The Tilbury Times

Year: 2021

  • Champagne Annouces Funding for research projects at 30 universities

    Saeed Akhtar, Local Journalism Initiative
    The federal government has announced new funding for research infrastructure projects.  Innovation, Science, and Industry Minister Francois-Philippe Champagne announced a $77 million in support to go to 332 research projects across 50 universities.
    Our researchers have always thought big. Now, more than ever, they need state-of-the-art labs and equipment to turn their visions into reality. Investing in our university research infrastructure is key to our continuing role as an innovation leader in wide-ranging fields, from Indigenous research to quantum computing, from neurobiology to advanced robotics. These investments will not only support our ground-breaking contributions to science and research but also improve our economy, environment, and quality of life,” Champagne said.  The funding will come through the Canada Foundation for Innovations (CFI) John R. Evans Leaders’ Fund (JELF).
    “With the necessary spaces and tools, Canada’s researchers will play a meaningful role on the global stage and contribute significantly to the quality of life today and for generations to come,” said Roseann O’Reilly Runte, President, and CEO, Canada Foundation for Innovation.
    Universities benefitting include projects based at the University of British Columbia. Bioengineer Anna Blakney will focus on the prevention and treatment of infections, such as COVID-19, as well as inherited disorders and diseases, including cancer.
    Her work aims to revolutionize treatments with new biotechnologies involving the engineering of vaccine formulations.
     

  • Top 20 per cent income earners pay half of total taxes: Fraser Institute

    Top 20 per cent income earners pay half of total taxes: Fraser Institute

    By: Shazia Nazir, Local Journalism Initative
    Canada’s top income earners pay more than half of total taxes according to the Fraser Institute.
    “Despite the common misperception that top earners don’t pay their ‘fair share’ of taxes, in reality, these households pay a disproportionately large share of the total tax bill,” said Tegan Hill, economist at the Fraser Institute and co-author of Measuring Progressivity in Canada’s Tax System.  The study finds the top 20% of income-earning families pay approximately 54% of the total taxes.
    The study defines ‘fairness’ as comparing the share of income earned by one group compared to their share of total taxes paid. Using this  measure, the top 20 percent of income-earning families is the only group to pay a disproportionate share of the total tax burden compared to their share of income earned.
    The bottom 20 percent of income-earning families pay 2.3 percent of total taxes.  This is party to the progressivity of Canada’s personal income tax system but earn 5.5 percent of the total family income in Canada.
    “The assertion that the top 20 percent of earners in Canada are not paying their fair share is simply not supported by the evidence,” Jake Fuss said.  Fuss is a senior economist at the Fraser Institute, and co-authored the study.
     

  • Feds drop court fight to block documents on firing of National Microbiology Lab scientists

