Military police weren't concerned with Afghan detention

By macleans.ca - Thursday, April 15, 2010 at 4:59 PM - 5 Comments

Though Canadian troops were keen to make sure Afghan detainees weren’t subjected to abuse while in their custody, that concern didn’t extend to how they’d be treated once in Afghan authorities’ hands. According to a senior military policeman testifying before the Military Complaints Commission, Canadian soldiers didn’t consider preventing Afghans from torturing detainees part of their job. “My military policemen had more than enough to do with their own responsibilities,” Lieutenant-Colonel Douglas Boot told the commission Thursday. “We didn’t need to go looking for work.” Boot says the military was instead eager to avoid a repeat of the Somalia scandal, in which a Somali teenager was killed while in Canadian custody. “Our focus was much more on: were [Canadian] soldiers abusing.”

Globe and Mail

"You are the criminals not us"

By macleans.ca - Thursday, April 15, 2010 at 4:51 PM - 0 Comments

It had been months since the latest installment in an anti-Encana letter-writing campaign in northeast B.C., one punctuated here and there by a pipeline bombing, six since October, 2008. But ever since the arrest of northern Alberta environmental activist Wiebo Ludwig in connection with the explosions—police released him almost as quickly as they picked him up—it almost seemed as though authorities had silenced the Encana bomber. Not so. Today, details of the latest missive, sent to the Dawson Creek Daily News newspaper, emerge: “Time-out is over!! The long and ‘hot’ summer is coming. You had enough time to reconsider your actions but you chose to push harass and intimidate people in our territories. We are growing in strength and now ready for actions at all your installations,” reads the letter. “This land belongs to us and our children not to you. You are the criminals not us. Be prepared for action as we intended to fight back with a range you haven’t seen before. Get out of our home lands and stop poisoning us or face the consequences!!”

Calgary Herald

Former prisoners say they were tortured at Bagram airbase

By macleans.ca - Thursday, April 15, 2010 at 4:17 PM - 1 Comment

According to witnesses interviewed by the BBC, Afghan detainees are being tortured at a secret prison at Bagram airbase. Former prisoners at the undocumented site say they were subjected to harsh temperatures and sleep deprivation before being transferred to the base’s main detention center. “They call it the Black Hole,” said Sher Agha who spent six days in the facility last autumn. “When they released us they told us we should not tell our stories to outsiders because that will harm us.” The abuses have all reportedly taken place since the election of Barack Obama, who promised to end U.S.-sanctioned torture of terror suspects and are said to be still occurring.

BBC News

In case this week was lacking anything

By Aaron Wherry - Thursday, April 15, 2010 at 3:44 PM - 91 Comments

Conservative backbencher Rod Bruinooge introduces a bill that would make it illegal to “coerce” someone to have an abortion. The Prime Minister’s Office says it won’t support the legislation.

Mr. Bruinooge, who is chairman of the multiparty pro-life caucus on Parliament Hill, said his bill was not inconsistent with Mr. Harper’s stand. ”This bill doesn’t affect gestational limits or access to abortion in Canada,” he said. “It’s something that, in fact, doesn’t reopen the abortion debate. But it does make it a crime to threaten or intimidate a woman into an abortion.”

Spring house hunting

By macleans.ca - Thursday, April 15, 2010 at 3:32 PM - 7 Comments

Though Canada’s housing market has shown remarkable resilience in past years even as other sectors of the economy have tumbled, a trio of factors appears likely to cool things down over the coming months: a record number of homes entered the market during the first quarter of 2010, meaning buyers will likely spend more time shopping around before bidding on a home; the country’s biggest lenders are starting to hike interest rates after a long stretch at record lows; and the federal government is tightening mortgage eligibility rules, which could leave some potential buyers out in the cold. Still, the pace of sales has been brisk of late and homes are still selling for near-record prices across the country, both of which suggest Canadians have yet to lose their appetite for house shopping.

Click below to see what’s available in some of Canada’s largest markets.

