'Komodo dragons on steroids': Fossil of predatory water dweller recovered at mine

Yesterday 
The Canadian Press

MAGRATH, ALBERTA — A fossil of a prehistoric lizard "on steroids" has been found at a mining site in southern Alberta.

The partial fossil of a recently discovered mosasaurus was recently discovered at an ammolite mine south of Lethbridge.

It lived in the inland sea that covered Alberta during the Cretaceous Period about 75 million years ago and would often grow to be seven to eight metres long with a skull that was about one metre.

Donald Henderson from the Royal Tyrrell Museum of Palaeontology said mining operations have been providing a regular supply of various fossils for years and the museum has about 30 partially complete mosasaurus skeletons.

"It does surprise me because there's long sequences of vertical layers of rock where you don't find any and then you come to a layer where there's a whole bunch," Henderson, the museum's dinosaur curator, said in an interview.

"We're very fortunate here in Alberta. We get so many fossil types of reptiles," he said. "We get a bit, I wouldn't, say blasé, but compared to other parts of the world, they would love to have what we have."

Henderson said every find is a little bit different.

"There's always something new to be learned. One of the things we've been tracking the last few years is exactly where in the rock layers they come from. The vertical layer of rock records time," he explained.

"We can see what species are occurring at what different layers … and possibly the menu items, because these things were the top predators."



Fossils have fascinated humankind from time immemorial. These preserved remains from a bygone era transport us through time to discover more about the world before our arrival. In this gallery, discover the most amazing fossils in the world.

Henderson stressed that the mosasaurus is not a dinosaur. He said it descended from land dwelling lizards and, over tens of millions of years, began to adapt to water with the addition of four modified flippers and extra joints in their skulls.

"If you know what the Komodo dragon is like — the world's biggest living lizard — these things are like Komodo dragons on steroids," he said. "A big Komodo dragon is about 10 feet (and) these things are three to four times bigger."

Henderson said they have been able to identify the mosasaurus as a top predator.

We've got a couple of specimens with stomach contents so they were chomping down on fish, turtles and other mosasaurs," he said. "They would eat whatever they could overpower."

John Issa, vice-president for business development for Korite, a Canadian company that mines and sells Alberta’s official gemstone, ammolite, said the company has found 12 mosasaurs there over the last 40 years.

"So it's not a rare occurrence, but it is a special occurrence when it happens," Issa said.

"This piece had an amazing skull piece. It had a jaw section with the teeth for both the uppers and lowers in the same rock."

Mine foreman Evan Kovacs said it was just a normal day until the skull and jawbone, which have already been sent to the museum, were spotted by the operator of the excavator.

"They just moved some material around, scraping it just to level off the machine and they found some brown material, which ended up being the bones of the mosasaur that they found," Kovacs said.

"Every time we find something (that) ends up being a vertebrate fossil, like this mosasaur, it's always a very great moment, the excitement definitely rises."

This report by The Canadian Press was first published May 11, 2022.

Bill Graveland, The Canadian Press

Ukraine opens online platform where the world can donate to the country

By JERUSALEM POST STAFF - Friday
© (photo credit: REUTERS/VALENTYN OGIRENKO)

Ukraine has opened an online donation platform where anyone from the worldwide web can donate to the country. President Volodymyr Zelensky tweeted on Thursday afternoon that he has launched "United 24."

"Only together we have the potential to stop the war that Russia has started and to rebuild what Russia has destroyed," the Ukrainian leader said. "Together we can help freedom defeat tyranny.

"In one click, you can donate funds to protect our defenders, save our civilians and rebuild Ukraine."

All funds donated will be transferred to Ukraine's National Bank and distributed to all relevant ministries, according to the platform's website.

The site also lists the relevant actions that the funds will support, including defense and medical aid to Ukrainian civilians and soldiers.

The website will also provide reports of how much was donated to the platform, the Zelensky said. Its Twitter account wrote that it is "the main venue for making one-click donations from any country in support of Ukraine."

You can follow their Twitter @U24_gov_ua or donate directly to their website at https://u24.gov.ua

Canadian singer and activist Denise Ho among group arrested in Hong Kong: report

Wednesday
The Canadian Press


HONG KONG — Canadian singer and activist Denise Ho is one of at least four people who have been arrested in Hong Kong on suspicion of colluding with foreign forces to endanger China's national security, reports said Wednesday.

U.K.-based human rights group Hong Kong Watch said Ho was detained by Hong Kong’s National Security Police, along with Cardinal Joseph Zen, lawyer Margaret Ng and scholar Hui Po-keung.

The rights group says the arrests are apparently related to their roles as trustees of the 612 Humanitarian Relief Fund, which provided legal aid to people who took part in 2019 pro-democracy protests that were quashed by security forces.

Scores of pro-democracy activists have been arrested under a sweeping National Security Law imposed on the city by Beijing in 2020. Ho was previously arrested and briefly detained in December.

Canadian Foreign Affairs Minister Mélanie Joly, who had voiced her concern following Ho's first arrest, reiterated that sentiment on Wednesday.

"The news of multiple arrests in Hong Kong of former trustees of a legal defence fund, including Denise Ho, is deeply troubling," she wrote on Twitter.

"The ongoing targeting of civil society groups erodes the rights and freedoms of (Hong Kong) residents guaranteed under (Hong Kong's) basic law," Joly added, using pictograms of Hong Kong's flag in place of words.

A spokeswoman for the group Alliance Canada Hong Kong says the arrests are a sign of worsening repression in Hong Kong. "It's not exactly surprising that it happened, but it's still shocking," Ai-Men Lau said. "Especially arresting a 90-year-old cardinal for his peaceful activities," she added in reference to Zen.

Lau said Ho was born in Hong Kong but grew up in Brossard, Que., on Montreal's South Shore. Ho has previously cited her time in Canada as a source of inspiration for her activism, Lau said.

Since returning to Hong Kong, Ho has become a "significant figure" in the pro-democracy community, and she helped run the 612 Fund, said Lau, who urged the Canadian government to ensure Ho receives proper consular support.

Global Affairs Canada said in a statement Wednesday the department was providing consular services to Ho.

Ho's manager, Jelly Cheng, confirmed Ho’s arrest on Wednesday but said she had no other information.

The arrests follow the selection on Sunday of Hong Kong’s new leader, John Lee, a hardline former security chief who ran unopposed in a process controlled by Beijing.

The European Union and foreign ministers from the Group of Seven industrialized countries — including Canada — condemned the election as fundamentally undemocratic and a betrayal of the “one country, two systems” principle under which Hong Kong was supposed to retain its own political, legal and economic system for 50 years after the end of British colonial rule.

Lau, however, urged the Canadian government to go even further in supporting democracy in Hong Kong.

While the statement was a good step, "we haven't seen that followed up with concrete actions: for example, sanctions against Hong Kong officials responsible for the political crackdowns," she said.

She said she also believes Canada should further expand humanitarian programs for those impacted or those seeking to flee Hong Kong due to political persecution.

Hong Kong's government and police had no immediate comment on the reported arrests.

Zen, the retired archbishop of Hong Kong, is a fierce critic of China and has been blistering in his condemnation of the Vatican’s 2018 agreement with Beijing over bishop nominations, which he has said was a sellout of underground Christians in China.

The Vatican spokesman, Matteo Bruni, said the Holy See “learned with concern the news of the arrest of Cardinal Zen and is following the evolution of the situation with extreme attention.”

Hui was arrested at Hong Kong’s international airport as he sought to leave the city, Hong Kong Watch said.

“Today’s arrests signal beyond a doubt that Beijing intends to intensify its crackdown on basic rights and freedoms in Hong Kong,” said the group’s chief executive, Benedict Rogers.

“We urge the international community to shine a light on this brutal crackdown and call for the immediate release of these activists,” Rogers said.

The White House also called on China and Hong Kong authorities to cease targeting Hong Kong advocates and immediately release Zen and others who were “unjustly detained and charged,” deputy press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said Wednesday.

