National News

The federal Liberals are announcing nearly $100 million in humanitarian relief and governance support for Palestinians, days before a widely expected election. 

Foreign Affairs Minister Mélanie Joly, who took on the file of international development last week, is announcing funding for major agencies working in the occupied Palestinian territories.

Prime Minister Mark Carney is expected to call a federal election on Sunday for a vote as early as April 28.

Sources would not confirm the specific date of the vote, but federal campaigns must run at least 37 days.

This will be Canada's 45th federal election.

Canada's political parties have been mobilizing campaigns by nominating candidates and organizing leaders' tours.

Carney was elected as Liberal leader to succeed Justin Trudeau on March 9 and was sworn in as prime minister along with his new cabinet on March 14.

Foreign Affairs Minister Mélanie Joly said Wednesday that China has executed four Canadians in recent months.

The minister said all four were "dual citizens" and were all "facing charges linked to criminal activities according to China, linked to drugs."

"This is an issue that I've been following very, very closely, personally, for months, and I've asked personally also (for) leniency," Joly said, adding former prime minister Justin Trudeau also urged China not to execute the Canadians.

With polls suggesting U.S. President Donald Trump and his administration's use of punishing tariffs are a top-of-mind issue for Canadians ahead of the upcoming federal election, Trump has now offered his thoughts on which political party he would rather work with.

"I'd rather deal with a Liberal than a Conservative," Trump said in an interview with Fox News host Laura Ingraham Tuesday.

During the interview he reiterated his call for Canada to become a U.S. state and his false claim that the U.S. subsidizes Canada by $200 billion a year.

With a federal election call expected any day now, the Liberal party has only nominated about half of the candidates it would need to have a full slate on the ballot even as their polling numbers have been jump-started following their recent leadership race.

There will be 343 ridings contested in the upcoming vote and the Conservatives have nominated candidates in 275 of them so far. The NDP has 217 candidates and the Green Party has 208.

Canadians can expect to feel the absence of the consumer carbon price at the pumps immediately but it may take longer to notice a difference in the price of other goods, a new report released Wednesday suggests.

The analysis by Desjardins Economics comes less than a week after Prime Minister Mark Carney and his new Liberal cabinet ordered that the consumer levy be set to zero on April 1.

The carbon price came with a quarterly rebate to offset the cost of inflation; the final rebate will come in April.

The annual rate of inflation accelerated sharply to 2.6 per cent in February as the federal government’s temporary tax break came to an end mid-month, Statistics Canada said Tuesday.

That marks a sizeable jump from the 1.9 per cent increase seen in January, when Canadians saw GST and HST taken off a variety of household staples, common gifts and restaurant bills for the entire month.

Prime Minister Mark Carney said Tuesday that Ottawa will expand the Canadian Armed Forces’ presence in the Arctic and turn to Australia's over-the-horizon radar tech to monitor threats from adversaries such as China and Russia.

Carney also pledged $253 million in new funding for Indigenous reconciliation initiatives in the North.

They include $94 million to upgrade power plants in Nunavut and $20 million for a hydroelectricity project to help move northerners off diesel.

Prime Minister Mark Carney says United States President Donald Trump will have to stop his "disrespectful" comments about Canada before the two countries can have comprehensive bilateral conversations about trade and security.

"We've called out those comments. They're disrespectful, they're not helpful, and they need to stop," Carney said in response to a question regarding Trump's repeated remarks about Canada becoming the 51st state. 

"They will have to stop before we sit down and have a conversation about our broader partnership with the United States."

Ian Smith used to spend most of his days behind a desk in the RCMP's Windsor, Ont., detachment, working on investigations and performing administrative duties. As a member of the force's border integrity unit, the constable says he didn't even have to wear his uniform. 

But that recently changed. 

Smith now dons a uniform and body armour as he drives a marked RCMP vehicle to help patrol roughly 800 kilometres of Ontario's border with the United States, in addition to his usual investigative work.