Robert Pickton stabbed with toothbrush and broken broom handle: victim's family
The family of one of Robert Pickton's victims says the convicted serial killer suffered an incredibly violent death at the hands of another inmate.
Russian airstrikes targeted Ukraine's energy facilities again Thursday as the first snow of the season fell in Kyiv, a harbinger of the hardship to come if Moscow's missiles continue to take out power and gas plants as winter descends.
Separately, the United Nations announced the extension of a deal to ensure exports of grain and fertilizers from Ukraine that were disrupted by the war. The deal was set to expire soon, renewing fears of a global food crisis if exports were blocked from one of the world's largest grain producers.
Even as all sides agreed to extend the grain deal, air raid sirens sounded across Ukraine on Thursday. At least seven people were killed and more than two dozen others wounded in the drone and missile strikes, including one that hit a residential building, authorities said.
The Kremlin's forces have suffered a series of setbacks on the ground, the latest being the loss of the southern city of Kherson. In the face of those defeats, Russia has increasingly resorted to aerial onslaughts aimed at energy infrastructure and other civilian targets in parts of Ukraine it doesn't hold.
Russia on Tuesday unleashed a nationwide barrage of more than 100 missiles and drones that knocked out power to 10 million people in Ukraine - strikes described by Ukraine's energy minister as the biggest assault yet on the country's battered power grid in nearly nine months of war.
It also resulted in a missile landing in Poland, killing two people. Authorities still were trying to ascertain where that missile came from, with early indications pointing to a Ukrainian air defense system seeking to counter the Russian bombardment.
Polish President Andrzej Duda on Thursday visited the site where the missile landed and expressed understanding for Ukraine's plight. “It is a hugely difficult situation for them and there are great emotions, there is also great stress,” Duda said.
The renewed bombings come as many Ukrainians are coping with the discomforts of regular blackouts and heating outages. A light snow dusted the capital Thursday, where the temperature fell below freezing. Kyiv's military administration said air defenses shot down four cruise missiles and five Iranian-made exploding drones.
In eastern Ukraine, Russia “launched a massive attack on gas production infrastructure,” said the chief of the state energy company Naftogaz, Oleksiy Chernishov. He did not elaborate.
Russian strikes also hit the central city of Dnipro and Ukraine's southern Odesa region for the first time in weeks and hit critical infrastructure in the northeastern Kharkiv region near Izium, wounding three workers.
The head of Ukraine's presidential office, Andriy Yermak, called the strikes on energy targets “naive tactics of cowardly losers.”
“Ukraine has already withstood extremely difficult strikes by the enemy, which did not lead to results the Russian cowards hoped for,” Yermak wrote Thursday on Telegram.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in his nightly video address that 10 million people in Ukraine were without power on Thursday as well, mainly in the Kyiv, Odesa, Sumy and Vinnytsia regions. Ukraine had a prewar population of about 40 million.
Zelenskyy earlier posted on Telegram a video that he said was of one of the blasts in Dnipro. The footage from a vehicle dashboard camera showed a fiery blast engulfing a rainy road.
“This is another confirmation from Dnipro of how terrorists want peace,” Zelenskyy wrote, referring to the Kremlin's forces. “The peaceful city and people's wish to live their accustomed lives. Going to work, to their affairs. A rocket attack!”
Valentyn Reznichenko, governor of the Dnipropetrovsk region, said a large fire erupted in Dnipro after the strikes there hit an industrial target. The attack wounded at least 23 people, Reznichenko said.
Russia's Defense Ministry said the strikes in Dnipropetrovsk hit a factory that produces military rocket engines.
In the Odesa region, an infrastructure target was hit, Gov. Maksym Marchenko said on Telegram, warning about the threat of a “massive missile barrage on the entire territory of Ukraine.”
Elsewhere, a Russian strike that hit a residential building killed at least seven people overnight in Vilniansk in the southern region of Zaporizhzhia. Rescuers combed the rubble Thursday, searching for any other victims.
Officials in northeast Ukraine's Poltava and Kharkiv regions and the Khmelnytskyi and Rivne regions in the west urged residents to stay in bomb shelters.
