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Christbert Germain and Taina Saint Hilaire stood on the muddy Mexican shores of the Rio Grande faced with a stark choice: make their way across the river to the United States to claim asylum or risk joining thousands of others who were deported back to Haiti, the very place they had spent years trying to escape.
The couple had, in fact, already set foot in the U.S. For four nights, they slept with their toddler son beneath the bridge in Del Rio, Texas, where, days earlier, 15,000 people had congregated, many of whom are also Haitian.
They are among the tens of thousands – perhaps hundreds of thousands – caught in between the policy vacillations of a White House that’s seeking to stem the flow of border crossings while promising a more humane approach to immigration. That approach has received widespread condemnation, including from the U.S. special envoy for Haiti, who resigned in protest this week over the wave of expulsions.
Haitian migrants carry a girl and belongings as they cross the Rio Grande river, as seen from Ciudad Acuna, Coahuila state, Mexico on Sept. 23, 2021. Deportation fears mounted Thursday among Haitian migrants camped out in northern Mexico near the border with the United States after the sudden arrival of dozens of police officers at the site.PEDRO PARDO/AFP/Getty Images
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SNC-Lavalin, two former executives hit with fraud, forgery charges
SNC-Lavalin Group Inc. and two of its former executives are facing fresh criminal charges related to a bridge contract in Montreal almost two decades ago, embroiling the Quebec engineering giant in another legal saga as it tries to rebuild its business after years of crisis.
Quebec’s chief prosecutor’s office said Thursday that two of the company’s business entities – SNC-Lavalin Inc. and SNC-Lavalin International Inc. – and former vice-presidents Normand Morin and Kamal Francis have been charged in relation to a long-standing RCMP investigation into bribes paid on a $128-million contract for the refurbishment of Montreal’s Jacques Cartier bridge in 2002.
All four parties face charges of forgery, conspiracy to commit forgery, fraud, conspiracy to commit fraud, fraud against the government and conspiracy to commit fraud against the government, the RCMP said in a separate statement. The prosecutor said the company has been invited to negotiate a remediation agreement – a deal that would allow it to avoid a trial in exchange for paying a fine and having its activities monitored by a third party. The contents of a potential deal were not disclosed.
Some conservatives urge party supporters to unify around O’Toole after election loss
Some conservatives, including former Ontario premier Mike Harris, are throwing their support behind Erin O’Toole, as others publicly criticize the Conservative Leader’s performance.
The Conservatives were projected to win 119 seats in Monday’s election, a loss of two from the 2019 race. The Liberals were re-elected and leading with 159 seats, although one of them was won by a disavowed Liberal candidate – Kevin Vuong in Toronto’s Spadina-Fort York – who will now have to sit as an Independent MP. O’Toole, who has vowed to launch an election review, has said he was “disappointed” with his party’s showing.
Some party members believe O’Toole’s leadership could be in jeopardy. But on Thursday, others, including re-elected Alberta MP Garnett Genuis urged the party to unify around O’Toole and dismissed the idea of a change in leadership. Harris, who served as Ontario’s Progressive Conservative premier from 1995 to 2002, penned an op-ed in the Toronto Sun, saying the party should help O’Toole develop a “credible, conservative platform” in the next election.
More: Liberal Party’s plan to cut federal debt burden may clash with NDP, Bloc support in a minority Parliament
B.C., Quebec offer incentives to retain nurses as COVID-19 cases tick up
Quebec is paying full-time nurses bonuses of at least $15,000 each, making it the latest province to offer incentives to keep front-line staffers caring for patients as concerns grow over the severity of the fourth wave.
Premier François Legault announced the measure on Thursday, after months of pandemic-induced stresses that have contributed to a shortage of 4,300 nurses in the province. British Columbia last week also announced nearly $6.4-million in funding for efforts to recruit and retain health care workers in the northern part of the province. That region has also seen an exodus of nurses or many reporting work-related burnout as COVID-19 case counts have risen. It’s forced the regional Northern Health Authority to appeal for reinforcements.
With winter approaching, and anti-vaccine sentiment affecting morale, health officials fear the problem will worsen.
More COVID-19 coverage:
- Ottawa to provide Red Cross, military help as COVID-19 overwhelms Alberta’s hospitals
- Explainer: How to access your COVID-19 immunization receipt and where it’s required
- Editorial: It’s time to get vaccinated, or face the consequences
- Families of Herron residents denounce for-profit care homes: ‘These institutions could not withstand the pressure test of COVID-19′
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ALSO ON OUR RADAR
Severe punishment, executions will return to Afghanistan, Taliban official says: Mullah Nooruddin Turabi, one of the founders of the Taliban, said executions and amputations of hands will return, though the group is still developing its “policy” on whether such punishments will be meted out in public. Turabi, now in his 60s, served as the head of the Ministry of Propagation of Virtue and Prevention of Vice – effectively, the religious police – when the Taliban last ruled.
