Italy to open Europe’s first marine sanctuary for dolphins

More #Canadians are signing up to serve in the military, The Canadian Armed Forces are seeing a surge of recruits graduating from basic training at the Leadership and Recruit school in St-Jean-Sur-Richelieu, Quebec.

This marks a sea change after years of missing targets and grappling with how to get more Canadians signed up to serve. Five platoons recently took part in the parade marking graduation after eight weeks of instructors putting 204 would-be soldiers, sailors, aviators and new officers through their paces.

“This year, we put on 7,600 basic training seats, which is the most we’ve ever run,” says Commandant Marc Kieley. “This is the most we have ever run in the post-Cold War history of the Canadian Forces.”

Twenty-two-year-old Private Erica Jerome-Valdez was among recruits from across the country marching in the parade attended by hundreds of family members and friends.

“I think the Canadian Forces worked really hard to improve their image and also diversity,” says Jerome-Valdez. “I think it has become a more welcoming environment for different people.”

Despite efforts to address sexual misconduct in the armed forces, only 18 per cent of applicants are women. But overall, changes made in recent years are helping beef up military ranks, including the Ottawa putting more money on the table.

In August, Prime Minister Mark Carney announced pay raises retroactive to April 1, 2025, including a 20 per cent wage increase for privates in the Regular Force. A new Military Service Pay benefit and additional compensative initiatives were also added.

“Every member of the CAF works really hard,” says Jerome-Valdez. “I think it’s fair that we are getting that improvement in conditions and salary. I think that is also helping to bring more people in.”

The recruitment process was also streamlined.

In October, an Auditor General’s report looking at recruitment from 2022 to 2025 concluded the military did not bring in enough applicants to meet its operational need. There is still a gap, but it is starting to close.

“There is a common misconception that most people joining are between the ages of 18 and 22,” says Captain David White and instructor at the Canadian Forces Leadership and Recruit School. “We do skew towards a younger side, however a lot of candidates that we see coming through are in their late 20’s, late 30’s, and even in their 40’s.”

Geopolitical tensions have drawn attention to securing Canada’s sovereignty, including a focus on defending the North. The federal government is also planning a major cash infusion into the military over the next four years. That has contributed to boosting numbers but also changing the face of just who is signing up.

Traditionally, most recruits hailed from military families.

Private Logan McMackin from New Brunswick, for instance, followed in his grandfather Thomas McMackin’s footsteps. He served in the Second World War.

“My middle name is Thomas too,” he says. “I really looked up to him. My dad always told me stories about him and how strong he was and cool. It is super inspiring to chase that kind of life, and a disciplined lifestyle.”

But many other recruits now have no military ties.

“It’s wonderful to have second and third and fourth generation CAF members,” says Kieley. “But having Canadians and new Canadians with no family history of the military suddenly showing up in greater numbers, saying they know there is a need to defend the country, is great. They know there is a need to support Canadian security and the security of our values. They are coming in as the very first person in their family or friend group to serve. It is a definite change.”

The Leadership and Recruit’s school mission now is to continue the trend.

How the U.K.’s ancient stones are drawing renewed awareness of the sacred.

PENZANCE, England — On a gray afternoon in November, a group of 19 people gathered outside the Church of St. Buryan, an iconic medieval parish with a 92-foot granite tower that dominates the skyline.

Clad in raincoats, reflective vests, waterproof boots with some holding wooden staffs, these residents of Cornwall, England’s coastal southwestern county, were ready for a different kind of spiritual experience — not in the church, but a stone circle.

Carolyn Kennett, an astronomer leading a 3.2-mile hike to the stone circle Boscawen-Ûn, explained why she organized the trip for Nov. 5, the full moon. She was curious to see whether the moon rising opposite the sun cast a particular light on the taller inclining stone — the only one made of quartz.

“It would have been a really nice thing to have seen,” she told the group, motioning to the overcast sky. “We’re just going to hopefully have to imagine it, but you never know, we might get a small gap.”

