Avi Lewis, elected to lead Canada’s New Democratic party, promises ‘NDP comeback’

Ex-TV host pledged to centre party around equity, with higher wealth taxes, green energy and tuition-free education

Canada’s embattled New Democratic party (NDP) has elected the former broadcaster and self-proclaimed socialist Avi Lewis as its new leader, as it looks to rebuild following a devastating federal election last year that saw it lose official party status.

A record number of members voted in the three-day NDP leadership convention, giving Lewis a first-ballot win that underscored widespread support. Lewis pledged to convert the “tremendous momentum” of the convention into an “NDP comeback”.

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Air Canada CEO to resign after backlash to video tribute of pilots killed in crash

Michael Rousseau faced mockery for speaking English and not French while addressing fatal LaGuardia airport crash

The head of Canada’s largest airline is stepping down after his video tribute to pilots killed in a fatal collision became a public relations nightmare for Air Canada, prompting a wave of mockery and indignation at him from both the public and politicians for not speaking French.

Air Canada’s CEO, Michael Rousseau, will retire by the end of the third quarter of 2026, the company said Monday. He will continue to lead the company and serve on the board of directors until that time, the carrier said.

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Lawmakers call for Air Canada chief to resign after English-only message to plane crash victims

Quebec’s legislature passes vote calling on Michael Rousseau to step down, citing ‘lack of respect for the French language’ and families in mourning

The chief executive of Air Canada has apologized for his inability to express himself in French after politicians called for his resignation for his English-only message of condolence after Sunday’s deadly crash in New York.

But lawmakers in Canada’s lone francophone province rejected the mea culpa as “too little too late” and overwhelmingly passed a motion calling for the head of Canada’s flagship carrier to step down.

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Mark Carney rebukes Air Canada chief over English-only crash message

The prime minister says the condolence video after the fatal LaGuardia crash revived anger over linguistic rights

Canada’s prime minister, Mark Carney, has said a decision by Air Canada’s top executive to post an English-only message of condolence after a deadly crash in New York showed a “lack of judgment, a lack of compassion”.

Amid growing calls for his resignation, the airline chief’s misstep has once again revived frustrations and fears over linguistic rights protections in the province of Quebec, where French is the only official language.

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Canadian woman held with daughter by ICE warns all immigrants to ‘lie low’

Tania Warner says she has documents showing she is in the US legally, but immigration agents were not swayed

A Canadian woman who has been imprisoned with her seven-year-old daughter by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) has cautioned other immigrants that they are at risk of detention, even if they follow the correct legal process – and warned them to keep out of sight for as long as Donald Trump is president.

“Don’t go anywhere near a checkpoint, and if your papers are in processing, just lay low. Trump meant what he said – he is trying to get rid of everyone, whether they are good or bad,” said Tania Warner, 47, who is currently held with her autistic daughter, Ayla, at the Dilley immigration processing center in south Texas.

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LaGuardia pilots raised safety alarms months before deadly runway crash

Nasa reports show repeated warnings of close calls before crash that killed two pilots and injured 41 others

Pilot safety concerns about New York’s LaGuardia airport were filed to aviation officials months before Sunday’s collision between an airplane and a firetruck left two pilots dead and 41 other people hospitalized.

According to the aviation safety reporting system administered by the US space agency Nasa, a pilot using the airport in the summer wrote, “Please do something,” after air traffic controllers failed to provide appropriate guidance about multiple nearby aircraft.

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‘A miracle’: Canadian flight attendant ejected from plane survives New York crash

Solange Tremblay was ejected over 100 metres from the plane after collision at LaGuardia airport, her daughter says

A flight attendant on the Air Canada Jazz flight that collided with a fire truck at New York’s LaGuardia airport on Sunday survived in what her daughter called a “complete miracle”, when she was ejected more than 100 metres from the plane while still strapped to her seat.

The CRJ-900 jet, operated by Jazz Aviation, collided with a fire truck as it landed, killing both the pilot and co-pilot. Nine people were sent to the hospital with injuries, including Solange Tremblay, a flight attendant.

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Canadian mother and daughter ‘traumatized’ by ICE detainment, husband says

Tania Warner and Ayla, her seven-year-old with autism, sent to notorious Texas detention center and told to ‘self-deport’

A Canadian woman and her seven-year-old daughter with autism who have been held by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) for nearly a week have been transferred to a notorious detention center and asked to “self-deport”, according to her husband, who said the pair had been “traumatized” by the experience.

Tania Warner and her daughter Ayla Luca, originally from British Columbia, moved to the US five years ago, when Warner married Edward Warner, a US citizen.

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Seven-year-old Canadian girl with autism and mother detained by ICE in Texas

Mother and child held in notorious Rio Grande Valley detention centre despite presenting visa, family says

A Canadian mother and her seven-year-old daughter, who has autism, have been detained by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) in Texas since Saturday, family members have said.

Relatives of Tania Warner and her daughter Ayla Lucas say they were detained unlawfully. They are uncertain about what problem ICE found with their immigration paperwork.

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Canada in push for joint G7 and Middle East effort to de-escalate Iran war

Foreign minister Anita Anand says she has drafted principles to reduce risk of regional spillover and wider shocks

Canada is pushing for a collective G7 and Middle East approach to de-escalating the Iran war, including off ramps that could bring an end to the conflict, the Canadian foreign minister, Anita Anand, has said.

In London to meet the UK foreign secretary, Yvette Cooper, after talks with the her Turkish counterpart, Hakan Fidan, Anand told the Guardian she hoped a G7 meeting chaired by France, this year’s president of the group, might start to build a broader collective approach to the crisis.