Several leading Hong Kong activists have fled to Taiwan, Britain or elsewhere, while thousands of other Hong Kongers have chosen to leave the city, raising concerns about the economic future of the Asian financial centre of 7.4 million.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published May 11, 2022.

— by Morgan Lowrie in Montreal; with files from The Associated Press.

The Canadian Press

As Australia votes, indigenous people press call for inclusion in constitution

By Praveen Menon - Yesterday 

CANBERRA (Reuters) - Activists at one of the world's longest-running protests for the rights of indigenous people are not pinning their hopes for change on Australia's May 21 general election.

The election campaign has been dominated by debate about rising prices, COVID-19 and climate change, with the plight of Australia’s 700,000 or so indigenous people, who track near the bottom of its 25 million citizens on almost every economic and social indicator, far from the top of the agenda.

Indigenous Australians maintain presence at the Aboriginal Tent Embassy in Canberra

"I don't vote and wouldn't vote until we have our own voice," said Gwenda Stanley, an activist living at the "aboriginal tent embassy" camp of shelters on a lawn across from the old parliament building in Canberra.

The site was first occupied 50 years ago to protest against Australia's treatment of its indigenous people, who trace their roots back 65,000 years before British colonialists arrived.

While there may be cynicism about the election, indigenous activists are taking advantage of the campaign to remind political parties of their core demand - that Australia for the first time recognises its original inhabitants in its constitution.

The constitution makes no reference to indigenous people, whose leaders have struggled for generations to win recognition for injustices suffered since the beginning of European colonization in the 1700s.

Denied the vote until the mid-1960s, indigenous people face a 10-year gap in life expectancy compared with other Australians and make up 30% of the prison population. Aboriginal deaths in police custody have been a problem for years despite a Royal Commission looking into the issue since 1991.

The government only issued a formal apology for all injustices in 2008.

Campaigners are seeking a referendum, which is required to make changes to the constitution, on recognising indigenous minorities in the constitution and mandating governments to consult Aboriginal people on decisions that affect their lives.

Activists launched an information campaign last week running on all major television networks calling on political parties to back a referendum in 2023.

Constitutional recognition is a complex issue in a country that only started counting its indigenous people as part of its population in 1967.

But Australians are coming around in ever greater numbers in support of change. Public broadcaster ABC News said last week that 73% of people agreed there should be constitutional change to give indigenous Australians a greater say over their lives.

This was higher than the 64% of voters agreeing to a referendum in the 2019 election.

A successful referendum would bring Australia in line with Canada, New Zealand and the United States in formally recognising indigenous populations.

But the big political parties are divided on how to handle the demand.

Campaigning for the polls, Prime Minister Scott Morrison last week refused to back a referendum saying instead his government's policy was to establish indigenous representation in parliament through legislation.

The ruling coalition had promised in 2019 to hold a referendum and allocated $160 million for the process but little came of it.

Morrison's office did not respond to a request for comment on its views and plans on the issue.

The opposition Labor Party, however, has promised a referendum, a demand first enshrined in a 2017 Uluru Statement at a convention that brought together more than 250 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander leaders at the sacred monolith in central Australia.

"Five years after the Uluru Statement was presented to the Australian people, there should be no more delay. We believe the Australian people are ready," a Labor spokesperson told Reuters.

'BEGGING FOR RIGHTS'

Constitutional change requires approval through a referendum, with the backing of a majority of votes in a majority of states - a rare feat achieved only eight times in 44 attempts since 1901.

But it's the only way to bring about real reform, analysts say.

"If we want to see true structural change that changes how our country works then we need to have a referendum," said James Blackwell, research fellow in Indigenous Diplomacy at the Australian National University, who belongs to the Wiradyuri people.

"It's disappointing in many aspects that we have to keep coming back begging for rights, begging for recognition. But it is the way our system works," said Blackwell, a member of the Uluru Dialogue group of community leaders, legal scholars and activists.

The activists at the Canberra protest are staying put as the politics plays out.

"That's the whole point of this embassy ... to remind the government and the rest of the world that we are still oppressed people," said Stanley, who is from the Gomeroi people.

"We are staying here forever."

(Reporting by Praveen Menon; Editing by Robert Birsel)

PHOTOS © Reuters/LOREN ELLIOTT

KANADA*

Struggle against “violent erasure” of Indigenous languages continues today

The Canadian Press

Federal funding for NEȾOLṈEW̱, an Indigenous-led language revitalization research project, would not be needed if it weren’t for the devastating impacts of colonialism.

“The heart of the matter is really that our field (of Indigenous linguistics) only exists because of the history of this country, of the intentional historical violent erasure of Indigenous languages,” said Dr. Onowa McIvor, director of the NEȾOLṈEW̱ Research Partnership.

NEȾOLṈEW̱, meaning “one mind, one people” in the SENĆOŦEN language, is currently in year six of seven years of funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council.

McIvor, maskékow-ininiw (Swampy Cree) and Scottish-Canadian, is a professor in Indigenous education and holds a President’s Research Chair at the University of Victoria.

She was joined by Kahtehrón:ni Iris Stacey in a one hour Zoom presentation May 12 on the first of three days for the Big Thinking lecture series hosted virtually by the Congress of the Humanities and Social Sciences.

Stacey, who is Turtle Clan of the Kanien’kehá:ka Nation from Kahnawà:ke, Mohawk Territory, represents the Kahnawà:ke Education Centre (KEC), one of nine NEȾOLṈEW̱ partners.

While McIvor said it was important to understand the history of the language loss, she also stressed that challenges still existed today.

“It’s also important to remember that this is not only historic. There is an ongoing hostile environment towards Indigenous languages in Canada,” she said. “So acknowledging that ongoing difficulty is also critically important.”

McIvor said it was an “uphill battle” when it came to acknowledging Indigenous languages as the first languages of this country, in creating space and fighting for resources.

“It’s really important for us to pause and acknowledge the truth, even when it makes us uncomfortable, because then we can have a conversation in an honest space because we’re experiencing it. We can’t shy away from it. We experience it every day,” she said.

She added that there could be no reconciliation without first acknowledging the truth.

NEȾOLṈEW̱ is a “radical reclamation of Indigenous languages,” said McIvor, that has been built from the ground up in the nine partnership communities across the country.

The program focuses on adult-language learning. Over the years, it has become apparent that the majority of speakers are becoming elderly, McIvor said.

“We have far too few adult speakers, especially adult speakers who are working age, childbearing age…so there needs to be a specific and special focus on the creation of new adult speakers,” she said.

Stacey said that while in 2022 there are many initiatives and successes to celebrate, the number of language speakers continues to decline.

“The challenges in raising up new speakers are still apparent. So as a community and as the Kanien’kehá:ka Nation we’re stepping up our efforts once again,” said Stacey.

Immersion programs have proven to be the most impactful, she said, and to that end, KEC is focused on supporting their immersion staff who are teaching the language to elementary-aged children.

One in three Elders speak their language, but only one in 10 youth can claim the same.

“It’s not just about elderly speakers, but it’s also those of us who are kind of driving the movement right now that we have a responsibility (to the youth),” said McIvor.

She added that it was important to shift the focus to youth and that it was equally important to have youth guide that focus.

Stacey said language revitalization needed to have the goal of “an intergenerational community of speakers.”

She also pointed out that because of how descriptive Indigenous languages are, they are able to grow and evolve so they can continue to be used and to create vocabulary to represent new concepts or new objects.

McIvor said the focus, at this point, needed to remain with and on Indigenous communities. She said there were still too few Indigenous language speakers and too few resources to branch out into teaching non-Indigenous people.

“I do think that our movement could be strengthened by greater opportunities for non-Indigenous people to learn our languages when appropriate to do so,” she said.

But non-Indigenous people—or allies—still had a role to play in revitalizing Indigenous languages.

“We invite settler allies to take up their responsibility and to have an active role in the continuation and revival of Indigenous languages,” said McIvor, by recognizing that as Canadians, Indigenous languages are also part of their heritage.

The United Nations has declared 2022 to 2032 the Decade of Indigenous Languages.