Twitter requires People’s Party Leader Maxime Bernier to delete tweet inciting followers to harass journalists: Twitter has compelled the leader of the far-right People’s Party to take down a tweet that insulted individual reporters and encouraged his 160,000 followers to contact them. The reporters had e-mailed Bernier’s party requesting comment about its endorsement by white nationalist groups and fears among racialized Canadians about what the party represents. A spokesperson for Twitter said the tweet violated its information privacy policy.
Lululemon replaces Hudson’s Bay as official clothier of Team Canada: Lululemon will design Team Canada’s clothing for the Olympic and Paralympic Games through 2028, starting with the Beijing Winter Olympics, as the deal with long-time outfitter Hudson’s Bay Company comes to an end. Team Canada’s athlete kit for the coming Winter Games will be unveiled in late October.
Listen to The Decibel: What do you do when your depression isn’t responding to traditional treatments? For author and journalist Anna Mehler Paperny, that’s meant trying out ketamine. Long dismissed as just a party drug, ketamine is beginning to shed that reputation as evidence for its use as a treatment for depressions grows.
MORNING MARKETS
European shares slipped on Friday but held their gains for the week as uncertainty around the fate of debt-ridden China Evergrande weighed on investor sentiment. The regionwide STOXX 600 index lost 0.78 per cent after a three-day run of gains. It was a different story in Asia where MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan was little changed on the day but has fallen 0.7 per cent this week and is poised for its third weekly loss in a row. U.S. stock futures were down, while the Canadian dollar was 78.85 US cents.
WHAT EVERYONE’S TALKING ABOUT
What Gabby Petito’s case says about young women and violence
“To say the case has sparked public interest is a wild understatement. It has become a flashpoint for a society that does not know how to deal with violence as a social issue and cannot pass meaningful gun-control legislation, yet is obsessed with true-crime stories and the death of one young woman. But this has always been the case, sadly: One tragedy can galvanize, while a thousand cause numbness.” - Elizabeth Renzetti
A divided country? Actually, the federal election revealed Canada has never been more united in purpose
“Federal and provincial governments acted in unison to fight the pandemic, protect workers and businesses and procure and deliver vaccines. Almost every province has or will soon have some form of vaccine passport that residents must show to enter many businesses or entertainment venues.” - John Ibbitson
Jason Kenney should do the honourable thing and resign
“There is nothing, really, to be said in Mr. Kenney’s defence. He has allowed politics – and the various calculations and machinations that flow from it – to govern his decision-making. As opposed to doing the right thing for the greater good regardless of any political cost.” - Gary Mason
TODAY’S EDITORIAL CARTOON
David Parkins/The Globe and Mail
LIVING BETTER
Start your fall with these six new thrillers
From Ann Cleeves’s The Heron’s Cry, a hair-raising take on the Shetland Islands, to former Canadian Supreme Court chief justice Beverley McLachlin’s sophomore novel, Denial, here are six new thrillers to get your blood rushing as you brace for chillier temperatures.
MOMENT IN TIME: Sept. 24, 1936
Puppet master Jim Henson is born
Jim Henson's characters provided an outlet for the various sides of his sense of humour and personality, and Henson always considered Kermit the Frog his alter ego.John E. Barrett/Courtesy of The Jim Henson Company
Jim Henson once described Kermit – the frog he sculpted from foam rubber and padded in felt – as his alter ego. “But he’s a little snarkier than I am … Kermit says things I hold myself back from saying.” It’s fair to say that each of his Muppets – including Miss Piggy, the Swedish Chef, Beaker and even Oscar the Grouch – embodied a piece of the quiet, unassuming man. Kermit might be Mr. Henson’s best-known creation, but it was Rowlf the dog – conceived for a dog-food commercial – that first attracted national attention, setting the Muppets on a trajectory to become an entertainment and education powerhouse. In addition to entertaining viewers on The Muppet Show and other TV series, Mr. Henson’s characters starred in movies, appeared on stage with Johnny Carson and on Saturday Night Live and, of course, educated millions of children on Sesame Street. Mr. Henson died on May 16, 1990, of complications from pneumonia. The world lost one of the “great positive thinkers,” as one of his five children once said. More than 1,000 attendees (including Muppets such as Big Bird) were at his funeral, where Harry Belafonte sang his upbeat tune Turn the World Around, one of Mr. Henson’s favourites. Gayle MacDonald
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