Canada

Tuesday August 22, 2017

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Tuesday August 22, 2017

Rally in Quebec turns violent after protesters opposing anti-immigrant rallies clash with police

Tensions boiled over in Quebec City on Sunday, as police were pelted by beer bottles and smoke bombs set off in garbage cans in an ugly end to a weekend of pro- and anti-immigrant rallies across the country.

The Quebec group La Meute, which is associated with the far right, called for a rally Sunday to protest against the federal and provincial government’s handling of the border crossers, but ended up having its members pinned inside a garage while counter-protesters demonstrated outside.

Once the counterprotesters turned violent, the Quebec City police declared the protest illegal. Clashes ensued and at least one protester was arrested as officers tried to block access to the building where some of the La Meute protesters had taken refuge.

By 6 p.m. the counterprotesters had dispersed and the members of La Meute, many of them carrying flags featuring the group’s wolf-paw logo, emerged from the building to begin their protest.

Television footage showed them marching in silence near Quebec City’s legislature.

The protests in the Quebec capital were far more tense than a demonstration a day earlier in Vancouver where thousands of people peacefully demonstrated in an anti-racism rally in response to reports earlier in the week that an anti-Muslim protest was planned. That latter rally didn’t materialize. (Source: Toronto Star) 

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Thursday, August 17, 2017

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Thursday, August 17, 2017

Chapter 19 may be a NAFTA deal breaker for Canada

A lot of Canadian softwood lumber exporters will tell you Chapter 19 is an instrumental part of the North American Free Trade Agreement.

July 17, 2017

Softwood lumber is the longest and bitterest of Canada-U.S. trade disputes. Small wonder then that Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has cautioned that removing Chapter 19 from the trade pact would be a deal breaker in the upcoming renewal talks between Canada, the United States and Mexico.

Chapter 19 is a mechanism NAFTA members can use to review the fairness of anti-dumping and countervailing duties. The U.S. has a long history of slapping such duties on Canadian softwood lumber shipments, and Canada has taken advantage of Chapter 19 to reverse those actions.

A Chapter 19 panel decides each case according to the domestic laws of the country that imposed the duties. So a Chapter 19 panel does not override a country’s domestic laws, but serves as a check on how each country is applying its own rules.

June 7, 2017

“There is absolutely no doubt that it acts as a check on some of the more abusive, arbitrary and discriminatory actions of the regulators on both sides of the border,” said Milos Barutciski, co-head of the international trade and investment law practice at Bennett Jones LLP in Toronto.

Softwood lumber has long been a flash-point in Canada-U.S. trade relations, and Canada has turned to Chapter 19, both under the original Canada-U.S. Free Trade Agreement and subsequently under NAFTA, to address what it sees as the unfair imposition of duties.

August 27, 2005

The U.S. lumber industry argues that the tariffs are necessary because provincial governments unfairly subsidize Canadian producers who log on crown land. Canadian companies argue the tariffs are improper because they pay provincial governments market rates for that timber.

“Chapter 19 has been a very important piece in every softwood lumber dispute since the original FTA was signed,” Barutciski said. (Source: Financial Post) 

 

Friday August 11, 2017

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Friday August 11, 2017

Canada’s Army Builds Tent Camp For Haitian Asylum-Seekers Arriving From U.S.

Featuring a Fire and Fury gallery of Donald Trump cartoons

The Canadian military is building a temporary shelter near the border with the United States, to accommodate hundreds of asylum-seekers crossing illegally from the U.S. into Quebec.

June 2, 2017

Most of those arrivals are Haitians who were admitted to the U.S. after the earthquake in 2010, and whose future legal status in America is unclear.

Dan Karpenchuk, reporting for NPR, says the Canadian service members are only building the camp, not remaining afterward to staff it.

“The camp will hold as many as 500 seekers, about the number of asylum-seekers waiting to be processed,” Karpenchuk reports. “The soldiers will also set up lighting [and] heating, and install flooring. They will not have security roles.”

May 11, 2017

The CBC reports that currently, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police have a tent set up at the border to handle processing — but there are no beds. People spend two to three days waiting on benches and chairs.

The soldiers, at the request of Public Safety Canada, are assembling a camp at a nearby “converted private campsite,” the CBC reports.

“Setting up tents, this is something obviously we’re quite familiar with, we’re pretty good at doing this,” Maj. Yves Desbiens, the spokesperson on the ground for the Canadian Armed Forces, told the Canadian broadcaster. “But in terms of these capacities, this is not something we do often.”

February 10, 2017

The tent camp on the border is just the first stop for asylum-seekers.