    The Trudeau government is dropping its quest to have a court prohibit the disclosure of documents related to the firing of two scientists at Canada’s highest-security laboratory.
    It served the Federal Court with a notice of discontinuance late Tuesday afternoon.
    In so doing, it’s avoiding a legal showdown over the long-standing principle that the House of Commons is supreme and has unfettered power to demand the production of any documents it sees fit, no matter how sensitive and regardless of privacy or national security laws.
    Opposition parties joined forces earlier this year to pass a Commons order demanding that the Public Health Agency of Canada turn over all unredacted documents related to the firing of scientists Xiangguo Qiu and her husband, Keding Cheng.
    The pair were escorted out of the National Microbiology Laboratory in Winnipeg in July 2019 and subsequently fired last January.
    The government applied to the Federal Court of Canada in June to prevent release of the documents, which it maintained would be injurious to international relations or to national defence or national security.
    However, the Commons order to produce the documents, along with all other business before the chamber, was terminated when Parliament was dissolved Sunday for a federal election.
    Consequently, justice department spokesperson Melissa Gruber said Tuesday that no purpose would be served by continuing the court case.
    Pursuing the case would have put Liberal MP Anthony Rota in an awkward position as he campaigns for re-election in the northern Ontario riding of Nipissing-Timiskaming.
    As Speaker of the House of Commons, he was the named respondent in the court case. He had pledged to fight the Liberal government’s court application.
    Indeed, in a recent submission to the court, Rota asked it to dismiss the case, arguing that the courts have no jurisdiction to review the exercise of parliamentary privilege to send for the persons, papers and records deemed necessary.
    This constitutionally entrenched power is fundamental to our system of parliamentary democracy, and to Parliament’s critical role in acting as the ‘grand inquest of the nation’ and in holding the executive branch of government to account, Rota said in a notice of motion.
    The executive and the judicial branches do not have the jurisdiction to question, overrule, modify, control or review the
    exercise of this privilege by the House, he said.
    Gruber said the Speaker’s motion to strike the case is now unnecessary.
    Conservative Leader Erin O’Toole had requested the court’s permission to intervene in the proceedings.
    Abandoning the case is another attempt by Justin Trudeau to cover up the truth about the Winnipeg lab documents, said Mathew Clancy, a spokesman for the Conservative election campaign.
    The decision to drop the case brings an inconclusive end to the months-long power struggle between opposition parties and Public Health Agency of Canada head Iain Stewart.
    Opposition MPs repeatedly asserted the right of the Commons and its committees to order the production of any documents they please, while Stewart steadfastly argued that he was prevented by law from releasing material that could violate privacy or national security laws.
    The battle culminated in June with Stewart being hauled before the bar of the Commons to be reprimanded by Rota over his repeated refusal to provide the unredacted documents to MPs on the Canada-China relations committee. He was the first non-MP to be subjected to such a procedure in more than a century.
    Stewart had been ordered to turn over the documents to the parliamentary law clerk at that time, but he did not. Instead, he wrote to the attorney general, David Lametti, informing him that he was being ordered to divulge potentially injurious information contrary to the Canada Evidence Act.
    In accordance with the act, Lametti subsequently said the decision to apply to the court to prevent disclosure of the documents was made by justice officials.
    The Commons order for documents also included documents related to the transfer, overseen by Qiu, of deadly Ebola and Henipah viruses to China’s Wuhan Institute of Virology in March 2019.
    Stewart had said the virus transfer had nothing to do with the subsequent firings. He’d also said there was no connection to COVID-19, a coronavirus that first appeared in China’s Wuhan province and which some believe may have been released accidentally by the virology institute, triggering a global pandemic.
    Nevertheless, opposition parties continued to suspect a link and remained determined to see the unredacted documents.
    The Canadian Press

  • Afghan-Canadians try to help friends, family back home

    Canadians with family and friends in Afghanistan say the latest developments  — and shocking images of people clinging to an American military plane leaving the Kabul airport — have left them with fresh worries about their loved ones.
    Roya Shams came to Canada from Afghanistan when she was a teenager  after her father, a local police officer who worked with Canadian soldiers, was killed in a counter-insurgency operation.
    Her family has advocated for equal education for girls and boys back home and Shams continues that work sponsoring girls’ education through her small non-profit Andisha.
    For me it’s not just personal in terms of family. It’s personal in terms of the line of the work I was doing there and I can’t be there physically to help these people, said Shams, who is currently a Master’s student at the University of Ottawa.
    Beyond schools potentially being shut down by the Taliban, Shams remains concerned about the safety of her family still in Afghanistan who have gone into hiding.
    She said those fleeting moments of contact underline the urgency of the humanitarian crisis.
    Lives are taken by minutes or seconds, as we are speaking we might be losing a life, Shams said.
    When she saw images of Afghan civilians clinging to the outside of an American military plane as it took off from the Kabul airport , she could imagine one of her loved ones making that attempt to escape.

    Taliban has not changed

    Ali Mirzad, a volunteer with Canadian-Hazara Humanitarian Services, said those same images shocked him and showed how people fear the return of the Taliban.
    That’s how desperate people are for getting out of Afghanistan, he said.
    The Taliban has put on a face that they are kinder, they have changed, but we have seen enough of their past history that we know better.
    Mirzad said he spends sleepless nights trying to get information to people in Afghanistan who have heard Canada will accept 20,000 Afghan refugees.  He hopes groups like the Hazara — a minority group that experienced persecution under Taliban rule — will meet the government’s definition of a vulnerable population.
    The Taliban is an enemy to all Afghans, but moreso to the minorities, said Mirzad, who worries most Afghans don’t know how to take advantage of the Canadian program.
    He urges Canadians to keep this humanitarian crisis in their minds as the election campaign ramps up, and he encourages the Canadian government to loosen immigration rules around family sponsorship so relatives can be reunited.