The group assembled before her was undeterred. With one or two exceptions, they had trekked to Boscawen-Ûn multiple times.

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This content is written and produced by Religion News Service and distributed by The Associated Press. RNS and AP partner on some religion news content. RNS is solely responsible for this story.

An international body tasked with governing Gaza will be announced by the end of year, officials say.


DOHA, Qatar — An international body tasked with governing the Gaza Strip under the next phase of the U.S.-brokered ceasefire is expected to be announced by the end of the year, an Arab official and a Western diplomat said Friday.

According to the ceasefire agreement, the authority — known as the Board of Peace and chaired by U.S. President Donald Trump — is to oversee Gaza’s reconstruction under a two-year, renewable UN mandate.

It will include about a dozen other Middle Eastern and Western leaders, the Arab official and the Western diplomat told The Associated Press, speaking on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak on the matter.
The path forward for Gaza

Also to be announced is a committee of Palestinian technocrats who will run the day-to-day administration of post-war Gaza, they two said. The Western diplomat, who spoke to the AP over the phone from Cairo, said the announcement about this will likely happen when Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu meet later this month.

The ceasefire deal also calls for an armed International Stabilization Force to keep security and ensure the disarming of the militant Hamas group, a key demand of Israel.

The announcement would be a significant step forward in implementing Trump’s 20-point plan for the territory devastated by Israel’s two-year campaign against Hamas.

The shaky ceasefire, which came into effect on Oct. 10, has been tested by outbursts of violence and accusations by both sides of violations of the truce. The first phase of the ceasefire has neared completion, though Hamas is still to hand over the remains of a last Israel hostage called for under the deal.

The Arab official said that talks are still ongoing over which countries will take part in the international force for Gaza but that he expects deployment will begin in the first quarter of 2026.

A U.S. official gave a similar timeline, saying that “boots on the ground” could be a reality in early 2026. The official spoke to the AP on the same condition of anonymity. Axios first reported the anticipated announcement on Thursday.

The Arab official said that “extensive talks” will start immediately with Hamas and Israel on the details of the second phase, which he expects to be tough.

Those talks are expected the tackle the issue of disarming Hamas, a step the militant group has not yet agreed to. The plan also calls for Israeli forces to withdraw from the roughly half of the Gaza Strip that they still control as the international force deploys.

Funding for a rebuilding plan for the Gaza Strip still has not been determined. Some Palestinians have expressed concern over the apparent lack of a Palestinian voice in the body and the lack of a firm promise in the plan that they will eventually gain statehood.

Netanyahu’s government rejects the creation of a Palestinian state, and the U.S.-brokered deal includes only a vague provision that a pathway toward statehood may be possible if certain conditions are met.
Israel’s plan to open a Gaza border crossing with Egypt

Israel announced on Wednesday that it plans to reopen the Rafah border crossing between Gaza and Egypt in the coming days, allowing Palestinians to leave the devastated strip as laid out by the ceasefire agreement. That could be a major development for residents, for whom leaving has been extremely difficult — if not impossible — for most of the war.

However, the governments of Egypt, Jordan, United Arab Emirates, Indonesia, Pakistan, Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Qatar all expressed “deep concern” on Friday about the plan.

A dispute also emerged between Egypt and Israel — Cairo wants Palestinians to be able to return to Gaza through the crossing and says it would only be opened if movement is allowed both ways. Israel has said that Palestinians will not be able to return to Gaza through the crossing until the last hostages’ remains are returned from Gaza.

In a joint statement, the foreign ministers of the eight countries said the Rafah crossing must be open in both directions to allow for “freedom of movement” for Palestinians. They also expressed concern that if Palestinians were to leave Gaza, they might not be allowed to return.

The ministers underscored “their absolute rejection of any attempts to expel the Palestinian people from their land,” they wrote.
A rising death toll

On Friday, Israel’s military said it killed a man in northern Gaza who was approaching the troops with another man, both of whom were “carrying suspicious objects.”