“After they’re processed, the asylum-seekers will be bused to Montreal, where they will be put up in other temporary accommodation, including the Olympic Stadium, a former convent and now a facility at one of the city’s hospitals,” Karpenchuk says.

As we reported last week, Montreal’s Olympic Stadium has just recently been pressed into service to house asylum-seekers, after normal facilities were overwhelmed. But it’s only a temporary option, since the stadium won’t be available during upcoming events.

June 29, 2016

The surge has, by all accounts, been dramatic. Last week, a spokesperson for the provincial government organization that helps asylum-seekers told the CBC that the group helped about 180 people last July — and that more than 1,000 people crossed the border this July.

Immigration Canada told the CBC on Wednesday that crossings at one point along the border have quadrupled in just the past two weeks. (Source: NPR) 

 

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Thursday August 10, 2017

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Thursday August 10, 2017

Trump’s Threat to North Korea Was Improvised

President Trump delivered his “fire and fury” threat to North Korea on Tuesday with arms folded, jaw set and eyes flitting on what appeared to be a single page of talking points set before him on the conference table at his New Jersey golf resort.

April 15, 2013

The piece of paper, as it turned out, was a fact sheet on the opioid crisis he had come to talk about, and his ominous warning to Pyongyang was entirely improvised, according to several people with direct knowledge of what unfolded. In discussions with advisers beforehand, he had not run the specific language by them, though he had talked over possible responses in a general way.

The inflammatory words quickly escalated the confrontation with North Korea to a new, alarming level and were followed shortly by a new threat from North Korea to obliterate an American air base on Guam. In the hours since, the president’s advisers have sought to calm the situation, with Secretary of State Rex W. Tillerson assuring Americans that they “should sleep at night” without worrying about an imminent war.

June 21, 2006

But the president’s ad-libbed threat reflected an evolving and still unsettled approach to one of the most dangerous hot spots in the world as Mr. Trump and his team debate diplomatic, economic and military options.

The president’s aides are divided on North Korea, as on other issues, with national security veterans like Defense Secretary Jim Mattis and Lt. Gen. H.R. McMaster, the national security adviser, on one side and Stephen K. Bannon, the president’s chief strategist, and his allies on the other. 

The president had been told about a Washington Post story on North Korea’s progress in miniaturizing nuclear warheads so that they could fit on top of a ballistic missile, and was in a bellicose mood, according to a person who spoke with him before he made the statement. His team assumed that he would be asked about North Korea during a scheduled media appearance tied to his opioid meeting, but Mr. Trump had not mentioned his comment during a conference call beforehand that focused on North Korea.

“North Korea best not make any more threats to the United States,” Mr. Trump told reporters in remarks aired on television and broadcast around the globe. “They will be met with fire and fury like the world has never seen.”(Source: New York Times) 

 

Wednesday August 2, 2017

Editorial Cartoon by Graeme MacKay, The Hamilton Spectator – Wednesday August 2, 2017

Saudi Arabia reportedly using Canadian military trucks against its own civilians

The Canadian government is investigating reports that Saudi Arabia is using armoured vehicles made in Canada against its own civilians – allegations that have prompted renewed scrutiny over Ottawa’s recent decision to sign off on a billion-dollar arms deal with the kingdom.

October 23, 2015

Videos and photos posted on social media in recent days allegedly show Riyadh using Canadian equipment in a violent crackdown on minority Shia dissidents in eastern Saudi Arabia. Last week at least five people were killed as security forces flushed out suspected militants in the town of Awamiya.

Several sources told the Canadian newspaper the Globe and Mail that the vehicles being used appeared to be Gurkha RPVs made in Ontario by Terradyne Armoured Vehicles.

Canadian officials said they were deeply concerned by the reports. “We are looking at these claims very seriously … and have immediately launched a review,” Justin Trudeau told reporters.

June 13, 2017

In 2016, Saudi Arabia ranked among the largest importers of Canada-made military goods, purchasing more than C$142m worth of goods – nearly 20% of all Canadian military exports that year.

The ministry of global affairs said it was concerned over the escalating violence in eastern Saudi Arabia. In a statement issued last week, it highlighted the causalities among civilians and security forces and urged Riyadh to confront its security challenges in “a manner that abides by international human rights law”.

Days later, the ministry said the government was actively seeking more information about the reports of civilian casualties and claims that Canadian-made vehicles were involved. “If it is found that Canadian exports have been used to commit serious violations of human rights, the minister will take action,” a spokesperson for department told the Guardian. He did not answer questions around what kinds of actions this could entail.

Terradyne Armoured Vehicles did not respond to a request for comment. (Source: The Guardian) 

 

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