    Veteran’s phone buzzing with people trying to escape

    Brian McKenna, a retired warrant officer based in Delta, B.C., served two tours in Afghanistan. He said Canada must support interpreters who helped keep soldiers safe.
    The faces of people I wish were on an aircraft right now, those are not blurry at all, he said.
    When my phone stops buzzing with people that are trying to get out, then we’re done.
    McKenna, who is also a veteran adviser for the Centre of Excellence on PTSD based at the Royal Ottawa Mental Health Centre , said the 40,000 Canadian veterans of the Afghan war face difficult memories of their time overseas.
    You can get to a place where you feel some sense of calmness — not necessarily closure — about how things went, but as situations unfold and deteriorate, it can throw some of that progress in the garbage and make you start over again, McKenna said.
    He referenced moral injury, a type of post-traumatic stress  that comes from feeling betrayal or futility in a complex situation, as a key danger for many vets.
    Canada has a responsibility to help veterans, he added, while encouraging veterans to seek help if they need it.
    Shams holds on to hope recent days are just a setback in Afghanistan, and says her continued advocacy may be proof to Canadian veterans and their families their sacrifices were not in vain.
    I stand with their families. They should understand they have made a huge difference in people’s lives, she said.
    It might not seem like this right now, given the situation, but thank you to all of them.
    Matthew Kupfer · CBC News

  • Ontario CMOH Issues New Directives on COVID-19 Vaccines

    By: Laura Steiner
    Ontario Chief Medical Officer of health (CMOH) Dr. Kieran Moore has issued new Directives on immunization.  The orders were prompted by the Delta variant.
    “To provide the best protection to each individual while learning to live with the virus, we are taking action by requiring  individuals who work in higher-risk settings to be fully vaccinated by providing a third dose of a COVID-19 vaccine to certain groups who have a decreased immune response and by expanding the eligibility to the children born in 2009 or earlier,” Moore said. Ontario will also being staying in the current stage 3 until further notice.
    As of September 7, 2021 Community, and home care service providers, as well as hospitals will be required to have a COVID-19 vaccination policy for all personnel including students, volunteers and contractors.  The policies will include proof of three things:

    • A full vaccination against COVID-19
    • Proof of a medical reason for not being vaccinated
    • The Completion of a COVID-19 educational session

    Anyone who refuses will be asked to complete regular antigen test testing. Institutions will be required to report the implementation.  Other settings expected to see vaccination policies are:

    • Post-secondary institutions
    • Licensed Retirement homes;
    • Women’s Shelters , and:
    • Congregate groups as well as day programs for adults with developmental disabilities, children’s treatment centres, and services for children licensed children’s residential settings.

    The Ministry of Education  is also working on vaccination policy for the 2021-22 school year. Theirs will cover all private school staff, publicly funded board of Education staff, as well as  licensed child care settings.  The Ministry will help schools run voluntary vaccination clinics in nearby schools.  “Our plan will protect our schools, ensure rapid speed with contact tracing, all with the intention of keeping them open for the benefit of Ontario students,” Education Minister Stephen Lecce said.
    Children turning 12 this year are eligible to take the Pfizer vaccine beginning tomorrow (August 18, 2021).  Appointments are available through the provincial booking system, or through public health units, or walk-in vaccination clinics across the province.
    Moore has also recommended that a third dose of the vaccine be given to select groups at high-risk for COVID-19 including:

    • Transplant recipients (including solid organ transplant and hematopoietic stem cell transplants);
    • Patients with hematological cancers (examples include lymphoma, myeloma, leukemia) on active treatment (chemotherapy, targeted therapies, immunotherapy);
    • Recipients of an anti-CD20 agent (e.g. rituximab, ocrelizumab, ofatumumab); and
    • Residents of high-risk congregate settings including long-term care homes, higher-risk licensed retirement homes and First Nations elder care lodges.

    “By taking additional measures in high-risk settings we will further protect our most vulnerable, safeguard hospital capacity, and, ensure a safe return to school and keep Ontario running,” Health Minister Christine Elliott said.  The province reported an increase of 348 new cases.  Of those 61 were in unvaccinated.
    Halton Region reported an increase of 22 new cases, with three of those traced to Milton.  77% of Halton residents have had both doses of the COVID-19 vaccine.
     

