Calgary skyscraper targeted by man who pleads guilty to explosives offences

A Calgary man who once worked in military intelligence has pleaded guilty to firearms and explosives charges, after police found evidence suggesting he was planning an attack on a downtown Calgary skyscraper that houses a Veteran Affairs Canada office.

The 45-year-old man, who can only be referred to as GG under a court-ordered publication ban, had undergone a preliminary psychiatric exam and was fit to stand trial, but pleaded guilty Thursday in a Calgary courtroom to three of seven charges.

ArcelorMittal, Multinational Steel Giant, Asks PM To Reverse Ebola Visa Ban

TORONTO - An multinational company with major operations in Canada is asking Prime Minister Stephen Harper to reverse the government's decision to restrict entry to Canada from Ebola-affected countries.

The federal government announced last week it was suspending the issuance of new visas to residents and citizens of countries with widespread Ebola transmission, and was also halting work on residency applications from those countries.

Chris Alexander's Slammed For Remarks On Murder Case Before Courts

TORONTO - Criminal defence lawyers are dismayed that Immigration Minister Chris Alexander publicly branded a man charged with killing his wife a murderer before his trial.

Alexander brought up the case of Nasira Fazli this week as he talked publicly about the need for legislation to crack down on so-called "honour" killings and polygamy among immigrants.

"Not much more than one year ago, she was killed — 48 stab wounds — by her husband, Feraidon Mohammad Ibrahem, who had been in this country only for a few months, sponsored by her," Alexander told a news conference at a women's centre in west-end Toronto.

Encouraging Youth To Engage in Unpaid Work Is a Recipe For Exploitation

Almost 400,000 young Canadians are officially unemployed. Their unemployment rate (13.5 per cent in September) is more than double the national average. True youth unemployment is much higher, if we count those who have given up looking for work (and hence disappear from the official statistics). For the lucky ones who have a job, almost half work part-time, many in precarious short-term positions. Youth participation in the labour market is historically weak, and has actually deteriorated since the economic recovery began in 2009.

Canada Needs Zero Tolerance For Its Own 'Barbaric Cultural Practices'

Out of the blue yesterday, Canadians were suddenly informed that a bill, tabled by Chris Alexander, the Minister of Citizenship and Immigration, aims to target polygamy and forced marriages.

"We want to make it clear to anyone wishing to enter the country -- as well as those born in Canada -- that domestic violence, genital mutilation, forced marriages, and polygamy are illegal in Canada and "won't be tolerated," said Minister Alexander.

Tough-as-nails words there, Chris. Way to crack down! ZERO TOLERANCE! *waves flag*

Give Gas a Pass on Toxic Spill Clean-up, Says BC Official

British Columbia government officials, who were in discussions to set up an oil and gas sector-funded pool of money to pay for cleaning up toxic spills, suggested granting the natural gas sector an exemption, according to emails released through the province's freedom of information process.

The suggestion was made in an email exchange last March between a provincial environment official and two assistant deputy ministers. They were discussing which type of industries would be required to contribute to the proposed clean up fund. In one email, an official suggested that the natural gas sector be exempt from paying into the fund.

Brussels protests end in violence

About 100,000 workers marched across Brussels on Thursday to protest against government free-market reforms and austerity measures, and the demonstration ended in violence when people set fire to cars and threw cobblestones and police responded with tear gas and water cannons.

About 50 people were injured and 30 detained, police said, in one of biggest postwar labour demonstrations in Belgium, a country long vaunted as a shining example of an efficient welfare state.

Missing: 3 million News International emails

Three million emails at News International are missing after Rebekah Brooks changed the company’s email deletion policy, a jury heard.

Brooks ordered the change in June 2010, which resulted in a large quantity of emails being deleted, including those “covering her entire period as editor of the Sun”, Kingston crown court was told.

The issue of missing emails emerged as the prosecution completed its case in the trial of six Sun and former Sun journalists accused of making corrupt payments to public officials. All six deny the charges.

UK intelligence agencies spying on lawyers in sensitive security cases

The intelligence services have routinely been intercepting legally privileged communications between lawyers and their clients in sensitive security cases, according to internal MI5, MI6 and GCHQ documents.

The information obtained may even have been exploited unlawfully and used by the agencies in the fighting of court cases in which they themselves are involved, the Investigatory Powers Tribunal (IPT) has been told, resulting in miscarriages of justice.

This Chinese City Is Becoming The Silicon Valley Of Hardware

SHENZHEN, China -- Chinese technology is chock-full of awkward analogies and misfit metaphors. The social network formerly known as "the Facebook of China" (Renren) turned out to be a flop, "the Twitter of China" (Weibo) is slowly sliding toward irrelevance, and e-commerce behemoth Alibaba has burst out of several rhetorical straitjackets.

But recently, international tech circles have been buzzing about a new analogy, one that doesn't pigeonhole its subject as "the [insert U.S. tech giant] of China" but instead embeds it firmly in global innovation networks. They're talking about the city of Shenzhen, and they're calling it the Silicon Valley of hardware.