Darpan News Desk The Canadian Press, 22 May, 2020 06:24 PM
UPDATE: Conflicting reports on the number of casualties in the Pakistan plane crash. Pakistan's civil aviation authorities latest figures have shifted from the initial 107 to 91 pssengers killed along with 7 crew members. Local press in Pakistan are reporting 3 survived the crash.
A Pakistan International Airlines plane with 107 people on board has crashed in Karachi. The plane came down on houses in the Model Colony area in the city. Airbus A320 was traveling from Lahore. Mayor Wasim Akhtar at least 5 or 6 houses were destroyed in the crash. The crash occurred on the eve of the Islamic festival of Eid al-Fitr.
COVID-19 has now spread to every region in Canada, with Nunavut reporting its first case on Thursday, as Ontario reported its largest one-day climb in fatalities and the country's budget officer predicted a staggering $252-billion deficit. The case in northern Nunavut was identified in the 1,600-strong largely Inuit community of Pond Inlet on Baffin Island. The territory's chief public health officer, Dr. Michael Patterson, said a rapid response team was on its way to the community to help manage the situation.
The Canadian military is deploying a flight investigation team to look into the causes of a helicopter crash off the coast of Greece that has claimed the life of at least one service member and left five others missing. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau confirmed during a news conference that six people were aboard the Cyclone helicopter that went down in the Ionian Sea on Wednesday as the aircraft was returning to the Halifax-based frigate HMCS Fredericton from a NATO training mission.
Parliament's budget watchdog says that it's likely the federal deficit for the year will hit $252.1 billion as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, and could go even higher if emergency measures remain in place longer than planned. The figure is an estimate based on the almost $146 billion in spending measures the government has announced to help cushion the economic blow from the pandemic, estimated declines in the country's gross domestic product, and the price of oil remaining well below previous expectations.
Canadian support for the principle of equal rights for women and men is among the highest in the world — but in practice, archaic attitudes towards gender roles are still alive and well both at home and around the globe, a new survey suggests. Respondents to the international Pew Research Center poll released Thursday expressed overwhelming support for the concept of gender equality — 93 per cent of Canadians surveyed ranked it as "very important," second only to Sweden at 96 per cent.
The federal government is poised to ban a variety of assault-style rifles, including the type used in the 1989 Montreal Massacre. During the fall election campaign, the Liberals said guns designed to inflict mass human casualties have no place in Canada.
Premier John Horgan says in a news release the government will defer stumpage fees for the next three months to help forest companies with their financial liquidity during the crisis. Stumpage is the fee forest operators pay the province to harvest, buy or sell trees from Crown land.