Spring house hunting: What $1 million will get you

By macleans.ca - Thursday, April 15, 2010 at 3:32 PM - 4 Comments

Spring house hunting: What $500,000 will get you

By macleans.ca - Thursday, April 15, 2010 at 3:32 PM - 5 Comments

Spring house hunting: What $350,000 will get you

By macleans.ca - Thursday, April 15, 2010 at 3:32 PM - 0 Comments

Spring house hunting: What $150,000 will get you

By macleans.ca - Thursday, April 15, 2010 at 3:32 PM - 13 Comments

For All You Fergie Olver Fans Across the World

By Jaime Weinman - Thursday, April 15, 2010 at 3:31 PM - 24 Comments

Anybody remember Just Like Mom? I can’t be the only one who watched any cheap Canadian-made game show if there was nothing else on at the time. (For cripe’s sake, I watched Pitfall, and found out only later that it had been canceled years before I ever saw it.) Anyway, the co-host of the show, Fergie Olver, was someone we knew from Blue Jays sportscasts. As a game show host, he was very much in the Gene Rayburn/Richard Dawson tradition, but with a strange extra layer of creepiness, due to 1) The fact that he was complimenting and kissing little girls, and 2) his soothing Mr. Rogers tone of voice. And someone has put together a montage of creepy Fergie moments; it’s been up for a while now, but I only saw it today via New York magazine. Proving once again that Canada doesn’t exist until the U.S. says it does.

I must say, I never noticed the creepiness when I was watching the show at the time; all I really noticed was that the show was kind of boring. I think I preferred Bumper Stumpers.

How I spent my holiday (in Kandahar)

By Paul Wells - Thursday, April 15, 2010 at 3:07 PM - 25 Comments

So here’s where I was last week. My story in the new print edition, on sale today in Ottawa and Toronto and soon elsewhere, recounts my latest trip to Afghanistan. This one was a little different from the last two, a little closer to the ground. While we wait for the story to appear online, probably tomorrow, here are some photos I took while I was there; a few, including the two in which I figure, were taken by Capt. Andrew Chang, the aide-de-camp to Gen. Andrew Leslie, with whom I was travelling.

Volcanic ash disrupts airspace

By macleans.ca - Thursday, April 15, 2010 at 3:04 PM - 5 Comments

Massive clouds of ash belching out of a volcano in Iceland have grounded flights across northern Europe and the U.K. and forced emergency officials to evacuate hundreds away from the glacier near the eruption. The air traffic problem stems from the abrasiveness of the volcanic ash, which is made up of 0.001mm to two mm chunks of volcanic rock, minerals and glass. The gritty particles can sand the paint off a plane’s exterior, completely shut down its engines, and make the flight extremely unpleasant for passengers when sucked into ventilation systems. Travel could be delayed for some time, and could easily be interrupted if the eruptions reoccur—the volcano is expected to continue erupting for days or weeks. This isn’t the first time volcanos have hampered flights, about 100 planes ran into volcanic ash between 1983 and 2000, including two flights that fell several thousands of metres after losing power, narrowly avoiding crashing before their engines restarted.

CBC News

Presidency isn’t hurting Obama’s earning power

By macleans.ca - Thursday, April 15, 2010 at 2:28 PM - 1 Comment

The U.S. President’s official salary is $400,000, but Barack Obama and his wife, Michelle Obama, reported earning $5.5 million last year, and paying $1.792 million in federal income taxes, the White House said today. Most of the money came from sales of Obama’s books. The couple donated $329,100 to 40 different charities, with $50,000 going to CARE and the United Negro College Fund. The Nobel Committee donated Obama’s Nobel Peace Prize money, $1.4 million, directly to charity. The President didn’t have to recognize the prize as income on his tax return.

LA Times

Iranian dissidents run, but can’t hide;

By Michael Petrou - Thursday, April 15, 2010 at 2:20 PM - 0 Comments

AFP/Getty

Iran’s northwestern border with Iraq is mountainous and sparsely populated. It has long been traversed by smugglers. Much of the illegal alcohol Iranians drink is carried over the mountains here. The region is also a popular escape route for political dissidents fleeing the country. Ahmad Batebi, whose face became iconic when the Economist magazine ran a cover photo of him holding up the blood-spattered shirt of a fellow protester, slipped across the border while on temporary leave from prison in 2008. Popular blogger Alireza Rezaei fled by the same route earlier this year. But dissidents who make it into Iraqi Kurdistan are not free from threats by the Iranian government. Iran has a consulate in the northern Iraqi city of Erbil, and Iranian dissidents say Iranian security agents are active there.

