Tag: Region Americas

Vancouver, British Columbia — An official commission is about to get underway in Ottawa as Canada tries to determine to what extent China and other countries interfered in its last two elections. The investigation also will examine whether Russia and India interfered as well. All three countries have denied the allegations. Former Conservative Member of Parliament Kenny Chiu (Canadian House of Commons) Justice Marie-Josee Hogue will oversee the commission, which is the latest attempt to find out how countries — predominately…

WASHINGTON: Fresh off his victory in the Iowa Republican caucuses, Donald Trump arrived in a Manhattan courtroom for the next high-stakes trial of his crowded legal calendar – this time in a defamation lawsuit by E. Jean Carroll, the writer who won a separate sexual-abuse case against him last year. US district judge Lewis Kaplan, who is overseeing the trial, has already held Trump liable for defaming Carroll, leaving it for a jury to decide how much damages he must…

Perfectly timed to coincide with Anthony Fauci’s closed-door testimony before the US Congress, a recent bombshell report suggested, based on FOIA’d emails, that Shi Zhengli of the Wuhan Institute of Virology met with Fauci at his National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), outside Washington, in June 2017.  According to the most popular version of the “lab-leak” theory, it is, of course, Shi’s research on coronaviruses in bats which is supposed to have given rise to the SARS-CoV-2 virus which…

Whatever the weather in Cuba this February, people may be feeling gloomy about the cost of living. The Cuban government is set to raise fuel prices fivefold at the start of next month. Havana says the move is a must, as it seeks funds to trim its deficit spending and buy needed goods from abroad. The change is not expected to have much of an immediate impact on the costs of vacation packages for Canadians looking to get away to the popular…

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. – Today Florida Surgeon General Dr. Joseph Ladapo called for a “halt to the use of mRNA COVID-19 vaccines” in a press release and X thread. In a statement posted on X, Ladapo wrote, “The U.S. Food and Drug Administration and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have always played it fast and loose with COVID-19 safety, but their failure to test for DNA integration with the human genome – as their own guidelines dictate – when…

Starting in the mid-20th century, companies began distorting and manipulating science to favor specific commercial interests. Big tobacco is both the developer and the poster child of this strategy. When strong evidence that smoking caused lung cancer emerged in the 1950s, the tobacco industry began a campaign to obscure this fact. The Unmaking of Science The tobacco industry scientific disinformation campaign sought to disrupt and delay further studies, as well as to cast scientific doubt on the link between cigarette…

NEW DELHI: Alaska Airlines flight 1282 made an emergency landing as a part of the plane flew off mid-flight going from Portland, Oregon to Ontario, California on January 5, causing panic and worldwide concerns on flight safety. Following the incident, aviation authorities and airline companies are conducting checks on their own planes to prevent any more potential disasters.An investigation has been launched to determine the cause of the incident. Here’s what we know so far about the investigation: Alaska Airlines…

Canada, Britain, Sweden and Ukraine on Monday formally complained to the U.N. aviation council in their bid to hold Iran accountable for the downing of a Ukrainian passenger airliner in January 2020 that killed 176 people, they said on Monday. Most of the dead were citizens from the four nations, which created a coordination group that seeks to hold Iran to account. “Today we have jointly initiated dispute-settlement proceedings before the International Civil Aviation Organization against the Islamic Republic of…

A Marine veteran held hostage in Iran for more than four years has filed a federal lawsuit against the Department of Justice after FBI allegations reversed a decision that had awarded him $20 million from a fund for victims of state-sponsored terrorism. Attorneys for Amir Hekmati filed the federal civil lawsuit on Dec. 19. They claimed that Hekmati has been denied his due process rights to counter claims made by the FBI and they challenged the decision of the special…

Adult media giant Aylo has blocked access to many of its websites, including PornHub, to visitors from Montana and North Caroline as new age verifications laws go into effect. This move also impacts other adult sites owned by the company, including Tube8, RedTube, and Brazzers. As of January 1st, new age verification laws went into effect in Montana and North Carolina that require adult websites to verify the age of visitors from those states.  Under these new laws, failure to…

Attorneys for the Securities and Exchange Commission apologized to a judge on Thursday for misrepresenting facts used to secure a restraining order and asset freeze against a crypto firm. In a filing submitted to the U.S. District Court of Utah, in response to the judge’s order to show cause for its misstep, the SEC attorneys wrote that the commission “deeply regrets these orders” and promised to conduct mandatory training for staff members involved in the investigation. “I fully appreciate the…

In a significant development for US military space operations, the secretive X-37B robot spaceplane was launched from Florida on Thursday night. This marks its seventh mission and the first to be launched atop a SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket, potentially reaching higher orbits than ever before. Driving the news The Falcon Heavy, the most powerful operational rocket in the world, lifted off from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida in a dazzling display of fire and smoke. The launch was delayed…

Five years since the legalization of cannabis in Canada, the industry finds itself grappling with significant challenges. Despite making economic contributions on par with the dairy sector and marking its presence on the global stage, primarily in the medical cannabis export market, this promising industry is hindered by financial strains, murky advocacy, and unyielding regulations. Excise Tax: A Thorn in the Side A primary issue, raised during a recent industry gathering in Toronto, is the hefty excise tax, which critics…

The new year will likely prove to be one of significant force structure changes for the Army, according to its senior leaders. Although the service has maintained for years that embracing multidomain operations will require it to “transform” its force structure into one leaders believe is suited to tomorrow’s battlefield, back-to-back recruiting shortfalls led top officials to admit by mid-to-late 2023 that some pending cuts are influenced by a deepening numbers shortfall. The Army finished fiscal year 2023 with only…

WASHINGTON: The US will provide up to $250 million in arms and equipment to Ukraine in the final package of aid this year to help Kyiv in its war with Russia, Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Wednesday. President Joe Biden has asked Congress to provide another $61 billion in aid to Ukraine, but Republicans are refusing to approve the assistance without an agreement with Democrats to tighten security along the U.S.-Mexico border. The White House has warned that…

The U.S. on Wednesday announced what officials say could be the final package of military aid to Ukraine unless Congress approves supplemental funding legislation that is stalled on Capitol Hill. The weapons, worth up to $250 million, include an array of air munitions and other missiles, artillery, anti-armor systems, ammunition, demolition and medical equipment and parts. The aid, provided through the Presidential Drawdown Authority, will be pulled from Pentagon stockpiles. In a statement, Marine Lt. Col. Garron Garn, a Pentagon spokesman said there is…