acab

https://techcrunch.com/2024/12/16/cohere-is-quietly-working-with-palantir-to-deploy-its-ai-models/

A program intended to replace the entire stock of the Canadian military’s aging assault rifles is being sped up, CBC News has learned.

An internal Department of National Defence presentation references a move to quickly order the first tranche of weapons under the Canadian Modular Assault Rifle program.

A Defence Department equipment briefing, dated July 2025, says the plan is to order up to 65,401 modern rifles with the possibility being left open to increase the delivery up to 300,000 should the government proceed with a plan to drastically scale up the size of the military supplementary reserve.

The Canadian Modular Assault Rifle is intended to replace the current stock of C7 and C8 rifles, which date from the Afghan war almost two decades ago.

cross-posted from: https://mander.xyz/post/43442390

[Op-ed by Anders Fogh Rasmussen, a former prime minister of Denmark and former secretary general of Nato.]

Web archive link

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The war in Ukraine, North Korea’s missile tests, and China’s growing assertiveness reveal a stark truth: the great divide of our age is not as geographic as it once was, but political and ideological. It is the fault line between open societies and autocratic ones.

For Europe, the imperative is clear: deepen partnerships with other democracies that share our values, our economic models, and our strategic outlook.

And few countries embody this alignment more than Japan.

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Japan is not just a major economy in the Indo-Pacific — it is a democracy of principle, a strategic actor with advanced capabilities, and a steady partner in global security.

Over recent years, Tokyo has grown its defence cooperation, expanded its space and cyber capabilities, and strengthened its regional engagement.

Meanwhile, the nature of threat is shifting.

Autocratic states — Russia, North Korea, China — are cooperating increasingly.

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I have long advocated for a 'Democratic 7' (D7): the EU, the UK, Japan, South Korea, Australia, New Zealand, and Canada.

Together, these nations account for roughly a quarter of global GDP and more than a third of global trade.

Yet what they share is deeper: a network of trust, rule-of-law, and open economy.

Within that framework, Japan stands out. Its contributions in space, defence and high-tech industries are world-class.

Europe should not view Tokyo as adjunct — it should view Japan as central to our strategy. From satellite systems to missile defence, from industrial innovation to standard-setting in critical technologies, Japan can be both partner and template.

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• The Bank of Canada holds rates steady at 2.25% as expected
• Macklem says economy was proving more resilient to tariffs
• Macklem reiterates policy rate at about the right level

The Bank of Canada held its key policy rate steady at 2.25% on Wednesday as widely expected, and Governor Tiff Macklem said the economy was proving resilient overall to the effect of U.S. trade measures.

Despite tariffs between 25% and 50% on some critical sectors such as cars, lumber, aluminum and steel, Canada's economy has shown signs of strength.

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Third quarter annualized GDP grew by 2.6%, much more than expected, while employment data showed the economy added 181,000 new jobs between September and November.

"It's been a difficult year for Canadians and Canadian businesses. But as the year is closing, it's looking better than it looked in the spring, in the summer," Macklem said during a press conference after the rates decision.

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Uncertainty remains high and if the outlook changes, the bank is ready to respond, Macklem said, reiterating comments he made when the bank cut rates in October to their current level.

"Governing Council sees the current policy rate at about the right level to keep inflation close to 2% while helping the economy," said Macklem.

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Archived link

[HALO is an NGO operating in Ukraine. Women are clearing the land after Russians mined it.]

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Until 2017, demining was on Ukraine’s list of 450 occupations prohibited for women. Today, women make up 30 per cent of HALO’s 1,500 Ukrainian staff.

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[HALO is also] training Ukraine’s women to make their country’s land safe again. Canada has played a part in this work. In early 2024, the Trudeau government — which had a feminist foreign-aid strategy — provided HALO with a $5-million grant to support its female demining efforts. Today, the future of such grants look uncertain.

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For years, even before all-out war began, Russia has been littering Ukraine’s fields, roads and forests with mines, booby-traps and trip-wire explosives.

These efforts have turned Ukraine into one of the world’s most contaminated countries, some reports say. It is estimated that as much as a quarter of Ukraine’s territory — equivalent to the Canadian Maritimes in size — is mined.

The effect is devastating. As of May, explosive ordnance had killed nearly 500 people and injured another 1,000.

The contaminated lands mean farmers cannot plant crops, families cannot rebuild their homes and children cannot play safely outside. It also threatens global food security, undermining Ukraine’s agricultural output and role as Europe’s so-called “breadbasket.”

In 2023, Ukraine’s Ministry of Economy set a goal of clearing 80 per cent of Ukraine’s contaminated lands within 10 years.

This is where HALO comes in.

