Canada

VANCOUVER, British Columbia (AP) — Leaders of Indigenous groups in Canada said Thursday investigators have found more than 600 unmarked graves at the site of a former residential school for Indigenous children — a discovery that follows last month’s report of 215 bodies found at another school.

The bodies were discovered at the Marieval Indian Residential School, which operated from 1899 to 1997 where the Cowessess First Nation is now located, about 85 miles (135 kilometers) east of Regina, the capital of Saskatchewan.

OTTAWA, June 18 (Xinhua) -- Canada announced on Friday that the Canada-U.S. border agreement on travel restrictions will be extended for another month to July 21.

"In coordination with the U.S., we are extending restrictions on non-essential international travel and with the United States until July 21st, 2021," Canadian Public Safety Minister Bill Blair said in a tweet on Friday.

OTTAWA, June 17 (Xinhua) -- Canada's National Advisory Committee on Immunization (NACI) recommends Canadians who received a first shot of AstraZeneca vaccine should get Pfizer or Moderna vaccine for their second shot.

On June 1, NACI said AstraZeneca recipients could choose whether to get a second dose of the same vaccine, or an mRNA vaccine. But in new guidance released Thursday, NACI said Pfizer or Moderna are now "preferred" as the second dose.

TORONTO (AP) — A driver plowed a pickup truck into a family of five, killing four of them and seriously injuring the other in a deliberate attack that targeted the victims because they were Muslims, Canadian police said Monday.

Authorities said a young man was arrested in the parking lot of a nearby mall after the incident Sunday night in the Ontario city of London. Police said a black pickup truck mounted a curb and struck the victims at an intersection.

OTTAWA, June 4 (Xinhua) -- Canada's unemployment rate edged up 0.1 percent to 8.2 percent in May, Statistics Canada said Friday.

The country's jobless rate rose for a second month under third-wave restrictions with about 68,000 out of job in May due to governments' strengthened lockdown measures to stem the spread of COVID-19 third wave.

Almost all of the employment decline in May was in part-time work, which decreased 54,000 jobs.

The number of self-employed workers was virtually unchanged in May but remained 5 percent below its pre-COVID-19 pandemic level.

OTTAWA, June 3 (Xinhua) -- Former Canadian senator and Chair of Canada's Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) Murray Sinclair called for an independent investigation into the sites of indigenous children of Canada's residential school system on Thursday.

Speaking before the Indigenous and Northern Affairs Committee of the Canadian parliament, Sinclair said a search must be conducted outside the purview of a government department.

OTTAWA, Jun 2 (NNN-XINHUA) – Canada’s National Advisory Committee on Immunisation (NACI), announced its updated guidance yesterday, to allow mixing and matching approved COVID-19 vaccines in most scenarios.

Under the updated guidance, people who received a first dose of the AstraZeneca vaccine may receive Pfizer-BioNTech or Moderna for their second dose, unless contraindicated. Four vaccines, developed by Pfizer, Moderna, AstraZeneca and Johnson & Johnson, have been authorised for use in Canada to date.

OTTAWA, May 31 (Xinhua) -- Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said on Monday that his government will take further action in response to the discovery of the remains of 215 children in a former residential school in Kamloops city in western Canada.

Amid calls for accountability and to go beyond lowering flags at federal buildings, Trudeau told a press conference that Canada's Indigenous Services Minister Marc Miller, Crown-Indigenous Relations Minister Carolyn Bennett and Northern Affairs Minister Dan Vandal will discuss what role his government should be playing.

OTTAWA, May 30 (Xinhua) -- The Canadian government lowered flags at half-mast on Sunday to commemorate the deaths of 215 Indigenous children whose remains were found in a former residential school in Kamloops city in the country.

"To honor the 215 children whose lives were taken at the former Kamloops residential school and all Indigenous children who never made it home, the survivors, and their families, I have asked that the Peace Tower flag and flags on all federal buildings be flown at half-mast," Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau tweeted on Sunday.

KAMLOOPS, British Columbia (AP) — The remains of 215 children, some as young as 3 years old, have been found buried on the site of what was once Canada’s largest Indigenous residential school — one of the institutions that held children taken from families across the nation.

Chief Rosanne Casimir of the Tk’emlups te Secwépemc First Nation said in a news release that the remains were confirmed last weekend with the help of ground-penetrating radar.

More bodies may be found because there are more areas to search on the school grounds, Casimir said Friday.