A powerful blast in port warehouses near central Beirut storing highly explosive material killed 78 people, injured nearly 4,000 and sent seismic shockwaves that shattered windows, smashed masonry and shook the ground across the Lebanese capital.Officials said they expected the death toll to rise further after Tuesday’s blast as emergency workers dug through rubble to rescue people and remove the dead. It was the most powerful explosion in years in Beirut, which is already reeling from an economic crisis and a surge in coronavirus infections.
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Damage and casualties continued to rise Tuesay, as a heavy downpour that started over the weekend extended to a fourth day.
By 4 p.m. Tuesday, the torrential rains in capital Seoul and provinces Gyeonggi, North Chungcheong, South Chungcheong and Gangwon had left 14 dead, 12 missing, and seven injured, according to the Central Disaster and Safety Countermeasure Headquarters.
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North Korea did not notify South Korea before discharging water from a border dam earlier this week in violation of an inter-Korean agreement, a unification ministry official said Tuesday.
On Monday, the North partially opened the floodgates of Hwanggang Dam on the western inter-Korean border and sent water into the Imjin River, a move that put authorities here on alert against the potential rise in water levels in the South.
"North Korea has opened the gates of the dam three times from July to Aug. 3. The North has not notified us in advance as it opened the gates of the dam," the ministry official said.
"The water level in Pilseung Bridge as of 7 a.m. Tuesday was 2.99 meters, and it has not reached a level of concern," he said. "The government is cooperating closely with several institutions, maintaining communication and strictly following the response system."
"The government maintains the stance that (the two Koreas) must abide by inter-Korean agreements," he said.Under an agreement signed between the two Koreas in October 2009, the North agreed to notify the South in advance of its plans to open the floodgates, following a deadly accident that killed six South Koreans after the North discharged water from Hwanggang Dam without notice.
The alleged attempts to hide the documents, requested from the defence department and Canadian Forces under the Access to Information law, was revealed in December 2018 pre-trial proceedings in the case of Vice Adm. Norman.
That bombshell further fuelled concerns among Norman’s supporters who alleged the Liberal government and senior military officers were trying to railroad the vice admiral, who was once the second in command of the Canadian Forces. Norman had been charged by the RCMP with one count of breach of trust for allegedly revealing information about Liberal government plans to derail a supply ship project. But the case against Norman collapsed in May 2019, with the vice admiral exonerated and a large financial settlement paid by the federal government to the naval officer.
During pre-trial proceedings in the Norman case, a military officer testified that his boss, a brigadier general, bragged that Norman’s name was deliberately not used in internal military and Department of National Defence files — meaning any search for records under the Access to Information law about Norman would come up empty.
The testimony was enough to prompt Caroline Maynard, the federal government’s information watchdog, to begin an investigation into the Canadian Forces and DND’s handling of access requests in the Norman case. She revealed two weeks ago that the results of her initial investigation into the matter showed evidence of the possible commission of an offence under the access law and she had referred the issue to the Attorney General of Canada back in February 2019 for further investigation.
In response to Maynard’s statement from two weeks ago, officials with the federal government as well as the Public Prosecution Service of Canada, which prosecuted Norman, claimed the concerns raised by the information watchdog were referred first to the RCMP and then from there to the Ontario Provincial Police.
But an investigation by this newspaper has found those claims were false. The OPP confirmed they had never been contacted to investigate the allegations that documents were hidden in the Norman case.
The RCMP was indeed contacted by the Deputy Director of Public Prosecutions on March 19, 2019 about the concerns raised by Maynard. The RCMP, however, determined it was in a conflict of interest due to its investigation of Norman and it had planned to refer the case to the OPP.
Imagine this scene in an Ottawa courtroom. Arthur, the plaintiff in a lawsuit, claims millions of dollars in damages from the defendants, Justin and Bill. As the trial opens it emerges that the presiding judge, Madam Justice Portia, has recently enjoyed a luxurious family vacation in Africa, paid for by Arthur. Moreover, Portia’s daughter is employed by Arthur, while Portia’s mother and brother have received hundreds of thousands of dollars for giving inspirational talks to Arthur’s clients.
The lawyer representing Justin and Bill rises to his feet demanding that, in light of her past financial relationships with Arthur, Portia must recuse herself. Madam Justice Portia indignantly rejects the demand to step aside, insisting that her judgment will be influenced neither by her personal ties to the plaintiff nor by the financial benefits she and her family have received. “I am an independently wealthy woman,” she insists. “I can’t be bought for a few hundred thousand dollars. I am, moreover, a person of great integrity whose judgment will not in any way be influenced by my relationship to the plaintiff.”
Neither Justin, nor Bill, nor any other reasonable person is going to be satisfied with this reassurance. Even if they accept Portia’s declaration that she is a person of integrity, they are going to worry that when she weighs the evidence her judgment will be biased by the benefits she and her family have received from Arthur – if not consciously, then perhaps subconsciously. She’s a wealthy person but she cannot help but be grateful to Arthur. Portia may well feel a need to reciprocate for the favours he’s done for her. Reciprocity is a deep human need we all experience (psychopaths excepted).
Some important lessons can be learned from the above scenario. First, potential conflicts of interest arise when an official is required to exercise discretion and is obligated to do so without bias. Public officials, whether judges or cabinet ministers, are ethically required to be “disinterested” with respect to the decisions they make. That doesn’t mean that they don’t care about the issues. It means that they have no vested (or personal) interest that might bias their judgment.
