Back to newsletter list 10/05/2008 22:26:42 (UTC) Canada | World Briefs | Sports | Weather Headlines  - Governor-General appeals for vigilance against intolerance. - Ontario and Quebec to hold first joint cabinet meeting. - Stun gun maker rejects accusations.
BORDEAUX: GOVERNOR GENERAL APPEALS FOR VIGILANCE AGAINST INTOLERANCE Canada's governor-general, Michaelle Jean, appealed on Saturday for vigilance against intolerance. Miss Jean spoke in Bordeaux, where she marked 160 years since the abolition of slavery in France. She made reference to her own origins in Haiti, saying that as the great-great grand-daughter of a slave, she had come to pay tribute to the memory of millions of Africans who, she said, were victims of one of the most barbarous crimes against humanity. Bordeaux was a stopping point for slaves bound for North America. The mayor of Bordeaux, Alain Juppe, said that his city should establish a permament memorial to the victims of slavery. Miss Jean has been in France for the past week to mark the upcoming 400th anniversary of Quebec City's founding by French settlers. Quebec City is the capital of Canada's French-speaking province of Quebec. The governor general is the representive in Ottawa of Britain's Queen Elizabeth II, who is officially Canada's head of state. Miss Jean and her family emigrated from Haiti to Canada in 1968. TORONTO: ONTARIO AND QUEBEC TO HOLD FIRST JOINT CABINET MEETING The Canadian Press new agency reports that the central Canadian provinces of Ontario and Quebec will hold their first joint cabinet meeting next month. The agenda will include discussions of several proposed agreements and economic partnerships. One source said that the meeting should not be seen as a new force that will oppose other regions of the country or the federal government. VANCOUVER: STUN GUN MAKER REJECTS ACCUSATIONS The maker of the Taser stun gun, Taser International, is denying accusations that it rushed its product to market after faulty research. The accusation was made by Ken Stethem, the chairman of a competing company, Ageis Industries, at an inquiry in Vancouver. The inquiry is looking into police use of Tasers and examining charges that Taser did not conduct proper safety and medical research. The Taser inquiry was called after a Polish immigrant died after being shot by Tasers by police at Vancouver international airport last October. TORONTO: NATIONAL NEWSPAPER AWARDS ARE ANNOUNCED The Globe & Mail won six awards at the 59th National Newspaper Awards gala held on Friday night in Toronto. A total of 21 awards were handed out. The French-language newspaper, La Presse of Montreal, took five awards. The Ottawa Citizen and the Toronto Star earned two each. Among those winning one award were The Canadian Press and the National Post. TORONTO: TRAIN PASSENGERS DEEMED FREE OF DISEASE Canadian health officials have determined that there was no outbreak of an infectious disease on board a Via Rail train in Northern Ontario on Friday. Emergency officials stopped the train in a small town near Timmins after one passenger died and five others were reported with flu-like symptoms. All passengers aboard the train were quarantined for several hours while medical experts were flown in. Officials later said that there was no connection between the death and the minor illnesses reported by the other five. MONTREAL: PALESTINIANS STAGE PROTEST AGAINST ISRAEL More than 100 Canadians staged a march in downtown Montreal on Saturday to protest against celebrations this week marking the sixtieth anniversary of the founding of Israel. Demonstrators denounced Israel's occupation of Gaza and the West Bank. The demonstrators said that those marking Israel's anniversary should recall that hundreds of thousands of Palestinians were forcibly expulsed from the region when Israel was founded. The demonstrators appealed to Canada's government to urge Israel's government to pursue serious negotiations with Palestinians with a view to ending Israeli occupation and the dismantling of Jewish settlements in Gaza and the West Bank. Earlier this week, Prime Minister Stephen Harper described Canada as a friend and ally of Israel and expressed hope that Palestinians and Israelis could engage in a fruitful dialogue to achieve peace. MONTREAL: PRIVATE SCHOOL TEACHER ARRESTED FOR CHILD PORNOGRAPHY American police in the State of Virginia have arrested a teacher at a respected private school in Montreal who allegedly solicited a minor for sex. Richard Doucet was also alleged to possess child pornography. He was caught in a police sting operation when he tried to solicit an undercover police officer posing on the Internet as a 13-year-old boy. Mr. Doucet's colleagues at Selwyn House elementary school have expressed shock. He has no criminal record. The school in the tony Westmount section of Montreal was the centre of an earlier sex-related controversy. Several former students allege that they were sexually abused by three ex-teachers dating back as far as the 1960s. A lawsuit was launched and an offer of about CDN$5 million was made to all claimants. The suit has yet to be finalized in court.