  • How Waterloo Region parents are using tutoring services to solve pandemic learning gaps in children

    By: Genelle Levy, Local Journalism Initiative Reporter, Cambridge Times
    Stephanie Richmond immediately noticed a difference between her son and daughter when it came to virtual learning. While Richmond’s daughter in Grade 3 adapted easily to the new virtual program, Richmond’s son, who is introverted, was disengaged and withdrawn in the classroom.
    “My son who tends to be on the introverted side to begin with, it’s almost like the pandemic gave him permission to become even more so,” said Richmond. “He was there, but he wasn’t present, he couldn’t get what he got from a physical classroom setting.”
    Richmond, who is from Cambridge, enrolled her son in the Kitchener-based tutoring service, Indigo Tutoring, and saw a huge boost in his confidence. “Instead of saying, ‘I’m stupid,’ he’s like, ‘Oh, I did that wrong. Let me go back and try it again,’ ” says Richmond.
    Richmond is in the position that many parents find themselves in after a year and a half of virtual learning. Parents say that they are finding learning gaps in their kids due to some children’s inability to adapt to virtual learning.
    While school boards like the Waterloo Region District School Board say they plan to combat these learning gaps with diagnostic assessments in September and tailored summer courses that review basic learning foundations, some parents are forced to pay out-of-pocket for tutoring services for children who are already two full years behind.
    For Amber Huiser — whose 11-year-old son Kane has autism, a speech language disorder and a mild intellectual disability — closing the gaps was even harder. She kept getting calls from her son’s school at the beginning of the school year saying that they couldn’t manage him, despite smaller class sizes.
    “There’s been so many challenges during the pandemic, the most important being the inconsistency with rules and the inability to have a normal life,” says Huiser. This poses a particular challenge for special needs children whose daily lives often revolve around rules and routines.
    Huiser was forced to take Kane out of public school and enrol him in Beechwood Brainery, an alternative education school and tutoring service in Cambridge that caters to neurodiverse children. At the beginning of the school year Kane couldn’t even write. Now, thanks to the help of Beechwood Brainery, Kane is initiating writing on his own and even tackling spelling.
    “This kid is literally pushed into the tiniest little box, and he tries all the time,” says Huiser. “It’s about consistently trying to retrain and figure out a new way to engage with him.”
    Janet Greener, founder and principal of Beechwood Brainery, says many parents who never required tutoring services are now needing them, and that often taking it slow is the reason behind alternatives and tutoring services’ success with being able to close children’s learning gaps.
    “We meet the children where they are, we get to know them and their parents and we figure out what collective goals they have and work as a team,” says Greener. “So what we’ll do is that we’ll usually take a few steps back and work on some foundational skills, especially in math and English and we will use age-appropriate and interesting topics to work on those foundational skills, and then we build back up from there.”
    Grenner says it’s not a lack of desire or effort on the part of the school boards to educate every child, but that there’s a wide variety of learners out there, and the pandemic hasn’t created the ideal situation for any child.
    “Post-pandemic, it is just about slowing down and building those relationships back up and getting used to being with a group of kids again in a classroom setting,” says Greener. “And really just slowing down and making sure that the kids are adjusting before throwing them into academics.”
    Story Behind the Story: After examining how local school boards in Waterloo Region are dealing with pandemic learning gaps, reporter Genelle Levy set out to explore if there were other creative options parents were using to tackle pandemic learning gaps.

  • Erin O’Toole opposes mandatory vaccination for federal public servants, travellers

    Conservative Leader Erin O’Toole said late Sunday he is opposed to mandatory vaccinations for federal public servants and instead prefers a regular rapid testing regime to keep workplaces safe from COVID-19.
    O’Toole ducked questions for nearly a week about the Liberal government’s plan to implement a vaccine mandate for bureaucrats, transportation workers and most passengers travelling by air and rail, a program Ottawa says will help boost stalled vaccination rates at a time when COVID-19 case counts are on the rise.
    O’Toole said the Liberal plan is a divisive one and Canadians instead want a reasonable and balanced approach that protects their right to make personal health decisions.
    Rather than require public servants and travellers to get a shot, O’Toole said, if elected, he’d demand they pass a rapid test before going to work or boarding a bus, train, plane or ship.
    What they do not want is the politicization of the pandemic. Vaccines are not a political issue. To try and make them one is dangerous and irresponsible, O’Toole said.
    We should be united on this, not divided, and Conservatives will not engage in this attempt to drive a wedge between Canadians.