Organized by the Federation for the Humanities and Social Sciences, Congress 2022 serves as a platform for the unveiling of thousands of research papers and presentations from social sciences and humanities experts worldwide. The goal of the three-day event is to inspire ideas, dialogue and action that create a more diverse, sustainable, democratic and just future. More than 6,000 visitors are expected to log in.

Windspeaker.com

By Shari Narine, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter, Windspeaker.com, Windspeaker.com

*ORIGINAL SPELLING KANADA MEANS VILLAGE IN HURON

Quebec woman raises alarm after region's only horse vet forced out over language law

The Canadian Press

MONTREAL — Horse owners in a part of western Quebec say the province's language laws are forcing them to lose their only veterinarian at a time when there's already a critical shortage of animal doctors.

Local farmer Chantal Chrétien said she learned in late April that her vet, Melissa Jowett, would have to stop treating her two horses at her farm in Quyon, Que., because her French isn't strong enough to pass the language test required to get a permanent licence.

Chrétien said that with Jowett gone, the closest vet who specializes in horses is about a two-hour drive away — which could potentially put the welfare of animals at risk.

"I’m a good advocate for French. I think there’s a good base in that (language) law," she said in a phone interview. "But when the population and the animals need care, we don’t care which language is spoken."

Chrétien said more than half of residents in the Pontiac region where she lives are native English speakers, and the rest are mostly bilingual. She said Jowett's language skills have never posed a problem.

A petition she started asking the province for an exemption for Jowett had gained more than 6,400 signatures as of Wednesday morning.

Jowett could not be reached for comment. But in a statement provided to The Canadian Press, the U.K.-born veterinarian said she had been working under a temporary licence, which she said can no longer be renewed.

"There have been many vets over the years that have been restricted from working in Quebec because of this, and in this, I am no different," she said in the statement dated April 29.

"Unfortunately, languages are not my forte, and although I get by relatively well due to the anglophone/bilingual nature of the Pontiac and La Peche regions, this does not alter the rules of the (French language office)."

Jowett added that she has been discussing with Quebec's veterinary order to see if an exemption is possible, but she says there's no indication one will be granted.

The rules state that a vet can receive a temporary one-year licence that can be extended three times — giving them four years to pass the language test needed to get a permanent permit from the province's order of veterinarians.

Quebec's language watchdog, l'Office québécois de la langue française, says that while licensing is up to professional orders, there is "no provision that allows the Office to exempt a candidate from passing the French exam."

The news comes as Quebec continues to struggle with a lack of veterinarians that has been made worse by the fallout from the COVID-19 pandemic.

In her statement, Jowett said that, besides the issue with the licence, the pressure of being the area's only veterinarian who treats horses has pushed her "dangerously close to burnout."

"There was no support; no team members to give relief emergency cover for the equine work; I was regularly having to refer cases which I would have been able to deal with had I had access to appropriate equipment and assistance," she wrote.

Gaston Rioux, the president of Quebec's order of veterinarians, said Jowett's description of her work is unfortunately common.

He said there is only one university in Quebec that trains vets, and more people have adopted animals during the pandemic when health restrictions also limited how many animals vets can could treat.

He said vets have large overhead costs, often work alone, have to be on call nights and weekends and sometimes face anger or harassment from clients who are upset with outcomes or fees. A survey of 2,800 vets taken a year and a half ago found that 53 per cent of them were considering shifting jobs or leaving the profession altogether, he said.

In that context, he said to lose a vet such as Jowett would be too bad, especially because she works in an area where many people speak English.

"On our side, we want to be in solution mode," he said in a phone interview. "If there's a possibility to allow her to keep practising in Quebec, that's certainly what we'd like."

On the other hand, he said that professional orders in Quebec are bound by the province's language laws, and it's unclear what he can do in this case.

Rioux said the order is working on other solutions to relieve the pressure on vets, including allowing more work to be delegated to technicians, recruiting foreign-trained vets and adding another campus where candidates can study veterinary medicine.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published May 11, 2022.

Morgan Lowrie, The Canadian Press

Canadians supportive of federal measures to regulate internet: survey

MobileSyrup - Wednesday

The federal government has shared two legislations to regulate the internet, and recent survey results show most Canadians support the measures.

Commissioned by the Globe and Mail, the results show 55 percent of respondents support the government’s work to regulate the internet, 37 percent oppose it in some way, and 8 percent are unsure. Those against the regulations largely come from the Prairies.

The Online Streaming Act, also known as Bill C-11, was presented in February. It focuses on applying the same rules to streaming services as Canadian broadcasters. If passed, the act would also require streaming services to create Canadian content.

The bill has been met with harsh criticism from several parties.

YouTube’s chief business officer, Robert Kyncl, said the act could threaten Canadian content creators. In March, two creators who create content on TikTok, Darcy Michael and Oorbee Roy, raised similar concerns at a Canadian Heritage Committee meeting.

The second measure the government has taken to regulate the internet is the Online News Act. Known as Bill C-18, it would require digital giants, including Google and Meta, to pay Canadian news organizations for the content they display on their platforms.

Threat of violent extremism rising in Canada, MPs told

Elizabeth Thompson -

cbc.ca

The threat of violent extremism has increased in Canada during the pandemic — fuelled by misinformation and resulting in threats to politicians and public servants — top security and policing officials told members of Parliament on Thursday.

But while police and intelligence agencies are taking steps to detect extremists and prevent them from carrying out attacks, the government must also work proactively to counter the extremism in the first place, they added.

Testifying before the public safety and national security committee, Cherie Henderson, assistant director, requirements for the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) described the rise of ideologically motivated violent extremism (IMVE) over the past two years.

"Since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, IMVE activity has been fuelled by an increase in extreme anti-authority and anti-government rhetoric, often rooted in the weaponization of conspiracy theories," Henderson told the committee.

"CSIS has noted a marked increase in violent threats addressed at elected officials and public servants."

Henderson said CSIS has moved more resources to monitor IMVE.

The hearing came only a couple of days after an ugly altercation in Peterborough, Ont., where protesters shouted profanities at NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh after a provincial election campaign event.

That incident appeared to weigh on the minds of some committee members Thursday as they wrapped up their hearings on IMVE.

"This has been a very sombre time for the NDP caucus," said New Democrat MP Alistair MacGregor.

"Our leader Jagmeet Singh had to wade through a group of people who were calling him a traitor. They were hurling expletives at him, saying they hoped that he would die," he said.

"This is the exact same kind of behaviour that we saw littered throughout the occupation of Ottawa and it's time for us to wake up to the fact that this kind of behaviour has real, physical manifestations and real threats."

Liberal MP Pam Damoff said she and other MPs have received threats but that they don't necessarily lead to criminal charges.


© Sean Kilpatrick/The Canadian Press

Former security adviser Richard Fadden told MPs the key to countering ideologically motivated violent extremism is dialogue.

"It feels like it's a matter of time before this rhetoric and this kind of aggressive anger turn into something more violent," she said.

RCMP Deputy Commander Michael Duheme said the Mounties have also seen a rise in IMVE incidents, most by people "who are not clearly affiliated with a group and who are motivated by very individualized ideologies."

Duheme said the RCMP has identified gaps in how it has dealt with IMVE and has developed a strategy to address them over the next three years and to work with local police forces and other groups.

By "improving information sharing and building up our own intelligence capacities," specifically online, the RCMP will "be in a better position to identify individuals and groups who pose a threat before they are motivated to violence," he said.

Leslie Soper, director general of national security policy for the Department of Public Safety and Emergency Preparedness, described IMVE as "a serious threat" to Canada.

While some people on the right of the political spectrum are drawn to IMVE, such extremists come from a wide range of political perspectives, she said.

"It may be aligned to what we might traditionally call right-wing extremism. It may be motivated by other factors; anti-mandate. It could be motivated by other societal factors," Soper said.

Earlier, Conservative MP Dane Lloyd challenged Soper and CSIS officials to tell him what they were doing to investigate 30 churches that were set on fire in 2021. Both responded that those were police matters.

Richard Fadden, a former national security adviser and director of CSIS, said IMVE has been around for a while but it is now more intense, organized and co-ordinated.

