Prince William and Kate release photo of daughter Charlotte to mark ninth birthday
Prince William and his wife Kate released a picture of their daughter Charlotte to mark the princess's ninth birthday on Thursday.
New Zealand's Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern sat motionless Sunday as members of the Pacific Island community pulled a large white mat over her head, completely covering her. Moments later they removed it and embraced her.
It was part of an emotional ceremony at the Auckland Town Hall during which Ardern formally apologized for a racially charged part of the nation's history known as the Dawn Raids.
It's when Pasifika people were targeted for deportation in the mid-1970s during aggressive home raids by authorities to find, convict and deport visa overstayers. The raids often took place very early in the morning or late at night.
By being covered in the mat, Ardern was taking part in a traditional Samoan ritual known as an ifoga, in which the subject seeks forgiveness by exposing themselves to a kind of public humiliation.
Ardern told a tearful crowd of several hundred that the government was offering a formal and unreserved apology.
"The government expresses its sorrow, remorse, and regret that the Dawn Raids and random police checks occurred and that these actions were ever considered appropriate," Ardern said.
At the time of the raids, many Pacific people had come to New Zealand on temporary visas to help fill a need for workers in the nation's factories and fields. But the government appeared to turn on the community by deciding those workers were no longer needed.
People who didn't look like white New Zealanders were told they should carry identification to prove they weren't overstayers, and were often randomly stopped in the street, or even at schools or churches. Even though many overstayers at the time were British or American, only Pacific people were targeted for deportation.
Ardern said that while the raids took place almost 50 years ago, their legacy continued.
"It remains vividly etched in the memory of those who were directly impacted. It lives on in the disruption of trust and faith in authorities. And it lives on in the unresolved grievances of Pacific communities that these events happened and that to this day they have gone unaddressed," she said.
Ardern said that as a gesture of goodwill, the government would fund new education and training scholarships for Pacific communities and would help compile an official account of the raids from written records and oral history.
"As part of this, the community will have the opportunity to come forward and share their experiences," Ardern said.
Tongan Princess Mele Siu'ilikutapu Kalaniuvalu Fotofili said the impact of the Dawn Raids had haunted her community for generations.
"We are grateful to your government for making the right decision to apologize," she said to Ardern. "To right the extreme, inhumane, racist and unjust treatment, specifically against my community, in the Dawn Raids era."
The princess said that while some members of her Tongan community might have been on the wrong side of the law at the time, it didn't warrant the extreme measures taken against them.
But the princess said the government could do a better job of responding to current immigration needs, a comment which drew sustained applause. She said petitions had been submitted to find pathways and residency for overstayers and visa-holders.
"This is a new dawn for my community and the Pacific community at large," she said.
Sunday's ceremony had originally been scheduled for June but was delayed due to coronavirus measures. The apology didn't come with any broader financial compensation or legal changes, but many Pacific people say it represented an important first step.
Prince William and his wife Kate released a picture of their daughter Charlotte to mark the princess's ninth birthday on Thursday.
A Canadian restaurant lowered its prices this week, and though news of price tags dropping rather than climbing sounds unusual, the business strategy in this case is not, according to experts in the field.
Inspections are underway at more than one Loblaws location in Ottawa after complaints were filed about tall Plexiglas barriers.
Canadian baseball player Tyler Black made a major splash in his first-ever big league game for the Milwaukee Brewers on Tuesday night.
Guitarist Duane Eddy, best known for twangy riffs on hits such as 'Rebel Rouser' and 'Cannonball,' has died at the age of 86.
Scientists studying a Neanderthal woman's remains have painstakingly pieced together her skull from 200 bone fragments to understand what she may have looked like.
The makers of Ozempic say their weight-loss drug Wegovy will be available to patients in Canada starting Monday.
Archeologists have unearthed the skeletons of five people, missing their hands and feet, at a former Nazi military base in Poland.
The trusted traveller program between Canada and the United States is extremely popular and almost two million Canadians have a Nexus card.
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.
The lawyer for a residential school survivor leading a proposed class-action defamation lawsuit against the Catholic Church over residential schools says the court action is a last resort.
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.