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Man and woman charged with murder of Iranian activist in Canada

Charges follow discovery of body of Masood Masjoody, who was a critic of the Tehran regime and the exiled shah

Two people have been charged with the murder of an Iranian activist in Canada, in a case which has intensified fears over transnational repression of critics of the regime in Tehran.

Masood Masjoody, a former university maths teacher, went missing in early February in the city of Burnaby, British Columbia. He had been critical of Iran’s theocratic regime and the exiled family of the former shah.

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King Charles concerned about Alberta separatist movement, First Nation chief says

Joey Pete of Sunchild First Nation said king seemed ‘committed to learning’ after meeting Indigenous leaders

King Charles has expressed concern over a simmering separatist movement in western Canada, according to Indigenous leaders who met the head of state at Buckingham Palace.

Members of the Confederacy of Treaty Six First Nations travelled to London from their territories in the province of Alberta to raise the alarm over the secessionist movement, arguing that it ignores key agreements signed between First Nations and the crown nearly 150 years ago.

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Two people die after donating plasma at Canadian clinics under federal investigation

Company that runs the sites says it has ‘no reason to believe there is a correlation between the donors’ passing and plasma donation’

Two people have died in Canada after donating plasma at a chain of clinics that has been under scrutiny by federal inspectors for failing to keep accurate records, screen donors or maintain its machines.

While experts say the deaths are exceedingly rare, critics say Canada’s embrace of private companies to handle blood products reflects a “slow collapse of a system that has been the envy of the world”.

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Family of Tumbler Ridge shooting victim sues OpenAI alleging it could have prevented attack

Eight people were killed by 18-year-old in Canada, who had described violent scenarios involving guns to ChatGPT

The family of a child critically injured one of Canada’s worst mass shootings is suing OpenAI, arguing the technology company could have prevented the attack on a school last month.

The lawsuit comes days after the head of OpenAI said he would apologize to the families of a remote Canadian town after violence shattered the tight-knit community.

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‘We thought we were doomed’: Canadian fishers in dramatic rescue after ice shelf floats away

Anglers describe harrowing phone calls to loved ones once ice detached from shores of Georgian Bay in Ontario

Kevin Fox thought the spring-like temperatures that had temporarily pushed the cold away from south-eastern Ontario meant a good day on for ice fishing, a popular winter pastime in the region.

After shifting location because the wind and ice “didn’t feel right” and the fish weren’t biting close to shore, he and a friend joined nearly two dozen others far out on a sheet of ice in Lake Huron. They followed the familiar routine of anyone who spends a day on the ice: they drilled holes, dropped their lines and waited.

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Time for a change: British Columbia decides to keep daylight saving time permanently

Most residents of Canadian province wanted change for years – Trump’s unneighbourly rhetoric helped seal the deal

Since 1918, the clocks in Creston, a town in eastern British Columbia, ran an hour ahead of nearby communities for half the year. For the other six months, they slipped back into sync. Not because the town changed them but because its neighbours changed back and forth from daylight saving time.

Creston was an outlier: a community that effectively created its own time zone. But when residents in most parts of the province shift their clocks forward on Sunday, they will be doing it for the last time – and permanently joining Creston for the first time in nearly 70 years.

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Canadian PM Mark Carney says former prince Andrew should be removed from royal line of succession

Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor’s ‘deplorable’ alleged actions warrant his removal from the royal line of succession, Carney says

The Canadian prime minister, Mark Carney, has said Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor should be removed from the royal line of succession for alleged actions he described as “deplorable”.

Speaking to reporters in Tokyo, Carney said the actions that have caused the former prince to be stripped of his royal titles “necessitate” his removal from the line of succession.

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Canada seeks answers from OpenAI for failing to alert police after suspending school shooter’s account

Company had suspended account of Tumbler Ridge shooter in June 2025 over ‘furtherance of violent activities’

Canada’s artificial intelligence minister says he has summoned representatives from the technology company OpenAI after the company declined to alert police after suspending the account of a user who became the perpetrator of one of the country’s worst-ever school shootings.

Evan Solomon says he is “deeply disturbed” by reports that the company, which operates the popular ChatGPT chatbot, suspended the account of Jesse Van Rootselaar over the “furtherance of violent activities” in June 2025 but did not reach out to Canadian law enforcement.

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Credit cards cancelled, Google accounts closed: ICC judges on life under Trump sanctions

Kimberly Prost and Luz del Carmen Ibáñez Carranza vow US reprisals will not affect work of international criminal court

When the Canadian Kimberly Prost learned Donald Trump’s administration had imposed sanctions on her, it came as a shock.

For years, she has sat as a judge at the international criminal court, weighing accusations of war crimes, genocide and crimes against humanity; now she is on the same list as terrorists and those involved in organised crime. “It really was a moment of a bit of disbelief,” she said.

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Publisher condemns ‘violent’ use of Franklin the Turtle after Hegseth’s boat strike post

US defense secretary posted meme depicting beloved children’s character aiming rocket launcher at set of boats

A post on social media by US defense secretary Pete Hegseth, depicting a beloved children’s character aiming a rocket launcher at a cluster of boats, has elicited condemnation from the book’s Canadian publisher.

Hegseth’s post of the mocked cover of a Franklin the Turtle book titled Franklin Targets Narco Terrorists prompted disbelief and outrage. The image shows a smiling anthropomorphic turtle in military helmet and vest, with a US flag on his arm and a drug-laden boat exploding in the background. “For your Christmas wish list,” Hegseth wrote as the caption.

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