Fadden said if Canada wants to counter IMVE, it must get to the roots of the dissatisfaction felt by those attracted to it, and their feeling that their views aren't being heard.

Fadden called for more dialogue with those being attracted to IMVE, saying countering it needs to go beyond the federal government to provinces, municipalities and schools.

However, he also acknowledged it can be difficult these days to talk openly about some things.

"I really do think that political correctness has reached the point today where it's almost impossible to have a conversation about a whole raft of issues and if you're frustrated with government and with society to begin with, this is not helpful," he said.

RCMP ‘following up’ after Jagmeet Singh harassed by protesters in Peterborough

Alex Boutilier - Yesterday 
Global News


The RCMP say they’re “following up” on an incident in Peterborough, Ont., Tuesday, in which NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh was harassed by protesters who called him a “traitor” and followed him to his car.

Deputy Commissioner Michael Duheme called the incident “unacceptable” and said the national police force has been in contact with party leaders and cabinet ministers about security threats.

Read more:
Protesters harass federal NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh during visit to Peterborough

“It’s unacceptable, it’s not the first time (it has happened) … We’re following up on it to determine what can be done,” Duheme told the House of Commons’ public safety committee Thursday.

“When we do have a file with regards to potential threats, be it online or via phone or directly, we do engage with (federal prosecutors) to discuss the file and see if we’ve met the threshold (for criminal charges). It is a challenge, I can say from the RCMP perspective.”

Singh was in Peterborough Tuesday to stump for Jen Deck, the Ontario NDP candidate for Peterborough-Kawartha. Protesters gathered outside the event, calling Singh a “traitor” and “liar” as he left, hounding him to his waiting vehicle. Singh was able to get into the truck, which sped off.

Speaking to reporters in Ottawa Thursday, Singh said the experience was one of the most “intense, threatening (and) insulting” experiences he’s had as a public figure.

“I’ve experienced worse in my life and experienced it regularly. So it’s not something for me; it doesn’t faze me or shake me in any way. But I am worried about what that means for politics, generally,” Singh said.

Read more:
Canada’s security agencies drawing on lessons from ‘extraordinary’ convoy blockade

Duheme told MPs the RCMP have been meeting with cabinet ministers every month to discuss threats, which have risen over the course of the global pandemic, as well as with the party leaders.

While the threats against Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and his cabinet have been increasing in recent years, they have not been limited to the Liberals — or to federal politicians.

“When we do have a file with regards to potential threats, be it online or via phone or directly, we do engage with (federal prosecutors) to discuss the file and see if we’ve met the threshold,” said Duheme, who is responsible for federal policing and the Mounties’ national security investigations.

Duheme said that when politicians receive credible threats, the RCMP collaborates with local police through the force’s regional integrated national security teams.

Threats against politicians have seen an uptick in recent years, with some high-profile incidents — like when a former Canadian Armed Forces reservist drove his truck through a barrier near Trudeau’s official residence, armed with multiple firearms — breaking through to make headlines.

Read more:
Manitoba man who rammed gate at Rideau Hall sentenced to 6 years in prison

Singh has faced multiple incidents of harassment, including an attempted “citizen’s arrest” just steps from Parliament Hill in 2020.

“This is the exact same kind of behaviour that we saw littered throughout the occupation of Ottawa,” said NDP MP Alistair McGregor on Thursday.

“And it’s time for us to wake up to the fact this kind of behaviour has real physical manifestations and real threats.”

Duheme told the committee that the RCMP has developed a “comprehensive” three-year plan to revamp how the national police force deals with “ideologically-motivated violent extremism” (IMVE) — the Canadian intelligence community’s catch-all term for a wide array of grievance-based violence, including far-right extremism and anti-government sentiment.

“We know that the IMVE threat environment is rapidly evolving and complex, and is increasingly fuelled by misinformation and hostile rhetoric surrounding a host of grievances, many of which focus on the government’s response to COVID-19 and other matters,” Duheme said.

“This has sown distrust in government institutions, including law enforcement, and has augmented the ability for extremist groups to both recruit new members and increasingly foster hostility.”

Duheme said the Mounties are trying “get (their) own house in order” on investigating ideological extremism.

USA

Coronavirus committee: Meat companies lied about impending shortage and put workers at risk

Parija Kavilanz -
CNN

At the height of the pandemic, as the coronavirus infected tens of thousands of meat industry workers and caused hundreds to die, executives at the nation’s largest meat producers were aware of the transmission risk in their plants and successfully lobbied the Trump White House and the USDA to circumvent coronavirus prevention measures and regulations, according to the latest findings of a congressional investigation.

The House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Crisis, which launched its probe in February 2021 into meatpackers’ Covid response, also found that meat processors’ warnings about the nation being on the brink of a meat shortage were not based in fact, and that industry experts at the time believed them to be intentionally misleading.

“The Select Subcommittee’s investigation has revealed that former President Trump’s political appointees at USDA collaborated with large meatpacking companies to lead an Administration-wide effort to force workers to remain on the job during the coronavirus crisis despite dangerous conditions, and even to prevent the imposition of commonsense mitigation measures,” committee chairman, US Rep. James Clyburn, said in a statement Thursday.

The North American Meat Institute, an industry trade group, criticized the committee’s report as “partisan” and said it “distorts the truth about the meat and poultry industry’s work to protect employees during the Covid-19 pandemic.”

“The House Select Committee has done the nation a disservice. The Committee could have tried to learn what the industry did to stop the spread of Covid among meat and poultry workers, reducing positive cases associated with the industry while cases were surging across the country. Instead, the Committee uses 20/20 hindsight and cherry picks data to support a narrative that is completely unrepresentative of the early days of an unprecedented national emergency,” Julie Anna Potts, president and CEO of the North American Meat Institute, said in a statement.
Ignoring the risk

The investigation centered on meat producers Tyson (TSN), Smithfield, JBS USA, Cargill and National Beef along with the Occupational Safety and Health Administration and its response to worker illnesses. Meat plants became a hotbed for Covid outbreaks in the first year of the pandemic as workers grappled with long hours in crowded work spaces.

The initial results of the probe, released last October, showed infections and deaths among workers in plants owned by those five companies in the first year of the pandemic were significantly higher than previously estimated, with over 59,000 workers infected and at least 269 deaths.

The report cited examples, based on Internal meatpacking industry documents, of at least one company ignoring warnings by a doctor of the risk of rapid transmission of the virus in their facilities.

For example, the report found that a JBS executive received an April 2020 email from a doctor in a hospital near JBS’ Cactus, Texas, facility saying, “100% of all Covid-19 patients we have in the hospital are either direct employees or family member[s] of your employees.” The doctor warned: “Your employees will get sick and may die if this factory continues to be open.”

The emails prompted Texas Governor Greg Abbott’s chief of staff to reach out to JBS, but it remains unclear whether JBS ever responded to the email, the report said.

“This coordinated campaign prioritized industry production over the health of workers and communities and contributed to tens of thousands of workers becoming ill, hundreds of workers dying, and the virus spreading throughout surrounding areas,” said Rep. Clyburn.

“The shameful conduct of corporate executives pursuing profit at any cost during a crisis and government officials eager to do their bidding regardless of resulting harm to the public must never be repeated,” he said.

In a response to CNN’s request for comment, JBS, in an email, did not address the doctors warning, highlighted by the committee.

“In 2020, as the world faced the challenge of navigating Covid-19, many lessons were learned, and the health and safety of our team members guided all our actions and decisions. During that critical time, we did everything possible to ensure the safety of our people who kept our critical food supply chain running,” said Nikki Richardson, a spokeswoman for JBS USA & Pilgrim’s.

The investigation surfaced examples of some meatpacking industry executives acknowledging that being transparent about the lax mitigation measures and high infections rates in plants would cause alarm.

The report, citing a company email, said on April 7, 2020, managers at National Beef discussed avoiding explicitly notifying workers when an infected plant worker returned to work with physician clearance, saying they should instead “announce line meeting style,” likely referring to announcements made during informal in-person huddles of production line workers, “hoping it doesn’t incite additional panic.”

