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Canadian embassy in Syria damaged in Israeli strike on Iranian embassy next door – CBC.ca

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Canadian officials are saying little publicly about the state of the Canadian Embassy in Damascus, Syria, a week after an Israeli bomb or missile demolished an Iranian Embassy annex next door.

A source at Global Affairs Canada (GAC) told CBC News that Canada’s embassy building sustained damage in the April 1 airstrike, including the destruction of at least some of its windows. Officials have not yet been able to assess the building for structural damage.

The blast that destroyed the consular annex next door would have sent a powerful shockwave through the foundations of adjacent structures.

Global Affairs has declined to answer questions about whether the Israeli government warned Canada in advance of the strike on the Iranian Embassy annex.

The nearby Canadian embassy ceased operations in 2012 as the Syrian civil war worsened. GAC didn’t say whether Israel checked with Canada to ensure that no Canadian personnel were on site when the airstrike hit.

Canadian diplomats and other personnel, including RCMP officers, have entered Syria on several occasions since the embassy was closed. It’s not clear whether they used the embassy as a base of operations.

The GAC source told CBC News the embassy building remains the property of the Government of Canada.

The Canadian Embassy is two doors down from the large and ornate mission of the Islamic Republic on al-Farabi Street in the Mazzeh district, which houses many foreign embassies. Between the two buildings was a nondescript consular annex used by the Iranian government.

On the night of Monday, April 1, that annex was hosting a meeting of Iranian generals and senior officers of the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps. The death toll from the Israeli airstrike could not be independently confirmed; the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported that the strike killed 16, including two civilian bystanders.

Iranian Ambassador to Syria Hossein Akbari claimed that the strike had been carried out by Israeli F-35 aircraft that fired six missiles.

The Iranian government announced the deaths of seven IRGC members, including two generals. Some Israeli reports claimed that a representative of Hezbollah was killed in the strike, and the New York Times quoted an IRGC source as saying Palestinian Islamic Jihad had a representative at the meeting.

The most significant loss for Iran was that of Brig.-Gen. Mohammad Reza Zahedi of the IRGC’s foreign operations arm, the Quds Force. Reza Zahedi was the only Iranian to sit on the Shura, or guiding council, of the Lebanese Shia group Hezbollah, and was widely considered to be Iran’s top military official in Syria and Lebanon.

WATCH | Top Iranian commander among dead after Israeli airstrike in Damascus, reports say

Top Iranian commander among dead after Israeli airstrike in Damascus, reports say

8 days ago

Duration 3:06

An Israeli airstrike hit a building next to Iran’s embassy in Damascus on Monday, according to reports from Iranian media and security sources. At least six people have reportedly been killed, including a senior commander of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps.

Israel has a policy of not claiming responsibility for strikes conducted in other countries. An Israeli Embassy spokesperson declined to say whether Israel had warned Canada in advance of the airstrike.

“Israel have not taken responsibility for the strike,” Yifah Mivtach Greenvald of the Israeli Embassy told CBC News, “so I have no further comment than that.”

Iran has promised to take revenge. “The embassies of the Zionist regime are no longer safe,” Yahya Rahim Safavi, senior adviser to Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, told Iran’s ISNA state news agency.

Iranian TV also published images of different types of ballistic missiles it said could hit Israel. The threats of reprisal have caused Israel to cancel all military leave and bolster its air defences.

Israeli officials also leaked news that their air force was practicing drills for strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities,

The Vienna Convention that protects diplomatic missions only prohibits host countries from acts of violence against diplomatic missions — Israel’s strike on an embassy in a third country is not a violation of the treaty, although it does violate international conventions.

Israel has long argued that Iranian government officials were involved in the deadly bombing of its embassy in Buenos Aires in 1992.

In December, a French consular employee was killed along with family members in an Israeli airstrike in Gaza on a house belonging to another staff member of France’s consulate in Gaza.

“The house was hit by an Israeli air strike on Wednesday evening, which seriously hurt our agent and killed about 10 others,” France’s foreign ministry said.

France condemned the bombing of a residential building.

“We’ve asked for explanations as to why the house was hit,” French Foreign Minister Catherine Colonna said.

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Here is how to prepare your online accounts for when you die

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LONDON (AP) — Most people have accumulated a pile of data — selfies, emails, videos and more — on their social media and digital accounts over their lifetimes. What happens to it when we die?

It’s wise to draft a will spelling out who inherits your physical assets after you’re gone, but don’t forget to take care of your digital estate too. Friends and family might treasure files and posts you’ve left behind, but they could get lost in digital purgatory after you pass away unless you take some simple steps.

Here’s how you can prepare your digital life for your survivors:

Apple

The iPhone maker lets you nominate a “ legacy contact ” who can access your Apple account’s data after you die. The company says it’s a secure way to give trusted people access to photos, files and messages. To set it up you’ll need an Apple device with a fairly recent operating system — iPhones and iPads need iOS or iPadOS 15.2 and MacBooks needs macOS Monterey 12.1.

For iPhones, go to settings, tap Sign-in & Security and then Legacy Contact. You can name one or more people, and they don’t need an Apple ID or device.

You’ll have to share an access key with your contact. It can be a digital version sent electronically, or you can print a copy or save it as a screenshot or PDF.

Take note that there are some types of files you won’t be able to pass on — including digital rights-protected music, movies and passwords stored in Apple’s password manager. Legacy contacts can only access a deceased user’s account for three years before Apple deletes the account.

Google

Google takes a different approach with its Inactive Account Manager, which allows you to share your data with someone if it notices that you’ve stopped using your account.

When setting it up, you need to decide how long Google should wait — from three to 18 months — before considering your account inactive. Once that time is up, Google can notify up to 10 people.

