Independent grocers and industry stakeholders are welcoming the federal government’s national food security strategy, aimed at boosting competition among grocers, growing local produce year-round and improving consumer affordability.

Ottawa says the strategy is backed by more than $3 billion in investments over 10 years. That includes $1 billion for infrastructure — including food terminals and hubs — to help independent grocers compete with large retailers by making it easier for them to buy from farmers and food processors.

Giancarlo Trimarchi, president of family-owned grocery chain

OTTAWA — Foreign Affairs Minister Anita Anand has announced $100 million in federal funding to support Palestinians living in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.

She unveiled the funding in Paris, where western leaders are meeting to discuss mounting challenges preventing a future two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Anand’s office says the funding will go to United Nations agencies, the Red Cross and others to address what it calls a worsening humanitarian crisis in Gaza and rising violence in the West Bank by extremist Israeli

OTTAWA — The federal government has tabled a bill to change the way Canada bars imports of products made with forced labour following an American tariff threat.

Foreign Affairs Minister Anita Anand is in Paris with Prime Minister Mark Carney and her parliamentary secretary Rob Oliphant tabled the legislation today.

Oliphant says the bill would create a list of products and regions that have been linked to forced labour and would require importers to prove that their products were not made through slavery.

He says the bill is a Canadian approach that should also meet the concerns

TORONTO — Thousands of excited soccer fans filled Toronto Stadium on Friday as Canada’s FIFA World Cup opener against Bosnia-Herzegovina got underway, marking the first match of its kind on Canadian soil.

Fans arrived in droves at the temporarily rebranded BMO Field, wearing red and white jerseys and carrying Canadian flags, while others sported Bosnia’s blue and yellow.

At the stadium, artists including Alessia Cara and Michael Buble opened the ceremony, and actor Will Arnett welcomed the fans. Crowds filled the seats and roared with applause

A man who opened fire in the West Texas city of Midland in an attack Friday morning that left one person dead and 10 injured had shot at police just days earlier during a chase, authorities said.

The suspect, 45-year-old Victor Mata Villarreal, already was being sought by authorities when he began firing at officers and bystanders in Midland on Friday before barricading himself in an abandoned veterinary clinic, according to the Texas Department of Public Safety.

Police arrived in the area in response to reports of an

WASHINGTON — U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick has been leading the charge in the Trump administration on the Gordie Howe International Bridge, which has seen its opening delayed at the request of the United States, a White House official said Friday.

Speaking on background, the administration official said Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer spoke with the White House recently about the bridge but was not given a green light for it to open.

Invitations had already been sent out for a ribbon cutting event that was supposed to take place Friday to

ISLAMABAD (AP) — Pakistan’s prime minister said Friday the United States and Iran have agreed to wording of an agreement aimed at ending their war in the Middle East and that mediators were working with both sides to finalize a deal.

Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif said the U.S. and Iran have reached a “final, agreed upon text.” He said Pakistan, which has taken the lead in mediation efforts, was working with the warring countries on next steps.

“Peace has never been this close as

As the search for a suspect in the fatal shooting of a 43-year-old Toronto police officer continues, the family of Const. Marc Pinizzotto is grappling with the immeasurable loss — his mother trying to channel the breadth of her grief into a moving homage to her son on Instagram.

In a post on Friday morning, Linda Pinizzotto called him one of her “extraordinary sons” and “everyone’s hero.”

“His passing echoes deep inside us, our loving family is shattered as we search for

ALEXANDRIA, Va. (AP) — A federal judge agreed on Friday to extend a court-ordered block on the Trump administration’s creation and operation of a $1.8 billion settlement fund for compensating people who claim to be victims of a weaponized government.

Earlier this month, acting Attorney General Todd Blanche told Congress that the government is scrapping its plans for the fund in the face of a fierce bipartisan backlash, and government attorneys have argued that lawsuits challenging the fund are now moot. But plaintiffs’ attorneys