Most of Canada to receive emergency alert test today
The federal government will test its capacity to issue emergency alerts today, with the exception of Ontario, where the test will take place on May 15.
North Korean leader Kim Jong Un has presided over a meeting of his ruling party in his first public appearance in about a month, and called for a larger political conference to discuss efforts to salvage a decaying economy.
The North's official Korean Central News Agency said Saturday that Kim expressed appreciation that a lot of works were being sped up thanks to the "ideological enthusiasm and fighting spirit of self-reliance" demonstrated by the party and his people.
But he also said there was a need to correct "deflective matters" and called for a plenary meeting of the Workers' Party's Central Committee to review overall state affairs for the first half of 2021. The party announced that the plenary meeting was set for early June.
Kim's appearance at Friday's Politburo meeting was the first time he showed himself in public since May 6, when he held a photo session with families of North Korean soldiers.
North Korea's battered economy has deteriorated further amid pandemic border closures, which significantly reduced trade with China, its major ally and economic lifeline.
The Workers' Party last held a plenary meeting of Central Committee members in February, when Kim ripped into state economic agencies for their "passive and self-protecting tendencies" in setting their annual goals.
While Kim said Friday that North Korea was continuing to face challenges brought by "unfavorable subjective and objective conditions and environment," the KCNA report did not mention any comments he made toward the United States or South Korea.
North Korea has so far ignored the allies' calls to resume nuclear negotiations that have stalled since the collapse of the second summit between Kim and former President Donald Trump in February 2019. The Americans then rejected North Koreans' demands for lifting sanctions in exchange for a piecemeal deal toward partially surrendering their nuclear capabilities.
Following a meeting last month in Washington, President Joe Biden and South Korean President Moon Jae-in said in a joint statement that Washington would take a "calibrated and practical approach that is open to and will explore diplomacy" with Pyongyang.
But North Korea has questioned the sincerity of the proposals and claimed that Biden's agreement to end Washington's decades-long range restrictions that capped South Korea's missile development, which was announced after his meeting with Moon, demonstrated continuing U.S. hostility toward the North.
U.S. officials have suggested Biden would adopt a middle ground policy between his predecessors -- Trump's direct dealings with Kim and Barack Obama's "strategic patience." But some experts say Washington won't likely provide the North with meaningful sanctions relief unless it takes concrete denuclearization steps first. Kim has vowed to strengthen his nuclear weapons program in recent political speeches, while saying that the fate of bilateral relations depends on whether Washington discards what he perceives as hostile policies.
During a rare ruling party congress in January, Kim urged his people to be resilient in the struggle for economic self-reliance. He called for reasserting greater state control over the economy, boosting agricultural production and prioritizing the development of chemicals and metal industries.
Experts say such sectors are crucial to North Korean hopes to revitalize industrial production that has been decimated by sanctions and halted imports of factory materials amid the pandemic.
The federal government will test its capacity to issue emergency alerts today, with the exception of Ontario, where the test will take place on May 15.
Prince Harry, the Duke of Sussex, has made headlines with his recent arrival in the U.K., this time to celebrate all things Invictus. But upon the prince landing in the U.K., we have already had confirmation that King Charles III won't have time to see his youngest son during his brief visit.
An Ontario man found out that a line of credit he thought was insured actually isn't after his wife of 50 years died.
After more than a century, Boy Scouts of America is rebranding as Scouting America, another major shakeup for an organization that once proudly resisted change.
The trial of a man who admits he killed four women in Winnipeg is set to begin Wednesday, and a law professor says lawyers for Jeremy Skibicki have multiple hurdles to clear for a defence of mental illness.
An Ontario woman said it would have been impossible to buy a house without her mother – an anecdote that animates the fact that over 17 per cent of Canadian homeowners born in the ‘90s own their property with their parents, according to a new report.
A first-of-its-kind Canadian research study is working towards a major medical breakthrough for a brain disorder, believed to be caused by repeated head injuries, that can only be detected after death.
In March, Indonesian officials and local fishermen rescued 75 people from the overturned hull of a boat off the coast of Indonesia. Until now, little was known about why the boat capsized.
With Donald Trump sitting just feet away, Stormy Daniels testified Tuesday at the former president's hush money trial about a sexual encounter the porn actor says they had in 2006 that resulted in her being paid to keep silent during the presidential race 10 years later.
A chicken farmer near Mattawa made an 'eggstraordinary' find Friday morning when she discovered one of her hens laid an egg close to three times the size of an average large chicken egg.
A P.E.I. lighthouse and a New Brunswick river are being honoured in a Canada Post series.
An Ontario man says he paid more than $7,700 for a luxury villa he found on a popular travel website -- but the listing was fake.
Whether passionate about Poirot or hungry for Holmes, Winnipeg mystery obsessives have had a local haunt for over 30 years in which to search out their latest page-turners.
Eighty-two-year-old Susan Neufeldt and 90-year-old Ulrich Richter are no spring chickens, but their love blossomed over the weekend with their wedding at Pine View Manor just outside of Rosthern.
Alberta Ballet's double-bill production of 'Der Wolf' and 'The Rite of Spring' marks not only its final show of the season, but the last production for twin sisters Alexandra and Jennifer Gibson.
A mother goose and her goslings caused a bit of a traffic jam on a busy stretch of the Trans-Canada Highway near Vancouver Saturday.
A British Columbia mayor has been censured by city council – stripping him of his travel and lobbying budgets and removing him from city committees – for allegedly distributing a book that questions the history of Indigenous residential schools in Canada.
Three men in Quebec from the same family have fathered more than 600 children.