- The US consulate in Toronto was hit by gunfire early Tuesday morning. Nobody was hurt; police are looking for two suspects in what they are calling a "national security incident". As someone on this Reddit thread remarked:
So have your pick of suspects : Canadian angry at the tariffs? Iranian angry at the attack? Muslim supporting other Muslims? Indian, Brazilian, Mexican, European, Chinese angry at tariffs? Venezuelan angry at Maduro's ousting? Russian angry at America? Palestinian?
There are 195 sovereign countries on Earth, Trump managed to piss off most of them.
Others have pointed out the fact that the shots appear to have fired from a handgun, meaning that there's an excellent chance that the gun was originally smuggled into the country from the States, bringing things full circle.
- The US is reportedly putting pressure on Sri Lanka not to repatriate the survivors from the Iranian ship sunk by an American submarine last week, as well as the crew of a second Iranian vessel that became stranded near the island nation. A State Department cable indicates that the US ambassador to Sri Lanka has urged the country to "minimize Iranian attempts to use the detainees for propaganda".
- Nunavut's Lori Idlout has become the latest MP to to defect to the Liberals, this time from the NDP. This defection, along with 3 recent Conservative MPs who defected recently, brings the Liberals up to 170 seats, two short of a majority. The motive for Idlout's decision is unclear. Meanwhile at the provincial level in Manitoba, Conservative MLA Bob Lagassé has left his party to sit as an independent, saying that the last straw was the party's failure to eject Jeff Wharton after he was implicated and fined in the Sio Silica scandal.
- A recall campaign against Alberta premier Danielle Smith has failed after activists only managed to get 2,300 of the 12,000 signatures needed to force a byelection in her constituency of Brooks-Medicine Hat.
- French authorities are investigating an apparent foreign disinformation campaign against two members of the leftwing France Unbowed party who are running for municipal office. One of the candidates, Sebastien Delogu, who is running for mayor of Marseille, was the subject of a blog posting by an anonymous person who claims that he ruined their life; posters with a QR code linking to the blog were posted around the city. The blog, which has since been removed, appears to be connected with a network of accounts linked to the pro-Israeli ELNET organization, a registered lobby group in the country. The group had also targeted Francois Piquemal, who is running for the mayoral office in Toulouse. Both Delogu and Piquemal have been vocal critics of Israel.
- Hungary's parliament has passed a resolution opposing the admission of Ukraine to the EU. Hungary has also adopted a special resolution to permit the cash and gold that was seized while being transported through the country by Ukrainian financial institution Oschadbank to be held for the duration of their investigation into what they claim may be linked to organized crime. Strangely, in light of Hungary's claims, they have released the bank employees that they arrested during the seizure; perhaps they don't want the inconvenience of a trial that might undermine their case for taking the assets. And Slovak prime minister Robert Fico is vowing to "take up the baton from Hungary" and block EU funds to Ukraine even if Hungary's Viktor Orbán is defeated in the upcoming election.
- Lou Callaghan, a captain with the Canadian Coast Guard has been fired after he ignored a distress call from a fishing boat that had run aground. Callaghan claimed to have initially not heard the first call; crew members on his vessel claimed that he turned down the radio after the call came through. Fortunately he was eventually persuaded to attend and the crew of the fishing boat were rescued.
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