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For nearly four decades, HALO has been clearing landmines, cluster munitions and other explosives from some of the world’s most dangerous conflict zones.

Its work began in Afghanistan but today spans 30 countries. The non-profit employs more than 11,000 people and generates roughly US$200 million in revenue.

Its expansion into Ukraine has been supported by international donors, including Canada.

Samuel Fricker, a Canadian projects officer with HALO who is based in Langley, B.C., says he is glad to see Canadian dollars being put toward HALO.

“As someone who pays taxes in Canada, I’m … happy with where the money goes,” he tells me in a HALO team video call days later.

“The reason I work in this field is because of how tangible the impact is. You are seeing landmines being removed. You’re seeing genuine lives saved,” he says.

Canada’s $5-million contribution accounts for a small fraction of HALO’s $60-million annual Ukraine budget.

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Daria Hapirova, a gender expert at HALO, says training women to demine is crucial because hundreds of thousands of Ukrainian men have joined the military.

“Unfortunately, there is no time for us to act in a gender-neutral way,” she says on the call. “[W]ithout women right now, Ukrainian mine action wouldn’t function.”

Hapirova says there are halo effects to promoting gender equality in a niche sector like demining.

“We started to change our uniform sets, for example, to make it more inclusive, and not only suitable for female bodies, but also to be more practical and more inclusive for different shapes of man’s bodies,” she says.

Fricker says HALO is also more effective at its work when women are included.

Households headed by women — often widows or those whose husbands are fighting — are more willing to share information with female surveyors, he says.

“The interactions are much, much improved by having that diversity,” he says.

Canada’s $5-million grant ended in August, and HALO currently has no ongoing Canadian funding for Ukraine. “We are in discussions with [Global Affairs Canada] about potential future options for follow-on funding,” Shustova says.

But the political winds have shifted. On Nov. 23, Prime Minister Mark Carney said at a press conference in Johannesburg that Canada no longer has a feminist foreign policy.

He added, however, that gender equality will remain an “aspect” of Canada’s broader international agenda.

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President Donald Trump issued his 2025 National Security Strategy for the United States on Friday. It’s a remarkable document, something like the Rescript of Honorius, when the emperor Honorius in the year 410 told the cities of Roman Britain that he was withdrawing Rome’s legions and they’d have to defend themselves hereafter.

From now on, Trump says, America will look after itself and leave Europe and Asia to their fates. But the countries of the Western Hemisphere are now to be firmly in America’s sphere of influence. And that includes Canada.

The strategy says: “Our goals for the Western Hemisphere can be summarized as ‘Enlist and Expand.’ We will enlist established friends in the Hemisphere to control migration, stop drug flows, and strengthen stability and security on land and sea. We will expand by cultivating and strengthening new partners while bolstering our own nation’s appeal as the Hemisphere’s economic and security partner of choice.”

Canada could expect similar interference with our domestic affairs, including our immigration policy. The United States would explicitly support far-right parties like the Conservatives and the People’s Party of Canada and their provincial equivalents like Alberta’s United Conservative Party. Any party or government endorsing immigration and multiculturalism could expect a barrage of disinformation attacks in social media and U.S. mainstream media (which are increasingly owned by a few tech billionaires like Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk).

If we look at the top US companies market cap list, Canadians are still in love with the top 10 companies, if not most from the top 100. Seems the majority of loser Canadians prefer Canschluss. Welcome 51st state/15th territory! 50 billion maximum travel boycott is literally nothing when Google is worth more than the entire Canadian economy alone. Every Canadian still has a Google/Apple phone, uses Microsoft products, Amazon servers, Visa/Mastercard transactions, etc. etc. America's got you by the balls and they will have your resources at this rate!

https://companiesmarketcap.com/usa/largest-companies-in-the-usa-by-market-cap/

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.ca/post/56654224

Ottawa added four new organizations to the Criminal Code list of terrorist entities:

Maniac Murder Cult.

Terrorgram Collective.

The Islamic State-Mozambique.

Captain Stephen Ye, commander of the defence and security platoon at the headquarters of the Labrie military base near Riga, is responsible for protecting the brigade headquarters. He says innovations in Russia’s war in Ukraine are continually reshaping his job.

“It has helped us understand that the battlefield we operate in is now almost completely transparent. It is very hard to hide when drones have become so widespread that perhaps there is no such thing as a safe zone anymore, so we must always think about security, no matter where we are operating,” Capt Ye tells LRT.lt.

At the base, troops from Canada’s lead multinational brigade train for a range of scenarios – from drone reconnaissance to enemy infiltration. Although they are trained to use various types of counter-drone weapons, NATO troops still lack their own unmanned aircraft to prepare effectively for modern drone warfare.

