Winnipeg Free Press

Winnipeg Free Press (Newspaper) - February 03, 2015, Winnipeg, Manitoba C M Y K PAGE B6 B 6 WINNIPEG FREE PRESS, TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 3, 2015 CANADA / WORLD winnipegfreepress. com GRIMSHAW, Alta. - A school bus driver was killed and several students were injured in a crash with a transport truck in northwestern Alberta on Monday. RCMP said the crash happened about 8: 20 a. m. on Highway 35 north of Grimshaw. The bus was taking 14 students to classes at elementary and high schools in the Peace River area. All of the kids, ages eight to 18, went to area hospitals with injuries ranging from minor scrapes and bruises to broken bones and a head wound, said RCMP. " One of the children has been flown to an Edmonton- area hospital with serious but not- life- threatening injuries," said Cpl. Carol McKinley. She said it appears the bus crossed the centre line into the path of the oncoming truck. Grimshaw Fire Chief Lance Bushie said the students were tossed about as the front of the bus was crushed and the semi landed in a ditch. Both drivers were trapped in the vehicles and crews had to use equipment to free them. Students managed to get out of the rear door of the bus on their own, he said. The 36- year- old truck driver was also flown to hospital in Edmonton with serious but not life- threatening injuries. The 60- year- old male bus driver died on the way to hospital. Paul Bennett, superintendent of the Peace River School Division, which owns and operates the bus, said the driver had worked as a spare driver in 2013 and went on the substitute list again last month. The man was trained and qualified and being considered for a full- time position that had recently opened up, said Bennett. Bennett drove to the crash site shortly after the accident and spoke with some students who were keeping warm in their parents' vehicles, waiting to go home. " They were obviously very shaken up. They had just been in a horrific crash." Parents of the students were notified and counselling was to be provided to students and drivers who need it, Bennett said. The students are from Kennedy Elementary School, Grimshaw High School and Holy Family Catholic School - all in Grimshaw. Betty Turpin, superintendent of the Holy Family Catholic Regional Division, said four of her students were on the bus, including the one who was flown to Edmonton. She said the student was " doing OK," and the others had already been released from hospital. Counselling was also being provided to help students gear up for boarding buses Tuesday, she said. Police said the stretch of highway where the crash happened has three lanes - one south and two north. A preliminary investigation showed the truck was travelling in the outside northbound lane and the school bus was going south, then crossed the centre line. RCMP weren't able to say if weather was a factor. " We do know that at the time there was a bit of a snow- sleet mix," said Mc- Kinley. " I can't say specifically what that would have done to the road conditions." Grimshaw is about 600 kilometres northwest of Edmonton. - The Canadian Press Fight over Williams' estate SAN FRANCISCO - Robin Williams' children and wife have gone to court in a fight over the late comedian's estate. In papers filed in December in San Francisco Superior Court, Williams' wife, Susan, accuses the comedian's children from two previous marriages of taking items without her permission and asks the court to exclude the contents of the Tiburon home she shared with Williams from the jewelry, memorabilia and other items Williams said the children should have. The children, Zachary, Zelda and Cody, counter Susan Williams is " adding insult to a terrible injury" by trying to change the trust agreement and rob them of the late actor's clothing and other personal items. No wedding for Manson FRESNO, Calif. - The marriage licence of mass murderer Charles Manson and a 26- year- old devotee who believes in his innocence is set to expire without a wedding taking place, prison officials said Monday. California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation spokesman Jeffrey Callison said weekend visiting for inmates passed without Manson getting married. Afton Elaine Burton and the 80- year- old Manson obtained a 90- day marriage licence late last year. It expires Thursday, making this past weekend the couple's final opportunity to hold a wedding inside a visiting room at California State Prison, Corcoran. Burton, who goes by the name " Star" and says she loves Manson, left her home halfway across the country and has spent the last nine years living near the Central California prison. Son feared being alone NEW YORK - The mother of a sixyear- old boy who vanished on his way to school 35 years ago testified Monday he was trusting but also scared of being lost or alone. Julie Patz recounted her time living in Manhattan's SoHo neighbourhood when her son, Etan, was little. Etan disappeared on May 25, 1979 - the first time he walked to school alone. " That was the last time I saw him. I watched him walk one block away," 72- year- old Julie Patz testified at the murder trial of store clerk Pedro Hernandez, who's accused of killing Etan. " I turned around and went back upstairs and that was the last time." In considering evidence that reaches back to 1979, jurors will delve into a missing- child case that helped inject a new protectiveness into American parenting. Etan became one of the first missing children featured on milk cartons. His parents helped advocate for legislation that created a nationwide law enforcement framework to address such cases, and the anniversary of his disappearance became National Missing Children's Day. American sniper honoured STEPHENVILLE, Texas - As the governor proclaimed Monday " Chris Kyle Day" in honour of the Navy SEAL made famous by the Oscar- nominated movie American Sniper , this small Texas town geared up for the trial of Kyle's accused killer, fellow Iraq war veteran Eddie Ray Routh. Kyle, 38, gained fame as one of the country's most lethal snipers during four tours of duty in Iraq and with his book about his experiences. He was gunned down two years ago Monday during target practice with Routh. Kyle's friend