TOKYO (AP) – The U.S. robotics expert tapped to head Toyota’s Silicon Valley research company says the $1 billion investment by the giant Japanese automaker will start showing results within five years. Gill Pratt told reporters that the Toyota Research Institute is also looking ahead into the distant future when …
Read More »Monthly Archives: June 2016
Next week in Toronto history: Pearson blockaded by airport taxi drivers on June 20, 2005
Taxi and limo drivers, fed up with the airport authority’s licensing system, blocked three roads leading out of Pearson. Anti-Uber taxi protesters who gridlocked City Hall’s surrounding streets last December were reviled by downtown commuters — but their protest didn’t come close to one 10 years earlier on June 20, …
Read More »Questions rise over Bangladesh jailing 11,600 in crackdown
NEW DELHI (AP) – Within six days of announcing a crackdown on Islamist militants, Bangladesh had filled its jailhouses with 11,600 new detainees in what seemed like an astonishing display of law enforcement might. The problem is, less than 2 percent of those picked up are suspected radicals, and not …
Read More »Iraqi troops clear IS mines in recaptured areas of Fallujah
BAGHDAD (AP) – An Iraqi military official says government forces are clearing mines and explosives left behind by members of the Islamic State group in areas recently retaken from the extremists in the city of Fallujah. Brig. Haider al-Obeidi told The Associated Press on Saturday that operations are still ongoing …
Read More »Police smother Chinese village ahead of planned protest
BEIJING (AP) – Scores of paramilitary police have locked down a restive village in southern China to ward off fresh anti-corruption protests nearly five years after its uprising made it a symbol of grassroots defiance against the Communist Party. A resident from Wukan village in Guangdong Province said by telephone …
Read More »Russian track and field athletes banned from Rio Games
VIENNA (AP) – Russia’s track and field athletes will be banned from competing for their country at the Rio de Janeiro Olympics after a landmark decision Friday that punished the sports powerhouse for a systematic doping system that operated “from the top down” and tainted the entire team. In an …
Read More »Man fatally struck by falling tree limb in Trinity Bellwoods Park
A man has died after being struck by a falling tree branch in Trinity Bellwoods Park, Toronto police have confirmed. It happened in the park located in the Queen Street West and Strachan Avenue area a short time ago. “We had multiple witnesses that we took statements from who confirmed …
Read More »‘Our story does not end here,’ Bosma’s widow says following convictions
Two men charged in the death of Tim Bosma have been found guilty of first-degree murder and sentenced to life in prison. Dellen Millard, 30, and Mark Smich, 28, were both found guilty in Bosma’s 2013 death. Family and friends of Bosma let out gasps in the Hamilton courtroom as …
Read More »No food, no teachers, violence in failing Venezuela schools
CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) – Maria Arias slipped her notebooks into her backpack, scrounged for a banana to share with her brother and sister, and set off for high school through narrow streets so violent taxis will not come here for any price. She hoped at least one of her teachers …
Read More »Philippine poor get hit early in Duterte-inspired crackdown
MANILA, Philippines (AP) – In a crackdown bearing the Philippine president-elect’s name, police have rounded up hundreds of children or their parents to enforce a night curfew for minors, and taken away drunk and shirtless men roaming metropolitan Manila’s slums. The poor, who were among Rodrigo Duterte’s strongest supporters, are …
Read More »