Ottawa, June 24 (IANS) Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has denied meddling in an investigation into the 2020 mass shooting, the worst the country's history.
Brenda Lucki, head of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP), has been accused of pressuring local officers to help advance Trudeau's gun control plans, the BBC quoted the Halifax Examiner as saying, which was the first to report on the development.
According to the Halifax Examiner, the accusation stemmed from notes made by a local RCMP officer, released as part of a public investigation into the mass shooting on April 18-19, 2020, during which a gunman posing as a police officer killed 22 people in Nova Scotia.
The suspect died in a stand-off with police.
Addressing reporters on Thursday, Trudeau said that his government "did not put any undo influence or pressure" on police.
"It is extremely important to highlight that it is only the RCMP, it is only police that determine what and when to release information," the BBC quoted the Prime Minister as saying.
Denying the accusations, Commissioner Lucki said in a statement released on Tuesday that information sharing between the federal government and police is normal during a high-profile event such as a mass shooting.
The RCMP chief however acknowledged that she "should have been more sensitive" in her approach.
Canada's opposition Conservative Party has called for a debate in the House of Commons, and a parliamentary committee voted on Thursday to hold a hearing into the matter.
In the wake of the deadliest rampage in Canadian history, Prime Minister Trudeau in May 2020 announced an immediate ban on the sale, transportation, importation, or use of some 1,500 makes and models of "military-grade assault-style" weapons.
In total, 4,941,795 doses of Pfizer-BioNTech, Moderna and AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccines have been administered in B.C., 1,368,464 of which are second doses.
As of 1:45 p.m. today, VPD officers had responded to more than 65 sudden deaths since the heat wave began on Friday, with more casualties being reported by the hour. Today alone, officers had responded to 20 sudden deaths as of 1:45 p.m., with more than a dozen others waiting for police to be dispatched.
Mark Sandler told a B.C. Supreme Court judge the documents obtained from HSBC include internal email chains and spreadsheets that undermine the allegations of fraud against Meng.
The agency says 851 people died between January and May, which surpasses the previous high of 704 deaths reported for those months in 2017 by almost 21 per cent.
The province will be recommending people wear masks in public indoor spaces if they are partially vaccinated or not vaccinated. No recommendation to wear a mask for those who are fully vaccinated.
Canada's chief public health officer says without vaccines the third wave of COVID-19 in Canada would have been much deadlier. Dr. Theresa Tam says as vaccines began to roll out among the most vulnerable, older populations in Canada, she was "quite struck" by how quickly infections and deaths plummeted in that age group.