Meatpacking companies and the United States Department of Agriculture “jointly lobbied the White House to dissuade workers from staying home or quitting,” according to the report.

Further, meatpacking companies successfully lobbied USDA officials to advocate for Department of Labor policies that deprived their employees of benefits if they chose to stay home or quit, while also seeking insulation from legal liability if their workers fell ill or died on the job, according to the report.

The probe found that in April 2020, the CEOs of JBS, Smithfield, Tyson and other meatpacking companies asked Trump cabinet member and then Secretary of Agriculture Sonny Perdue to “elevate the need for messaging about the importance of our workforce staying at work to the POTUS or VP level,” and to make clear that “being afraid of Covid-19 is not a reason to quit your job and you are not eligible for unemployment compensation if you do.”

On April 28th, 2020, President Trump signed an executive order directing meat packing plants to follow guidance being issued by the CDC and OSHA on how to keep workers safe, so processing plants could stay open

Sec. Perdue would later send a letter to governors and to the leaders of meat processing companies.

“Meat processing facilities are critical infrastructure and are essential to the national security of our nation. Keeping these facilities operational is critical to the food supply chain and we expect our partners across the country to work with us on this issue.”

The Committee report said meatpacking companies and lobbyists worked with USDA and the White House in an attempt to prevent state and local health departments from regulating coronavirus precautions in plants.

Calling the contents of the report deeply disturbling, a spokesperson for the USDA said “many of the decisions made by the previous administration are not in line with our values. This administration is committed to food safety, the viability of the meat and poultry sector and working with our partners across the government to protect workers and ensure their health and safety is given the priority it deserves.”

A spokesman for Perdue, who is currently Chancellor of the University of Georgia, said Perdue “is focused on his new position serving the students of Georgia” and did not provide a comment on the committee report.

Former President Trump has not responded to CNN Business’ request for comment.
False claims of impending meat shortage

As their workers fell ill with the virus, several meat suppliers were forced to temporarily shut plants in 2020 and their companies’ executives warned the situation would put the US meat supply at risk.

The report slammed those warnings as “flimsy if not outright false.”

“Just three days after Smithfield CEO Ken Sullivan publicly warned that the closure of a Smithfield plant was ‘pushing our country perilously close to the edge in terms of our nation’s meat supply,” he asked industry representatives to issue a statement that ‘there was plenty of meat, enough … to export,” while Smithfield told meat importers the same, the report said.

The investigation found industry representatives thought Smithfield’s statements about a meat supply crunch were “intentionally scaring people.”

At the time, food experts told CNN Business that while there were meat shortages, at times, various cuts of meat might not be available.

Tyson said via an email response that it was reviewing the report.

Smithfield said it took “every appropriate measure to keep our workers safe” when it encountered a “first-of-its-kind challenge” two years ago.

“To date, we have invested more than $900 million to support worker safety, including paying workers to stay home, and have exceeded CDC and OSHA guidelines,” Smithfield spokesman Jim Monroe, said in an email to CNN Business.

“The meat production system is a modern wonder, but it is not one that can be re-directed at the flip of a switch. That is the challenge we faced as restaurants closed, consumption patterns changed and hogs backed-up on farms with nowhere to go. The concerns we expressed were very real and we are thankful that a true food crisis was averted and that we are starting to return to normal…. Did we make every effort to share with government officials our perspective on the pandemic and how it was impacting the food production system? Absolutely,” he said.

Cargill and National Beef could not immediately be reached for comment.

The committee said its report was based on more than 151,000 pages of documents collected from meatpacking companies and interest groups, calls with meatpacking workers, union representatives, and former USDA and OSHA officials, among others.

– CNN Business’ Jennifer Korn contributed to this report

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Jagmeet Singh says grocery chains are ‘profiteering’ amid inflation. Is it true?

‘Excess profits tax’ needed for affordability of living: NDP’s Singh

Sean Boynton - 

Yesterday
Global News


NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh is calling out Canada's major grocery chains for making record profits amid soaring inflation, which he calls "profiteering."

Speaking to Global News Radio 640 host Greg Brady Tuesday, Singh accused corporate grocers of "gouging" Canadians with marked-up food prices while still reporting higher profits, which he says doesn't add up.

"If you're increasing prices to offset increased costs, they would have the same level of profit," he said. "But we're seeing a significant increase in their profits.

"It shows that they're just gouging Canadians at this difficult time."

Read more:
Global food, fuel prices won’t ease until 2024 due to Ukraine war: World Bank

On Wednesday, Singh called for an "excess profits tax" on major grocery chains and oil and gas companies, expanding the Liberals' plan to place a higher 18 per cent tax on bank profits exceeding $1 billion.

The NDP say the revenue collected from their proposed tax would help raise the annual GST tax credit and Canada Child Benefit by $500 each per year.

"Why is it that wealthy companies get to make more, and families have to suffer, and why do governments allow that to happen?" he asked.

"The whole point of government is to level that, to ensure companies aren't gouging or exploiting a difficult time."

A look at the latest earnings reports from the three major grocery chains — Loblaw, Empire Co. and Metro — shows sales and profits have indeed risen, which CEOs have attributed to higher food inflation and "cost and margin discipline."

Loblaw saw net earnings rise nearly 40 per cent compared to last year in its latest quarter, to $437 million, while sales rose just 3.3 per cent to $12.26 billion for a profit margin of 3.56 per cent — up from 2.68 per cent in 2021.

The grocery and drugstore retailer said last week it will now pay shareholders a quarterly dividend of 40.5 cents per share, up from 36.5 cents per share.

A spokesperson for Loblaw pinned the increased profits on higher-margin sales like cosmetics purchased at Shoppers Drug Mart locations, adding grocery sales are increasingly being driven by discount house brands as consumers try to curb their spending.

Read more:
Canadian shoppers moving to discount stores as inflation soars: Loblaw

Empire, which owns Sobeys, Safeway and FreshCo among other brands, reported a quarterly profit in March of $203.4 million, up 15.4 per cent from $176.3 million a year earlier. Its profit margin compared to sales, which rose by just 5.1 per cent, climbed from 2.51 per cent last year to 2.75 per cent.

That profit amounted to 77 cents per diluted share, which president and CEO Michael Medline called "our highest in memory" on an earnings call in March. He praised the company's ability to keep operating costs low amid "choppy waters" that have disrupted supply chains, including fuel costs and the flooding in British Columbia last fall.

As for Metro, it reported a second-quarter profit of $198.1 million, up 5.3 per cent from $188.1 million a year earlier, as sales gained 1.9 per cent. The Montreal-based grocery and drugstore retailer's profit margin sits at 4.63 per cent, up slightly from 4.49 per cent last year.

Metro president and CEO Eric La Fleche said in January that the company was actually using its higher profit margin to absorb some of the higher costs from food producers to keep shelf prices stable.

Empire and Metro both declined to comment on Singh's remarks when contacted by Global News.

Those profit margins have risen significantly since before the pandemic.

In 2019, Empire's profit margin was just 1.17 per cent, while Loblaw's was 1.86 per cent and Metro's was 3.28 per cent.

In Empire's case, that marks a 135-per-cent increase over the course of the pandemic. Loblaw's profit margin has soared 91 per cent, and Metro's shot up 41 per cent.

Yet James Brander, an economics professor at the University of British Columbia's Sauder School of Business, said the increases likely do not rise to the level of profiteering, which would suggest the higher profits are due to illegal or nefarious practices.

Read more:
High food costs shaping grocery shopping habits and buying patterns, Metro CEO says

"I wouldn't view this as profiteering and I wouldn't view it as unusual, and I certainly wouldn't think that it calls for government intervention," he said.

"Businesses are in business to make profits, and they are focused on growth, so that's what they're trying to do."

Brander said he also wouldn't support Singh's idea of an "excess profits tax" on grocery chains, arguing it would drive down incentives to keep costs down and retain staff.

"We want the producers of food to be investing more in producing food," he explained. "And we'll get that by having grocery stores promise to spend more on that food. You don't get that by limiting their profits."

