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Biden pick Ajay Banga cleared to take top job at World Bank

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 16:11:40 GMT

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Biden administration’s choice to run the World Bank — former Mastercard CEO Ajay Banga — appears to have a lock on the job.The World Bank said Thursday that Banga was the only candidate nominated in a search that began more than a month ago. The current president of the 189-nation poverty-fighting organization, David Malpass, announced last month that he would step down in June, nearly a year before his five-year term was due to expire in April 2024.The World Bank is under pressure to do more to help poor countries finance projects to combat and prepare for climate change without saddling them with heavy debts. And critics say it needs to do a better job of tackling problems that cross borders such as providing pandemic surveillance and backing broad vaccination programs.Banga, currently vice chairman at private equity firm General Atlantic, has more than 30 years of business experience, having served in various roles at Mastercard and the boards of the A...

Coroner rules against officer’s ‘suicide by cop’ theory for Sammy Yatim inquest

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 16:11:40 GMT

A coroner has denied a request from a former Toronto police officer to explore a theory that a distraught teen he shot was committing “suicide by cop.”The coroner presiding over the inquest into Sammy Yatim’s death ruled there is no evidence for James Forcillo’s argument that the teen tried to cause his own death through a police interaction, and expert evidence on the theory will not be included in the proceeding.The inquest was set to begin in November 2022 but was derailed when Forcillo submitted a last-minute motion arguing the proceeding should consider the theory and examine evidence like the teen’s text messages and web browsing history.Lawyers for Yatim’s family had argued the motion was an abuse of process that blamed the teen for his own death without evidence to support the assertion.Forcillo shot Yatim multiple times in July 2013 while the teen was holding a small knife on an empty streetcar.The shooting triggered widespread public out...

ESG reporting expectations on suppliers growing: BDC

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 16:11:40 GMT

MONTREAL — A new report finds that small and medium suppliers face growing expectations from their larger customers to report on environmental, social and governance (ESG) standards.The Business Development Bank of Canada (BDC) survey of 121 large companies and public-sector buyers found that already, 82 per cent require some disclosure from their suppliers on ESG, but that’s expected to grow to 92 per cent by 2024.The entrepreneur-focused BDC says three-quarters of the large organizations surveyed also said that over the next five years they plan to increase their ESG expectations on a range of areas like energy use, diversity in hiring and environmental risk management.The rising standards on smaller companies come as big companies are under pressure from investors to report a more detailed ESG picture across their entire supply chains.The bank says that in a separate survey of 1,251 small- and medium-sized companies, three-quarters said adopting ESG practices had benefited ...

Inquiry calls for changes to clarify relationship between RCMP, federal government

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 16:11:40 GMT

OTTAWA — A public inquiry is calling for a clearer definition of the relationship between the federal minister of public safety and the commissioner of the RCMP. The Mass Casualty Commission, which examined the circumstances and aftermath of the April 2020 mass shooting in Nova Scotia, says the RCMP Act should clarify that the top Mountie acts according to written directions of the minister, instead of under the minister’s direction.During the inquiry’s public hearings, a number of senior members of the Nova Scotia RCMP accused then-commissioner Brenda Lucki and former public safety minister Bill Blair of political interference in the investigation. That stemmed from a teleconference 10 days after the massacre in which Lucki referenced federal gun control legislation and expressed frustration with local RCMP over their communication with the public, especially about details of the weapons used in the killing. It resulted in weeks of political squabbling in Ottawa over wh...

Gov’t to start looking for bias in small business lending

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 16:11:40 GMT

NEW YORK (AP) — Banks will need to start reporting the demographics and income of small business loan applicants under new rules published by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau on Thursday.It’s a move that policymakers hope will lead to less discrimination and more transparency in the small business lending market, similar to how other laws have regulated the residential mortgage market for decades.Under the Dodd-Frank Act, Congress mandated the bureau to start collecting data on small business lending decisions to look for patterns of discrimination. Implementation of the rule has taken more than a decade, and the bureau was sued by the California Reinvestment Coalition for its failure to start collecting this data. Bank regulators have for decades collected data on residential mortgage applicants — including race, geography, whether the loan was approved and the interest rate — under a 1970s era law known as the Home Mortgage Disclosure Act. The data collected under HM...