You can write a message informing them you’ve stopped using the account, and, optionally, include a link to download your data. You can choose what types of data they can access — including emails, photos, calendar entries and YouTube videos.

There’s also an option to automatically delete your account after three months of inactivity, so your contacts will have to download any data before that deadline.

Facebook and Instagram

Some social media platforms can preserve accounts for people who have died so that friends and family can honor their memories.

When users of Facebook or Instagram die, parent company Meta says it can memorialize the account if it gets a “valid request” from a friend or family member. Requests can be submitted through an online form.

The social media company strongly recommends Facebook users add a legacy contact to look after their memorial accounts. Legacy contacts can do things like respond to new friend requests and update pinned posts, but they can’t read private messages or remove or alter previous posts. You can only choose one person, who also has to have a Facebook account.

You can also ask Facebook or Instagram to delete a deceased user’s account if you’re a close family member or an executor. You’ll need to send in documents like a death certificate.

TikTok

The video-sharing platform says that if a user has died, people can submit a request to memorialize the account through the settings menu. Go to the Report a Problem section, then Account and profile, then Manage account, where you can report a deceased user.

Once an account has been memorialized, it will be labeled “Remembering.” No one will be able to log into the account, which prevents anyone from editing the profile or using the account to post new content or send messages.

X

It’s not possible to nominate a legacy contact on Elon Musk’s social media site. But family members or an authorized person can submit a request to deactivate a deceased user’s account.

Passwords

Besides the major online services, you’ll probably have dozens if not hundreds of other digital accounts that your survivors might need to access. You could just write all your login credentials down in a notebook and put it somewhere safe. But making a physical copy presents its own vulnerabilities. What if you lose track of it? What if someone finds it?

Instead, consider a password manager that has an emergency access feature. Password managers are digital vaults that you can use to store all your credentials. Some, like Keeper,Bitwarden and NordPass, allow users to nominate one or more trusted contacts who can access their keys in case of an emergency such as a death.

But there are a few catches: Those contacts also need to use the same password manager and you might have to pay for the service.

___

Is there a tech challenge you need help figuring out? Write to us at onetechtip@ap.org with your questions.

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Police suggest speed a factor in fiery EV crash that killed four in downtown Toronto

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TORONTO – Speed was considered a factor in a fiery overnight crash in downtown Toronto that killed four people and injured one woman, officials said Thursday, underlining the challenges firefighters face when batting electric-vehicle battery fires.

The Tesla car was travelling at a “high rate of speed” when it lost control, slammed into a guard rail and then caught fire along Lake Shore Boulevard east of Cherry Street shortly after midnight, Toronto police Deputy Insp. Phillip Sinclair said Thursday.

“There is some evidence to suggest that speed was a factor,” he said.

Sinclair described the crash as “heartbreaking.” All four people who were killed — three men and one woman — were in their 20s and 30s, he said.

The surviving woman was pulled from the car by a motorist who stopped to help, he said. The woman, in her 20s, was sent to hospital with non-life-threatening injuries.

“Thanks very much to that bystander. We have been speaking to them, and obviously they are also deeply affected by this incident — a very horrific scene for that bystander to step in,” Sinclair told a press conference Thursday morning.

Toronto’s deputy fire chief said the crash underlined the challenge firefighters can face when trying to put out electric-vehicle battery fires.

“The intensity of the fire is directly linked to the battery cells in the Tesla,” said Jim Jessop, speaking alongside Sinclair.

“But I want to be very clear: we have all attended collisions where we’ve had horrible car fires as well that are gasoline powered.”

One of the major risks in electric-vehicle fires, he said, is when the battery gets into an uncontrollable self-heating chain reaction, or what’s called thermal runaway. The battery can sometimes reignite up to weeks later, he said.

Firefighters at the scene put the car’s battery cell in a dumpster and filled it with sand, then moved it from the scene for safe disposal, he said.

“We don’t want to speculate on the intensity of the fire until the investigation is complete, but certainly it did cause extra care and concern in transporting the vehicle and the battery cell that had been ejected (from the vehicle),” Jessop said.

Talk of battery fire risks comes as the city’s transit agency considers a possible ban on e-bikes and e-scooters from its vehicles. A staff report going before the Toronto Transit Commission’s board says the risks are particularly associated with lithium-ion batteries in uncertified or misused devices.

Research findings from EV FireSafe, a group backed by the Australian government, suggest electric-vehicle battery fires are uncommon and happen less often than gas-powered vehicle fires.

Jessop said Toronto Fire is being “very proactive” in preparing for a future where lithium-ion batteries, the type found in everything from cellphones to cars, are even more common.

He said the service has a working group to help inform its response to public messaging about battery fires and tactics for safe disposal by firefighters.

“It’s something that you know we’re going to have to deal with and continue to deal with as this technology expands … and it’s something that, you know, we’re going to continue to work on,” he said.

Lake Shore Boulevard, the major arterial road along the city’s waterfront, was closed in both directions between the Don Valley parkway and Cherry Street for several hours ahead of the morning rush hour. One lane reopened in each direction later in the morning.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 24, 2024.

The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.

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Parents charged after police say malnourished, abused baby taken to Winnipeg hospital

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WINNIPEG – Police in Winnipeg say they have charged the parents of an infant who was brought to hospital with suspicious injuries.

Police were called in late September when a man and a woman arrived at the emergency room with a baby girl who was unresponsive and had multiple injuries.

The child abuse unit investigated and found the injuries were the result of malnutrition and abuse.

The girl’s parents were arrested on Tuesday and are in custody.

Both are charged with failing to provide the necessities of life.

The father also faces a charge of aggravated assault.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 24, 2024.

The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.

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