Israeli forces also killed another man in the occupied West Bank. The Palestinian Health Ministry said a 38-year-old was shot by Israeli forces in the northern West Bank while the military said the man threw a rock at soldiers.

The killings mark the latest violence in the Palestinian territories, which has fueled concern that it could shake Gaza’s fragile truce.

The latest Israel-Hamas war started when Hamas-led militants attacked southern Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, killing around 1,200 people and taking more than 250 others hostage. Israel’s subsequent campaign in Gaza has killed more than 70,100 Palestinians, according to the Gaza Health Ministry. The ministry, which operates under the Hamas-run government, is staffed by medical professionals and maintains detailed records viewed as generally reliable by the international community.

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Associated Press writers Josef Federman in Doha, Qatar, and Megan Janetsky in Jerusalem contributed to this report.

Samy Magdy, The Associated Press

Burn and fire hazard’: More than 16,000 wireless earbuds recalled, A brand of wireless earbuds sold in Canada is being recalled due to burn and fire hazards.

An alert on Health Canada’s website advises anyone who owns a pair of True Wireless Earbuds to immediately stop using them and return the product to a Giant Tiger store for a refund.

The issue with the earbuds is a result of the USB charging cords being manufactured with the wrong wiring material. As a result, the product may overheat when plugged into a charger, leading to a risk of burns or fires.

There have been three reports of incidents in Canada since Nov. 27, though no reports of injuries.

There were 16,278 units of the affected product sold in Canada, according to the company.

The UPC is 774223568363 and SKU is 1545426, information which can be found on the packaging. The product was sold between July 17 and Oct. 14, 2025.

Any products purchased before then are excluded from the recall, including those that show a label for lot number 11012025.

Damaged roads and debris slow relief operations after deadly floods in Asia.


ACEH TAMIANG, Indonesia — Emergency crews were racing against time on Friday after last week’s catastrophic floods and landslides struck parts of Asia, killing more than 1,500 people. Relief operations are underway, but the scale of need is overwhelming the capabilities of rescuers.

Authorities said 867 people were confirmed dead in Indonesia, 486 in Sri Lanka and 185 in Thailand, as well as three in Malaysia.

Many villages in Indonesia and Sri Lanka remained buried under mud and debris, with nearly 900 people still unaccounted for in both countries, while recovery was further along in Thailand and Malaysia.

As the waters recede, survivors find that the disaster has crippled their villages’ lifelines. Roads that once connected the cities and districts to the outside world are severed, leaving some areas accessible only by helicopter. Transmission towers collapsed under the weight of landslides, plunging communities into darkness and causing internet outages.

In Aceh Tamiang, the hardest-hit area in Aceh province, infrastructure is in ruins. Entire villages in the lush hills district lie submerged beneath a thick blanket of mud. More than 260,000 residents fled homes once on green farmland.

With wells contaminated and pipes shattered, the floodwaters have turned necessities into luxuries. Food is scarce, and the stench of decay hangs heavily in the air.

Helicopters began deploying to drop food, medicine, and blankets into Aceh Tamiang’s isolated pockets, where clean water, sanitation and shelter top the list of urgent priorities. For many, survival hinges on the speed of aid.

Trucks carrying relief supplies crawl along roads connecting North Sumatra’s Medan city to Aceh Tamiang, which reopened almost a week after the disaster, but distribution is slowed by debris on the roads, said National Disaster Management Agency’s spokesperson Abdul Muhari.

Television reports showed widespread devastation in Aceh Tamiang after flash floods tore through the area, with cars overturned and homes badly damaged. Animal carcasses are scattered among the debris.

Two hospitals and 15 community health centers stood idle. Medical teams improvised in crowded shelters, battling shortages of medicine and staff as waterborne diseases loom.

On a battered bridge spanning the swollen Tamiang River, families cling to survival under makeshift tarpaulins. Children shiver in damp clothes. A survivor there, Vira, broke down in tears, “We have nothing left,” she cried.