“I have been threatened so many times that I’ve lost track,” Hoomam Sadiyeh, an activist from the mainly Kurdish city of Mahabad in northwest Iran, told Maclean’s. Sadiyeh has been in northern Iraq since 2004. Late last year he received an email from a sender identifying himself as Habib: “Silly boy, you might think we won’t be able to reach you, but we can reach you a lot easier than you might think. Also we know who your fiancée is and when she might be returning. We don’t want to hurt anyone. So stop what you’re doing.”

Another Iranian dissident in Iraq, who asked not to be identified because his family is still in Iran, recently received a threatening email from his former prison interrogator.

Sadiyeh said the flow of Iranian dissidents into Iraq increased after the 2009 presidential election and the crackdown that followed it. He said the pressure to which these activists are subject in Iraq has had an effect. Many have stopped their political activities. Others have fled to Europe, some illegally. Sadiyeh had originally planned to stay in Iraq. Now he, too, has registered with the United Nations as a refugee and hopes to live elsewhere.

More on Iranian efforts to establish networks in the West

By Michael Petrou - Thursday, April 15, 2010 at 2:07 PM - 4 Comments

The Australian reports on allegations that the Iranian embassy in Canberra spies on Iranian pro-democracy activists in Australia.

In a separate article, it discusses Tehran’s practice of funding Islamic centres and universities in Australia. The Australian National University, for example, received more than $500,000 from the Iranian government. The article also explores the presence of agents from the Iranian proxy Hezbollah in Australia. Continue…

Halifax’s insurance industry is expected to grow 25 per cent

By Tom Henheffer - Thursday, April 15, 2010 at 2:00 PM - 0 Comments

Insurance is big business in Nova Scotia. According to a recent Conference Board of Canada study, the industry directly contributed about $470 million in GDP to the provincial economy in 2008, and is expected to grow by 25 per cent in the next three years. With around 4,500 people (up 20 per cent since 2005) currently working for one of more than 360 insurance businesses, Halifax has the second-highest concentration per capita of insurance employees of any Canadian city (only Regina has more). And the jobs pay well, too. The average insurance industry worker in Nova Scotia earns $51,000, which is 38 per cent higher than the provincial average. “It doesn’t make a lot of noise but it’s been one of the fastest growing sectors of our economy for a long time,” says Fred Morley, chief economist with the Greater Halifax Partnership, an organization dedicated to attracting new companies to the city.

An insurance hub since the early 1800s, Halifax has the infrastructure needed to encourage and maintain growth. Being centrally located between Toronto, London and New York, Halifax provides workers the opportunity to live in a low-cost region and be just a short flight from major business capitals. That’s helped entice large international companies—including Admiral Insurance, a British firm—to set up shop. Richard Nason, an associate professor of finance at Dalhousie University, says insurance is one of the few industries that hires students straight out of school, making Halifax—with its six universities—a hotbed for new talent. A real benefit for an industry that, as noted in the Conference Board’s report, is faced with an aging workforce.

And, says Nason, the city is a great place for young workers to settle down, offering a small-town setting with big-city benefits. “You get to have your cake and eat it too,” he says.

It’s pirate season on the high seas

By Kate Lunau - Thursday, April 15, 2010 at 2:00 PM - 0 Comments

Last week, in a brazen attack, a gang of Somali pirates took on a U.S. Navy frigate. The caper predictably backfired, but it’s another episode in the long-running narrative of piracy in the anarchic waters off the African country’s shore—and it won’t be the last. U.S. officials warn that piracy attacks are expected to increase as the Indian Ocean enters a period of relatively calm weather.

