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For years, Canada has been under pressure from NATO allies to hit the military alliance’s target of spending at least two per cent of GDP on defence — something experts say cannot be done with the flick of a switch. Yet that pressure has only grown under the new Trump administration in the U.S.Last week, the White House said it expects all NATO allies to be meeting the two per cent target by June, when leaders gather at the Hague for the alliance’s annual summit.Experts who study Canadian defence and financial policy used words like “impossible” and “not realistic” when asked if hitting that June deadline was feasible.“You’re talking about increasing our defence spending by almost 50 per cent,” said Stephen Saideman, the Paterson Chair of International Affairs at Carleton University and di...

Three parties reached a deal on Thursday to form a new centrist Austrian government, two weeks after a far-right party that won an election in September failed to put together an administration. The conservative Austrian People’s Party, the center-left Social Democrats and the liberal Neos agreed on a program for a coalition after what Christian Stocker, who is expected to become chancellor, called “perhaps the most difficult negotiations on a government in the history of our country.”Three weeks ago, the country’s politicians broke a post-World War II record of 129 days to form a new government that dated to 1962. Migration, the economy and extremism “The challenges are historic and far-reaching,” said Stocker, the new People’s Party leader, pointing to the ong...

Thousands of U.S. Agency for International Development workers who have been fired or placed on leave as part of the Trump administration’s dismantling of the agency are being given a brief window Thursday and Friday to clear out their workspaces. USAID placed 4,080 staffers who work across the globe on leave Monday. That was joined by a “reduction in force” that will affect another 1,600 employees, a State Department spokesman said in an emailed response to questions.USAID has been one of the biggest targets so far of a broad campaign by President Donald Trump and the Department of Government Efficiency, a project of Trump adviser Elon Musk, to slash the size of the federal government. The actions at USAID leave only a small fraction of its employees on the job.Trump and Musk have moved s...

Canada deported more people last year to hit its highest annual level of removals in about a decade, overwhelmingly deporting people whose refugee claims were rejected, data obtained by Reuters showed. By late November, Canada’s removal numbers had reached their highest point since at least 2015, when the governing Liberals led by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau came to power. The government has also budgeted more money for deportations this year.Trudeau’s government, now in its final days, has sought to show Canadians it is getting tough on immigration amid a rising backlog of refugee claims and a backlash against immigrants over concerns that immigration is exacerbating a housing shortage.Canada’s border agency said the spike in deportations is tied to a “significant increase” in the numbe...

A new documentary makes the case that a change in Canada’s immigration policy more than 50 years ago has fuelled the country’s current boom in NBA players. “Inbound,” a short film on how Prime Minister Pierre Trudeau’s multiculturalism policy in the early 1970s brought an influx of immigrants to Canada whose children and grandchildren are now becoming professional basketball players premiered in Toronto last week. After a limited engagement in Cineplex theatres across the country, it’s now available to be streamed online through TSN, Crave and the NBA app.The family of Montreal’s Chris Boucher, a backup forward for the Toronto Raptors, is prominently featured in “Inbound.” He said that the documentary’s thesis reflected his lived experience.“My family was definitely part of the immigration...