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Ukraine news: Trudeau addresses parliament in Kyiv

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KYIV, Ukraine –

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau accused Moscow of a “new colonial approach” in Ukraine during a surprise visit to Kyiv on Saturday, where he told that country’s parliament they are fighting for “the future of us all.”

“You are the tip of the spear that is determining the future of the 21st century,” Trudeau said during a 25-minute speech before a special session of the national legislature, known as the Verkhovna Rada.

Canada will spend another $500 million to help Ukraine’s military fight Russia’s invasion, pledging more weapons and fighter-pilot training.

Trudeau also said he believes Russia is behind the collapse of a dam that has drastically worsened a humanitarian crisis in southern Ukraine.

He told lawmakers that Canada will support their Ukraine’s bid for membership in the NATO military alliance.

“We want peace on Ukrainian terms,” he said. “Russia must completely and unconditionally withdraw all its military forces from Ukraine.”

Trudeau received several standing ovations in his speech, and a warm embrace from Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Two legislators were holding Canadian flags.

“Canada will continue to stand with Ukraine with whatever it takes, as long as it takes,” Trudeau said earlier Saturday at a press conference while standing beside Zelenskyy.

“You’re fighting for your country and for values like democracy, freedom, respect, and dignity. And in fighting for Ukraine, you’re also fighting for the future of us all,” Trudeau told Zelenskyy.

The visit, which was at the invitation of Ukraine, comes amid signs that a long-awaited spring counteroffensive against Russia could be underway.

It is also happening during wildfires across Canada, with smoke reducing air quality, and after Friday’s resignation of the special rapporteur Trudeau had assigned to probe foreign interference.

“Canada will be part of the multinational efforts to train fighter pilots and to help maintain Ukraine’s fighter-jet program, leveraging Canadian expertise in these areas,” Trudeau said during the news conference.

He added Canada will join a team of countries helping to maintain tanks, while providing additional missiles and rounds of ammunition.

That includes 288 more AIM-7 missiles for warding off Russian airstrikes, and reallocating existing funds for 10,000 rounds of 105-millimetre ammunition, Trudeau said.

The prime minister also announced $10 million in new funding to support those coping with a worsening humanitarian situation in southern Ukraine after the collapse of a hydroelectric dam this week, along with $37.5 million in aid previously earmarked for the country.

The Nova Kakhovka hydroelectric dam on the Dnieper River has flooded a large part of the front line in southern Ukraine, an area that was already undergoing shelling.

It remains unclear how the dam collapse happened. Kyiv has accused Russia of blowing up the dam and its hydropower plant, which Russian forces controlled. Moscow said Ukraine did it.

When pressed by reporters, Trudeau put direct responsibility on Russia for the dam’s collapse, saying investigations will reveal how Moscow was responsible.

“I have no doubt in my mind that Russia is responsible for the collapse of that dam. (As for) the mechanisms they used, I’m going to trust the experts that are still looking into it,” he said.

“My trip today wasn’t to inspect the Kakhovka dam; my trip is here to demonstrate my support for Ukraine.”

Trudeau also announced more sanctions on 24 individuals and 17 entities for their alleged responsibility in the theft of cultural artifacts and damaging heritage sites in Ukraine, including five museums.

He also said the federal government has seized a massive Russian-registered Antonov 124 cargo plane that Canada grounded after it landed at Toronto Pearson International Airport in February 2022.

The prime minister said Canada will try to forfeit the plane to Ukraine, so it can’t be used to support Russia’s war effort. Ottawa has legislation to forfeit assets of people sanctioned by Canada, but as of a month ago it had not filed any court application despite promising last December to seize assets held by oligarch Roman Abramovich.

Trudeau and Zelenskyy also issued a joint declaration with a dozen points that largely reiterated Canada’s actions for Ukraine. It mentioned “the need to strengthen efforts to ensure the effective implementation of sanctions and to prevent and counter circumvention in and by third countries.”

Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland joined Trudeau on the trip, which began with the laying of a wreath at the Wall of Remembrance at St. Michael’s Golden-Domed Monastery.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau laid a wreath at the Wall of Remembrance in Kyiv and spoke with soldiers trained by Canada. (Paul Workman / CTV News)

Freeland also placed some flowers at the wall, which features photos of Ukrainians who have died while defending their homeland since Russia’s initial invasion in 2014. Both met Ukrainian soldiers there for the event.

On his way to the wall, Trudeau at one point crouched down low to look inside one of the frames of burnt-out Russian tanks and military vehicles that fill a public square. Not long before Trudeau and Freeland arrived, there was sombre music and an honour guard for a casket carried into the cathedral for a funeral.

Trudeau also visited a rehabilitation centre for war veterans that focuses on both mental and physical recovery. He was joined by Olena Zelenska, the first lady of Ukraine. One of the patients gave the prime minister a Ukrainian flag as he was leaving the facility.

Some media outlets, including The Canadian Press, were made aware of the trip ahead of time on the condition that it not be reported until it was made public, for security reasons.

This is the second time that Trudeau has made an unannounced visit to the embattled country since Russia began its large-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau in Kyiv speaking with soldiers trained by Canada. (Paul Workman / CTV News)

Trudeau last travelled to Ukraine just over a year ago, where he reopened the Canadian Embassy in Kyiv and met Zelenskyy in person for the first time since the war began.

Trudeau met Zelenskyy in the building housing his office, and the pair then took part in an expanded bilateral meeting with some of both Zelenskyy and Trudeau’s senior advisers, Freeland and Ukraine’s trade minister, as well as both countries’ ambassadors.

Zelenskyy thanked Canada for taking in thousands of Ukrainians fleeing the conflict. “We need more friends like Canada,” he said.

The visit coincides with Ukraine’s gradual ramping up of military activity. Moscow has claimed that Ukraine’s long-promised spring counteroffensive is already happening, while Ukraine’s top military brass confirmed Saturday that “heavy battles” were underway and that Russia was launching air and artillery strikes in Ukraine’s southern Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions.

On Friday, Russian President Vladimir Putin said Moscow will deploy some of its tactical nuclear weapons to Belarus next month, a move that the Belarusian opposition described as an attempt to blackmail the West ahead of a July meeting of the NATO military alliance.

Ottawa has contributed more than $8 billion to efforts related to the war in Ukraine since last year. That has included launching a special immigration program to allow Ukrainians to come to Canada quickly with a temporary work and study permit, instead of going through the usual refugee system.

The money includes $1 billion in military support, including the donation of eight Leopard 2 main battle tanks to Ukraine and training for its medics and soldiers in third countries like Latvia.

Trudeau said the fight in Ukraine is a matter of shoring up the democratic model that is under attack in other countries too.

“We see more and more emerging economies understanding that the new, colonial approach of autocracies like Russia and other countries is not the path to go down.”

Trudeau was originally expected to appear at the parliamentary press gallery dinner Saturday night at the Museum of History in Gatineau, Que., a gathering of political journalists where federal party leaders are invited to deliver humorous speeches.

Instead, he appeared in a video alongside Zelenskyy that was recorded during his visit to Kyiv, where they thanked the media for telling the truth and defending freedom and democracy.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau arrives in Kyiv on an unannounced visit. (Paul Workman / CTV News)

This report by The Canadian Press was first published June 10, 2023.

With files from The Associated Press

 

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Australia plans a social media ban for children under 16

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MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) — The Australian government announced on Thursday what it described as world-leading legislation that would institute an age limit of 16 years for children to start using social media, and hold platforms responsible for ensuring compliance.

“Social media is doing harm to our kids and I’m calling time on it,” Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said.

The legislation will be introduced in Parliament during its final two weeks in session this year, which begin on Nov. 18. The age limit would take effect 12 months after the law is passed, Albanese told reporters.

The platforms including X, TikTok, Instagram and Facebook would need to use that year to work out how to exclude Australian children younger than 16.

“I’ve spoken to thousands of parents, grandparents, aunties and uncles. They, like me, are worried sick about the safety of our kids online,” Albanese said.

The proposal comes as governments around the world are wrestling with how to supervise young people’s use of technologies like smartphones and social media.

