The Thursday news briefing: An at-a-glance survey of some top stories

Highlights from the news file for Thursday, Feb. 2

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THOUSANDS MOURN VICTIMS OF MOSQUE ATTACK: Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says last Sunday’s massacre at a Quebec City mosque has unified the country in solidarity with the Muslim community. Trudeau spoke at a memorial service for three of the six men killed in the attack. Several thousand mourners packed the floor and stands of the Maurice-Richard Arena to pay their respects to the three men, whose caskets were draped in wreaths and the flags of their homelands.

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TRUMP READY TO START NAFTA TALKS: U.S. President Donald Trump is getting the ball rolling on renegotiating the North American Free Trade Agreement. Trump says his commerce secretary will be involved in negotiations, but he’s not sure what form a new NAFTA will take. Trump says he doesn’t care if it’s a renovated NAFTA or an entirely new deal, but that it’s important that it be fair. Some trade experts predict the trilateral agreement of 1993 could wind up splintering into separate one-on-one deals between the countries — the approach favoured by one of Trump’s closest congressional allies.

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COULD CANADA GET SURGE IN FOREIGN STUDENTS: The head of Canada’s biggest university organization says there’s growing evidence that post-American election uncertainty could help boost an important source of cash for the economy: international students. Universities Canada president Paul Davidson says the number of U.S. students applying to study in Canada for next fall has surged since the election last November. He says Canadian universities have also seen more interest this year from countries like India and Mexico, where many of their students have historically applied to study in the U.S.

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CANADA WISE TO LOOK AT DEFENDING ITS POLITICAL SYSTEM FROM CYBERTHREATS:A former top U.S. spy says Canada is prudent to look at defending its political system from cyberthreats and hackers, given what happened recently in the United States. Michael Hayden, who used to head the Central Intelligence Agency, says there are ways to make a foreign attack on key Canadian databases more difficult, if not impossible. The Liberal government plans to ask the federal Communications Security Establishment, the NSA’s Canadian counterpart, to advise political parties and Elections Canada on good cybersecurity practices.

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FEDS LAGGING ON FUNDING INFRASTRUCTURE PROJECTS: The Parliamentary Budget Office says the federal government is well behind on finding projects for billions in new infrastructure spending. The agency released a report on Thursday that says of the $13.6 billion in infrastructure money announced in last year’s budget and slated to be spent through March 2018, departments have only identified $4.6 billion worth of projects. The Liberals’ first budget predicted that the infrastructure money would boost the economy by 0.6 per cent over two years. The parliamentary budget office report says the government must dole out roughly $11 billion by the end of March 2018 to meet that target.

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POLICE WATCHDOG COMPLETES REPORT ON MOUNTIE DEATH:British Columbia’s police watchdog has passed on a report to Crown prosecutors involving an RCMP officer who was chasing a vehicle that hit a police cruiser, killing the officer inside. Sarah Beckett was killed in her police vehicle while at an intersection near Victoria last April. The Independent Investigations Office says it has forwarded its report to the Crown to consider that the officer pursuing the vehicle may have committed an offence. It did not make any recommendation whether charges should be approved.

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IRVINGS LOBBY FEDS ON SHIPBUILDING:Halifax-based Irving Shipbuilding wants the federal government to provide additional contracts to tide it over once it finishes the Arctic patrol ships it’s working on. Irving is worried about a gap between the patrol ships and a new contract to build warships, warning it could result in “significant layoffs.”The shipyard wants the government to give it additional work to make sure workers don’t sit idle between when the first fleet of Arctic patrol vessels is finished and work begins on the second fleet of much larger warships.

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ONTARIO HEALTH OFFICIALS PROVE GASTROINTESTINAL ILLNESSES: Ontario Chief Medical Health officer Dr. David McKeown says there have been 24 cases of gastrointestinal illness since January consistent with norovirus in people who reported eating raw or undercooked oysters. McKeown says cooking oysters at an internal temperature of 90 degrees Celsius for a minimum of 90 seconds should eliminate norovirus and other potentially harmful microorganisms. Health officials say shellfish such as oysters can become contaminated from the water before they are pulled out of the water.

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TRUMP ‘UNBELIEVABLY DISAPPOINTED’ IN AUSTRALIA DEAL: The White House says President Donald Trump is “unbelievably disappointed” that the Obama administration agreed to a deal with Australia to allow about 1,600 mostly Muslim refugees to be resettled in the U.S. Still, spokesman Sean Spicer suggested Trump will allow the deal to go forward. He says any refugees who come to the U.S. as part of the deal will go through “extreme vetting.” Trump expressed his anger over the deal in a recent phone call with Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull. Asked Thursday about continuing the deal, Trump said, “We’ll see what happens.”

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O’LEARY TAKES DOWN CONTROVERSIAL VIDEO:Conservative leadership candidate Kevin O’Leary says he took down an Internet video of himself firing automatic weapons out of “respect” for the memorial to three of the six victims of the weekend massacre at a Quebec City mosque. The video showed O’Leary firing a variety of high-powered weapons during a visit to a Miami gun range. It was posted just as the high-profile funeral in Montreal was getting underway. Public Safety Minister Ralph Goodale described the timing of the video as “obviously crass, insensitive and exceedingly dumb.”

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