The April 1 incident took place off the western coast of the Seychelles. The USS Nicholas, working in support of U.S. Africa Command, exchanged fire with a skiff before chasing it down. Finding ammunition and cans of fuel onboard, officials arrested three suspected pirates (along with two more on the mothership, which was also confiscated) before sinking the vessel. It was just one of a spate of attacks; according to the European Union’s naval force, the rate of pirate activity in March was double that of September to November. Earlier this week there was another major attack, as pirates hijacked a South Korean oil tanker.

Last week, the U.S. Maritime Administration warned of increased piracy off the Horn of Africa and in the Indian Ocean: “Mariners must be vigilant and prepare for potential attacks,” warned David T. Matsuda, acting maritime administrator, attributing this to the end of monsoon season and the increased range of recent incidents. What to do with captured pirates is another problem. Naval officials said those captured by the USS Nicholas would remain on board until officials determined how to deal with them. The EU is also in search of a solution. Kenya agreed to try those captured by the EU naval force, but the country now holds over 100 pirates and says it can’t take any more. The bulk of the problem will likely have to be handled on shore: until Somalia, whose government collapsed in 1991, achieves stability, stopping the marine criminals will be difficult.

Tea Partiers: wealthy and smart?

By macleans.ca - Thursday, April 15, 2010 at 1:48 PM - 16 Comments

Tea Party supporters: down-and-out Americans raising confederate flags from the roll-down windows of their mobile homes, right? Not exactly. A New New York Times/CBS poll found that, in fact, Tea Partiers are richer and more educated than the average American. The poll shows that the average Tea Party supporter is “Republican, white, male, married and older than 45.” So what exactly sets a Tea Partier apart from an ordinary Republican backer? The Tea Partier is more likely to describe Barack Obama as “very liberal,” more likely to say he is “angry” with Washington, and more likely to think that the government is making too much of the issues facing African Americans. Six out of ten believe that “America’s best years are behind us.”

New York Times

The next green energy boom: roofs

By Peter Shawn Taylor - Thursday, April 15, 2010 at 1:40 PM - 5 Comments

Denis Balibouse/Reuters

Searching for the latest land rush? Look up. But not too far up. In Ontario, rooftops have become a boom town all their own. Green energy policies announced last year by the Ontario government have turned rooftop solar power installations into can’t-miss money-makers. And that’s caused a mad rush to secure the rights to roofs across the province.

Ontario promises to pay up to 80.2 cents per kilowatt hour (kWh) for electricity generated by rooftop solar panels. This price, called a feed-in tariff, is guaranteed for 20 years. While residents currently pay as little as 4.4 cents per kWh for their power, the cost of these large solar subsidies will eventually work their way into future rates, pushing them up. Still, there’s been little in the way of opposition.

“This is an incredible opportunity,” says Justin Woodward, director of solar development at Greta Energy Inc, one of many firms now roaming the province looking to lease roof space. “But it is getting more and more crowded.” With the best locations quickly depleting, Woodward has been looking to smaller centres for virgin roofs. Greta typically offers 40 cents per square foot in annual lease payments for the right to put up panels. “This was just empty space for building owners. Now it can be generating income,” Woodward says. It’s such a sweet deal, everyone wants a piece of the action. Loblaw Co. Ltd., the food retailing giant, plans to turn 136 of its stores into rooftop generators. And one Toronto home builder provides rooftop hookups on its new houses, with the prospect of $1,200 in annual lease payments for homeowners who sign solar power deals.

The only question now is how long the rooftop land rush will last. In Europe, solar power feed-in tariffs are under fire for being overly generous. Spain is looking to drop its future rates 30 to 40 per cent. And Germany just implemented a 10 per cent cut but is considering further reductions as well. For this boom, there may well be a dark cloud on the horizon.

A family that’s too big to fail?

By Jason Kirby - Thursday, April 15, 2010 at 1:40 PM - 1 Comment

Wayne Glowacki/Winnipeg Free Press

In the span of 10 years, Winnipeg’s Asper clan saw much of its $3.5-billion investment in the newspaper business wiped out. Canwest’s television properties have been hemorrhaging viewers and cash for years. Now, after succumbing to its crushing debt load, the Aspers’ company is being carved up and sold off. Not exactly a track record to instill confidence. But when the Aspers, avid free-market proponents, need money these days, they’ve found a willing source of funds—Manitoba taxpayers.