    Vaccination rates slowing

    The Conservatives have been highly critical of the government’s handling of the immunization campaign and the procurement process for COVID-19 shots, suggesting for weeks that Canada was at the back of the line on deliveries and it may not be until 2030 that people are vaccinated.
    After a slow start in the early months of this year, Canada is now a world leader in immunizations with more than 81 per cent of the eligible population vaccinated with at least one dose. But the pace of administering doses has slowed considerably since a blitz in April and May, with well below 100,000 first shots handed out each day.
    Based on a CBC News estimate, more than 5.7 million eligible Canadians have still not received a dose even though there is ample supply in virtually all parts of the country.
    At his campaign launch Sunday, Liberal Leader Justin Trudeau said this election is a chance for Canadians to weigh in on how the government approaches the next phase of this pandemic — including a push to bolster these sagging vaccination rates through workplace measures like mandatory shots for some employees.
    We’ve seen situations where Conservative backbenchers have weighed in on some of this government’s decisions as tyrannical in terms of how we’re creating mandates for vaccination of public servants or vaccination of people on trains and airplanes, Trudeau said, referencing remarks from Conservative MP David Yurdiga , who said last week that forcing federal workers to get a vaccine is a “tyrannical” idea that should give all Canadians pause.
    Well, the answer to tyranny is to have an election and I think people who disagree with this government, or disagree with this direction, should have an opportunity to make themselves heard.
    The government announced last week that it would require vaccination across the federal public service by the end of September. There will be some exemptions for workers with verifiable health conditions.
    By the end of October at the latest, employees in federally regulated air, rail and marine transportation sectors must also be vaccinated.
    Ottawa expects other employers in federally regulated sectors  — like banking, broadcasting and telecommunication — will require vaccination for their employees. The government will work with these employers to ensure this result, the government said in a statement announcing the new mandate.
    A timeline for when shots will be required for the travelling public was not made clear, but Transport Minister Omar Alghabra said the government is tentatively planning to have that requirement in place some time in the fall. The government is also working on a vaccine passport so travellers can easily prove their vaccination history when travelling internationally.
    In a statement Monday, NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh said the Liberal promises lack clear timelines and Trudeau must commit to vaccine passports and mandatory vaccinations by Labour Day — just 21 days from today.
    If Justin Trudeau really wants to protect Canadians, he needs to set real deadlines for vaccine passports and mandatory vaccinations for federal industries, said Singh.
    The timelines I’m calling for are aggressive but doable. Canadians deserve more than Justin Trudeau’s empty talk. They deserve real action to keep them safe.
    John Paul Tasker  · CBC News 

  • Election Call: September 20, 2021

    By: Laura Steiner
    Prime Minister Justin Trudeau met with Governor General Mary Simon earlier this morning at Rideau Hall.  Following a meeting last about 40 minutes, he came out, and announced that she had agreed to dissolve Parliament.  The procedure triggered the 44th general election.
    To kick off our coverage, we’d like to hear from you.
    What are your concerns for yourself, and our community?
    What issues are you most interested in?
    What issues would you like to learn more about?
    Add yours below, or discuss on our social media platforms

  • HRPS Seeks Help investigating August 5 crash

    HRPS Seeks Help investigating August 5 crash

    By: Saeed Akhtar
    Halton Regional Police Service (HRPS) is looking the public help in relation to the death of a pedestrian August 5 in Oakville.
    A 70 year-old female pedestrian was killed in a fatal accident in the area of Bronte Road and Khalsa Gate, Oakville at approximately  8.18 pm.
    The  pedestrian was crossing Bronte Road mid-block when she was hit by a black Cadillac SUV, moving southbound. She was pronounced dead at the scene  The driver of the SUV remained at the scene and was cooperating with the investigators. The Collision Reconstruction Unit reached the scene and started investigation.  The cause of the accident remains unknown.
    HRPS is asking anyone with information to contact the lead investigator, DC Stevenson or the Collision Reconstruction Unit at 905-825-4747 ext. 5065.

