"Today, we began the process of establishing a new passage and we will share this safe pathway with the maritime industry soon."

"Additional U.S. forces, including underwater drones, will join the clearance effort in the coming days."

U.S. Central Command commander Admiral Brad Cooper 

 

"Effective immediately, the United States Navy, the Finest in the World, will begin the process of BLOCKADING any and all Ships trying to enter, or leave, the Strait of Hormuz. At some point, we will reach an “ALL BEING ALLOWED TO GO IN, ALL BEING ALLOWED TO GO OUT” basis, but Iran has not allowed that to happen by merely saying, “There may be a mine out there somewhere,” that nobody knows about but them. THIS IS WORLD EXTORTION, and Leaders of Countries, especially the United States of America, will never be extorted. I have also instructed our Navy to seek and interdict every vessel in International Waters that has paid a toll to Iran. No one who pays an illegal toll will have safe passage on the high seas. We will also begin destroying the mines the Iranians laid in the Straits. Any Iranian who fires at us, or at peaceful vessels, will be BLOWN TO HELL!"

U.S. President Donald J. Trump 

A Navy destroyer in the U.S. Central Command area of operations transits the Strait of Hormuz, April 11, 2026.  Photo: U.S. War Department  

"The blockade will be enforced impartially against vessels of all nations entering or departing Iranian ports and coastal areas, including all Iranian ports on the Arabian Gulf and Gulf of Oman. CENTCOM forces will not impede freedom of navigation for vessels transiting the Strait of Hormuz to and from non-Iranian ports."

"Additional information will be provided to commercial mariners through a formal notice prior to the start of the blockade. All mariners are advised to monitor Notice to Mariners broadcasts and contact U.S. naval forces on bridge-to-bridge channel 16 when operating in the Gulf of Oman and Strait of Hormuz approaches [per the release]."

Centcom press release  

The U.S. Department of War announced on its website that the USS Frank E. Peterson and the USS Michael Murphy are operating in the Persian Gulf, part of a broader mission to fully clear the Hormuz Strait -- an international sea passage and essential trade corridor -- of sea mines, laid courtesy of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. Underwater drones, along with  additional American forces, are set to join the clearance project in coming days.

 

US has deployed two Navy guided-missile destroyers to Hormuz (Representational Image)

"We're sweeping the strait. Whether we make a deal or not makes no difference to me", said President Trump, even as negotiations between U.S. and Iranian representatives -- alongside a Pakistani mediator -- on a potential ceasefire broke down. The Iranian preconditions were a non-starter, with Israel intent on continuing its strikes on Hezbollah in southern Lebanon. Iran's continued insistence on its right to continue with its nuclear program, its demand that the U.S. withdraw from bombing Iran and prepare to pay reparations, along with its refusal to put a stop to its support of proxy terrorist groups ensure the talks would go nowhere.

The Islamic Republic's 'red lines' expressed as demand for damage caused by U.S.-Israeli strikes compensation and the release of  Iran's frozen assets, are a reflection of the supreme arrogance of a ruling elite that refuses to acknowledge its position as a bludgeoned theistic hegemon that threatened its neighbours and launched terror attacks by proxy internationally whose beating is its just due for the further threat its nuclear ambition poses to the world at large. 

The country of 93 million people is deserving of relief from the tyranny of a regime that persecutes its own population, using vast oil reserves to fund global terrorism rather than investing in internal infrastructure of benefit to the country's future -- not as a conquering Islamist totalitarian state, but as a responsible government adhering to international norms of human rights standards. That its disregard for and abuse of its female population's right to equal treatment and respect given to their male counterparts is ignored by the United Nations where Iran was recently appointed to a human rights group is cynicism on steroids.

United Nations General Assembly, UN Watch

The 15-point proposal by the United States includes restrictions on Iran's nuclear program and the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz, while Iran's 10-point proposal prior to the talks focused on a guaranteed end to the war and control over the Strait of Hormuz, where it plans to collect a maritime passage fee for each ship passing through, amounting to $1 million. An average of 100 to 130 ships passed through the strait daily, prior to the U.S.-Israel joint aerial assaults. 

That toll, if permitted to proceed, despite the deep objections of the other Gulf States that the IRGC has been bombing persistently since February 28, would enable the Islamic Republic to amass an astronomical fortune, far outstripping its revenues up to the conflict derived from its energy products. And all of it would be directed toward restoring its destroyed ballistic missile and drone stocks, along with other military assets that it has lost during the prosecution of the war, including warplanes and warships. 

"An integrated suite of unmanned maritime systems and sensors, the MCM MP counteracts mines in the littorals while increasing the host vessel’s standoff distance from the threat area."

"Embarked with the MCM MP, [a littoral combat ship] or a vessel of opportunity can conduct the full spectrum of detect-to-engage operations (hunt, neutralize, and sweep) against mine threats using sensors and weapons deployed from the MCM Unmanned Surface Vehicle (USV), an MH-60S multi-mission helicopter, and associated support equipment."

