Four officers of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) were killed while investigating an illegal marijuana farm, in what is the worst single case of police deaths in Canada in 120 years.
RCMP spokesman Corporal Wayne Oakes said the four officers were at a Quonset hut on a farm near the village of Rochfort Bridge in northwestern Alberta on Thursday when they were shot by a suspect, who was also found in the shed. A government source told The Canadian Press news agency that the suspect later killed himself after shooting the officers.
"It's my sad duty to inform you that four members of the RCMP were killed today in the line of duty -- four brave, young members," said Bill Sweeney, commanding officer of the RCMP in Alberta.
"The loss of four police officers is unprecedented in recent history," Sweeney said. "I'm told you have to go back to about 1885 in the RCMP history during the Northwest Rebellion to have a loss of this magnitude."
Public Safety Minister Anne McLellan held a news conference to say she would consider tougher penalties for growers in the proposed marijuana decriminalization bill. Parliament is preparing to debate a resolution that asserts that legalizing pot would weaken the activities of drug dealers and organized crime.
Prime Minister Paul Martin called it an act of "brutality" and offered his condolences to the families of the slain officers.
Sweeney said he couldn't give details on what happened until all the facts were gathered.
There had been confusion all day about the fate of the officers after the first reports that shots were fired at a farm near Rochfort Bridge, a village of about 60 people.
Cenaiko had first told reporters that four officers were not responding to their radios after having gone to investigate suspected illegal activities on the farm. Sergeant Rick Oncescu of the Calgary RCMP said two SWAT teams were called into the area and Mounties from surrounding jurisdictions also responded.
Major Scott Lundy, a spokesman for Edmonton Garrison, said the military received a request just after 12:30pm from the RCMP for assistance. He said two armored personnel carriers, an ambulance and about 20 military personnel were dispatched from the military base.
A ship that appears to be taking on the identity of a scrapped gas carrier exited the Strait of Hormuz on Friday, showing how strategies to get through the waterway are evolving as the Middle East war progresses. The vessel identifying as liquefied natural gas (LNG) carrier Jamal left the Strait on Friday morning, ship-tracking data show. However, the same tanker was also recorded as having beached at an Indian demolition yard in October last year, where it is being broken up, according to market participants and port agent’s reports. The ship claiming to be Jamal is likely a zombie vessel that
Japan is to downgrade its description of ties with China from “one of its most important” in an annual diplomatic report, according to a draft reviewed by Reuters, as relations with Beijing worsen. This year’s Diplomatic Bluebook, which Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s government is expected to approve next month, would instead describe China as an important neighbor and the relationship as “strategic” and “mutually beneficial.” The draft cites a series of confrontations with Beijing over the past year, including export controls on rare earths, radar lock-ons targeting Japanese military aircraft and increased pressure around Taiwan. The shift in tone underscores a deterioration
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German Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s conservative Christian Democratic Union (CDU) yesterday faced a regional election battle in Rhineland-Palatinate, now held by the center-left Social Democratic Party (SPD). Merz’s CDU has enjoyed a narrow poll lead over the SPD — their coalition partners at the national level — who have ruled the mid-sized state for 35 years. Polling third is the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD), which spells a greater threat to the two centrist parties in several state elections in September in the country’s ex-communist east. The picturesque state of Rhineland-Palatinate, bordering France, Belgium and Luxembourg and with a population of about 4 million,
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