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HS baseball: Breaking down the tournament

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:51:00 GMT

In his first year at the helm Matt Henriksen coached Whitman-Hanson to a Patriot League Keenan title. Now he hopes that magic translates to the state tournament.Courtesy of a strong pitching staff highlighted by Evan Yakavonis and Ryan Baker, the No. 5 Panthers are a legitimate threat in Div. 2 but face plenty of landmines if they hope to reach a state final. Defending champion Milton enters as the tournament’s top overall seed and has the talent depth in Owen McHugh, Scott Longo, and Jimmy Fallon to make another deep run. The finalist from a year ago, No. 3 King Philip, has Brendan Senjac leading a strong lineup. A second-round matchup with No. 14 Duxbury would be interesting.Second-seeded Leominster may be playing better than anyone in Massachusetts and is a contender while No. 4 Hopkinton closed the year with an impressive win over Franklin. Dwayne Follette’s Plymouth North team enters the tournament as the No. 9 seed and can never be taken lightly while perennial con...

US lawyer named chief prosecutor at office linked to Kosovo war crimes court

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:51:00 GMT

THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP) — American lawyer Kimberly West has been appointed as the chief prosecutor linked to a European Union-backed court prosecuting war crimes in Kosovo, the prosecutor’s office announced Friday.West replaces Jack Smith, who stood down as head of the Specialist Prosecutor’s Office in November to become a U.S. Justice Department special counsel overseeing investigations into the retention of classified documents at former President Donald Trump’s Florida estate, Mar-a-Lago, as well as aspects of an investigation into efforts to overturn the 2020 election won by Democrat Joe Biden.“It is an honor to have been selected for this important and challenging role,” West said in a statement. “I am looking forward to joining the SPO and to taking its work forward.”West currently works for a Boston law firm. From 2008-2013 she was part of the team at the United Nations’ Yugoslav war crimes tribunal that prosecuted former Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Kara...

In The News for June 2 : Provincial fire bans spark campfire alternatives

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:51:00 GMT

In The News is a roundup of stories from The Canadian Press designed to kickstart your day. Here is what’s on the radar of our editors for the morning of June 2 …What we are watching in Canada …As fire bans continue in many provinces, businesses selling camping gear and firewood are seeing a shift in demand. Fire bans began rolling in after hot, dry weather took over much of Canada early in the season — starting in Alberta, Saskatchewan and British Columbia, now expanding to the Maritimes. While Saskatchewan and Alberta have lifted the bans in some regions, people in the Prairies have been monitoring the wildfire season closely.Companies that supply camping enthusiasts have been seeing trends change.Alberta-based Smart Firewood Products Managing Director Jade Najam says demand usually picks up around mid-April and continues until mid-October, but things are different this year. “This May, I’m not even at five per cent of what I did last year in sales,&#...

Kyiv defenses thwart Russia’s 6th air assault in 6 days against Ukraine capital

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:51:00 GMT

KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Ukrainian air defenses shot down more than 30 Russian cruise missiles and drones in Moscow’s sixth air attack in six days on Kyiv, local officials said Friday.The Ukrainian capital was simultaneously attacked from different directions by Iranian-made Shahed drones and cruise missiles from the Caspian region, senior Kyiv official Serhii Popko wrote on Telegram.A 68-year-old man and an 11-year-old child were wounded in the attack, with private houses, outbuildings and cars sustaining damage from falling debris, according to Ukraine’s Prosecutor General’s Office.A recent spate of attacks on the capital has put strain on residents and tested the strength of Ukraine’s air defenses while Kyiv officials plot what they say is an upcoming counteroffensive to push back the Kremlin’s forces 15 months after their full-scale invasion. Kyiv was the target of drone and missile attacks on 17 days last month, including daylight attacks.Moscow’s strategy c...

Planned production studio in Iqaluit will be ‘game changing,’ says filmmaker

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:51:00 GMT

IQALUIT, Nunavut — Nunavut filmmakers and videographers say construction of a large-scale TV and film production studio in Iqaluit will be “game changing” for the territory’s film industry.Iqaluit-based production company Red Marrow Media, co-founded by Stacey Aglok MacDonald and Alethea Arnaquq-Baril, is leading the project. They’re currently developing a yet-untitled comedy series, commissioned by CBC, APTN and Netflix. “It’ll be the biggest show that’s ever come out of Nunavut,” Arnaquq-Baril said, adding she could not yet share many details.“We’re excited to spend time in our communities on screen making people laugh, which is not something we get to do on the global stage very often.”CBC said in a news release the series will centre on a young Inuk mother trying to build a new future for herself in a small Arctic town where everyone knows each other’s business.The studio will help make the show possible, as...