US Mideast envoy hopeful Saudi-Iran détente will help region

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 16:11:40 GMT

KHARTOUM, Sudan (AP) — The Biden administration is hopeful that warming ties between Iran and Saudi Arabia will help deescalate conflicts and crises across the Middle East, a senior U.S. diplomat said Thursday.The détente between the two regional heavyweights could help bring Yemen’s nine-year civil war to an end, Barbara Leaf said. Earlier this month, Riyadh and Tehran agreed to re-establish diplomatic relations after seven years of rupture — a move that stirred cautious optimism across the region. “The first order is to see whether Iran will live up to its commitments in terms of Yemen,” Leaf said, stressing that Tehran needs to stop the “lethal aid” it provides its allies.Earlier this month, the Wall Street Journal reported that Iran had agreed to stop arming Tehran’s allies in Yemen — the Shiite Houthi rebels who are fighting a Saudi-led coalition in the Arab world’s most impoverished country — as part of the deal.In 2014, the Iran-backed Houthis seized Yemen’s...

US: North Korea engaged in arms-for-food deal with Russia

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 16:11:40 GMT

WASHINGTON (AP) — The White House on Thursday said it has new evidence that Russia is looking again to North Korea for weapons to fuel the war in Ukraine, this time in a deal that would provide Pyongyang with needed food and other commodities in return.It’s the latest accusation that Russia, desperate for weaponry and restricted by sanctions and export controls, is turning to “rogue” nations to help it continue to prosecute the 13-month-old war.“As part of this proposed deal, Russia would receive over two dozen kinds of weapons and munitions from Pyongyang,” White House National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said. “We also understand that Russia is seeking to send a delegation to North Korea and that Russia is offering North Korea food in exchange for munitions.”The administration has previously declassified intelligence to present evidence that Iran sold hundreds of attack drones to Russia over the summer and that the Wagner Group, a private Russian military company, ...

Timeline of April 2020 Nova Scotia mass shooting

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 16:11:40 GMT

TRURO, N.S. — The final report released Thursday into the 2020 Nova Scotia mass shooting chronicles minute by minute how the tragedy unfolded.—After 9 p.m. on April 18, the killer’s rampage began when he violently assaulted his partner, Lisa Banfield.Gabriel Wortman handcuffed Banfield in the back of his replica police cruiser. He told her he would kill her if she tried to run away.He poured gasoline throughout the home they shared in Portapique, N.S., before lighting it and his warehouse on fire.Banfield pulled off one handcuff, escaped through the front window and ran to nearby woods, where she hid overnight.At 10 p.m. the killer drove his replica cruiser to his neighbours Greg and Jamie Blair’s house.He shot and killed Greg Blair on the deck. Jamie Blair instructed their two children to hide and called the police at 10:01 p.m. She told police Wortman drove to her home in a replica police car and killed her husband.Wortman fatally shot Jamie. The two children hiding in...

College ends partnership with school over ‘David’ issue

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 16:11:40 GMT

HILLSDALE, Mich. (AP) — A Michigan college has ended its partnership with a Florida charter school whose principal was forced to resign after a parent complained sixth graders were exposed to pornography during a lesson on Renaissance art that included Michelangelo’s “David” sculpture.A Hillsdale College spokesperson said Tallahassee Classical School no longer is affiliated with the small, Christian classical liberal arts college in southern Michigan, MLive.com reported Thursday.“This drama around teaching Michelangelo’s ‘David’ sculpture, one of the most important works of art in existence, has become a distraction from, and a parody of, the actual aims of classical education,” spokesperson Emily Stack Davis wrote in a statement. “Of course, Hillsdale’s K-12 art curriculum includes Michelangelo’s ‘David’ and other works of art that depict the human form.”Tallahassee Classical School was licensed to use Hillsdale’s classical education curriculum, but its license was “rev...

Dior transforms Mumbai’s Gateway of India into fashion ramp

Published Thu, 20 Feb 2025 16:11:40 GMT

MUMBAI (AP) — In a glittering splash of luxury fashion Thursday, Dior transformed Mumbai’s grand, historic Gateway of India monument into a runway laden with celebrity, beauty and craftsmanship.Flanked by the brightly lit, iconic Taj Mahal Hotel, the spectacular decor turned the heritage site in India’s entertainment and business capital into a blend of color and style as the models lined up to showcase the Paris fashion house’s 2023 pre-fall collection.The runway, lined with traditional Indian floral designs, reverberated with fusion beats from live musicians as Indian artistry and craftsmanship took center stage in creative director Maria Grazia Chiuri’s collection.The lineup featured silk dresses, evening coats and sari-inspired skirts that referenced traditional Indian silhouettes. The show opened with an array of neutrals, subtly transitioning to forest green before giving way to a blaze of bright colors and patterns. Throughout it all, most of the models sported strings ...