Canada
Toronto-based professional with a newcomer’s interest in all things Canadian. A former News Editor with Al Jazeera English and Content Manager with the Maytree Foundation, main forte is in planning, writing and presenting exceptional digital and print content.
Canada
Wrapping up our series on "Immigrants on the Frontlines of Fighting COVID-19," we look into the relationship between health care and immigrants in Canada. There is an old joke that the best place in Toronto to get a heart attack is in the back of a city taxi because chances are the driver is an out-of-work immigrant doctor.
Journalist Ranjit Bhaskar reflects on his recent virtual citizenship ceremony and the physical act that symbolized cutting of the cord with the land of his birth, India. This Canada Day will be different for all of us. We will not be coming together on Parliament Hill in Ottawa and in other cities, towns and communities, here and abroad.
Civic engagement
Live Toronto, Canada From reclaiming public space to opening up economic opportunities, a local women's group re-imagines what their neighbourhood can and should be. Thorncliffe Park is unlike any other place in Toronto. This densely populated neighourhood in Canada's largest city is seen by some as its version of Hong Kong.
Adrian is proud of his eight-year old son's facility with English and his general ease in adapting to the ways of his new Canadian surroundings. "He is now our family's interpreter when we visit our doctor," says the newcomer father from Romania. What he doesn't know is that his case is not unique.
The idea of unconditional cash transfer from government to individuals or families has been receiving renewed attention of late. The concept, usually referred to as Guaranteed Annual Income (GAI) or basic income, has waxed and waned in Canadian and global policy circles for decades. Support for the scheme has always been across the ideological spectrum.
International
News that the family of Aylan Kurdi, the Syrian toddler who drowned on a Turkish beach, had tried to get to Canada has touched a raw nerve amid campaigning for the federal election in October.
Brazil appears to be the most popular BRICS nation even as other members seem to be facing an image deficit globally and among themselves. It occupies a middle ranking position relative to the other countries (and the EU) evaluated in 2013, ranking seventh overall in terms of positive ratings, a 25-country poll released last week said.
Victims' relatives say despite several probes and a trial, many questions remain [GALLO/GETTY] Twenty five years after an Air India Boeing 747 en route from Canada to India exploded off the coast of Ireland, the results of an inquiry into the bombing are keenly awaited by the relatives of the victims. The four-year-long investigation into the June 23, 1985, destruction of Flight 182 that killed 329 people is to be released on Thursday in Ottawa.
About four million voters have registered for the referendum that may lead to the partition of Sudan [Ranjit Bhaskar] Polling stations have closed on the first day of voting in Southern Sudan's week-long referendum on secession. The atmosphere was festive in the southern capital Juba on Sunday, with voters queueing for hours outside polling stations.
Francis Odong's story of a childhood derailed is sadly typical for children in troubled Sudan [Ranjit Bhaskar/Al Jazeera] This is the story of Francis Odong, a Southern Sudanese man from Eastern Equitoria state.
The bull has a special place in southern Sudan, especially among the Dinka, the main tribe of the region. Indeed, Dinka culture is centred on cattle. It is the medium of exchange whether in marriage, payment of debts and blood price, or for sacrifices to the spirits and on major occasions and rites.
What was unusual was the large turnout of middle and upper class voters in urban areas, who traditionally stay indoors treating polling day as any other public holiday As expected, the Maoists made their presence felt in the first phase of India's general election.
New norms driven by individualism, republicanism and industrial capital led to the emergence of the concept[GALLO/GETTY] The concept of human rights is one of the most powerful espoused in the 20th century. Ever since the adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights by the United Nations on December 10, 1948, the legitimacy and popularity of human rights discourse has grown consistently.
Sputnik beeped for three weeks and spent about three months in orbit before burning up in the atmosphere EPA] The time: October 4, 1957. The place: The arid steppes of the Soviet Republic of Kazakhstan. The event: A rocket designed to deliver nuclear bombs blasts off with an unusual payload - a sputnik, Russian for satellite.