Social media platforms would be penalized for breaching the age limit, but under-age children and their parents would not.

“The onus will be on social media platforms to demonstrate they are taking reasonable steps to prevent access. The onus won’t be on parents or young people,” Albanese said.

Antigone Davis, head of safety at Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram, said the company would respect any age limitations the government wants to introduce.

“However, what’s missing is a deeper discussion on how we implement protections, otherwise we risk making ourselves feel better, like we have taken action, but teens and parents will not find themselves in a better place,” Davis said in a statement.

She added that stronger tools in app stores and operating systems for parents to control what apps their children can use would be a “simple and effective solution.”

X did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Thursday. TikTok declined to comment.

The Digital Industry Group Inc., an advocate for the digital industry in Australia, described the age limit as a “20th Century response to 21st Century challenges.”

“Rather than blocking access through bans, we need to take a balanced approach to create age-appropriate spaces, build digital literacy and protect young people from online harm,” DIGI managing director Sunita Bose said in a statement.

More than 140 Australian and international academics with expertise in fields related to technology and child welfare signed an open letter to Albanese last month opposing a social media age limit as “too blunt an instrument to address risks effectively.”

Jackie Hallan, a director at the youth mental health service ReachOut, opposed the ban. She said 73% of young people across Australia accessing mental health support did so through social media.

“We’re uncomfortable with the ban. We think young people are likely to circumvent a ban and our concern is that it really drives the behavior underground and then if things go wrong, young people are less likely to get support from parents and carers because they’re worried about getting in trouble,” Hallan said.

Child psychologist Philip Tam said a minimum age of 12 or 13 would have been more enforceable.

“My real fear honestly is that the problem of social media will simply be driven underground,” Tam said.

Australian National University lawyer Associate Prof. Faith Gordon feared separating children from there platforms could create pressures within families.

Albanese said there would be exclusions and exemptions in circumstances such as a need to continue access to educational services.

But parental consent would not entitle a child under 16 to access social media.

Earlier this year, the government began a trial of age-restriciton technologies. Australia’s eSafety Commissioner, the online watchdog that will police compliance, will use the results of that trial to provide platforms with guidance on what reasonable steps they can take.

Communications Minister Michelle Rowland said the year-long lead-in would ensure the age limit could be implemented in a “very practical way.”

“There does need to be enhanced penalties to ensure compliance,” Rowland said.

“Every company that operates in Australia, whether domiciled here or otherwise, is expected and must comply with Australian law or face the consequences,” she added.

The main opposition party has given in-principle support for an age limit at 16.

Opposition lawmaker Paul Fletcher said the platforms already had the technology to enforce such an age ban.

“It’s not really a technical viability question, it’s a question of their readiness to do it and will they incur the cost to do it,” Fletcher told Australian Broadcasting Corp.

“The platforms say: ’It’s all too hard, we can’t do it, Australia will become a backwater, it won’t possibly work.’ But if you have well-drafted legislation and you stick to your guns, you can get the outcomes,” Fletcher added.

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A tiny grain of nuclear fuel is pulled from ruined Japanese nuclear plant, in a step toward cleanup

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TOKYO (AP) — A robot that has spent months inside the ruins of a nuclear reactor at the tsunami-hit Fukushima Daiichi plant delivered a tiny sample of melted nuclear fuel on Thursday, in what plant officials said was a step toward beginning the cleanup of hundreds of tons of melted fuel debris.

The sample, the size of a grain of rice, was placed into a secure container, marking the end of the mission, according to Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings, which manages the plant. It is being transported to a glove box for size and weight measurements before being sent to outside laboratories for detailed analyses over the coming months.

Plant chief Akira Ono has said it will provide key data to plan a decommissioning strategy, develop necessary technology and robots and learn how the accident had developed.

The first sample alone is not enough and additional small-scale sampling missions will be necessary in order to obtain more data, TEPCO spokesperson Kenichi Takahara told reporters Thursday. “It may take time, but we will steadily tackle decommissioning,” Takahara said.