  • Canadian special forces ready to evacuate embassy after Kandahar falls to the Taliban

    Special forces troops are on standby to help evacuate Canada’s embassy in Kabul, a defence source tells CBC News.
    The highly-trained soldiers are expected to work alongside allies, such as the United States and the United Kingdom, which are sending thousands of troops to the Afghan capital to aid in the partial evacuation of their embassies as security throughout the war-torn country rapidly deteriorates.
    In what can only be described as a major military and psychological victory, on Thursday the Taliban captured both Kandahar and Herat — Afghanistan’s second and third largest cities.
    The confidential source, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said that at the moment the government has no intention of deploying a large conventional force, as both the Americans and British plan to do. (The U.S. is sending 3,000 troops, the British 600.)
    There has been extensive discussion between the Canadian military and U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) — which is responsible for the Middle East — about providing logistical and transport assistance to Canada, should it be required, said the source — who is not being identified by CBC News because they were not authorized to discuss the issue publicly.
    The decision to shut down the Canadian embassy or reduce its operations lies with the federal government.
    Ciara Trudeau, a spokesperson for Global Affairs Canada, would not confirm the embassy is in the process of being shut down, but did say that the federal government is closely monitoring the situation and that Foreign Affairs Minister Marc Garneau is in close coordination with our allies and the country’s ambassador in Afghanistan.
    The security of the Canadian Embassy and the safety of our personnel in Kabul is our top priority. For security reasons we do not comment on specific operational matters of our missions abroad, said Trudeau in an email late Thursday night.
    Separately, the U.S. State Department confirmed Garneau spoke with Secretary of State Antony Blinken about Washington’s plan to reduce the size of the U.S. civilian contingent in Afghanistan.

    The ‘security situation is deteriorating’ — Sajjan

    Earlier Thursday, before the news out of Afghanistan, Defence Minister Harjit Sajjan acknowledged that Kandahar — the city Canadians fought and died to protect for five years — could fall.
    We’re monitoring the situation extremely closely, Sajjan said during a media availability in South Vancouver. “In fact, I have daily briefings on this, and I had one this morning.
    All I can say is right now, yes, the security situation is deteriorating. We do have contingency plans in place to make sure that our personnel are safe.
    Sajjan would not elaborate on those plans.
    Addressing one portion of his remarks to members of the military and to the families of the 158 Canadian soldiers who died in Afghanistan, Sajjan said their sacrifices and contributions to Canada were extraordinary.
    He even tried to suggest those sacrifices will endure, noting that the Taliban committed many heinous acts in Kandahar before they were driven from power in 2001 by the U.S.-led invasion and that Canada helped to transform the city in the years afterward.
    The stadium in Kandahar City that was used for atrocities, it was again used for people to play soccer. Girls were able to go to school … he said.
    There’s a generation of Afghans who have benefited from the tremendous sacrifice that have been made by Canadians and our allies. And I want to say this — no one can erase that now.

    Taliban reportedly hunting down those who worked for western forces

    Sajjan acknowledged, however, that Canada can’t choose a destiny for Afghanistan. He said that Canada will continue to support the Afghan people.
    In areas conquered by the Taliban recently, humanitarian groups — notably Human Rights Watch — have reported militants executing prisoners and hunting down people who worked for western forces and civilian agencies.
    Canada has been working to bring some of those Afghan workers to Canada under a special immigration program. A first government flight carrying dozens of Afghans who assisted the Canadian military during the war in Afghanistan arrived in Toronto.
    Tonight a spokesperson for Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada told CBC News that the agency is processing applications as quickly as possible. It is also adapting the program to help workers who have had to leave Afghanistan.
    Unfortunately, the security situation in Afghanistan is extremely dangerous and volatile, Nancy Caron said in an email. Given this situation, we are adapting our processes to accommodate those who may now find themselves outside Afghanistan.
    Individuals who want to come to Canada may now apply for the program from anywhere, provided applicants or their eligible family members were in Afghanistan on or after July 22, 2021, according to Caron.
    More are expected to arrive in coming weeks.
    Quoting an anonymous Afghan official, the Associated Press reported that Kandahar had fallen after weeks of heavy street-to-street fighting.
    The news agency said the provincial governor and other officials managed to flee the city by air on Thursday.
    The capture of both Kandahar and Herat brings to 12 the number of provincial capitals which have fallen to the Taliban offensive in recent days.
    Earlier this week, the city of Ghazni was also overrun. It is on the main highway between Kandahar and the capital and its demise means the hardline Islamist movement is tightening its grip on Kabul.
    Murray Brewster · CBC News