More than a million people in darkness and thousands of flights cancelled amid lows with wind chill of -55F (-48C)
More than a million people in the US are in the dark after a “bomb cyclone” winter storm struck the country, closing highways, grounding flights and causing misery for Christmas travellers.
Heavy snow, howling winds and air so frigid it instantly turned boiling water into ice took hold of much of the country, including normally temperate southern states.
Continue reading...Government research shows dramatic decline in numbers in western Hudson Bay stronghold
Polar bears are disappearing fast from the western part of Hudson Bay on the southern tip of the Canadian Arctic, according to a government survey.
The report said there had been a dramatic decline in the of number of female bears and cubs in particular.
Continue reading...The suspects – ages 13 to 16 – were said to have met via social media before gathering downtown and allegedly ‘swarming’ victim
Eight teenage girls who appear to have met on social media have been charged with second-degree murder over the death of a 59-year-old man who was stabbed in downtown Toronto.
Police allege that the girls assaulted and stabbed the man at a plaza near the main rail station in Canada’s largest city early on Sunday morning. Three of the girls are 13, three are 14 and two are 16, police said on Tuesday.
Continue reading...Francesco Velli, 73, had history of harassing neighbours before killing three members of the condo board and two others
The man who shot and killed five people at a suburban Toronto condominium on Sunday evening had spent years harassing his neighbours and threatening the building’s condo board over a belief that the building’s electrical room was making him sick.
At a news conference on Monday, York region police chief James MacSween identified the gunman in Sunday night’s attack in the city of Vaughn as Francesco Velli.
Continue reading...The Democratic Republic of the Congo’s last-minute bid for additional funds was dismissed on a legal technicality
It was almost a special moment in the early hours of Monday morning in the Palais des congrès in Montreal. China and Canada, two squabbling adversaries, had united for the good of the planet to help the world at Cop15 forge a once-in-a-decade deal to halt the destruction of Earth’s ecosystems.
From the emphasis on indigenous rights to conserving 30% of Earth for nature, there is good reason to believe the Kunming-Montreal agreement could be a truly historic, hopeful turning point in humanity’s relationship with nature after decades of destruction and warnings of mass extinctions.
Continue reading...Democratic Republic of the Congo’s environment minister says country has not agreed to ‘30 by 30’ deal
The Democratic Republic of the Congo’s environment minister has said her country has not agreed to a deal to halt the destruction of the Earth’s ecosystems, prompting behind-the-scenes diplomatic efforts to keep the agreement alive just hours after it was adopted.
Ève Bazaiba, the DRC’s environment minister, said her country would be writing to the UN secretary general, António Guterres, and the Convention on Biological Diversity to express the DRC’s position on the final text. It comes after the Chinese Cop15 president, Huang Runqiu, appeared to force through the agreement in the final plenary just moments after the DRC negotiator had said did not support the deal, which is typically negotiated by consensus. His interventions prompted further objections from Uganda and Cameroon.
Continue reading...Government plans to seize US$26m from Granite Capital Holdings, owned by sanctioned former Chelsea FC owner
Canada plans to seize US$26m from a company owned by the sanctioned Russian oligarch Roman Abramovich, the federal government said on Monday.
The pursuit of Abramovich’s Granite Capital Holdings marks a first attempt by Ottawa to seize assets belonging to a sanctioned individual and reflects a broader strategy to punish Russia and its wealthy elite for the invasion of Ukraine.
Continue reading...Police in Canada shoot dead suspect after receiving reports of an active male shooter in Vaughan on Sunday night
Five people have been shot and killed in a residential unit in a Toronto suburb before the gunman was killed by police, authorities have said.
Police were called to a residential building in Vaughan, Ontario, at about 7.20pm on Sunday to reports of an active male shooter who had shot several victims at a condo in Vaughan, Ontario.
Continue reading...Clinicians say there is concern that the country’s healthcare system is inadequate to protect most vulnerable
Canada is delaying plans which would allow people with mental illness to access medically assisted death amid concern from some clinicians that the healthcare system is not prepared to handle the complicated cases.
Starting March 2023, Canada is expected to become one of the few countries in the world to allow physician-assisted death for chronic mental disorders.
Continue reading...Negotiators say divisions mean risk is growing of a weak final agreement similar to Denmark summit in 2009
Talks to halt the destruction of nature “very much hang in the balance”, sources have said, as environment ministers from around the world begin to arrive in Montreal amid concerns about a lack of Chinese leadership of the Cop15 talks.
At the halfway stage of the summit in Canada, negotiators at the UN biodiversity summit have said divisions are contributing to the growing risk of a “Copenhagen moment”, referring to the 2009 UN climate summit when talks ended with a weak final agreement in the Danish capital, not the “Paris moment for nature” leading environmental figures had been calling for.
Continue reading...Candice Servatius, an evangelical Protestant, claimed ceremony infringes on her children’s religious freedoms
A Canadian court has again rejected claims from a mother that Indigenous cultural events at her children’s school infringed on their religious freedoms, ordering her to pay costs after revelations her lawsuit was secretly funded by a Christian activist organization.