Last week, Manitoba agreed to a deal with David Asper’s Creswin Properties that will see it cough up funds to build a new $115-million stadium for the Winnipeg Blue Bombers. The money comes in the form of a $90-million loan and a $15-million grant. If Asper repays the loan by 2016 with proceeds from a planned mall next door, he’ll gain control of the CFL team. If not, taxpayers in Manitoba, which faces a $545-million deficit this year, could wind up holding the bill.

Even before the stadium deal, local governments were heavily into another Asper project—the Canadian Museum for Human Rights, a dream conceived by patriarch Izzy Asper before his death. In addition to $120 million in capital and operating funds from Ottawa, Manitoba is on the hook for more than $50 million. Not surprisingly, critics have panned the terms of the stadium deal. “[Premier Greg Selinger] is out of control and running around like a backup quarterback throwing political Hail Marys,” said Opposition Conservative Leader Hugh McFadyen. “It appears Mr. Selinger is turning the government into a lender of last resort for projects that nobody else wants to finance.”

Manitobans had better hope the family’s business track record improves. With so much taxpayer money on the line, the Aspers are looking like they’re too big to fail.

The Games get more political

By Rachel Mendleson - Thursday, April 15, 2010 at 1:24 PM - 0 Comments

Bruce Bennet/Getty

During the Vancouver Olympics, Canadians basked in the collective glory of patriotism; even party politics gave way to communal revelry. But now questions have emerged about whether government officials, many of whom enjoyed free tickets or priority access to Olympic tickets, deserved VIP status at the party.

In Ottawa, Conservative senators and MPs bought 211 tickets (including 76 for hockey—and four for the men’s gold medal final) from the block reserved by Canadian Heritage, while opposition representatives steered clear of the benefit, arguing that politicians shouldn’t get to jump the line. The Tories have since accused the Liberals, who were in power when the multi-party agreement regarding tickets to the Vancouver Games was struck, of being hypocritical for not purchasing from the block. Joyce Murray, Liberal critic for the Olympics, dismissed the charge as “petty politics.”

Meanwhile, in Vancouver, a report indicates that the city spent $36,155 on tickets for city councillors and park board trustees—over $10,000 more than it spent on seats for local athletes and Olympians. Ellen Woodsworth, one of three city councillors who declined free tickets, has ripped the program as a waste of resources. But Nelson Wiseman, a Canadian politics expert at the University of Toronto, says “it’s not wholly unreasonable” for local politicians to receive free tickets because they are heavily invested in the event. And he doesn’t have a problem with MPs getting priority access either. “They are VIPs,” he says. “As long as they paid for their tickets, it’s kosher.”

An Olympic presence has long been important to government—whether or not Canada plays host. Sheila Copps, the heritage minister under Jean Chrétien, says that at the time, the Liberals offered free Olympic tickets to a delegation that included the minister of state for sport, opposition critics and parliamentary assistants. “What better way to build support for sport investment,” she says, “than to have parliamentarians see how the investment is spent?”

Plugging in the car of the future

By Kate Lunau - Thursday, April 15, 2010 at 1:09 PM - 1 Comment

For those concerned about the environment, or about the price of gas, plug-in cars—which recharge by plugging into the wall—have long been the dream. Now, we might actually start to see some of them on the road: Toyota’s trying out its new plug-in Prius in several Canadian cities, and Chrysler’s working on a plug-in hybrid version of the Dodge Ram pickup truck, with the help of a Mississauga, Ont.-based company, Electrovaya Inc.

Despite Toyota’s recent woes, the Prius remains a bright spot (March sales of the hybrid were up 130 per cent) with room for improvement. Plug-ins would be able to travel further than current generation hybrids on just electric power, says Peter Frise, scientific director and CEO of Canadian automotive research network AUTO21. “If you lived eight or nine kilometres from work, and were driving just on city streets, you could theoretically drive the car all week” just on battery power, he notes, recharging by “plugging into the wall at night.”