LEBANON Hezbollah has begun withdrawing its gunmen from Beirut following a request from the Lebanese army. Speaking on Hezbollah-run television, the militants said that they would nevertheless continue a civil disobedience campaign in Beirut until their demands are met. On Friday, Hezbollah forcibly took control of most of Beirut's Muslim sector after three days of hard fighting. At least 37 people were reported killed. On Saturday, a gunbattle in northern Lebanon killed 12 people and wounded 20 others. Fighters loyal to Sunni Muslim leader Saad Hariri and the government clashed with members of the Syrian Social Nationalist party, a secular group allied with the Shiite Hezbollah. BURMA Voting began on Saturday in a referendum on the junta's proposed constitution. Western nations had urged the junta to postpone the vote and to concentrate efforts on delivering aid to more than a million victims of the recent cyclone. The vote is Burma's first in more than a decade. Polling stations were open in all but the most devastated parts of the country. Meanwhile, the United Nations launched another appeal to the junta to stop restricting aid workers from delivering emergency supplies to cyclone victims. The U.N. was to resume aid flights to Burma on Saturday, one day after the U.N. World Food Program suspended deliveries because cargo from two of its aid p***s had impounded in Rangoon. FRANCE Two French cargo p***s were scheduled to leave on Saturday with emergency aid for Burma. One p*** carrying 35 tonnes of emergency aid left Bordeaux-Merignac airport. It carried shelters, water-treatment equipment, first-aid supplies and food. A second p*** was also due to leave the southwestern French city on Saturday with another 36 tonnes of materials. SUDAN Sudan's government is accusing Chad of helping rebels in Darfur to make their closest advance to the capital, Khartoum. Sudanese troops fought with the rebels in a suburb of Khartoum on Saturday. Heavy gunfire and artillery shook Omdurman, across the Nile River from Khartoum. Helicopters and armoured vehicles headed for the fighting. An overnight curfew was declared. The government said that the attack on the capital had been defeated. SOMALIA Tension is rising near Somalia's capital, Mogadishu, where rebels have been reported to be advancing. At least 11 people were killed on Saturday when Islamist insurgents ambushed government forces in two incidents. In one attack, insurgents fired on a government convoy in Yaqbiriweyne, a village around 80 kilometres south of Mogadishu. The insurgents also ambushed government forces overnight in the south of Mogadishu, killing at least seven civilians. EGYPT Egyptian authorities were reported on Saturday to have re-opened the Rafah border crossing with Gaza for Palestinians facing medical emergencies. Palestinians in need of surgery as well as cancer and heart patients will be given priority to cross into Egypt. The Rafah terminal has been closed since Hamas militants seized control of Gaza last year. Palestinians briefly breached the border fence for 10 days in January. Hamas says that the border should be reopened for humanitarian cases. CENTRAL AFRICA The last major rebel group in the Central African Republic has signed a ceasefire agreement with the government. The group, the Popular Army for the Restoration of the Republic and Democracy, has joined a national peace process that aims to end years of instability. Government envoys signed the accord on Friday in Libreville, Gabon. The rebels operate in Central African Republic's northwest bordering Cameroon and Chad. APRD rebel fighters will remain in their northwest bases until they can be integrated into the national army. Authorities are suspending all legal action against them. President *** Bozize signed peace pacts with two other rebel groups last year. AFGHANISTAN At least two people were killed and seven others were wounded in eastern Afghanistan on Saturday in clashes between police and demonstrators protesting against civilian deaths at the hands of foreign troops. Several thousand protesters blocked a highway through Nangarhar province linking the capital Kabul with Pakistan. They were demonstrating