In a statement, a spokesperson for Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland's office said the government remains focused on "building a fairer and more inclusive economy," which includes ensuring the wealthiest Canadians and businesses pay their fair share in taxes.

Video: Why global food and fuel prices may not ease until 2024

Back in December, the Canada Food Price Report from Dalhousie University predicted Canadians would spend between five to seven per cent more on groceries in 2022.

That was before record inflation and the war in Ukraine drove prices up even further. Statistics Canada reported last month that grocery store prices rose 8.7 per cent year-over-year in March, the fastest annual rate since 2009, aided by the largest annual increase in dairy and egg prices since February 1983.

Four-fifths of respondents to a Leger poll released in March said they had started or planned to buy cheaper items at the grocery store to save on food bills and were cutting back on food waste.

Read more:
Most Canadians are cutting back their food spending as inflation soars: poll

While Metro said its food prices inflated by just under five per cent, compared to 3.5 per cent in the most recent quarter, Loblaw said its consumer price index rose 7.5 per cent after hitting just 0.9 per cent the year before.

Both companies have noted that sales of their discount house brands have increased as customers look to curb spending.

Empire's Medline said the company is focused on its supplier relationships to ensure competitive pricing for customers as inflation continues to push up the cost of goods. He also noted that higher fuel costs are also starting to make an impact on shipping expenses.

— with files from the Canadian Press

Efforts to unionize Amazon workers in Canada ramp up in Ontario as Teamsters target Hamilton

CBC/Radio-Canada - 

Workers arriving at the Amazon warehouse in Hamilton on Wednesday morning were met by a handful of people in bright yellow vests with pamphlets and signs saying "Amazon needs a union!"

Members of Teamsters Local 879 said they stepped up their efforts after hearing from some workers at the Mountain fulfilment centre who expressed interest in unionizing.

"We have gotten some calls from Amazon workers to do with the conditions inside, how they're being treated," said Jim Killey, who handles organizing for the union. "When they call, we come."

The action outside the Hamilton fulfilment centre follows similar leaflet handouts at other Amazon locations in Ontario, in Milton, Cambridge, Kitchener and London, according to Killey.

"There's a Canada-wide organizing campaign with Teamsters," he said.

The robotics facility, which the company called its "most technologically advanced fulfilment centre" in Canada, opened under a month ago, with Amazon announcing in April it plans to set up three more Ontario facilities in 2023.

The four centres will create a combined 4,500 "safe" jobs, the online retail giant said at the time, with at least 1,500 at the Hamilton location.

Amazon spokesperson Dave Bauer previously told CBC the majority of local warehouse workers would be full time, with a starting wage of $18.70 an hour.

Workers will also have medical, vision and dental coverage, and other benefits like a group RRSP plan, stock awards and performance bonuses, Bauer said.


© Dan Taekema/CBC

Teamsters Local 879 member Steve Robertson hands out informational pamphlets outside the Amazon warehouse in Hamilton on Wednesday.

Asked for comment on the unionization effort in Hamilton, Amazon spokesperson Ryma Boussoufa said the company does not believe "unions are the best answer for our employees," but the choice is up to the workers.

"Our focus remains on working directly with our team to continue making Amazon a great place to work," Boussoufa wrote in an email.

Paul Gray describes Amazon as one of the "most notoriously anti-union companies in Canada."

The assistant professor of labour studies at Brock University in St. Catharines, Ont., pointed to reports of stress and an "incredibly" high injury rate at warehouses because of Amazon's quotas.

While the pay may be higher than other entry-level jobs, Gray said, it's low in comparison to other warehouse work.

"A lot of these workers are saying the compensation may be comparatively good, but that doesn't justify the working conditions that put them in danger."

Union rep says he's heard worker concerns

A lack of breaks, cutting back on time off and being docked for the time it takes to cross the massive facility to use the washroom are among concerns Killey said he's heard from staff in Hamilton.

He declined to be more specific, citing a need to protect the workers.


© Dan Taekema/CBC

The pamphlets included wage comparisons and contact information for Teamsters Local 879.

Unionization efforts are underway at Amazon sites across Canada, including in Montreal and Alberta, where the Teamsters union has an application for a second unionization at an Amazon site near Edmonton.

Killey said news of a recent union vote by Amazon workers at the Staten Island facility in New York City "sparked a lot" of interest in Canada.

A second vote on unionization failed earlier this month, a setback for organizers at the Staten Island site.

Gray, the labour studies professor, said one of the biggest challenges for people looking to unionize at Amazon locations is the "massive amount of turnover" each plant tends to see.

The New York unionization drive provides lessons for Canadian efforts, including that the organizers were co-workers or people known by staff at the warehouse, he said.

Third parties, such as established unions, should take that as a sign to build relationships over time so employees get a sense it's a "genuine collective voice of the workers themselves, not a group coming in from the outside," said Gray.

Campaign won't end in a week, says union

The Teamsters in Hamilton spent about an hour Wednesday handing out brochures sharing wage comparisons and contact information to people driving into the parking lot and workers being dropped off by bus.

The union can help secure "respect in the workplace" and lock in contract details through a collective agreement, Killey said.

"Right now, they're an individual," he said, gesturing at the Amazon building and the people inside.

"With us we're going to protect you, we're going to make sure we take care of you and through collective bargaining we're going to try everything we can to get what you deserve."


© Dan Taekema/CBC

Robertson hands out informational pamphlets to workers getting off the bus outside Hamilton Amazon's location.

Killey estimated the small group of Teamsters on site handed out hundreds of pamphlets.

They were met with "a lot of thumbs up" and questions about how to get ahold of the Teamsters, he added, describing it as a "very positive response."

The action was about getting the word out, said Killey, explaining the union has plans to return and distribute more information.

"This is going to be a campaign that doesn't end in a week," he said. "We're here until they either say 'No' or until we get a certification."

B.C. mine environment safeguards whittled down by amendments, university study says


The Canadian Press


Some environmental safeguards built into British Columbia mine approvals are being gradually whittled away without enough public or scientific oversight, says new university research.

A recently published paper from researchers at Dalhousie University's School for Resource and Environmental Studies concludes that mining companies have been able to amend their original operating conditions in ways that can have serious effects on water resources. Those amendments, it says, are often granted with little apparent scientific justification or followup.

"We express concern that the amendment process is being used as a loophole, intentionally or unintentionally, to evade the rigour and scrutiny of the full environmental assessment process," said Ben Collison, lead author of the paper published in the journal Facets.

Collison said that, while his research was restricted to B.C., the same thing may be happening across the country.

"This could be part of a bigger picture," he said.

David Karn, spokesman for B.C.'s department of Environment and Climate Change, disputed the paper's conclusions.

"The Environmental Assessment Office has a robust process to review any application to amend an environmental assessment certificate," he said in an email.

Collison and his colleagues looked at 23 mines in British Columbia that were approved between 2002 and 2020 after going through an environmental assessment. Of those mines, 15 requested a total of 49 amendments to the original conditions of their operating licence, most within three years of opening.

Almost all — 98 per cent — were granted.

The researchers concluded 20 of those approved amendments were likely to damage water resources. The amendments permitted changes to effluent discharge, increased water withdrawals and damage to fish habitat. One allowed a mine to increase its production 50 per cent.

Collison said those amendments were accompanied by little scientific justification, oversight or monitoring.

"It was very, very difficult to find information in those amendment documents that gave us numerical, quantitative descriptions of the proposed changes," he said. "Oftentimes, these were being approved without any followup monitoring studies or enforcement actions or compliance checkups after the fact."

The report includes examples of amendments being granted despite the B.C. Environmental Assessment Office acknowledging information on their effects was lacking. In 2017, one mine was allowed to change its tailings storage on the understanding that a water treatment plant would be up and running — a plant that, said Collison, still wasn't operating as of earlier this year.

"There were changes that could have potentially serious impacts," he said.

But Karn said that the paper didn't look at the whole story.

"This research project was conducted using only documents posted on the (assessment office's) project information website, which does not provide a complete account of (its) rigorous assessment process and project information," he said.

Karn said all amendments are carefully assessed. First Nations are consulted and public engagement may be sought.