Canada silent on Polish democratic backslide as prime minister visits Ottawa

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:51:00 GMT

OTTAWA — Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is welcoming Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki to Canada Friday as the federal Liberals keep quiet about a democratic backslide in his country. “There is too much silence, and I think we are on the edge in Poland,” said Marcin Gabrys, a political scientist with Jagiellonian University in Krakow.“How can you have a shared commitment to democracy when there is a clear threat to the electoral process?”Gabrys, who specializes in Canadian studies, said Canada and Poland have been undertaking an unprecedented amount of collaboration since the ruling Law and Justice party, locally known as PiS, took power in 2015.Yet the party has “a strong discrepancy” with the values held by the Trudeau government, he said.For example, a new law in Poland will create a commission to probe alleged Russian interference in the country. Academics and civil-rights groups say the mandate is so vague that the panel of mostly gover...

‘All about the campfire’: Campers adjust their plans with fire bans in place

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:51:00 GMT

EDMONTON — Jade Najam was getting excited about camping during the May long weekend, sitting around the campfire late into the night with his family and sipping hot chocolate.“Camping is all about the campfire. Just surfing the fire and sitting around the fire,” said Najam. “Sitting around the campfire is the most important part of our evening.”But Alberta’s fire ban, which was put in place in early May, still hadn’t been lifted. Najam called off the plans to go camping in the wilderness, deciding it was better to stay home instead.Fire bans began rolling in after hot, dry weather took over much of Canada early in the season — starting in Alberta, Saskatchewan and British Columbia, now expanding to the Maritimes. While Saskatchewan and Alberta have lifted the bans in some regions, people in the Prairies have been monitoring the wildfire season closely.Companies that supply camping enthusiasts have been seeing trends change.Najam, who is the managi...

Urban sprawl on wooded lands presents unique challenges when fires spread: experts

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:51:00 GMT

As more people build houses on the fringes of wooded areas, the approach to firefighting is getting more complex — and the out-of-control wildfire near Halifax is one stark example, experts say.The fast-moving wildfire that broke out Sunday destroyed an estimated 150 homes and forced about 16,000 people from their homes in subdivisions northwest of Halifax.Roger Collet, wildfire management officer with the New Brunswick Department of Natural Resources, said such “interface” fires require teams from municipal fire departments to work alongside wildland firefighters.“Where the forest meets the urban area — the subdivisions where people are living in there — it’s still quite wooded, so we have to work together,” he said in an interview.Robert Gray, a wildland fire ecologist in British Columbia, said whether a fire is in an urban or wildland setting, one of the first things firefighters do is establish a containment zone.In forested areas, he said, fi...

Barrington Lake blaze largest ever in recorded in provincial history at 200 square km

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:51:00 GMT

Four out-of-control wildfires continue to burn throughout Nova Scotia, including the largest wildfire ever recorded in provincial history.Despite the best efforts of firefighters, the Barrington Lake fire in Shelburne County now covers more than 200 square kilometres.Natural Resources Minister Tory Rushton says six more water bombers are flying in from the United States on Friday and over the weekend, and an unspecified number of firefighters from the U.S. and Costa Rica are on their way to help battle the blaze.Fire officials say a fast-moving wildfire burning in suburban Halifax since Sunday is 50 per cent contained, but add that while it has not grown since Wednesday, it remains out of control.Halifax Mayor Mike Savage says at least two people in the city have been fined for violating a provincewide burn ban after one was caught lighting leaves on fire with a propane torch and another decided to have a bonfire.Ottawa announced Thursday it is establishing a donation matching progr...

Poilievre tries to head off PPC vote as Bernier bets on social conservatives

Published Fri, 21 Feb 2025 10:51:00 GMT

OTTAWA — Pierre Poilievre is off to Manitoba to rally Conservative supporters ahead of a byelection that Maxime Bernier is hoping will send him back to Parliament.The far-right People’s Party of Canada leader lost his Quebec seat in the 2019 federal vote and lost again in the 2021 election. The riding of Portage—Lisgar came up for grabs after longtime Conservative MP Candice Bergen, who served as the party’s interim leader before Poilievre took over, decided to resign. Bernier will test his luck in the rural Manitoba riding that delivered his fledging party its best result in 2021, with slightly more than 20 per cent of the vote. Numbers like that spooked Conservative MPs, especially those in the West who saw their typically rock-solid support slipping to a more populist party. Bernier stood vehemently against COVID-19 health restrictions, while then-Tory leader Erin O’Toole struggled to strike a position on vaccine mandates that satisfied anyone the party’s ...