“As ground-based soldiers, we usually talk about the importance of overhead cover, but it has never been more important than it is now, with the proliferation of unmanned aerial systems all over the battlefield,” Capt Ye says.

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Canada began its mission in Latvia in 2014 after Russia’s aggression against Ukraine. The operation was named Reassurance, reflecting NATO allies’ intent to reassure eastern flank members that the Alliance would defend them.

More than a decade on, the operation has become the largest overseas mission of the Canadian Armed Forces. During a visit to Riga this August, Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney announced its extension for another three years.

Canada now deploys ships to the Baltic region, contributing to NATO’s standing naval forces and other missions. The country also maintains an air force unit providing logistical support from the United Kingdom.

Canada’s land forces established their presence in Latvia in 2017, when the country agreed to lead the multinational NATO battlegroup. After Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, the battlegroup was expanded to a brigade of several thousand troops.

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The European Union and Canada also announced last Monday an agreement that will allow Ottawa to join SAFE, the EU’s €150-billion defence financing programme. The scheme aims to offer favourable loans to participating states so they can purchase weapons jointly with other partners.

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As his six-month rotation draws to a close, Capt Ye is preparing to return to Canada. Reflecting on his service in Latvia, he says the sense of purpose and the experience gained outweigh all the challenges.

“Working with NATO allies is an opportunity I would not have had at home. Coming here and working with all these different countries has been challenging – because of language barriers, because of different command structures and so on. But that is also why I volunteered to come here: I wanted to get to know our NATO allies better and see what we can learn from them,” Capt Ye says.

Canadians tend to think of far-right extremism and white nationalism as a strictly American problem, adopting an “it couldn’t happen here” mindset, or seeing it as a lunatic fringe that should just be ignored. But these movements are gaining a foothold in mainstream culture, and the structure for that to happen has been in this country since its inception.

White supremacy arrived in Canada in the fifteenth century, with the first Europeans. Since then, Canada has waged a cultural and literal genocide against Indigenous peoples, including the horrors perpetrated as early as 1831 at Christian church- and government-sponsored residential schools, which were designed to strip children from their families and their culture, with the last federally run residential school closing in 1996. In 1911, the government passed an order-in-council to ban Black immigrants from entering Canada (it was never invoked). In 1921, the Ku Klux Klan formed its first Canadian chapter. In 1946, Viola Desmond was arrested for refusing to leave the whites-only section of a movie theatre. The last segregated school in Canada didn’t close until 1983.

The late 2010s brought with them the “alt-right” era, a term coined by white nationalist Richard Spencer to differentiate his views from traditional American conservatism. Originally characterized by online trolling, the “alt-right” was a random and reactionary series of chats, pages, memes, and shitposting accounts—mainly from the US—as well as a loose collection of more serious actors like the Proud Boys and Atomwaffen. Over the years, its membership has become increasingly public, participating in rallies and engaging in acts of violence in the real world. Since the COVID-19 pandemic, a new iteration has emerged in Canada: Diagolon.

IT WAS STILL LIGHT OUT when the attacks occurred. In just forty-five minutes, a slim, dark-haired man wearing a Jets jersey sexually assaulted three nurses and a teenager in and around Winnipeg’s largest hospital, the Health Sciences Centre (HSC), on July 2, according to police.

While officers searched for the suspect, hospital workers finished their shifts and walked back to their vehicles, unaware a predator was at large. Later, police would report that a third woman was assaulted that night in the area, by the same man. Staff didn’t learn what happened until the following day.

For HSC employees, these assaults weren’t an aberration. They were a tipping point after years of increasing violence against hospital staff. In a 2024 survey, one-third of physicians at HSC reported experiencing an average of eleven safety episodes in the previous year, almost double the provincial rate. A safety episode can include threats, violence, sexual assault, and harassment. HSC alone accounted for nearly half of all reported assaults on Manitoba doctors. Physicians described being punched, kicked, spat on, and bombarded with verbal abuse. The danger follows them outside the hospital into walkways and parking lots, where some have been chased and attacked coming to and from the job.

Archived link

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Just last week, Prime Minister Mark Carney met with the government of India to launch new trade negotiations. This is the same government former prime minister Justin Trudeau accused of involvement in killing a Canadian citizen on our own soil. Moreover, the RCMP claims to have evidence of Indian government “agents” engaging in extortion, intimidation, coercion and harassment.

Foreign actors have also targeted sensitive Canadian information and technological services we rely upon. At Ontario Power Generation, an employee was charged under the Security of Information Act for allegedly attempting to share safeguarded information with a foreign entity. At Hydro-Québec, a researcher was charged with obtaining trade secrets for the benefit of a foreign state. We must not become numb to persistent hacking attempts by hostile foreign states.