U.S. Navy, new mine countermeasures mission package

Getty Images

"[The] delusion of omnipotence [that is fuelling the U.S.-Israel war in Iran must stop]."

"Enough of the idolatry of self and money! Enough of the display of power! Enough of war!"

"[Praying for peace is a way to] break the demonic cycle of evil [to build instead the Kingdom of God where there are no swords, drones or] unjust profit."

"It is here that we find a bulwark against that delusion of omnipotence that surrounds us and is becoming increasingly unpredictable and aggressive."

"Even the holy Name of God, the God of life, is being dragged into discourses of death."

"[God] does not listen to the prayers of those who wage war, but rejects them. Even though you may make many prayers, I will not listen -- your hands are full of blood [Isaiah]." 

Pope Leo XIV

Pope Leo XIV presides over a prayer vigil and rosary for peace in St Peter's Basilica at the Vatican on 11 April. Photograph: Remo Casilli/Reuters

"They're two white guy boomers but they could not be any more different in their life experiences, in their values, in the way they have chosen to live those values."

"This is a very stark contrast, and I think an inflection point for American Christianity."

"There's no question about his [Pope Leo's] inflection and meaning. It removes any ambiguities."

Natalia Imperatori-Lee, theology professor, Fordham University

 

"For the last five centuries, the church has been involved in a project of helping develop strong international norms [including the Geneva Conventions in recent centuries]."

"It is a very long-standing tradition rooted in Scripture and theology and philosophy."

Professor William Barbieri, Catholic University  

The first American pope has taken to directly criticizing the American president over the war in Iran, when Pope Leo declared President Trump's "belligerence is truly unacceptable". Two polarized world views, one on the part of the 79-year-old U.S. President, the second a 70-year-old pontiff from Chicago. Coevals in time, sharing common cultural roots with distinct oppositional attitudes they bring to their positions of immense power and influence. 

 

Leo's opposition to the war in Iran, according to Catholic Church experts, reflects established church teachings, quite aside from the politics of the time. Speaking of an American administration in the 
White House with close links to conservative evangelical Protestantism which claims Trump's war on Iran is backed by heavenly endorsement. Americans were urged by U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth to pray for victory "in the name of Jesus Christ". As for President Trump, asked whether he felt God approved of the war, replied: "I do, because God is good -- because God is good and God wants to see people taken care of."

 

President Trump's response alludes to the plight of the Iranian people, held in thrall to a radical, fundamental tyranny of theocratic jihadists whose goal is conquest of mind and soul packaged into a submission to Islam as the only true religion, through the Shi'ite version specifically. A theocracy that has exemplified in its foundational belief in worldwide conversion to wipe all other religious devotion out of contention. Beginning with world Jewry and Israel, then on to Christianity, and Buddhism, Hinduism and others will fall into place, and be no more with conquest completed.

 

On its way to that conquest beginning with its own Iranian population almost a half-century ago, complete restraints on civil society; all forced to adhere to the version of Islam that demanded full obeisance in faith through complete surrender of self in the interests of the idolized Ruhollah Khomeini who took up the Prophet Mohammad's scimitar and wielded it with the passion of the celestially nominated. The Ayatollah who tasked the Islamic Republican Guard Corps with stifling the spirit of Iranians, who assigned the al Quds division the task of forming, training, arming and dispatching Shia terror militias on missions abroad.

 

Investing in them the full authority, under his unquestioned own to supervise uranium enrichment for use in nuclear technology, while perfecting the range and power of ballistic missiles capable of taking warheads vast distances. This is a nation dedicated to performing its obligations to the foremost directive for the faithful in the sacred scripts demanding non-stop jihad for full transformation from false gods to the only religious devotion recognizing the sole Divine Eminence. 

 

Iranians, women in particular, forced to appear in public only garbed in black all-encompassing garb, paid dearly for their transgressions of occasional passionate rejection of the demands for absence while present in their gender-obscuring garments that offered no protection from rape and murder at the behest of the authorities. Mass demonstrations of youth demanding freedom and liberty to live as human beings earned themselves the freedom to take the lethal brunt of the regime's response. Iran's vast oil wealth failed to trickle through to improving the civilian population's lives, but flowed extravagantly in support of terror.

 

What would be the Catholic Church's solution to a population of 93 million people in thrall to terror crying out for rescue from their ill fate?  What has Pope Leo to say of a nation whose leaders continuously threaten to eradicate the Jewish State of Israel from the Middle East, and which has exported its Jew-hate propaganda throughout Europe and North America? What has Pope Leo to say of Islamists in Africa, Asia, Europe and North America targeting Christians in faith to jihad? 