So why the holdup? The challenge in designing electric vehicles “has historically been the battery,” says Gitanjali DasGupta, manager of electric vehicles for Electrovaya, which will supply Chrysler with batteries for the Ram. Cars need space for “luggage, kids and groceries, but the larger the battery, the further you go electrically.” Advances in lithium batteries—which helped make cellphones and computers smaller and sleeker—are making plug-in vehicles possible, DasGupta says.

Toyota’s tests may go a long way in convincing skeptics that pricey plug-in hybrids can work. It’s lending five plug-in Priuses for testing to 13 partners across Canada, including the cities of Vancouver and Toronto, the University of Manitoba, Hydro-Québec and AUTO21. Each will be fitted with a device to capture data on how the vehicle performs. If all goes to plan, the plug-in Prius might be commercially available as soon as 2012.

'We are not saying very much'

By Aaron Wherry - Thursday, April 15, 2010 at 1:04 PM - 15 Comments

I asked Mr. Gillani’s spokesman, Brian Kilgore, if Mr. Gillani had any comment on last night’s report from CTV. Here is the response.

You probably know Nazim Gillani has been “invited” by a Hourse of Commons committee to appear before it on April 28.

This idea of House of Commons committees is new to us — Nazim is a business man, not a politician — and so we are treating this, at least for the next few days, as being similar to the idea of  a matter being “before the courts” and thus we are not saying very much.

Remember, the CTV report said others had said Nazim spoke about various things, and CTV was clear in saying there was no confirmation that pictures actually existed, or other items in the allegations were true.

Even local radio in Toronto this morning was careful to include phrasing saying there was no confirmation of the story about any (alleged) photos.

And our position is that with the court proceding on the 21st and the House of Commons committee on the 28th that we should not say anything because of the before the courts / Parliament restrictions.

Holly Elizabeth Bartlett 1978-2010

By Jen Cutts - Thursday, April 15, 2010 at 12:40 PM - 5 Comments

Holly Elizabeth Bartlett was born in Halifax on Dec. 26, 1978, to Wayne, a self-taught carpenter and construction worker, and Marion, a cashier manager. Holly was a second daughter for the Bartletts; older sister Kim was four when she was born, and a third daughter, Amanda, followed in 1981. Holly was born with a condition called microphthalmia, characterized by small, underdeveloped eyes, and was completely blind in one eye, with some vision in the other. She began wearing thick glasses as a toddler and found ways to keep up with her sisters—pulling a stool right up to the TV to play Nintendo, or using her limited light and colour perception to ride her bike.

Holly was a “tiny little thing” (only growing to four foot eleven and weighing under 100 lb.) and had a protector in Kim, who’d offer a piece of her mind to anyone who dared tease her little sister. But “that was her biggest beef with me,” says Kim. “She said it made it worse for her, that she didn’t want to be looked at as different.”

Between the ages of 12 and 13, Holly rapidly lost nearly all of what little sight she had. She was discouraged for the first year or so, says Amanda, but was soon “always the first to crack a joke” about her disability: Amanda recalls Holly teasing her for fumbling a ball at a baseball game by shouting, “What’s wrong with you? Even I could see that!” In Grade 9, Holly attended Sir Frederick Fraser, a school for the blind, where she learned how to safely orient herself using a cane. Meeting other blind students brought out a new confidence in Holly, says Kim. She began to apply herself at school and started taking horseback riding lessons. After a year at Sir Fred, Holly joined her sisters at Prince Andrew High School, and graduated with several awards, including the Walter and Wayne Gretzky Scholarship.

That fall, Holly enrolled at St. Francis Xavier University in Anti­gonish, N.S., bringing along a new guide dog. “We drove her and Willow down, over two hours away from home, and left her there,” says Amanda. “We saw her at Christmas, maybe Thanksgiving. She wanted to do everything on her own.” (Holly did allow for some orientation to the campus with the Canadian National Institute for the Blind, which also helped with having her textbooks translated into Braille.) In her second year, Holly moved off campus with friends, and later travelled to Guatemala and Mexico as part of volunteer research teams. She graduated on the dean’s list in 2002.

Continue…