National News

EDMONTON — Alberta Premier Danielle Smith, in a leaked cellphone call, commiserated with a COVID-19 protester about his trial while divulging to him there was an internal dispute over how Crown prosecutors were handling COVID-19 cases.

OTTAWA — Jagmeet Singh took a victory lap at his New Democrat caucus meeting on Wednesday in a speech that praised his party’s wins in the recent federal budget.

MONTREAL — A Quebec man accused of killing a provincial police officer had a history of mental health issues and had been found not criminally responsible at least five times for past offences.

OTTAWA — Canadian supporters of Dong Guangping, a missing Chinese human-rights defender, are disappointed with what they call a disingenuous response from Vietnamese officials to the United Nations.

YELLOWKNIFE — The Northwest Territories government has released its first strategy aimed at reducing alcohol-related harms.

OTTAWA — Even as the Liberals keep a tight focus on new clean-tech and health-care spending, the federal budget released Tuesday still projects deficits for the next five years.

WASHINGTON — U.S. Indigenous leaders from the Pacific Northwest say they won't give up trying to convince Canada's federal government to agree to a bilateral investigation of toxic mining runoff from the B.C. Interior. Representatives from several U.

OTTAWA — The trauma of past cost-cutting exercises is looming large as national veterans' organizations anxiously await word on how the federal budget will affect ill and injured ex-soldiers.

MONTREAL — The federal government has air travel on its radar after laying out plans in its budget to speed up airport security screening and reduce flight delays, but industry and advocates remain skeptical.

CALGARY — After six months under Russian occupation, Dmytro Syrman and his family decided to flee Ukraine for a safer life abroad and are now in Calgary. The family lived in Dniprorudne, a mining city of 17,000 in southern Ukraine.