps down as head of Canada's liberal party with his popularity in shreds. So much for Western liberal values.

In the high tides of inflation and immigration, those who were their supposed flag-bearers are no longer what electorates want.

For Mr Trudeau, it is a dramatic reckoning. His approval ratings have dropped from 65% at their highest in September 2016 to 22% now, according to the "Trudeau Tracker" from Canada's non-profit Angus Reid Institute.

Read Magnay's full piece here. 

"It's time for a reset... for the temperature to come down," Justin Trudeau says, beginning to wrap up his news conference. 

He says the prorogation of parliament until the end of March and his resignation provides the opportunity for such a reset. 

He adds he hopes that Canadian politicians can take some time to reflect and scale back the polarisation. 

With that, he thanks the assembled journalists, turns and heads back inside the Rideau Cottage in Ottawa, concluding the news conference. 

Justin Trudeau says Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre's vision for Canada is "not the right one".

Stopping the fight against climate change "doesn't make sense", he says, and backing off on the values and strengths on diversity is "not the right path".

"We need an ambitious, optimistic view of the future and Pierre Poilievre is not offering that," Mr Trudeau says.

"I look forward to the fight as progressives stand up for the vision of a better country despite the pressures around the world to think smaller and veer towards the hard right and be less ambitious when the world really needs Canada."

Taking questions from the media, Justin Trudeau is asked what regrets he has from his time in office. 

"If I have one regret... I do wish that we'd been able to change the way we elect our governments in this country," he says, before adding he will reflect and likely find many more things he wished he had handled differently. 

The outgoing prime minister says he wanted voters to be able to pick their second or third choices on ballots, with the present system, in his view, being set up to play to the advantage of those who want to "polarise" and play Canadians against each other.

"I could not change [the system] unilaterally without the support of the other parties... that wouldn't have been responsible."