A survey, titled “Sous ta façade” taken by almost 24,000 Quebec university students from 16 universities found a frightening figure, one in five Quebec university students have symptoms of depression that require urgent professional help.
The survey also found that close to 60 percent of university students have a heightened level of psychological distress when compared to the rest of the province. The survey also found that students are three times as likely to have suicidal thoughts compared to the general population and twice as likely to have attempted suicide. The survey also revealed that certain groups are more at risk to face mental health problems, namely those with disabilities, first-generation university students and those in the LGBTQ community.
Iranian-Canadians, community leaders mourn victims of flight 752 in Montreal
Iranian-Canadians and community leaders gathered Thursday night at the Iranian Islamic Centre of Montreal to commemorate the lives lost in the tragic shooting down of Ukranian flight 752 by Iranian missiles.
Those who attended included Mayor of Lachine/Lasalle/Dorval, Maya Vodanovich; Assistant of Mayor of Pierrefonds, Sophie Mohsen; MP of Lachine, Anju Dhillon; City councillor for Lachine, Michele Flennery; and Imam Saleh Sibeveih, Director and Cleric of the Islamic Centre of Montreal Canada and Zurich Switzerland.
Imam Saleh Sibeveih spoke at the solemn gathering, one of many such gatherings across Canada during this time of mourning for the 176 victims of the murderous act by the Iranian regime.
The Islamic Centre of Montreal is an orthodox Islamic Centre and cannot be dismissed as fringe or discredited by the Iranian regime.
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Activist acquitted by Quebec court due to lack of English prosecutors
Left-wing activist Jaggi Singh has been released of all charges in a Quebec City court, due to the city’s inability to hold a trial in English.
Singh, who was facing charges of Obstruction of Justice, was also facing charges of impersonation after being arrested by police and giving the name “Michel Goulet,” with a home address of “the Colosseum,” attempting to impersonate a former Quebec Nordique of the same name.
After 29 months of charges being laid, the trial began—but Quebec’s chief prosecutor Steve Marquis had to postpone the trial.
Mainly due to the fact that the main prosecutor, Marie-Helene Guillemette, has been absent on maternity leave.
This meant that Marquis would have to carry out the trial, but due to his very limited English, the trial would not be proceeding as planned.
Judge Guillemette had set the trial for January without mentioning that she would be absent on maternity leave, something that judges say boiled down to disorganization.
With no one able to hold the trial, Justice Bordeleau announced that Singh would be acquitted of the two charges against him.
In an interview after the decision, Singh chalked up the acquittal to the court “self-sabotaging,” knowing that the Crown would lose in a full trial.
Singh later returned to Montreal, telling media that his struggle “is not in the courtrooms,” but is rather against the “far right.”
Singh’s “activism”
Singh has a long history of activism in his hometown Montreal and throughout Canada.
In 2002, Singh participated in an anti-Israel protest against Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu, held by the Hillel club at Concordia University. The talk was later cancelled, as the event turned into a violent clash between protestors and security.
In January 2003, Singh was deported by Israeli authorities after having gone to the West Bank.
On April 19, 2006, Singh was arrested at a pro-Palestinian poetry event at El Salon cafe. There are conflicting reports as to why Singh was arrested, though local police say they were responding to an alleged assault on a taxi driver.
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38-year-old Quebec man faces charges for incitement of hatred, genocide
Valentin Auclair, a 38-year-old resident of Granby, Quebec, a town approximately an hour’s drive east of Montreal will be faced with a count of wilful promotion of genocide against an identifiable group, two separate counts of wilful promotion of hatred against an identifiable group, as well as a charge of hate speech.
These charges come after concerning online activity that has been active as recently as Jan. 5 of 2020. The activity of Auclair was first noticed by Quebec college professor Xavier Camus, who monitors extremism within Quebec and sent a detailed tip to Granby authorities.
It was learned that the hate speech used by Auclair was coming from VK, a popular Russian social media platform.
A quick investigation led by Granby Police resulted in a Tuesday court appearance by Auclair.
According to CTV News, the content Auclair shared “allegedly included images promoting Aryan white supremacy and hateful comments about Jews, Muslims, the LGBTQ community and other minority groups. He also allegedly sympathized with neo-Nazis and applauded several mass killers, including the men behind the Quebec City mosque attack and the Montreal Polytechnique massacre.”
As reported by the Canadian Jewish News, Auclair “continued to propagate what (Professor) Camus terms ‘genocidal fantasies’ glorifying Hitler, ranting about Zyklon B and ‘a pile of cadavers,’ about Jews, black people, Arabs, Asians and Latinos.”
Caroline Garland, a spokesperson for the Granby Police said in a statement that “this is an accusation which is still rare in the past few years and it is an individual with no criminal priors.”
Auclair’s case is believed to be the first case that deals with online hate to be tried this year.
Online hate continues to be a reoccurring issue in Canada and was studied in depth by the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights in the previous session of Parliament.
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400 billion gallons of raw sewage was dumped into Canadian water
Canadian municipalities are dumping an estimated 400 billion gallons of raw sewage every year. Quebec is the worst offender—leading all other provinces in their failure to meet federal water safety regulations, according to documents obtained through an access to information request by news outlet Blacklock’s Reporter.
The Department of the Environment stated that of the 3.4 billion cubic metres flushed per year across Canada, 374 billion gallons went untreated and did not meet the limits. The department’s researchers also predict the actual discharges are likely much higher.
“These volumes do not include releases from combined sewer overflows, sanitary sewer overflows or any other discharges occurring at a point other than the final discharge point,” staff from the department wrote.
The research involved looking at 1,737 sewage plants across Canada.
In 2012, the Harper government attempted to tackle sewage dumping, however, it was largely viewed as ineffective. So far, eighty-five lethal waste discharges have occurred in 2016: 42 in Quebec; twelve in Ontario; and nine in Alberta. These have often resulted in the fish-killing sewage being leaked into Canada’s waterways.
In late 2015, the federal government waived penalties against Montreal for releasing eight billion litres of sewage into the St. Lawrence River, with then-Environment Minister Catherine McKenna approving the dump under several conditions.
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