Despite multiple probes in the years since the 2011 disaster that wrecked the. plant and forced thousands of nearby residents to leave their homes, much about the site’s highly radioactive interior remains a mystery.

The sample, the first to be retrieved from inside a reactor, was significantly less radioactive than expected. Officials had been concerned that it might be too radioactive to be safely tested even with heavy protective gear, and set an upper limit for removal out of the reactor. The sample came in well under the limit.

That’s led some to question whether the robot extracted the nuclear fuel it was looking for from an area in which previous probes have detected much higher levels of radioactive contamination, but TEPCO officials insist they believe the sample is melted fuel.

The extendable robot, nicknamed Telesco, first began its mission August with a plan for a two-week round trip, after previous missions had been delayed since 2021. But progress was suspended twice due to mishaps — the first involving an assembly error that took nearly three weeks to fix, and the second a camera failure.

On Oct. 30, it clipped a sample weighting less than 3 grams (.01 ounces) from the surface of a mound of melted fuel debris sitting on the bottom of the primary containment vessel of the Unit 2 reactor, TEPCO said.

Three days later, the robot returned to an enclosed container, as workers in full hazmat gear slowly pulled it out.

On Thursday, the gravel, whose radioactivity earlier this week recorded far below the upper limit set for its environmental and health safety, was placed into a safe container for removal out of the compartment.

The sample return marks the first time the melted fuel is retrieved out of the containment vessel.

Fukushima Daiichi lost its key cooling systems during a 2011 earthquake and tsunami, causing meltdowns in its three reactors. An estimated 880 tons of fatally radioactive melted fuel remains in them.

The government and TEPCO have set a 30-to-40-year target to finish the cleanup by 2051, which experts say is overly optimistic and should be updated. Some say it would take for a century or longer.

Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshimasa Hayashi said there have been some delays but “there will be no impact on the entire decommissioning process.”

No specific plans for the full removal of the fuel debris or its final disposal have been decided.

The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.

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Strong typhoon threatens northern Philippine region still recovering from back-to-back storms

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MANILA, Philippines (AP) — A strong typhoon was forecast to hit the northern Philippines on Thursday, prompting a new round of evacuations in a region still recovering from back-to-back storms a few weeks ago.

Typhoon Yinxing is the 13th to batter the disaster-prone Southeast Asian nation this season.

“I really pity our people but all of them are tough,” Gov. Marilou Cayco of the province of Batanes said by telephone. Her province was ravaged by recent destructive storms and is expected to be affected by Yinxing’s fierce wind and rain.

Tens of thousands of villagers were returning to emergency shelters and disaster-response teams were again put on alert in Cagayan and other northern provinces near the expected path of Yinxing. The typhoon was located about 175 kilometers (109 miles) east of Aparri town in Cagayan province on Thursday morning.

The slow-moving typhoon, locally named Marce, was packing sustained winds of up to 165 kilometers (102 miles) per hour and gusts of up to 205 kph (127 mph) and was forecast to hit or come very near to the coast of Cagayan and outlying islands later Thursday.

The coast guard, army, air force and police were put on alert. Inter-island ferries and cargo services and domestic flights were suspended in northern provinces.

Tropical Storm Trami and Typhoon Kong-rey hit the northern Philippines in recent weeks, leaving at least 151 people dead and affecting nearly 9 million others. More than 14 billion pesos ($241 million) worth of rice, corn and other crops and infrastructure were damaged.

The deaths and destruction from the storms prompted President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. to declare a day of national mourning on Monday when he visited the worst-hit province of Batangas, south of the capital, Manila. At least 61 people perished in the coastal province.

Trami dumped one to two months’ worth of rain in just 24 hours in some regions, including in Batangas.

“We want to avoid the loss of lives due to calamities,” Marcos said in Talisay town in Batangas, where he brought key Cabinet members to reassure storm victims of rapid government help. “Storms nowadays are more intense, extensive and powerful.”

In 2013, Typhoon Haiyan, one of the strongest recorded tropical cyclones, left more than 7,300 people dead or missing, flattened entire villages and caused ships to run aground and smash into houses in the central Philippines.

The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.

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