Russia puts Ukrainian President Zelenskyy on its wanted list
Russia has put Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on its wanted list, Russian state media reported Saturday, citing the interior ministry’s database.
The turmoil of the pandemic contributed to the rise of hate and discriminatory behaviour, reflecting historical surges in antisemitism, says the CEO of the Jewish Federation of Greater Vancouver.
Ezra Shanken said antisemitism is often recast to fit with current events, and the pandemic was no different, but he expressed sympathy for other communities that also saw a rise of hate-motivated incidents during the early years of the pandemic.
New figures released by Statistics Canada show hate crimes reported to police continued to spike across the country in the second year of the pandemic as people were targeted by race, religion and sexual orientation.
The agency said in a news release Wednesday that all provinces and territories experienced increases in hate crime reports in 2021 except Yukon, where they were unchanged.
The figures show incidents motivated by religion were up 67 per cent across Canada, while reports to police involving sexual orientation rose by 63 per cent, and race-related incidents were up six per cent.
Shanken said Jewish people in Canada were certainly no strangers to discrimination before the pandemic, but the troubling developments for him were the resurrection of antisemitic language and the misappropriation of Holocaust symbols by anti-vaccine groups.
The statistics agency reported the pandemic “exacerbated experiences of discrimination,” including hate crimes, and “underscored an increase in discourse” about the issue.
Overall, there were 3,360 hate crimes of all motivations reported to police in 2021, up by 27 per cent, after a 35 per cent increase in 2020.
Reports of hate crime targeting East or Southeast Asians rose 16 per cent to 305 incidents in 2021, a level that is more than four times higher than it was in 2019.
Statistics Canada said community awareness and relations with police can influence whether incidents get reported at all, and just over one in five reported incidents result in charges being recommended or laid.
The agency said the victims and those accused of reported hate crimes are most often men and boys.
In British Columbia, religious hate crime reports more than doubled to 150 in 2021, while in Alberta they tripled to 91 incidents.
In Ontario, hate crimes based on sexual orientation were up 107 per cent.
For Shanken, the numbers released by Statistics Canada underscore the need for Canadians to speak out against incidents of hate, no matter who it's directed at.
“We want a country that's loving, caring, accepting of all people, of all practices, so that people can really find their most fulfilling life right here,” he said.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published March 22, 2023.
Russia has put Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on its wanted list, Russian state media reported Saturday, citing the interior ministry’s database.
A man was denied a $5,000 payout from his brother after a B.C. tribunal dismissed his claim disputing how many kittens were born in a litter.
A Chinese truck driver was praised in local media Saturday for parking his vehicle across a highway and preventing more cars from tumbling down a slope after a section of the road in the country's mountainous south collapsed and killed at least 48 people.
A man accused of arson in a January Old Strathcona apartment fire is expected to be charged with manslaughter after a body was discovered in the burned building late last month.
Ontario Provincial Police say two people were killed after a car and a transport truck collided in the westbound lanes of Highway 417 near Limoges, Ont. on Tuesday afternoon.
A Quebec man who pleaded guilty to threatening Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Premier François Legault has been sentenced to 20 months in jail.
As Wegovy becomes available to Canadians starting Monday, a medical expert is cautioning patients wanting to use the drug to lose weight that no medication is a ''magic bullet,' and the new medication is meant particularly for people who meet certain criteria related to obesity and weight.
A source close to singer Britney Spears tells CNN that the pop star is 'home and safe' after she had a 'major fight' with her boyfriend on Wednesday night at the Chateau Marmont in West Hollywood.
Tributes continue to pour in for Bob Cole as his family has confirmed a funeral will be held for the legendary broadcaster Friday in St. John's, N.L.
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 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.
A group of SaskPower workers recently received special recognition at the legislature – for their efforts in repairing one of Saskatchewan's largest power plants after it was knocked offline for months following a serious flood last summer.
A police officer on Montreal's South Shore anonymously donated a kidney that wound up drastically changing the life of a schoolteacher living on dialysis.
Since 1932, Montreal's Henri Henri has been filled to the brim with every possible kind of hat, from newsboy caps to feathered fedoras.
Police in Oak Bay, B.C., had to close a stretch of road Sunday to help an elephant seal named Emerson get safely back into the water.
Out of more than 9,000 entries from over 2,000 breweries in 50 countries, a handful of B.C. brews landed on the podium at the World Beer Cup this week.
Raneem, 10, lives with a neurological condition and liver disease and needs Cholbam, a medication, for a longer and healthier life.