Conflict of interest does not require that bias actually occur, only that there is reason to fear that bias may be present. The risk of bias, not the exercise of bias, is what makes both our imaginary scenario and the WE Charity imbroglio real conflicts of interest.
Even if Portia ultimately rules against Arthur and in favour of Justin and Bill, this would not show that she is innocent of conflict of interest. Nor would it matter if, in her heart of hearts, she was unaffected by Arthur’s beneficence. It was ethically impermissible for Portia to hear the case because the benefits she had received from Arthur were a risk factor for bias. Cabinet ministers, like judges, are required by law, as well as ethics, to avoid such situations.
Thus, even if an independent inquiry establishes the truth of Prime Minister Trudeau’s claim that “WE Charity received no preferential treatment, not from me, not from anyone else,” it will still be the case that Mr. Trudeau and Mr. Morneau were guilty of conflict of interest. It’s time that cabinet members and those who advise them figured this out.
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AMD Medicom Inc. was given the ten-year contract and some MPs are now demanding to see the terms of the contract, according to a report by Blacklock’s Reporter on Tuesday.“As small and medium-sized businesses we want to know, does everybody have the same opportunity to produce personal protective equipment and sell it, or is the federal government picking winners and losers” Jocelyn Bamford, president of the Coalition of Concerned Manufacturers and Businesses of Canada, earlier told the Commons government operations committee.
Restrictions on non-essential travel across the Canada-U.S. border have been in place since March 21 due to COVID-19.
Businesses in upper New York State are also feeling the loss of Canadians from Quebec and Ontario who cross the border to shop and vacation.
“We depend on our friends and neighbours to the north a lot,” said Billy Jones, member of the New York State Assembly for the area that includes Plattsburgh, N.Y.
“I’ve talked to some campground owners that are at 10 per cent capacity. Close to 90 per cent would be Canadians who come down here,” Jones said. “A lot of people from Canada have second homes here, and camps along our lakes.”
Jones said there are many businesses in his area that have yet to reopen, but those that have are feeling the absence of Canadians.
China vowed on Tuesday to retaliate if the United States persisted with “hostile action” against Chinese journalists who may be forced to leave in coming days if their U.S. visas are not extended.
Canada’s first big push for a COVID-19 vaccine may be falling victim to sour relations with Beijing, as Chinese officials continue to hold up a shipment of the drug needed to carry out promised human trials here.
CanSino Biologics of Tianjin, China signed an accord with the federal government in May to have its vaccine tested in Canada, a heavily promoted deal the government said could give Canadians early access to the serum.But more two-and-a-half months later, the Canadian trials have yet to start, because scientists have nothing to study.
Samples of the vaccine candidate – already one of the world’s most advanced in terms of the trial process – have not been approved for shipment to Canada by Chinese customs, one of the researchers confirmed Tuesday.
David Mulroney, Canada’s ambassador to China from 2009 to 2012, said it’s hard to know why the delivery has been stalled, but he has his suspicions.
“It’s likely that the shipment is being delayed as part of China’s retaliation against Canada over the Meng (Wanzhou) arrest,” he said, referring to the Huawei Technologies CFO held in Vancouver on a U.S. extradition request.
North Korea has expressed its desire for “complete denuclearization” of the Korean peninsula and is not seeking conditions such as U.S. troops withdrawing from the South first, South Korean President Moon Jae-in said on Thursday.
North Korea is pressing on with its nuclear weapons program and several countries believe it has “probably developed miniaturized nuclear devices to fit into the warheads of its ballistic missiles,” according to a confidential U.N. report.The report by an independent panel of experts monitoring U.N. sanctions said the countries, which it did not identify, believed North Korea’s past six nuclear tests had likely helped it develop miniaturized nuclear devices. Pyongyang has not conducted a nuclear test since September 2017.
The National Research Council of Canada was heavily involved in the Manhattan Project and in the research by British scientists to develop the atom bomb. In April of 1944, King’s Cabinet War Committee approved expenditures for the National Research Council to design and operate nuclear reactors in Montreal and at Chalk River, Ont., whose discoveries about the production of plutonium would be shared with those involved in the Manhattan Project.
Yet Canada’s extensive role in the Manhattan Project and the development of the atom bombs that destroyed Hiroshima and Nagasaki has been completely wiped from the collective Canadian consciousness and memory.
The Canadian government has never publicly acknowledged its participation in the Manhattan Project after gloating about it when the bombs were first dropped in 1945. There is little published about Canada’s contribution in the creation of atomic weapons and the subject is not taught in schools. Canadians of all ages believe Canada had nothing to do with the American atom bomb.
In my appeal to Mr. Trudeau, I asked that the government acknowledge Canada’s participation in the Manhattan Project and that the Prime Minister issue a statement of regret for the deaths and immense suffering inflicted on the inhabitants of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
Well, people clearly do know about this involvement and crying about to PM Blackface Mc-People Experience Things Differently won't change the fact that the Japanese military was the ISIS of its day, committing atrocities and dragging its country into a war it could not win.
It was not the atomic bomb that gouged this huge hole in the Urakami basin. We dug it ourselves to the rhythm of military marches.
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