B.C. seeks ban on public drug use, dialing back decriminalization
The B.C. NDP has asked the federal government to recriminalize public drug use, marking a major shift in the province's approach to addressing the deadly overdose crisis.
Hardy Kruger, considered one of post-war Germany's best actors, has died. He was 93.
His Hamburg-based literary agent, Peter Kaefferlein, said Thursday that Kruger died "suddenly and unexpectedly" Wednesday in California, where he lived with his third wife, American-born writer Anita Park.
Kruger starred in the 1957 British movie "The One That Got Away" about a captured German fighter pilot who stages a series of daring attempts to escape the Allies and, as the title suggests, finally succeeds.
His charm, good looks and the fact that he deserted from the Nazi army toward the end of the Second World War helped Kruger land further roles at a time when Germans of his generation were still eyed with suspicion abroad.
Kruger appeared in a string of English-language adventure and war movies, including "Barry Lyndon" (1975), "A Bridge too Far" (1977) and "The Wild Geese" (1978).
In later years, he focused on making travel films for German television, writing books and the occasional stage performance.
Franz Eberhard August Krueger was born April 12, 1928, in Berlin.
Initially, he wanted to follow in the footsteps of his engineer father, but while at an elite Nazi boarding school he appeared in the 1944 film "Junge Adler."
While it was intended as a propaganda movie, Kruger's encounter with older actors on the set opened his eyes to the horrors of Adolf Hitler's dictatorship.
As the war turned against Germany, Kruger's Hitler Youth unit was drafted into the newly formed SS division "Nibelungen."
Kruger, who was 16 at the time, found himself fighting experienced American troops in southern Germany.
In a 2006 interview with German daily Bild, he recounted how he and his school friends were sent to the front "as cannon fodder" in Hitler's futile attempt to halt the Allies' advance.
"I knew the war was lost," he told the newspaper. "I knew that there were concentration camps and that the Nazis were a bunch of criminals."
Kruger deserted, was captured by the Allies and spent some time as a POW. After the war, he returned to acting, first in theatres and then in Germany's re-emerging movie industry.
Ambition led Kruger to Paris and London where he studied French and English, and dropped the umlaut in his surname name, in the hope of landing more glamorous roles in foreign films.
His breakthrough came when English director Roy Baker picked Kruger for the role of Luftwaffe ace Franz von Werra in "The One That Got Away." Kruger managed to fit the archetype of the blond German soldier without appearing cold and superior -- thereby avoiding being cast as the villain in the war movie roles that would inevitably follow.
"I had no interest in playing the war criminal," Kruger said in a 2003 interview with German magazine Der Spiegel, adding that he wanted to portray the many Germans who found themselves unwilling participants in the war. In later years, Kruger supported campaigns to educate younger generations about Nazi crimes and confront neo-Nazi groups in post-war Germany.
"The fight against racism and the education of young people was his personal mission in life," Kruger's agent said in a statement. "His warm-heartedness, his joy for life and his unshakable sense of justice made him unforgettable."
Once again in the role of a former fighter pilot, Kruger starred in the French movie "Les Dimanches de Ville d'Avray," which won an Academy Award for best foreign film in 1963. Claude Martin, a former French ambassador in Berlin, said years later that the film inspired sympathy for the Germans among French moviegoers whose memories of the war were still fresh.
During the 1960s and '70s Kruger appeared in numerous international blockbusters, starring alongside John Wayne in the safari movie "Hatari" (1962), and "The Flight of the Phoenix" (1965), whose all-star cast included James Stewart, Richard Attenborough and Peter Finch.
An avid traveller, he once owned a farm in Tanzania at the foot of Mount Kilimanjaro.
"After World War II he was one of the first German actors to gain international recognition," Germany's culture minister, Claudia Roth, said in a statement. "Hardy Kruger's power as an artist and his clear stance against right-wing violence will be missed," she said.
Kruger is survived by Park and his children Christiane, Malaika and Hardy Jr. from previous marriages.
The B.C. NDP has asked the federal government to recriminalize public drug use, marking a major shift in the province's approach to addressing the deadly overdose crisis.
More than 115 people who viewed the solar eclipse in Ontario earlier this month experienced eye damage after the event, according to eye doctors in the province.
A Sherwood Park family says their new house is uninhabitable. The McNaughton's say they were forced to leave the house after living there for only a week because contaminants inside made it difficult to breathe.
A man has been handed a lengthy hunting ban and fined thousands of dollars for illegally killing a grizzly bear, B.C. conservation officers say.
Sophie Gregoire Trudeau says there is 'still so much love' between her and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, as they navigate their post-separation relationship co-parenting their three children.
George Mallory is renowned for being one of the first British mountaineers to attempt to scale the dizzying heights of Mount Everest during the 1920s. Nearly a century later, newly digitized letters shed light on Mallory’s hopes and fears about ascending Everest.
An emergency slide fell off a Delta Air Lines jetliner shortly after takeoff Friday from New York, and pilots who felt a vibration in the plane circled back to land safely at JFK Airport.
The Ontario Provincial Police (OPP) says it's investigating an interaction between a uniformed officer and anti-Trudeau government protestors after a video circulated on social media.
An Ontario man who took out a loan to pay for auto repairs said his car was repossessed after he missed two payments.
Mounties in Nanaimo, B.C., say two late-night revellers are lucky their allegedly drunken antics weren't reported to police after security cameras captured the men trying to steal a heavy sign from a downtown business.
A property tax bill is perplexing a small townhouse community in Fergus, Ont.
When identical twin sisters Kim and Michelle Krezonoski were invited to compete against some of the world’s most elite female runners at last week’s Boston Marathon, they were in disbelief.
The giant stone statues guarding the Lions Gate Bridge have been dressed in custom Vancouver Canucks jerseys as the NHL playoffs get underway.
A local Oilers fan is hoping to see his team cut through the postseason, so he can cut his hair.
A family from Laval, Que. is looking for answers... and their father's body. He died on vacation in Cuba and authorities sent someone else's body back to Canada.
A former educational assistant is calling attention to the rising violence in Alberta's classrooms.
The federal government says its plan to increase taxes on capital gains is aimed at wealthy Canadians to achieve “tax fairness.”
At 6'8" and 350 pounds, there is nothing typical about UBC offensive lineman Giovanni Manu, who was born in Tonga and went to high school in Pitt Meadows.