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Canada planning more evacuation flights from Sudan but situation remains volatile

Published Thu, 26 Dec 2024 18:20:48 GMT

OTTAWA — Military and foreign affairs officials said Thursday Canada expects to send additional planes to help evacuate people from Sudan in the coming days but the volatile situation on the ground is making planning difficult.The first two Canadian-operated evacuation planes left Khartoum Thursday carrying 118 people, including both Canadians and citizens of allied nations. Two hundred Canadians had previously escaped with the help of allies including Germany, the United States and the United Kingdom.Global Affairs Canada says about 1,800 Canadians registered their presence in Sudan and just over 100 Canadians still there have asked for help to flee. Several hundred others have asked for assistance on the ground but currently want to stay.Most of them in the capital of Khartoum.Defence Minister Anita Anand was pleased with the news some flights had succeeded but called the whole situation “volatile” with intermittent power and communications systems.“The situation...

Lawyer says Prince Harry’s words undermine phone hack case

Published Thu, 26 Dec 2024 18:20:48 GMT

LONDON (AP) — An attorney for the publisher of The Sun tabloid used Prince Harry’s own words Thursday to argue that his phone hacking lawsuit should be thrown out.Attorney Anthony Hudson said emails from the Duke of Sussex to the royal family’s chief spokesperson indicated he was aware enough of allegations against the publisher that he could have brought a lawsuit in a timely manner.Harry first learned that one of his voicemails had been intercepted in 2006 and knew he had a claim to bring in 2012, Hudson said.But the prince only began pushing Buckingham Palace in late 2017 and early 2018 to pressure the British newspaper arm of Rupert Murdoch’s media empire to apologize for hacking his phone.“There needs to be an ultimatum otherwise this institution and everything it stands for becomes a laughingstock,” the Duke of Sussex emailed the chief spokesperson for the royal family in February 2018, according to court records.After a three day hearing in the High Court, Hudson ...

California passes 1st-in-nation emission rules for trains

Published Thu, 26 Dec 2024 18:20:48 GMT

SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — The California Air Resources Board approved Thursday a first-in-the-nation, ambitious rule limiting rail pollution. The goal is to drastically cut greenhouse gas emissions from locomotives. The standards would also reduce a group of chemicals that contribute to the formation of smog. They could improve air quality for people living near railyards and ports. The standards would need approval from the Biden administration to move forward. They follow rules approved by the Environmental Protection Agency to cut emissions from heavy trucks. The locomotive rule is part of the state’s plan to establish itself as a global leader in the fight against climate change.“It is time to kickstart the next step of transformation with trains in this regulation,” said Davina Hurt, a board member.Locomotives pull rail cars filled with food, lumber, oil and other products through railyards near neighborhoods in Oakland, Commerce, San Bernardino and other California cities.They...

Forcible restraint by police among factors in Myles Gray death, pathologist says

Published Thu, 26 Dec 2024 18:20:48 GMT

BURNABY, B.C. — A forensic pathologist says a “perfect storm” of factors led to Myles Gray’s death, including his extreme exertion and the Vancouver police actions to restrain him.Dr. Matthew Orde told the coroner’s inquest into Gray’s death that descriptions of the 33-year-old suggest he’d been experiencing an acute behavioural disturbance, and his body would have been working in overdrive as he struggled with police. Orde testified that Gray’s heart would have been pumping rapidly and he would have been breathing heavily as several police officers forced him into a prone position, lying on his stomach, with his arms handcuffed behind his back.He said people who are forcibly restrained in that position are at greater risk of death, especially when someone’s body has increased demands.Orde, who performed an autopsy in the days after Gray died in August 2015, said the man also sustained multiple blunt force injuries to his face and body...

Fighters rampage in Darfur despite fragile Sudan truce

Published Thu, 26 Dec 2024 18:20:48 GMT

CAIRO (AP) — Armed fighters rampaged through a main city in Sudan’s war-ravaged region of Darfur on Thursday, battling each other and looting shops and homes, residents said. The violence came despite a fragile three-day truce between Sudan’s two top generals, whose power struggle has killed hundreds.The mayhem in the Darfur city of Genena pointed to how the rival generals’ fight for control in the capital, Khartoum, was spiraling into violence in other parts of Sudan. The cease-fire has brought a significant easing of fighting in Khartoum and its neighboring city Omdurman for the first time since the military and a rival paramilitary force began clashing on April 15. The fighting had turned residential neighborhoods into battlegrounds. The relative calm has allowed foreign governments to airlift out hundreds of citizens, while tens of thousands of Sudanese have streamed out of Khartoum, seeking safer areas or escape abroad. The military, led by Gen. Abdel Fattah Burhan, said ...