against the killing of three civilians in the area by foreign forces in an overnight raid. An official for NATO in Kabul said that he was not aware of the raid. The U.S. military said all those killed were militants and the target of its raid was 'a foreign fighter network.' MEXICO Two high ranking police officials are the latest victims of the Mexican government's war against drug cartels. On Friday, the commander of Mexico City's investigative police force, Esteban Robles Espinosa, was shot and killed. He was also a member of an internal commission looking into corruption among city police. On Thursday, Mexico City's federal police chief, Edgar Eusebio Millan Gomez, was killed on his way home. He had played an active role in the government's fight against drug cartels and organized crime. President Felipe Calderon said that the murders would not deter his government's battle against organized crime. SICILY Lava began flowing from Mount Etna on Saturday. Mount Etna, in Sicily, is the highest active volcano in Europe. It last erupted in November, two months after another eruption forced a temporary closure of nearby Catania airport due to flying lava and clouds of ash. JAPAN China's President Hu Jintao ended his visit to Japan on Saturday with stops at two Buddhist temples in Nara, about 400 kilometres from Tokyo. Mr. Hu's five-day state visit was the first to Japan by a Chinese leader in a decade. He hoped to ease strains with Japan over issues concerning energy, security and wartime history. He also hoped to silence critics of China's crackdown in Tibet. At one temple, he bowed in respect before a statue of a Chinese Buddhist monk. About 50 protesters stood outside, denouncing Chinese rule in Tibet and shouting "Free Tibet". One of the protesters was arrested. Mr. Hu's visit appeared intended to deflect criticism that his government is hostile to religion. On Saturday, he also met regional officials and visited the headquarters of Japanese electronics maker Matsushita Electric Industrial.
TRACK AND FIELD Canadians Dana Elli and Carly Dockendorf captured medals in pole vaulting at the Osaka Grand Prix on Saturday. Elli took the gold medal with a leap of 4.20 metres. Dockendorf tied for the bronze with Japan's Ikuo Nishikori at 4.00 metres. Li Ling of China was second at 4.20 metres. JUDO Canadians won two medals at the Pan American judo championships in Miami on Friday. In men's 73 kilos, Nicholas Tritton won the bronze medal, defeating Josue Deprez of Haiti in the medal match. Sasha Mehmedovic won the bronze medal in men's 66 kilos, defeating Ronnie Talledo of Peru in his last bout. Frazer Will, Mehmedovic and Tritton each Friday for the Olympic Games in Beijing. BASEBALL The Toronto Blue Jays lost for the 13 times in 14 games on Friday, beaten, 6-1, by the Cleveland Indians. Cleveland scored all its runs in the seventh inning. The Blue Jays lost centre-fielder Vernon Wells when he suffered a left wrist injury. HOCKEY At the World Hockey championships in Halifax on Saturday, Canada routed Germany, 10-1. Eric Staal scored four goals. Jason Spezza, Dany Heatley, Patrick Sharp, Derek Roy and Mike Green also scored for Canada. Germany's Frank Hordler spoiled Cam Ward's shutout bid. The Czech Republic survived a scare from Belarus to post a 3-2 victory. Russia defeated Belarus, 4-3 on Friday. Finland beat Latvia 2-1, Slovakia defeated Slovenia 5-1, while France edged Italy 3-2. The Philadelphia Flyers lost to the Pittsburgh Penguins on Friday, 4-2, in Game One of the NHL's Eastern Conference final.
Weather Here is Canada's weather on Sunday. British Columbia will have showers. The high temperature in Vancouver will be 14 degrees Celsius. The Yukon: variable cloudiness. Whitehorse, 12. Northwest Territories: sunny. Yellowknife, nine. Nunavut: cloudy. Iqaluit, four. Alberta: rain showers. Edmonton, 15. Saskatchewan: rain showers. Regina, 14. Manitoba: sunny. Winnipeg, 16. Ontario: increasing cloudiness. Toronto, 16. Ottawa, 21. Quebec: sunny. Montreal, 20. New Brunswick: variable cloudiness. Fredericton, 14. Nova Scotia: rain. Halifax, five. Prince Edward Island: light rain. Charlottetown, six. Newfoundland: cloudy. St. John's, three.
|
