Today's News

Nova Scotia has decided that if the Turks and Caicos islands join Canada, they'll invite the islands to become part of the province of Nova Scotia. Sounds great, but we've been talking about it for too long. Will it finally happen this time? Or is it just smoke and mirrors. I'm still excited by the prospect.

Canada's House of Commons has voted to call the deaths of 1.5million Armenians in the Ottoman Empire nearly 90years ago a genocide. Previously, the official position of the government was to call it a 'tragedy'. Naturally, Armenian-Canadians are pleased at the recognition; better late than never. Turkish-Canadians, on the flip side, aren't so pleased. It should be noted though, that the Ottoman Empire ceased to exist many years ago, therefore the condemnation of an act by the former Empire isn't necessarily directed at present day Turkey. The United Nations recognizes the killings as a genocide. Turkey has fought attempts at inquiries into the massacres in the past, halting defense contracts with France when the French government backed the Armenians. The Turkish government also managed to cow the United States when it pursued the Armenian interests, strategic defense concerns have always been more important to the U.S. than human rights. Prime Minister Paul Martin didnt deign the vote important enough to even show up.

Maher Arar is suing the Canadian government for $400 million. He claims that due process was ignored in his 2002 arrest and subsequent deportation to Syria, where he says he was tortured. It appears that the government was a little too exuberant in it's attempts to find and eliminate possible post-9/11 terrorist threats. As the inquiry gets ready to launch in June, the government could be facing a hefty bill.

I don't imagine the $400 million tag will faze the Liberals though, Billions of dollars routinely disappear under the 'watchful' Liberal eye.

New Ships for the Canadian Navy? It appears so. Paul Martin recently announced funding for three $700-million Joint Support Ships for the Navy. Sounds like great news for the military, new helicopters AND new ships, what could be better? Well, the ships won't be ready for another 11 years, and a lot can happen in 11 years. Does anyone remember the Conservatives promising to buy all kinds of goodies for the military 15 years ago, only to have the project annexed by the Liberals when they came to power - with a loss of a few hundred million dollars that had already been spent. I'm going to remain optomistic on this one though, because at least if a Liberal government initiates the deal, the more military minded Conservatives are a lot less likely to cancel it in the event they came to power.

That's about enough Canadian news for now, feel free to peruse the sites in my soon to be added News section.

As for Glasgow news, there isn't very much to say. It's still raining, we play a lot of air hockey to pass the time in Jon's flat, I've planned out a really big meal for tonight, I'm hoping to make enough that we'll have leftovers for at least one more day. We may also hit a pub tonight, very likely the same one we went to the other night - we fell in love with that place. I took a few pictures of us making asses out of ourselves inside the other day, I'll be sure to show those off when I get home, along with the rest of my pictures. (I really love having a memory card large enough that I can take 1200 pictures at a reasonable quality :D)

Peace out folks.