Winnipeg Free Press

Winnipeg Free Press (Newspaper) - September 6, 2020, Winnipeg, Manitoba C M Y K PAGE A3 SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 6, 2020 ● WINNIPEGFREEPRESS.COM A 3NEWS I LOCAL • CANADA The province also released an animated video, Wear It Well, show- ing kids how to don a non-medical mask and prevent the spread of the virus. The video is found on the province’s website and comes days before many children head back to class. It uses a hockey stick to explain physical distancing and references a taco as a way to safely store a reusable mask. Public health officials are urging Manitobans to remember the funda- mentals: remain home when feeling ill, follow proper hand hygiene, cover your cough, physically distance and wear a mask when you can’t. The total number of Manitoba cas- es is 1,294 and there have been 852 recoveries. Health officials report the current five-day test positivity rate is 1.4 per cent with an additional 1,494 tests completed Friday. gabrielle.piche@freepress.mb.ca The city has a survey online where people can give feedback about Open Streets, including picking the best time of year to have the program, if at all. The survey ends Monday. The motion before city council aims to keep active transport routes until Nov. 1 at the Wolseley Avenue route and at Churchill Drive, from Hay Street to Jubilee Avenue. Council may vote on the matter at its Sept. 30 meeting. Coun. John Orlikow (River Heights- Fort Garry) said he’ll make his decision after receiving the survey’s results. “We have time,” Orlikow said, adding if council votes for extended active transport routes, the changes will prob- ably last from October to November. Some people felt a bit relieved over the ending of Open Streets, includ- ing Amy Bruno, who lives on Vialoux Drive. She’s been yelled at for driving down the road in her car, which she needs to do when she leaves her house. “It’s like, well, how are people sup- posed to go to work if people read the signs (on the street) and assume, ‘Oh, you’re not supposed to drive down here,’” Bruno said. Most people are understanding once they realize people who live on the road can still drive on it, Bruno said. She added she likes the initiative because people have more access to walking around and social distancing. Others, like Matt Ullenboom, feel indifferent about the program’s end. Ullenboom, 33, went for a bike ride with his five-year-old son through Assini- boine Park and Vialoux Drive Saturday. “It’s definitely a good thing in the warmer months, when people can be out,” Ullenboom said. “In the winter and fall, it wouldn’t bother me if they changed it back to car traffic.” Beginning Sept. 13, Lyndale Drive, from Cromwell Street to Gauvin Street; Scotia Street, from Anderson Avenue (at St. Cross Street) to Arm- strong Avenue; Wellington Crescent, from the west end of Academy Road to Guelph Street; and Wolseley Avenue, from Raglan Road to Maryland Street, will have limited motor vehicle traffic on Sundays and holidays from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. The restrictions end Oct. 12. gabrielle.piche@freepress.mb.ca OPEN STREETS ● FROM A1 COVID-19 ● FROM A1 ‘It’s definitely a good thing in the warmer months, when people can be out’ — Matt Ullenboom DANIEL CRUMP / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS MOVE-IN DAY Todd Mazur (right) helps his daughter, Emily Mazur, move into her room at the Pembina Hall residence at the University of Manitoba. Along with safety precautions, such as wearing a mask and physical distancing, students are only allowed to have one other person help them move belongings into their dorms. Emily, who is from Fischer Branch, is starting her first year of university and pursuing a science degree. OTTAWA — The federal govern- ment is being urged to halt trade talks with Brazil after another summer of record-breaking fires in the Amazon rainforest. New data from Brazil’s own space agency show the fire dev- astation in the rainforest even worse this year than in 2019, when 30 per cent more of the for- est was destroyed compared to the year before. Between January and the end of July, an area almost twice the size of Prince Edward Island had burned, and recent reports show the trend continued in August. France and Germany have both halted further movement to ratify Europe’s free trade deal with the Mercosur bloc, which includes Brazil, Argentina, Paraguay and Uruguay. Greenpeace Canada campaign manager Reykia Fick said Canada needs to pull out of trade talks with Mercosur too. “The government cannot be rewarding the destruction of the Amazon,” she said. “It cannot be opening the market to precisely the products that are driving the devastating Amazon fires and on- going deforestation and destruc- tion that we see, and claim to be responsible about climate change.” A year ago Canada resisted such calls, saying diversifying its trade partners was critical and that any deal would include en- vironmental protections. Canada began exploring talks with the Mercosur bloc in 2017 and official negotiations began a year later. Six rounds of talks took place between March 2018 and June 2019, but no talks have occurred since then, said Ryan Nearing, press secretary for International Trade Minister Mary Ng. “Canada is firmly committed to the principle that trade liberaliza- tion and environmental protection should be mutually supportive,” he said in a written statement. “We recognize that the health of forests in the region is of great importance to the well-being of the planet, and we are seeking an ambitious, comprehensive and enforceable environment chapter within a free-trade agreement with Mercosur.” Fick said Canada can’t pursue the agreement and claim to be a climate leader. “Under these circumstances, having some clauses or wording is just not going to cut it,” she said. “The trade deal is fundamentally flawed and it must be