The U.N. nuclear watchdog has warned that the repeated strikes on Ukraine's electricity grid were endangering the country's nuclear power plants. The reactors need power for cooling and other essential safety functions, and their emergency generators can only provide back-up electricity for a limited period of time.
A nuclear plant in Khmelnytskyi was cut off from the electricity grid on Tuesday, forcing it to temporarily rely on diesel generators and to shut down its two reactors, the International Atomic Energy Agency said. Another plant in Rivne disconnected one of its four reactors after partially losing connection to Ukraine's outside grid.
IAEA Director-General Rafael Grossi said the power loss at the Khmelnytskyi plant “clearly demonstrates that the nuclear safety and security situation in Ukraine can suddenly take a turn for the worse, increasing the risk of a nuclear emergency.”
Grossi also has expressed grave concerns about the potential for a radiation leak at the Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant, Europe's largest, which has been held by Russian forces for most of the war.
The war's impact has been felt far beyond Ukraine, in global food and energy markets. Ukraine and Russia are among the world's largest exporters of grain, and Russia is also a significant producer of fertilizer.
There were concerns in recent days about the fate of the deal brokered by the U.N.- and Turkey that created a safe shipping corridor in the Black Sea to address wartime disruptions of grain exports. The deal was set to expire Saturday, but U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said it had been extended for 120 days.
In addition to securing the safe passage of Ukrainian exports, Guterres said the United Nations is also “fully committed” to removing obstacles that have impeded the export of food and fertilizer from Russia.
The Russian Foreign Ministry confirmed the extension, and Zelenskyy called it a “key decision in the global fight against the food crisis.”
------
Associated Press writers Jamey Keaten in Geneva, and Suzan Fraser in Ankara, Turkey, contributed to this report.
The family of one of Robert Pickton's victims says the convicted serial killer suffered an incredibly violent death at the hands of another inmate.
Few people can say they accidentally purchased a nude beach — but Shelley can. When she saw a piece of land she could fondly remember camping on was up for sale, she inquired about it and ended up purchasing it. She soon found that there were already inhabitants on it.
A Mennonite father who killed his one-year-old son with an axe may be allowed to travel to parts of southern Ontario in the coming months
On a tiny island off Panama's Caribbean coast, about 300 families are packing their belongings in preparation for a dramatic change. Generations of Gunas who have grown up on Gardi Sugdub in a life dedicated to the sea and tourism will trade that next week for the mainland’s solid ground.
Attention Ottawa residents, a $70 million Lotto Max winning ticket was sold somewhere in the nation's capital.
Live Nation is investigating a data breach at its Ticketmaster subsidiary, which dominates ticketing for live events in the United States.
Jennifer Lopez has cancelled her 2024 North American tour, representatives for Live Nation confirmed to The Associated Press.
A daughter of actors Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt filed paperwork to legally remove "Pitt" from her name on the day she turned 18.
Germany midfielder Joshua Kimmich has slammed as "absolutely racist" a survey and its findings that one in five of his compatriots would prefer more white players on the national team.
A hefty donation by a renowned local activist to the University of Winnipeg has created what is believed to be the most comprehensive two-spirit archives in all of Canada.
Leanne Van Bergen discovered a skulk of 10 baby foxes, and two mothers, had made themselves at home on her property in Beausejour.
An 81-year-old Waterloo, Ont. woman thought she’d never ride a horse again after a brain bleed led to severe physical complications.
A CP24 camera caught the moment a driver frantically got out of her car as it was being dragged by a truck on Avenue Road Wednesday afternoon.
Prince Edward Island is celebrating its first-ever International Day of Potato on Thursday.
The president of Covered Bridge Chips in New Brunswick is hoping to have his factory rebuilt for late 2025 following a devastating fire last year.
Students and staff at Winnipeg’s Westwood Collegiate had a unique problem to solve this month; how do you lead ducks to water from the school’s courtyard when 12 of them can’t fly yet?
Debby Lorinczy remembers her father as an amazing person and as a man who also made an amazing discovery.
Abigail Strate is a member of the Canadian national ski jumping team and an Olympic bronze medallist. She's also a certified beekeeper.