Montreal Cab Hit-And-Run

A 23-year-old man was hospitalized after a cab struck him on Montreal's

on St. Laurent Blvd. early Sunday morning, the Montreal Gazette

reported.

      MONTREAL - Disturbing images are circulating on the Internet, showing a man apparently being run over by a taxi cab in Montreal.
A 23-year-old man was rushed to hospital pre-dawn Sunday with serious but non life-threatening injuries.
A 47-year-old taxi driver and some of his clients were being investigated, police said, with the possibility of criminal charges being laid. The incident occurred in a lively downtown district, filled with night stops and restaurants.
Const. Yannick Ouimet said it appeared the taxi driver was having an argument with three clients when he told them to get out. Things quickly degenerated at that point, Ouimet said.
"People were actually kicking the vehicle, causing some (damage) on the vehicle."
Images circulating on the Internet showed a taxi nearly hitting one man and then, moments later, rolling over him. Ouimet said police are aware of several videos circulating online and he said they are being used in the investigation.
"All those videos were looked at by investigators and should help them lay down accusations," he said.
One video posted to YouTube shows the conflict escalating, with a group of men kicking at a car and one man jumping on its roof. Moments later, the vehicle drives right over one of the men. The car then darts away, down the street.
"I told you guys to get out of there!" a man is heard in the video, yelling at the pedestrians involved in the altercation.

Sarabjit case: Indian advocates file mercy plea with Zardari

Amritsar, April 29
A delegation of Indian advocates has filed a mercy petition for Sarabjit Singh, lodged in Kot Lakhpat Rai jail, before Pakistan President Asif Ali Zardari.
Talking to The Tribune, BM Vinayak, a member of the delegation, here today said they also met Sarabjit Singh and Interior Minister Rehman Malik.
Vinayak, a member of the Punjab and Haryana Bar Council, said Sarabjit was lodged in a solitary confinement cell number E-7. Sarabjit had grown his beard and was wearing a skullcap, he said. "He was happy to see us and expressed his desire to meet his daughters," said Vinayak.
He said, "We took up Sarabjit's case with Interior Minister Malik during a lunch hosted by him. He informed us that Presidential pardon is the only way now. We requested him to arrange a meeting with Sarabjit and he happily obliged us."
He said they wrote the mercy petition citing humanitarian grounds. "Sarabjit has served 22 years in jail. His family too has suffered a lot. Further, his confinement will serve no purpose. But the President can grant him a pardon as a good will gesture to built cordial relations," said Vinayak adding that Malik had promised to follow up the matter with President Zardari.
Vinayak claimed that 33 Indians, including three women, were lodged in Kot Lakhpat Jail. "Two more Indians, excluding Sarabjit, have been sentenced to death. We have confirmed that 17 more Indians are in other district jails," said Vinayak.
The Interior Minister has extended visa for a year to all the 15 members of the delegation.
A resident of Bhikhiwind in Tarn Taran district, Sarabjit was convicted for the 1990 serial bomb blasts in Lahore and Multan in which 14 people were killed. Sarabjit was to be hanged in 2008. His execution was put off indefinitely following intervention of Pakistan Prime Minster Yousuf Raza Gilani.
However, his family members, especially his sister Dalbir Kaur, said that Sarabjit was wrongly convicted and the case was that of a "mistaken identity".

Edmonton City Bus service now links airport to LRT

This is one of the buses used on the new ETS route to Edmonton International Airport (EIA) at the Century Park Transit Centre in Edmonton on April 27, 2012.

EDMONTON -  Edmonton finally has a direct bus route to the airport.

The aptly named Route 747 will begin running on Sunday, offering service seven days a week between the Edmonton International Airport and the Century Park LRT station.

“Its time has come,” Mayor Stephen Mandel said of the route. 

The plan to start a three-year trial run of the route was recommended for funding by city council last fall. Sunday’s ferrying of the first passengers on the route will be a victory for the city, Mandel said.

Edmonton was the only city in Canada with a major airport that wasn’t served by public transit.

“It’s important for the future, to how our city’s perceived and the movement of people,” said Mandel.

Passengers can board at Century Park every half-hour during peak flying times from 5 a.m. to 9 a.m. and from 3 p.m. to 7 p.m.

Service will run every hour during the rest of the day. 

A one-way trip on the bus will cost $5 and take about 17 minutes. The fare is non-transferable, and those looking to take the LRT to Century Park to catch the bus or go elsewhere in the city will have to pay a regular ETS fare of $2.75 on top of it.

The majority of the route’s passengers are expected to be some of the nearly 5,000 people who work at the airport. ETS has partnered with the airport to offer employees a $100-monthly bus pass, said Myron Keehn of EIA.

“It’s a critical link for us,” Keehn said.

Tiffany Fuhr, who drives herself and two other airport workers to the airport every day, won’t be using the new service. Though the 5 a.m. start time is earlier than other city routes, it’s not early enough for her and her co-workers. “To be here by 4:30 a.m. to open, it doesn’t really work,” Fuhr said.

There are no plans to make the service start earlier, says Coun. Bill Henderson, but that is exactly the kind of information the three-year trial is intended to collect.

“If our system was running a little bit earlier, they could go earlier, but we’ll see, we’ve got to get this going,” Henderson said.

The same data could help extend the LRT further south, bypassing the need for a connecting bus.

“When we finish with the LRT to the west end and the north, I think we have to look at moving it south and then out to the airport,” Mandel said.

“Cities need to have transit out to the airport and this is the first step in the long term of getting real transit out there.”

ETS has allocated five buses to the route. The buses, which are postered with images of travel destinations such as Cancun and Houston, have added luggage racks.

The North Face | Ruchir Sharma

The northern states are pulling away as growth stutters in the once arrogant south. In this exclusive extract, the author posits the fresh challenges facing India in its bid to be a breakout nation


The North Face | Ruchir Sharma

Dalai Lama thanks Stephen Harper for meeting

 

The Dalai Lama on Saturday commended Prime Minister Stephen Harper for holding a private meeting with him one day earlier despite regular pressure from China on world leaders not to associate with the exiled Tibetan spiritual leader.

"He had the courage to meet me, so I very much appreciate that," the Dalai Lama said at a news conference following a speaking engagement in Ottawa attended by a reported 7,000 people.

Relations with the Dalai Lama is a touchy subject with China, a country the Harper government is eager to expand economic relationships with and which sees the Dalai Lama as a threat by encouraging the independence of Tibet from China.

The Dalai Lama has said before he is simply calling for enough au-tonomy for Tibet to allow its culture to survive, rather than outright independence.

At Saturday's news conference, he encouraged Canada to maintain its relationship with China.

The Dalai Lama hearkened back to the honorary Canadian citizenship given to him by Parliament in 2006, and he referred to Harper as "my prime minister."

The Dalai Lama said one of the things he did during the meeting with Harper was thank him for an agreement more than a year ago to accept 1,000 Tibetans into Canada from India over a five-year period.