Chad Littlefield, 35, was also shot to death. Routh, 27, was being held at Erath County Jail on Monday in lieu of $ 3 million bail. Jury selection is scheduled to start Thursday, Erath County District Court Clerk Wanda Pringle said. The trial will get underway the following Wednesday and is expected to last two weeks, Pringle said. - from the news services Driver dead after school- bus crash MILE ZERO NEWS A school- bus driver was killed after a crash in northwestern Alberta Monday. T OKYO - The killing of two Japanese taken hostage by the Islamic State group has savagely driven home the high stakes Japan faces and limited options it can muster in such circumstances. Journalist Kenji Goto's beheading, seen in an online video over the weekend, also offers a glimpse into how Japan is struggling to handle the rising menace of terrorism. Until this crisis, Japan had not become directly embroiled in the fight against the militants, who now control about a third of both Syria and neighbouring Iraq in a self- declared caliphate. Tokyo's backing for U. S.- led airstrikes against the Islamic State group is confined to financial and humanitarian aid for refugees and other non- military support for countries affected by the conflict. That proved no hindrance for the jihadis. " What we should realize is that the Japanese are no exception to terrorist targets. We really should open our eyes to see this reality," Kunihiko Miyake, a former diplomat and researcher at a private think- tank in Tokyo, told a news show on TV Asahi. " The levels of safety precautions Japan has taken up until now are not enough," he said. " We must review and step up security for Japanese, not only those abroad but here in Japan." Japan's options for trying to free the hostages were limited. Tokyo lacks a strong diplomatic presence in the region and has a very small corps of Arab experts. Moreover, the military is confined by the constitution, drafted by U. S. occupying forces after the Second World War, to a strictly self- defence role and would be unable to stage a rescue attempt. The video showing Goto's killing, purportedly from the Islamic State militants, carried chilling threats to single out Japanese anywhere as targets. Addressing Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, a man resembling a militant shown in other beheading videos by the Islamic State group said, " Because of your reckless decision to take part in an unwinnable war, this knife will not only slaughter Kenji, but will also carry on and cause carnage wherever your people are found. So let the nightmare for Japan begin." Abe has made security a top priority of his administration. He ordered greater vigilance at airports and at Japanese facilities overseas, such as embassies and schools. The government already was considering sending troops for overseas rescues. In parliament Monday, opposition lawmakers questioned Abe over his response to the crisis and challenged his desire to expand the scope of Japan's military. Abe already has sought and won a reinterpretation of the constitution by his cabinet allowing defence of an ally, such as the U. S., in limited conditions under a concept known as " collective self- defence." The Jan. 20 ransom demand for Goto and for the other hostage, gun aficionado and adventurer Haruna Yukawa, came days after Abe, while visiting the Middle East, announced $ 200 million in humanitarian aid to nations fighting the militants. Since the ransom message addressed Abe and demanded the same amount for the hostages, some critics have faulted him for having directly mentioned the Islamic State group in announcing the aid. " We should not be seen succumbing to terrorism, but there is no need for provocation. We should not send them the wrong message," said Yukio Edano, a former trade minister with the opposition Democrats. Japan's aid may help discourage refugees from becoming recruits of the Islamic State group, but Abe should have used more caution, said Koichiro Tanaka, chief Middle East analyst at the Institute of Energy and Economics in Tokyo. Abe rejects those misgivings and says he took the hostages' plight into account when making his speech. " I thought announcing Japan's contribution to fulfil its responsibility would contribute to the international community's effort to fight terrorism and prevent its expansion," he told parliament. Nationalists in Japan might try to use the hostage crisis as a pretext for a stronger military, said Stephen Nagy, a professor of politics at International Christian University in Tokyo. He noted the U. S. has lost several citizens to the Islamic State group over the past months " and has been incapable of rescuing them. And they have apparently the most sophisticated military in the world and experience in such rescues." For Japan, and possibly the rest of Asia, a more urgent issue is the possibility Islamic State extremists may be more likely to target their citizens, using them as pawns in Middle East regional politics, Nagy said. Japan's handling of the hostage crisis was complicated by the odd series of messages purportedly from the Islamic State militants. The intertwining of Goto's predicament with the plight of a Jordanian pilot captured after his F- 16 fighter jet crashed near the Islamic State's de facto capital Raqqa in December added a further layer of complexity. - The Associated Press DMITRY ROGULIN / THE ASSOCIATED PRESS Motherland calling A man dressed in a Red Army Second World War uniform walks towards The Motherland Calls monument during ceremonies marking the 72nd anniversary of the Battle of Stalingrad in the southern Russian city of Volgograd. The city, known as Stalingrad during the Second World War, suffered six months of intensive fighting that ended with the Red Army's defeat of the Nazis. The high stakes of terrorism Japan forced to become more assertive after Islamic State's killing of hostages By Elaine Kurtenbach and Mari Yamaguchi TOMOHIRO OHSUMI / BLOOMBERG NEWS ( LEFT), THE ASSOCIATED PRESS ( ABOVE) LEFT: Japan Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has been criticized after Japanese journalist Kenji Goto ( above) was beheaded by Islamic State militants. The World B_ 06_ Feb- 03- 15_ FP_ 01. indd B6 2/ 2/ 15 10: 19: 13 PM ;