"Amendments do not weaken the requirements for proponents to protect environmental values, conditions and actions, which are part of their environmental assessment certificates, and in many cases will result in strengthened requirements," Karn said.

Collison said the situation has improved in the province since its new environmental assessment legislation became law in 2019, as it has made information more publicly available.

But he warned that his study was narrowly focused. It only dealt with mines, water impacts and one province. And the amendments it examined remain in force.

"This is only a small piece of the puzzle," Collison said.

"The findings call into question the credibility of the entire environmental assessment process. I think there are other impacts that other researchers should look at."

This report by The Canadian Press was first published May 12, 2022.

— Follow Bob Weber on Twitter at @row1960

Bob Weber, The Canadian Press

Fisheries minister pledges to study impact of seals on Atlantic Canada's fisheries

CORNER BROOK, N.L. — More research is needed on the impact of seals on dwindling East Coast fish stocks, federal Fisheries Minister Joyce Murray said Thursday, in response to a report by the region's fisheries industry.

Part of that research will include a summit in St. John's this fall on the country's seal population, Murray said, reacting to the newly released report from the Atlantic seal science task team, which was commissioned by the Fisheries Department in 2020.

The report said the high numbers of grey seals and harp seas "are at, or approaching, historic levels" and are having a "serious impact on the ocean ecosystem in Atlantic Canada. The extent of the impacts cannot be determined with the limited information held by (Fisheries Department) science."

It said the grey seal population in Atlantic Canada has increased from around 15,000 in the 1960s to 424,300 animals in 2016, which is the largest concentration of grey seals in the world. The region's harp seal population has increased from approximately two million animals in the 1970s to an estimated 7.6 million in 2019 — the largest Northwest Atlantic harp seal population in recorded history.

Groundfish stocks in Atlantic Canada, the report said, "are at or near the lowest level ever observed and are experiencing very little recovery due to very high levels of unexplained natural mortality, which has been attributed to seals in some regions, but not in other regions."

Glenn Blackwood, co-chairman of the team that produced the report, said the mortality rate for many fish stocks is high, adding that the region's fishing industry and the Fisheries Department need to know what role seals are playing in the ocean ecosystem.

"Additional work needs to be done on harp and grey seal feeding," Blackwood told the news conference. "Also on distribution patterns, and we need to understand the relationship of seals to fish stocks."

"We believe that industry is ready to step up and work with DFO science on designing, collecting the samples and solving this problem," he added.

Speaking outside a seafood processing plant, Murray drew applause when she said she knows "seals eat fish."

"So, that's the reason we need to better understand the impact they are having on our fish stocks," she said. The minister said that as a first step, her department will host a seal summit this fall.

"That will be to broaden engagement on Atlantic seals and bring stakeholders together to discuss approaches for science, market development and management," she said.

Murray said her department is committed to maintaining the existing markets for Canadian seal products and supporting the development of potential new markets.

That news was welcomed Thursday by the Fur Institute of Canada, which is the national voice for the fur industry.

"Uncontrolled seal populations threaten the health of our oceans and the communities that rely upon them. They threaten the sustainability of our fishing industry, they threaten biodiversity, and they threaten rebuilding our fish stocks," Doug Chiasson, the institute's executive director, said in a statement.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published May 12, 2022.

— By Kevin Bissett in Fredericton.

The Canadian Press

Thousands attend annual anti-abortion rally on Parliament Hill


The Canadian Press

OTTAWA — Thousands of anti-abortion demonstrators descended on Parliament Hill Thursday, as a leaked U.S. Supreme Court draft decision brings renewed attention to the issue on both sides of the border.

"How about that Roe v. Wade decision? Are you stoked? I am," said Jeff Gunnarson, national president of anti-abortion group Campaign Life Coalition.

Gunnarson spoke to the crowd, referencing the draft decision that would overturn the landmark 1973 case in the U.S. on abortion rights.

"They're not. They're nervous," he said, gesturing to the dozens of abortion rights advocates who counter-protested at the margins of the rally.

James Schadenberg said while he would have come out to the rally regardless, he hopes the leaked decision will bring encourage Canada's politicians to bring a law to prevent abortion and "protect the right to life."

Fellow anti-abortion protester Valerie Luetke said the situations in Canada and the U.S. are "certainly different."

“They're trying to strike down the Roe v. Wade abortion law in the States. But here we don't have a law, so we're trying to build a law. So it's definitely different circumstances."

Anti-abortion demonstrators held signs that said "I regret my abortion," and "love life, choose life."

Meanwhile, counter-demonstrators carried placards reading "abortion is health care" and "keep your laws off my body."

Jaisie Walker, executive director for Planned Parenthood Ottawa, said the organization wanted to make sure its presence was extra powerful this year.

"Our goal for the day is to build solidarity amongst the folks who come here today," said Walker, adding the group was there to share information and "support reproductive justice."

Attendees in religious attire were present at the March for Life rally and many speakers made references to Christianity.

"Life is very important. It's a gift from God, the life we have," said Gaetana Nicola, who said she has been coming to the annual rally for a long time.

The Liberals promised last fall to bring in new regulations solidifying abortion access as a requirement for federal funding under the Canada Health Act, but Prime Minister Justin Trudeau last week raised the spectre of enshrining abortion rights in legislation instead. That could make it more difficult for future governments to make adjustments.

Asked Thursday what factors are being weighed in considering whether to legislate, Trudeau said the most important one is that "every woman in Canada should have a full access to legal, safe abortion services, and reproductive health services wherever she is in the country."

He said the government also wants to assure that gains are not rolled back by future governments or court decisions, and discussions are taking place on the best way to do that.

"Maybe it's legislation, maybe it's not legislation, maybe it's leaving it in the hands of the Canadian Medical Association that has ensured governance over these procedures for a long time," he said.

The subject of abortion was broached during the Conservative leadership debate on Wednesday, where every candidate except recently elected Ontario MP Leslyn Lewis said they either supported the right to choose an abortion or would not introduce legislation on abortion as prime minister.

Longtime MP Pierre Poilievre stated that a government led by him wouldn't pass or introduce legislation restricting access to abortion.

Jean Charest, Quebec's former premier, said he supports abortion rights, and called Poilievre's answer insufficient, saying that Canadian women deserved to know where he stood.

Poilievre later said he believes in freedom of choice and would allow free votes from his caucus. He also laid into Charest's own record, noting that the former Progressive Conservative MP voted for a law that would have recriminalized abortion in 1990.

"Whoever the new leader is, the issue is going to come up in the election,” said Scott Hayward, co-founder of RightNow, a organization that works to elect anti-abortion candidates.

“Whether they want to talk about inflation the whole time or not, it's gonna come up and they have to have an answer.”

Lewis is the only one who takes it on and "doesn't look like you're trying to hide from something," Hayward added.

Ottawa police advised those travelling downtown Thursday to expect traffic disruptions, and notify they would carry out rolling road closures ahead of the demonstration.

Vehicles are still not allowed on Wellington Street between Bank Street and Elgin Street, after the “Freedom Convoy” protest that gridlocked downtown Ottawa for several weeks in February.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published May 12, 2022.

———

This story was produced with the financial assistance of the Meta and Canadian Press News Fellowship.

Erika Ibrahim, The Canadian Press

Note to readers: This is a corrected story. An earlier version referred to an anti-abortion group as Canadian Life Coalition.

The use of deepfakes can sow doubt, creating confusion and distrust in viewers

Sze-Fung Lee, Research Assistant, Department of Information Studies, McGill University 

 Benjamin C. M. Fung, Professor and Canada Research Chair in Data Mining for Cybersecurity, McGill University

The Conversation

In early March, a manipulated video of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy was ciruclated. In it, a digitally generated Zelenskyy told the Ukrainian national army to surrender. The video was circulated online but was quickly debunked as a deepfake — a hyper-realistic yet fake and manipulated video produced using artificial intelligence.

While Russian disinformation seems to be having a limited impact, this alarming example illustrated the potential consequences of deepfakes.

However, deepfakes are being used successfully in assistive technology. For instance, people who suffer from Parkinson’s disease can use voice cloning to communicate.