Police say head of Montreal seniors home billed for services that weren’t provided

Published Thu, 26 Dec 2024 18:20:48 GMT

MONTREAL — The head of a private seniors residence in Montreal has been charged with fraud after he allegedly billed a regional health authority for resident services that were never provided.Paul Asselin, 60, produced fake invoices using the names of people who were not living at the care home at the time the services were allegedly provided, Quebec anti-corruption police allege. The Unité permanente anticorruption says the alleged fraud took place between March 18, 2021, and April 30, 2022. Asselin, who runs Les Jardins de Jouvence residence in Montreal’s Mercier—Hochelaga-Maisonneuve borough, has been charged with fraud under $5,000, forgery and use of a forged document. The value of the fraud is estimated at more than $4,000, police say.The local heath authority declined to comment directly on the case, but Christian Merciari, an assistant to the president and CEO, said the agency is reviewing its verification process “to ensure greater control over our process of pa...

Federal public service strike enters ninth day, no sign of back-to-work legislation

Published Thu, 26 Dec 2024 18:20:48 GMT

OTTAWA — The Liberal government is showing no hints it will end the strike of its largest public sector union by legislating some 100,000 federal civil servants back to work.Workers with the Public Service Alliance of Canada walked off the job nine days ago after contract negotiations with the government couldn’t find agreement on issues such as wage increases and remote work.Amid questions over how the impasse will be resolved, former clerk of the Privy Council Michael Wernick says the federal government can’t discuss hypotheticals such as back-to-work legislation because negotiations are ongoing. Wernick headed the federal public service for three years. He says introducing back-to-work legislation prematurely could spell trouble for the federal government and lead to accusations of bad-faith bargaining.There’s also the matter of political support, which the minority Liberals would need to pass legislation. The NDP say they will not support any back-to-work bill,...

Stock market today: Meta’s surge fuels big Wall Street rally

Published Thu, 26 Dec 2024 18:20:48 GMT

NEW YORK (AP) — Wall Street is steaming toward its best day since January after Meta Platforms on Thursday became the latest Big Tech company to blow past profit expectations and reports painted a mixed picture of the U.S. economy. The S&P 500 was 2% higher in late trading and on pace to erase all its losses from what had been a tough week so far. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was up 551 points, or 1.7%, at 33,853 as of 3 p.m. Eastern time, while the Nasdaq composite was leading the market with a 2.4% gain. Facebook’s parent company was doing the heaviest lifting, and it jumped 14.6%. Not only did Meta beat analysts’ estimates for profit during the first three months of the year, it also gave a forecast for revenue that topped expectations. The majority of companies have been beating forecasts so far this earnings reporting season. Hasbro climbed 14%, and Comcast rose 9.7% after they also topped Wall Street’s estimates. But expectations were broadly low coming into this repor...

Saucepans clang anew in France against Macron’s pension law

Published Thu, 26 Dec 2024 18:20:48 GMT

PARIS (AP) — Protesters loudly banged pots and pans near a castle where French President Emmanuel Macron was to make a speech Thursday, in what has become a popular way to voice anger at a resented new law raising the retirement age from 62 to 64. Similar saucepan actions, dubbed “casserolades, ” were staged elsewhere in the country where government members were scheduled to travel.Macron attended a ceremony for the 175th anniversary of the abolition of slavery in France at the Fort de Joux, near the border with Switzerland, a castle where the most prominent leader of the Haitian slave revolution, Toussaint Louverture, was imprisoned and died in 1803.As police were preventing protesters from getting too close to the Fort de Joux, Macron made a surprise stop in the nearby town of Dole to meet with French people on a street market without the clattering of pots and pans. Yet he was not able to avoid all criticism, with several people raising their concerns out loud — from the pe...

Bank regulator says no indicators of liquidity shock re-emerging

Published Thu, 26 Dec 2024 18:20:48 GMT

TORONTO — The head of Canada’s banking regulator says that despite continued liquidity stress at some U.S. banks, he isn’t seeing any data to suggest that a wider shock is going to re-emerge.Superintendent of Financial Institutions Peter Routledge says it feels like the market has accepted that authorities have stabilized liquidity concerns.Speaking to media after a speech at the Economic Club of Canada, Routledge cautioned that he isn’t saying that the sector is fully in the clear, noting that the problem with shocks is you don’t know when they’re going to return.His comments come as First Republic Bank has seen its stock price plummet this week after it disclosed that it saw more than US$100 billion of deposit outflows last month.The San Francisco bank is one of several that saw knock-on effects of the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank, though wider contagion was limited after U.S. authorities agreed to backstop deposits at SVB.Routledge says the recent...