Stay ConnectedYour essential daily news podcast. We take you deep into the stories shaping Canada and the world. Hosted by Jayme Poisson. Every morning, Monday to Friday.
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An enormous effort is underway to gather evidence of alleged war crimes by Russian forces in Ukraine. Investigators from the International Criminal Court, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch are on the ground, collecting accounts of extrajudicial killings, forced disappearances and torture, among other abuses. Today, Belkis Wille, senior researcher at Human Rights Watch, talks about what she and her team have found so far, and why she believes it’s important that “people around the world, those in power, but also citizens of Russia, can actually read about what this war looks like and what abuses are being perpetrated.” WARNING: This episode contains graphic content and may affect those who have experienced sexual violence or know someone affected by it.
Inflation is obvious in Canada, but the reasons for it are a little more complicated. Prices at gas stations rose above $2 a litre in many parts of the country, while the cost of pasta is up 20 per cent at grocery stores. Canada’s official inflation rate hit a three-decade high in April, rising at a 6.8 per cent annual pace. But what’s behind these sticker-shocking prices can’t be explained by any one factor; the ongoing war in Ukraine, climate change and even some unprecedented monetary policy all contribute to the current situation. Today, CBC business reporter Pete Evans joins Front Burner to sort through the myriad reasons prices keep rising and why the current inflation in Canada doesn’t mean the federal COVID-19 stimulus was a mistake.
The gun debate in America is cycling through its usual motions in the wake of mass shootings in Buffalo, N.Y., and Uvalde, Texas. Today on Front Burner, a look at the state of the U.S. government, and its unwillingness or inability to confront the large problems facing the country, from gun violence to climate change to income inequality. Canadian writer Stephen Marche's most recent book is called The Next Civil War: Dispatches from the American Future. He thinks that the gun control debate is just one symptom of a wider disconnect that Americans, on both the left and the right, feel with their government. And he fears this is all heading in a dangerous direction.
On Tuesday, an 18-year-old shooter barricaded himself in an elementary school classroom in Uvalde, Texas, killing 19 children and two teachers. This, nearly 10 years after the mass shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn. In the years between the shootings, no meaningful national legislation on gun control has passed in the United States. Veronique De La Rosa's son Noah was the youngest victim at Sandy Hook. She tells Jayme Poisson that she had hoped what happened at her son's school would be a watershed, but that now, "it's become painfully obvious that thoughts and prayers are not the way out of every single one of these tragedies."
Monkeypox was first detected in humans in 1970, but it has rarely spread beyond Central and West Africa, until now. As of Tuesday, 17 countries where the virus is not endemic have reported at least one case, including Canada. Given that COVID-19 is still a part of our day-to-day lives, the threat of another infectious disease spreading at a rapid rate feels unsettling at best. While there are many reasons to be aware of monkeypox, its symptoms and how it spreads, there are also plenty of reasons not to panic. Today on Front Burner, Dr. Boghuma Titanji, an infectious diseases doctor and scientist from Cameroon who is currently based at Emory University in Atlanta, delivers a primer on what you need to know about monkeypox. She also dispels some rumours about how it spreads and explains where we go from here.
A new investigation from the Guardian’s climate journalists shows that oil and gas investment continues globally on 195 projects that would each release more than one gigaton of carbon if the reserves were fully exploited. This, despite the fact that scientists say 60 per cent of oil and gas reserves will need to stay in the ground if we want to avoid heating the Earth by 1.5 C. If you add up all of the carbon that could be released from these oil and gas “carbon bombs,” Canada is in sixth place as one of the worst potential polluters. We’re home to nine sites that could release more than 27 gigatons of carbon. Canada is also home to three coal carbon bombs. Damian Carrington is the environment editor of the Guardian. He says the ongoing investment in these projects reveal an oil and gas industry that does not believe the world will achieve its climate goals.
Kuper Island is an 8-part series that tells the stories of four students: three who survived and one who didn’t. They attended one of Canada’s most notorious residential schools – where unsolved deaths, abuse, and lies haunt the community and the survivors to this day. Hosted by Duncan McCue. More episodes are available at hyperurl.co/kuperisland
On Wednesday, the United States Soccer Federation reached a landmark agreement that ensures the U.S. women’s and men’s national soccer teams are paid equally. The first of its kind, the deal puts an exclamation point on a wildly successful run for the U.S. women’s team, including four FIFA World Cup titles that date back to 1991 — and Olympic gold medals in 2008 and 2012. But it only came about after a hard-fought battle led by the team’s star players. Today on Front Burner, staff writer at The Athletic Stephanie Yang is here to break down how that battle played out and what the result means for women’s sport around the world.
He won a majority of his party’s support in the United Conservative Party leadership review, but it wasn’t enough for Jason Kenney to remain leader of the party he co-founded. Kenney stepped down last night after the results were announced, despite winning 51.4 percent of the vote, saying "it clearly is not adequate support to continue on as leader." Today, CBC Calgary Opinion producer and analyst Jason Markusoff walks us through Kenney’s spectacular fall from power and what this shocking result means for his party and the province of Alberta.
On Saturday, a white gunman drove to the only supermarket in a predominantly Black area on the east side of Buffalo, N.Y. He shot 13 people — 11 Black, two white. Ten people died. Law enforcement officials have labelled the massacre a racially motivated hate crime. Many of those killed were pillars of a tight-knit community shaped by decades of segregation. Today on Front Burner, we talk to former Erie County legislator and former Buffalo city councillor, Betty Jean Grant, about how community members are trying to support one another through their grief and horror.
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