abandoned. It must be stopped publicly with a clear message about why.” Brazil is the world’s biggest exporter of beef, though its meat exports to Canada are limited. In 2018, about $30 million of beef was imported into Canada from Brazil, compared with more than $3 billion in beef exported from Brazil to China. However in July, Brazil’s Con- federation of Agriculture and Livestock said a free-trade agree- ment with Canada could see meat exports to Canada rise by more than $1.8 billion. Cattle ranches are blamed for much of the rainforest destruc- tion as forest is cleared to make way for more pastures. Many of the fires are believed to be start- ed illegally by ranchers to clear even more land. While Brazil’s President Jair Bolsonaro has deployed the mil- itary to try to stop the fires, the forest continues to burn, at a rate of about two or three football fields every minute. Bolsonaro was elected on a promise to pro- ceed with rapid development of the Amazon. He has pushed plans to add bridges, highways, dams, mines and logging operations. The Amazon is one of the most critical habitats in the world, pro- ducing as much as one-fifth of the world’s oxygen and storing car- bon dioxide that would otherwise cause massive increases to global warming. Fick said Greenpeace would spend Saturday, a global day of ac- tion to protect rain forests, reach- ing out to multiple Canadian lead- ers pushing them to back away from further trade with Brazil. “What is happening in Brazil is at a crisis level and it will have global impacts in terms of what happens in the Amazon,” she said. “The urgency and… what the potential negative impact would have, of this trade deal are just especially striking.” — The Canadian Press MIA RABSON Ottawa urged to abandon trade talks with Brazil R EGINA — The fate of a Métis man’s hunger strike to highlight suicide rates will be decided by a Saskatchewan judge after hearing arguments from the government and protesters about what’s at stake. Tristen Durocher, a 24-year-old Mé- tis man, erected a teepee on a lawn in front of Saskatchewan’s legislature af- ter walking more than 600 kilometres from the province’s north to bring attention to the region’s high suicide rates. The provincial government said when he arrived at the end of July, Durocher failed to apply for a permit despite of- ficials telling him more than once one was required. Saskatchewan’s Ministry of Justice is seeking a court order to remove the teepee from the park. Durocher’s lawyer argued bylaws prohibit overnight camping, so he didn’t bother with permission. Eleanore Sunchild says her client is doing a ceremonial fast to honour the high number of Indigenous people who have killed themselves in his northern Saskatchewan home. It also highlights how Durocher feels the provincial government isn’t doing enough to prevent their deaths, she said. “The meaning is both political and spiritual,” Sunchild told the court. She argued his actions are protected under Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. She said he finishes his 44- day fasting ceremony on Sept. 13 and should be allowed to stay. Justice Graeme Mitchell acknow- ledged the tight turnaround Friday be- fore reserving his decision, which he said he’d try to have out within a week. Sunchild told court Durocher’s fast also includes the act of staying in his teepee, praying, smudging and the non- stop burning of a sacred fire. “He can’t have a fast without a tee- pee.” Michael Morris, legal counsel for the Saskatchewan government, said Friday the case isn’t about whether the protest- ers have an honourable cause. “Fundamentally, it is about whether the protesters must comply with the laws which govern the conduct of every- one in Wascana Centre (park),” he said. Morris says the Provincial Capital Commission, which operates the park, is concerned the teepee camp poses safety risks. The park has limited washroom fa- cilities and was never intended for camping, he said. Allowing protesters to sleep overnight can also attract un- wanted attention. “The very public flouting of bylaws can and does serve to ignite hostility,” said Morris, who added that in 2018 a man was criminally charged after set- ting off fireworks at another teepee protest camp at the legislature. In that case, a judge ordered the camp be removed. Morris said Durocher had stated to commission officials his protest wouldn’t be held back by bylaw bureau- cracy and “made some implied threats towards the legislative building.” “Saying, ‘I don’t want any (vandal- ism) to happen to this building, but you know, COVID has everybody anxious and Black Lives Matter has everybody charged and you really think carefully of your next moves because this could turn into a disaster,’” read Morris. Sunchild said her client felt intimi- dated by commission officers. She argued the rules prohibiting overnight camping infringes on Du- rocher’s freedom to use a teepee and the government could make excep- tions. Jeff Crawford, another government lawyer, said because Durocher never applied for a permit, they will never know if one would have been granted. Crawford also called into question how sleeping counts as a freedom of expression. Speaking outside court, Durocher said whether the government accepts it or not, that section of the lawn has be- come a ceremonial place for Indigenous peoples to air their grievances. “What sense would it make for us to try to raise public awareness camped out somewhere off grid in the bush where nobody could see us?” — The Canadian Press Judge reserves decision on Saskatchewan legislature teepee camp ‘Political and spiritual’ protest STEPHANIE TAYLOR MICHAEL BELL / THE CANADIAN PRESS FILES Tristen Durocher set up a teepee on a lawn in front of the Saskatchewan legislature and is doing a ceremonial fast after walking more than 600 kilometres from the province’s north. A_03_Sep-06-20_FP_01.indd A3 2020-09-05 10:08 PM ;