Candice Servatius, an evangelical Protestant, complained in 2016 after an Elder performed a smudging demonstration at her children’s school in the western British Columbia town of Port Alberni. A hoop dancer also said a prayer while performing at a school assembly.
Continue reading...Barry and Honey Sherman found dead in Toronto home five years ago but family frustration mounts as crime remains unsolved
The son of a billionaire couple murdered five years ago has tripled a cash reward for information about the unsolved crime amid frustration over a lack of progress in the investigation and deep rifts within the family.
Barry Sherman, the founder of drug giant Apotex, and his wife, Honey, are believed to have been killed in their Toronto home on 13 December 2017. A realtor found the couple in the basement pool area of their home two days later, with belts looped around their necks and attached to a pool railing.
Continue reading...Manitoba site pauses operations, raising prospect that search for bodies of Long Plain First Nation women could be possible
Operations have paused at a Canadian landfill where the bodies of at least two Indigenous victims of an alleged serial killer are believed to be buried, amid mounting frustration that authorities are not doing enough to recover the bodies.
Police in Winnipeg announced last week they had charged Jeremy Skibicki, 35, with the murder of Morgan Beatrice Harris, 39, and Marcedes Myran, 26, of Long Plain First Nation, months after he was accused of killing Rebecca Contois, 24, from O-Chi-Chak-Ko-Sipi First Nation.
Continue reading...Barry and Honey Sherman were found dead at home in 2017 in a case that shocked Canada but remains unsolved
The daughter of a billionaire couple whose unsolved murder shocked Canada’s largest city has pleaded for the public to come forward with any evidence ahead of the fifth anniversary of their deaths.
Barry Sherman, the founder of drug giant Apotex, and his wife Honey, were found dead in their Toronto home on 13 December 2017. A realtor found the couple in the basement pool area of their home two days later, with belts looped around their necks and attached to a pool railing.
Continue reading...Bill that could allow province to ignore federal laws criticized by constitutional scholars and Indigenous leaders
Alberta has passed a controversial “sovereignty act” that could allow the province to ignore federal laws, setting the stage for a combative relationship with the Canadian prime minister, Justin Trudeau, and tense relations with Indigenous leaders.
Shortly after midnight on Thursday, the governing United Conservative party passed Bill 1, the Alberta Sovereignty Within a United Canada Act, after weeks of criticism over the proposed law – and only after stripping away a contentious provision that would have allowed the provincial cabinet the power to bypass the legislature and rewrite laws.
Continue reading...Film-maker Zoe Greenberg says she raised concerns with Penguin Random House Canada over Leah McLaren’s book
A Canadian film-maker who was allegedly sexually assaulted as a teenager has accused the country’s largest book publisher of knowingly releasing a memoir by one of her alleged assailants that depicts the incident as consensual.
In a 6 December post on Medium, Zoe Greenberg claimed she was subjected to a sexual assault in her youth.
Continue reading...Family ‘heartbroken’ and angry by decision not to search landfill after four women were believed to have been killed by serial killer
Police in Canada have said they don’t have the resources to search a landfill to recover the bodies of two Indigenous women murdered by an alleged serial killer – a decision that has left the daughters of one victim “heartbroken” and angry.
Last week, police in Winnipeg announced that four Indigenous women – Marcedes Myran, Morgan Harris, Rebecca Contois and a fourth woman who they had not identified – were believed to have been killed by an alleged serial killer. Winnipeg police have charged Jeremy Skibicki in their deaths.
Continue reading...António Guterres calls for end to destruction of nature as Canada pushes proposal to protect 30% of Earth
Humanity has become a weapon of mass extinction and governments must end the “orgy of destruction”, the UN secretary general, António Guterres, has said at the beginning of the biodiversity Cop15.
“We are out of harmony with nature. In fact, we are playing an entirely different song. Around the world, for hundreds of years, we have conducted a cacophony of chaos, played with instruments of destruction. Deforestation and desertification are creating wastelands of once-thriving ecosystems,” he said.
Continue reading...Community members bestow name amid fears that the woman, who is believed to be Indigenous, would remain nameless
The unidentified victim of an alleged serial killer in Canada has been given the name Mashkode Bizhiki’ikwe, or Buffalo Woman, by grieving community members, amid growing fears that a woman who is believed to be Indigenous would remain nameless.
Last week, Winnipeg police charged Jeremy Skibicki in the deaths of three women. Two were named as Morgan Harris, 39, and Marcedes Myran, 26 of Long Plain First Nation, but the third woman has not been identified. Skibick had previously been charged in May in the killing of 24-year-old Rebecca Contois of O-Chi-Chak-Ko-Sipi First Nation.
Continue reading...Protests against oil and mining have been planned, as thousands of delegates arrive for UN biodiversity summit
Police in Montreal are bracing for their biggest operation in two decades, as thousands of visitors – including frustrated demonstrators – begin to arrive for the Cop15 global biodiversity summit.
Officials are expecting more than 10,000 people, including scientists and senior bureaucrats, to attend Cop15 in the Canadian city.
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