US to Send Millions of Covid-19 Vaccine Doses to Mexico and Canada – The New York Times

By Natalie Kitroeff, Maria Abi-Habib, Zolan Kanno-Youngs and Jim Tankersley

• March 18, 2021Updated 2:03 p.m. ET

“The United States plans to send millions of doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine to Mexico and Canada, the White House said Thursday, a notable step into vaccine diplomacy just as the Biden administration is quietly pressing Mexico to curb the stream of migrants coming to the border.

Jen Psaki, the White House press secretary, said the United States was planning to share 2.5 million doses of the vaccine with Mexico and 1.5 million with Canada, adding that it was “not finalized yet, but that is our aim.”

Tens of millions of doses of the vaccine have been sitting in American manufacturing sites. While their use has already been authorized in dozens of countries, including Mexico and Canada, the vaccine has not yet been approved by American regulators. Ms. Psaki said the shipments to Mexico and Canada would be essentially be a loan, with the United States receiving doses of AstraZeneca, or other vaccines, in the future.” . . .

Opinion | Living in Nova Scotia’s Covid-Free World – The New York Times

By Stephanie Nolen

• Nov. 18, 2020
• • 270

Credit…Paul Atwood for The New York Times

HALIFAX, Canada — This morning, my children went to school — school, in an old brick building, where they lined up to go in the scuffed front doors. I went to work out at the gym, the real gym, where I huffed and puffed in a sweaty group class. And a few days ago, my partner and I hosted a dinner party, gathering eight friends around the dining room table for a boisterous night that went too late. Remember those?

Where I’m living, we gather without fear. Life is unfolding much as it did a year ago. This magical, virus-free world is just one long day’s drive away from the Empire State Building — in a parallel dimension called Nova Scotia.

This is one of the four Atlantic provinces that cling to the coast of Canada, north and east of Maine. In Canada, these are typically known as “have-not provinces,” economically depressed areas dependent on cash transfers from wealthier provinces to the West.

‘Why Are So Many of Our Girls Dying?’ Canada Grapples With Violence Against Indigenous Women – The New York Times

WINNIPEG — In the 24 hours before the disappearance of Tina Fontaine, a 15-year-old from the Sagkeeng First Nation in Canada, she was seen by provincial child welfare workers, police officers and health care professionals.

Then she was found dead, dumped in Manitoba’s Red River, and wrapped in a plastic bag and duvet weighed down with 25 pounds of rocks.

“Canada and the system failed Tina at every step,” Thelma Favel, the great-aunt who raised her, said on a recent day from her small home in Powerview, a sleepy town on Lake Winnipeg near the reserve of the Sagkeeng First Nation. “Why are so many of our girls dying?”

Opinion | Thank God for Canada! – By Nicholas Kristof – The New York Times

By Nicholas Kristof

Opinion Columnist

• Feb. 6, 2019,   367
• 

Jessie Thomson, left, and Amany Alhadka, right, were among the countless Canadians who helped Syrian refugees acclimate to their new country.CreditCreditJustin Tang for The New York Times

“After the Canadian foreign minister, Chrystia Freeland, tweetedconcern about Saudi Arabia’s imprisoning of a women’s rights activist, the crown prince there seemed to go nuts.

Saudi Arabia announced that it was expelling Canada’s ambassador, halting flights to Canada, ending purchases of Canadian wheat, recalling students from Canada and selling off Canadian assets. Did the United States or other Western countries stand up for an old friend and ally, Canada?

Not a bit.

“The United States doesn’t have to get involved,” Heather Nauert, then the State Department spokeswoman, told reporters.

Yet Canada stuck to its principles. When a young Saudi woman, Rahaf Mohammed Alqunun, fled to Bangkok last month and warned that she would be murdered by her family if she was forced home, it was Canada that again braved Saudi fury by accepting her.”

Canada’s Ruthlessly Smart Immigration Policy – The New York Times

“But Canada’s hospitable attitude is not innate; it is, rather, the product of very hardheaded government policies. Ever since the mid-1960s, the majority of immigrants to the country (about 65 percent in 2015) have been admitted on purely economic grounds, having been evaluated under a nine-point rubric that ignores their race, religion and ethnicity and instead looks at their age, education, job skills, language ability and other attributes that define their potential contribution to the national work force.”

California Engages World, and Fights Washington, on Climate Change – The New York Times

“LOS ANGELES — The environmental ministers of Canada and Mexico went to San Francisco last month to sign a global pact — drafted largely by California — to lower planet-warming greenhouse pollution. Gov. Jerry Brown flies to China next month to meet with climate leaders there on a campaign to curb global warming. And a battery of state lawyers is preparing to battle any attempt by Washington to weaken California’s automobile pollution emission standards.

As President Trump moves to reverse the Obama administration’s policies on climate change, California is emerging as the nation’s de facto negotiator with the world on the environment. The state is pushing back on everything from White House efforts to roll back pollution rules on tailpipes and smokestacks, to plans to withdraw or weaken the United States’ commitments under the Paris climate change accord.”