Deepfakes are used in education: Ireland-based speech synthesis company CereProc created a synthetic voice for John F. Kennedy, bringing him back to life to deliver his historical speech.

Yet every coin has two sides. Deepfakes can be hyper-realistic, and basically undetectable by human eyes.

Therefore, the same voice-cloning technology could be used for phishing, defamation and blackmailing. When deepfakes are deliberately deployed to reshape public opinion, incite social conflicts and manipulate elections, they have the potential to undermine democracy.
Causing chaos

Deepfakes are based on technology known as generative adversarial networks in which two algorithms train each other to produce images.

While the technology behind deep fakes may sound complicated, it is a simple matter to produce one. There are numerous online applications such as Faceswap and ZAO Deepswap that can produce deepfakes within minutes.

Read more: Zao's deepfake face-swapping app shows uploading your photos is riskier than ever

Google Colaboratory — an online repository for code in several programming languages — includes examples of code that can be used to generate fake images and videos. With software this accessible, it’s easy to see how average users could wreak havoc with deepfakes without realizing the potential security risks.

The popularity of face-swapping apps and online services like Deep Nostalgia show how quickly and widely deepfakes could be adopted by the general public. In 2019, approximately 15,000 videos using deepfakes were detected. And this number is expected to increase.

Deepfakes are the perfect tool for disinformation campaigns because they produce believable fake news that takes time to debunk. Meanwhile, the damages caused by deepfakes — especially those that affect people’s reputations — are often long-lasting and irreversible.
Is seeing believing?

Perhaps the most dangerous ramification of deepfakes is how they lend themselves to disinformation in political campaigns.

We saw this when Donald Trump designated any unflattering media coverage as “fake news.” By accusing his critics of circulating fake news, Trump was able to use misinformation in defence of his wrongdoings and as a propaganda tool.

Trump’s strategy allows him to maintain support in an environment filled with distrust and disinformation by claiming “that true events and stories are fake news or deepfakes.”

Credibility in authorities and the media is being undermined, creating a climate of distrust. And with the rising proliferation of deepfakes, politicians could easily deny culpability in any emerging scandals. How can someone’s identity in a video be confirmed if they deny it?

Combating disinformation, however, has always been a challenge for democracies as they try to uphold freedom of speech. Human-AI partnerships can help deal with the rising risk of deepfakes by having people verify information. Introducing new legislation or applying existing laws to penalize producers of deepfakes for falsifying information and impersonating people could also be considered.

Multidisciplinary approaches by international and national governments, private companies and other organizations are all vital to protect democratic societies from false information.

This article is republished from The Conversation, a nonprofit news site dedicated to sharing ideas from academic experts.

Read more:
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Benjamin C. M. Fung receives funding from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC), Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC), Defence Research and Development Canada (DRDC), and Fonds de recherche du Québec - Nature et technologies (FRQNT).

Sze-Fung Lee does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

Detailed 'open source' news investigations are catching on

NEW YORK (AP) — One of the more striking pieces of journalism from the Ukraine war featured intercepted radio transmissions from Russian soldiers indicating an invasion in disarray, their conversations even interrupted by a hacker literally whistling “Dixie.”

It was the work of an investigations unit at The New York Times that specializes in open-source reporting, using publicly available material like satellite images, mobile phone or security camera recordings, geolocation and other internet tools to tell stories.

The field is in its infancy but rapidly catching on. The Washington Post announced last month it was adding six people to its video forensics team, doubling its size. The University of California at Berkeley last fall became the first college to offer an investigative reporting class that focuses specifically on these techniques.

Two video reports from open-source teams — The Times' “Day of Rage” reconstruction of the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot and the Post's look at how a 2020 racial protest in Washington's Lafayette Square was cleared out — won duPont-Columbia awards for excellence in digital and broadcast journalism.

The Ukraine radio transmissions, where soldiers complained about a lack of supplies and faulty equipment, were verified and brought to life with video and eyewitness reports from the town where they were operating.

At one point, what appears to be a Ukrainian interloper breaks in.

“Go home,” he advised in Russian. “It's better to be a deserter than fertilizer.”

The Times' visual investigations unit, founded in 2017 and now numbering 17 staff members, “is absolutely one of the most exciting areas of growth that we have,” said Joe Kahn, incoming executive editor.

The work is meticulous. “Day of Rage” is composed mostly of video shot by protesters themselves, in the heady days before they realized posting them online could get them into trouble, along with material from law enforcement and journalists. It outlines specifically how the attack began, who the ringleaders were and how people were killed.

Video sleuthing also contradicted an initial Pentagon story about an American drone strike that killed civilians in Afghanistan last year. “Looking to us for protection, they instead became some of the last victims in America's longest war,” the report said.

“There's just this overwhelming amount of evidence out there on the open web that if you know how to turn over the rocks and uncover that information, you can connect the dots between all these factoids to arrive at the indisputable truth around an event,” said Malachy Browne, senior story producer on the Times' team.

“Day of Rage” has been viewed nearly 7.3 million times on YouTube. A Post probe into the deaths at a 2021 Travis Scott concert in Houston has been seen more than 2 million times, and its story on George Floyd's last moments logged nearly 6.5 million views.

The Post team is an outgrowth of efforts begun in 2019 to verify the authenticity of potentially newsworthy video. There are many ways to smoke out fakes, including examining shadows to determine if the apparent time of day in the video corresponds to when the activity supposedly captured actually took place.

“The Post has seen the kind of impact that this kind of storytelling can have,” said Nadine Ajaka, leader of its visual forensics team. “It's another tool in our reporting mechanisms. It's really nice because it's transparent. It allows readers to understand what we know and what we don't know, by plainly showing it.”

Still new, the open-source storytelling isn't bound by rules that govern story length or form. A video can last a few minutes or, in the case of “Day of Rage,” 40 minutes. Work can stand alone or be embedded in text stories. They can be investigations or experiences; The Times used security and cellphone video, along with interviews, to tell the story of one Ukraine apartment house as Russians invaded.

Leaders in the field cite the work of the website Storyful, which calls itself a social media intelligence agency, and Bellingcat as pioneers. Bellingcat, an investigative news website, and its leader, Eliot Higgins, are best known for covering the Syrian civil war and investigating alleged Russian involvement in shooting down a Malaysian Airlines flight over Ukraine in 2014.

The Arab Spring in the early 2010s was another key moment. Many of the protests were coordinated in a digital space and journalists who could navigate this had access to a world of information, said Alexa Koenig, executive director of the Human Rights Center at the University of California at Berkeley's law school.

The commercial availability of satellite images was a landmark, too. The Times used satellite images to quickly disprove Russian claims that atrocities committed in Ukraine had been staged.

Other technology, including artificial intelligence, is helping journalists who seek information about how something happened when they couldn't be on the scene. The Times, in 2018, worked with a London company to artificially reconstruct a building in Syria that helped contradict official denials about the use of chemical weapons.

Similarly, The Associated Press constructed a 3D model of a theater in Mariupol bombed by the Russians and, combining it with video and interviews with survivors, produced an investigative report that concluded more people died there than was previously believed.

AP has also worked with Koenig's team on an investigation into terror tactics by Myanmar's military rulership, and used modeling for an examination on the toll of war in a neighborhood in Gaza. It is collaborating with PBS' Frontline to gather evidence of war crimes in Ukraine and is further looking to expand its digital efforts. Experts cite BBC's “Africa Eye” as another notable effort in the field.

As efforts expand, Koenig said journalists need to make sure their stories drive the tools that are used, instead of the other way around. She hears regularly now from news organizations looking to build their own investigate units and need her advice — or students. Berkeley grad Haley Willis is on the team at The Times.

It feels, Koenig said, like a major shift has happened in the past year.

Browne said the goal of his unit's reporting is to create stories with impact that touch upon broader truths. A probe about a Palestinian medic shot by an Israeli soldier on the Gaza strip was as much about the conflict in general than her death, for example.

“We have similar mandates,” the Post's Ajaka said, “which is to help make sense of some of the most urgent news of the day.”

David Bauder, The Associated Press