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As Canadians, we know the identities of individuals accused of compromising our energy grid, yet we do not know the names of lawmakers alleged to have been accomplices to foreign interference in our democracy. Some may have been re-elected to the House or remain in the Senate. Most likely continue to shape national policy.

Meanwhile, the core protections Canadians were promised to defend against future influence activities — particularly, a foreign agent registry and foreign influence commissioner — remain undelivered. Both were described as essential tools to safeguard our democratic institutions and rebuild public confidence, but neither has materialized.

This is the contradiction at the heart of Canada’s foreign policy moment. We are seeking to expand our partnerships while failing to implement the very protections we said were necessary to safeguard the country from many of those foreign actors.

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Canada should engage globally. And there are legitimate debates to be had about who we align ourselves with. But whoever we choose, we must do so from a position of strength, not vulnerability. That means delivering on the commitments for a registry and commissioner, and ensuring transparency and accountability for those implicated in foreign interference.

Until then, our citizens, secrets and democracy are left vulnerable — while we protect foreign states, and those who collude with them, from scrutiny.

Canada cannot lead internationally while leaving itself exposed at home. And the countries exploiting our vulnerabilities know it — even if we pretend not to.

Jordan Peterson, the popular and polarizing psychologist, is held in high esteem by Alberta Premier Danielle Smith, who has twice appeared on Peterson’s podcast, which draws millions of listeners worldwide.

A Tyee investigation has found that Smith’s admiration for Peterson went well beyond her affinity for him as a fellow conservative culture warrior.

Documents obtained through freedom of information request show that Smith, and her chief of staff, Rob Anderson, directly intervened with Alberta’s Advanced Education Ministry in an attempt to help Peterson’s higher-education business venture.

On Aug. 1, 2024, Smith met with Peterson “to discuss how his organization can work with the province to have their online training platform accredited.”

Darwin knows what cameras look like – and how to avoid them. From inside his enclosure, the monkey of Toronto Ikea parking lot fame spots us out of the corner of his eye and bolts under the table.

The now 13-year-old Japanese macaque has seen enough of the spotlight to last a lifetime.

Darwin was just a baby when he was found in a North York Ikea parking lot in 2012, wearing a diaper and shearling coat, and seized by animal services. He’s been living at Story Book Farm Primate Sanctuary in Sunderland, Ont., ever since.

The Department of National Defence is scrambling to figure out how it will clothe, equip and train hundreds of thousands of new reservists envisioned under an ambitious mobilization proposal that Canada’s top military commander describes as a work in progress.

Similarly, in what may be an ominous sign of the times, the department has established a key position dedicated solely to growing the military in the event of a major crisis.

Internal documents obtained by CBC News show the military buildup will, at the moment, proceed slowly because the defence industry is either overwhelmed — or not equipped for the ramp-up.

Archived link

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Why do we care about the Arctic? That’s the next major battleground as Russia, Denmark (through Greenland), Finland, Iceland, Norway, Sweden, and the U.S. all claim territory. Canada claims approximately 1.2 million square kilometres of the region. As a result of the climate crisis, the Arctic glaciers are melting at an increasingly rapid rate. This provides an incentive for countries that have maritime borders in the North to open up to potential resource extraction, new trade routes, and military capabilities. The federal government explains: “With the Arctic warming at an unprecedented rate, new maritime routes are becoming accessible. The Canadian Armed Forces … must recognize and fulfil its collaborative role in ensuring Canadian Arctic sovereignty.” Sovereignty is primarily established through occupation of the disputed lands, hence military expansion. With increased access to strategic trade and resources, Carney’s government is ostensibly investing in the future of Canada’s economy. Basically, Carney is turning Canada into Canada, Inc.—a global energy superpower for which the Arctic is imperative to the future of resource extraction.

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Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami is the national representative organization for Inuit in Canada. Its June 2025 document regarding Arctic sovereignty within a security and defence framework states: “As Canada turns toward the Arctic, governments must prioritize Inuit prosperity and perspectives as the foundation of Arctic security, sovereignty and defence.” In other words, Canada’s success in claiming Arctic waters cannot be established until Inuit communities are properly resourced: “Securing the Arctic requires Canada to invest in the people that live here and the services and supports needed to develop the economy.”

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The federal government should implement Article 3 from the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, which states: “Indigenous Peoples have the right to self-determination. By virtue of that right they freely determine their political status and freely pursue their economic, social and cultural development.” The implication is that Indigenous sovereignty is key to Canadian authority in the Arctic, and the vision for this country’s economic future.

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