“We drank floodwater from discarded bottles and scavenged for scraps ... whatever the current carried to us,” Vira, who goes by a single name, said in a television interview on Thursday.

Another resident, Angga, recounted how he and 13 relatives and neighbors clung to the tin roof of a shattered building for four nights.

“Even now, eight days after the floods erased our village, no aid has reached us — no helicopters, no rescue teams,” Angga said. “We had no choice but to drink the very water that destroyed our homes.”

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Karmini reported from Jakarta. Krishan Francis in Colombo, Sri Lanka, contributed reporting.

Binsar Bakkara And Niniek Karmini, The Associated Press

Microsoft co-founder and philanthropist Bill Gates told AFP on Thursday it is “tragic” that child deaths will increase worldwide for the first time this century because wealthy Western countries have slashed international aid.

The United States has cut the deepest, with Gates saying fellow billionaire Elon Musk’s so-called U.S. Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) was “responsible for a lot of deaths”.

However Britain, France and Germany have also “disproportionately” slashed aid, Gates, a major funder of numerous global health programmes, said in a video interview from Seattle.

The cuts mean that the number of children dying before their fifth birthday is projected to increase to 4.8 million this year, up 200,000 since 2024, according to the Gates Foundation’s annual Goalkeepers report released Thursday.

Gates said it was a “tragedy” to see child mortality rise after it had steadily fallen from around 10 million annual deaths at the turn of the millenium.

Aid for developing countries has plummeted by 27 per cent this year, threatening progress against a range of diseases including malaria, HIV and polio, the report said.

If global aid cuts of around 30 per cent are permanent, 16 million more children could die by 2045, according to modelling by the Gates-funded Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation.

“That’s 16 million mothers who are experiencing something that no one wants to or should have to deal with,” Gates said.
‘Chaotic’ DOGE cuts

Gates criticised the “chaotic situation” earlier this year when Musk’s DOGE abruptly cut off grants from the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), which has been dismantled since Donald Trump returned to the White House in January.

“I’m talking to President Trump about encouraging him to restore aid so that it is at most a modest cut -- I don’t know if I’ll be successful with that,” the 70-year-old said.

Gates, a major donor of the Gavi alliance which distributes vaccines around the world, said he was disappointed the U.S. did not renew its funding for the organisation in June.

US Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr also sent a video to the Gavi fund-raising event “that repeated his extremely debunked and misguided views that these childhood vaccines shouldn’t be used,” Gates said.

“Although the Gates Foundation works with every administration -- and we find some areas of agreement with Secretary Kennedy when it comes to vaccines -- we have essentially opposite views about the roles vaccines have played in the world.”
‘Tight’ budgets

While acknowledging that “rich world budgets are very tight,” Gates regretted that international aid was being “disproportionately” targeted in European nations.

Gates said he had spoken about aid cuts with political leaders in France, where the budget has not yet been finalised.

“I talked to the prime minister and the president, among others, and said, please remember how important this is -- but it’s a very tough budget situation.”

Gates also expressed hope that new tools such as vaccines would bring child mortality rates back down in the next five years.

He particularly pointed to new vaccines for respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) and pneumonia, as well as a groundbreaking twice-a-year HIV-prevention injection called lenacapavir that started being rolled out in South Africa this week.

The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation launched in 2000, with Melinda French Gates departing last year after the couple’s divorce.

In May, Gates announced he would give away his more than $200 billion fortune over the next two decades, wrapping up in 2045.

Jessica Sklair, who researches elite philanthropy at the Queen Mary University of London, told AFP that Gates already wielded “an enormous influence over the world of global health”.

The aid cuts would likely increase his level of influence, she said, adding that it did not appear that private philanthropy will “step in to fill the gap”.

Other research by the Barcelona Institute for Global Health, exclusively reported by AFP last month, determined that more than 22 million people could die from preventable deaths by 2030 due to the U.S. and European aid cuts.

By Daniel Lawler.

#Yemen’s Houthi rebels say mariners held since July attack on ship Eternity C are released to Oman.

#DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — Yemen’s Houthi rebels say they have released mariners they have held since their attack in July on the ship Eternity C in the Red Sea.

The Houthis said Wednesday through their al-Masirah satellite news channel that Oman had taken custody of the mariners, who were flying to the sultanate.

Oman did not immediately acknowledge the release. However, a Royal Oman Air Force jet did land in Sanaa, the capital of Yemen held for over a decade by the rebels.

The Philippines on Tuesday had said it expected Filipino mariners held by the Houthis since the attack to be released.

Associated Press, The Associated Press

#ICE ordering fleet of 20 armoured vehicles from #Canadian firm.

OTTAWA — U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement earmarked millions of dollars for a bulk order for 20 armoured vehicles from Canadian defence manufacturer Roshel that are built to resist bullets and bomb blasts.

U.S. government procurement records show the department laying out plans for a rush order worth the equivalent of about C$10 million for 20 Senator STANG emergency response tactical vehicles.

The justification for the sole-source order was published in a partially redacted document on a U.S. federal procurement website on Nov. 26, and the site says a contract was awarded on Nov. 28.

The procurement document declares only Roshel, which is headquartered in Brampton, Ont., meets the department’s requirements for the vehicles needed “to support agents in the field” and can complete the order within 30 days.

“Roshel is uniquely positioned to fulfil this requirement within the necessary time frame, having confirmed immediate availability of vehicles that fully meet ICE’s specifications,” said the document, produced by ICE’s Office of Acquisition Management.

“While other sources were consulted, they had limited quantities available or none could fulfil the entire requirement within the required period of performance, nor meet all technical requirements.”

The purchase was first reported by the U.K.-based newspaper The Independent.

Roshel has said it has sent hundreds of Senator vehicles to Ukraine in its ongoing war against Russia, although it makes different types. Company marketing materials state the emergency response vehicle’s floor is outfitted with blast protection.

The department, commonly known as ICE, is awash in controversy and allegations of human rights abuses as U.S. President Donald Trump pursues a campaign to expel vast numbers of immigrants residing in the country illegally.

The order comes despite Trump’s “America-first” trade policy and as he pursues a protracted trade war to poach jobs and plants from the Canadian steel, manufacturing and automotive sectors.

The department turned its nose up at other U.S.-based heavy vehicle manufacturers, saying Alpine Amoring Inc., CITE Armored, Inc., DGM LLC and Lenco Armored Vehicles did not meet all of the requirements or timeline.

“Delaying this procurement to pursue a fully competitive action would significantly impact operational readiness and hinder ICE’s ability to deploy mission-critical resources in a timely manner,” the procurement document said.

Roshel, Global Affairs Canada and ICE did not immediately replied to requests for comment Tuesday.

The document says the total price tag for the vehicle fleet will likely run US$7,331,200.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Dec. 2, 2025.

#MOSCOW, December 1. Russian President Vladimir #Putin visited a frontline command center late on November 30 to hear reports on the liberation of the cities of Krasnoarmeysk in the Donetsk People’s Republic (#DPR) and Volchansk in the Kharkov Region, presidential press secretary Dmitry Peskov said.

"Late on November 30, Russian President and Supreme Commander-in-Chief Vladimir Putin visited a command post of the Joint Force. He heard reports by Chief of the General Staff [Valery] Gerasimov, Commander of the Battlegroup Center [Valery] Solodchuk, and Commander of the Battlegroup East [Andrey] Ivanayev," Peskov said.

"Army General Gerasimov reported to the Supreme Commander-in-Chief about the liberation of the cities of Krasnoarmeysk in the DPR and Volchansk in the Kharkov Region, as well as about the results of offensive operations in other areas," he added.

Apart from that, Solodchuk reported to the president about the progress in the elimination of a Ukrainian battlegroup near the Krasnoarmeysk-Dimitrov agglomeration, "including about taking the southern part of the city of Dimitrov under the control of Russian forces, and about the situation in Krasnoarmeysk after it was liberated by our forces.".