The Red Cross and the Vatican both helped thousands of Nazi war criminals and collaborators to escape after the second world war, according to a book that pulls together evidence from unpublished documents.

The Red Cross has previously acknowledged that its efforts to help refugees were used by Nazis because administrators were overwhelmed, but the research suggests the numbers were much higher than thought.

Gerald Steinacher, a research fellow at Harvard University, was given access to thousands of internal documents in the archives of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC). The documents include Red Cross travel documents issued mistakenly to Nazis in the postwar chaos.

They throw light on how and why mass murderers such as Adolf Eichmann, Josef Mengele and Klaus Barbie and thousands of others evaded capture by the allies.

By comparing lists of wanted war criminals to travel documents, Steinacher says Britain and Canada alone inadvertently took in around 8,000 former Waffen-SS members in 1947, many on the basis of valid documents issued mistakenly.

The documents – which are discussed in Steinacher's book Nazis on the Run: How Hitler's henchmen fled justice – offer a significant insight into Vatican thinking, particularly, because its own archives beyond 1939 are still closed. The Vatican has consistently refused to comment.

Steinacher believes the Vatican's help was based on a hoped-for revival of European Christianity and dread of the Soviet Union. But through the Vatican Refugee Commission, war criminals were knowingly provided with false identities.

The Red Cross, overwhelmed by millions of refugees, relied substantially on Vatican references and the often cursory Allied military checks in issuing travel papers, known as 10.100s.

The Guardian 

SS officers at Auschwitz in 1944. From left: Richard Baer, who became the commandant of Auschwitz in May 1944, Josef Mengele, commandant of Birkenau Josef Kramer, hidden, and the former commandant of Auschwitz Rudolf Höss, foreground; the man on the right is unidentified. Photograph: AP

  

"What Pope Leo and Donald Trump have in common is they both lived through the postwar polarization [including the political upheaval of the Civil Rights Movement and Vietnam War]."

"In some ways he's [Leo] just like us, [someone] who understands where our domestic political crisis came from [unlike the Argentinian Francis] who did not fully understand the peculiarities of the United States [even as he offered implicit criticism]."

Professor Steven Millies, Catholic Theological Union, Chicago 

"[I was contacted by Ottawa police and] told if I don't delete my X posts where I say mosques in Occupied Iran are hubs of terrorism and should be bombed, I would be charged under the Criminal Code of Canada."

"So I deleted my posts." (April X post)

"We know that the Islamic Republic is incredibly vicious. They’ve been oppressing us for the last 47 years. And so we knew that the closer it gets to the end, the more vicious and more brutal the Islamic Republic is going to be. Despite all of this, Iranians are more determined than ever to overthrow the Islamic Republic. It’s literally now or never. It’s life or death. So we are right now in the middle of the Iranian revolution, and the fight is not over yet. We still have a long way to go, but Iranians are mobilized. They’re determined."

"We’re seeing millions of Iranians out in the streets chanting “Death to the dictator, Death to the Islamic Republic.” They’re also chanting, “this is the final battle. Pahlavi will return.” Pahlavi, of course, is his royal highness, the crown prince of Iran. And the reason that they’re calling for Pahlavi to return is because Pahlavi is the only person that Iranians trust to transition them from a totalitarian Islamic dictatorship into a functioning secular, democratic society."

"At the same time, we’re also seeing horrific footage of Islamic regime terrorists who are literally just opening fire, shooting into crowds of unarmed Iranians. But, we’re also seeing videos of Iranians who are fighting back. Some of them are using homemade Molotov cocktails. I don’t condone violence, but when you have a population that’s unarmed and being brutally murdered, this is how Iranians are fighting back. At this point, Iranians have nothing left to lose, and these are the true freedom fighters of the 21st century." (January 2026 interview)

"Mosques in occupied Iran are hubs of terrorism. Burn them down. Bomb them." (X)

Goldie Ghamarie, Iranian-Canadian activist, former Ontario MLA  

Goldie Ghamari, a prominent critic of the Iranian regime and former Ontario MPP, threatened with criminal charges over an X post that linked the IRGC to mosques in Iran. Ashley Fraser/Postmedia News

 

 Goldie Ghamari is credited for what she is, a passionate political activist who advocates for the downfall of the Islamic Republic of Iran's theocratic regime. A regime that has for far too long oppressed and persecuted Iranians, forcing them to submit to radical Islamist fundamentalism, completely altering the society pre-1979, when Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini returned to Iran from exile in France, to engineer the downfall of the Shah of Iran at a time when Iran, under the Shah's rule was a friend and ally of the West.

 

Under the Islamic Republic, all that the West stood for in democratic values was demonized by the theocracy which also made no secret of its plan to destroy another nation in the Middle East, the State of Israel. The regime's hostility to the United States was immediately illustrated when the U.S. Embassy in Tehran was seized by radical Islamist students, and 66 U.S. diplomatic staff were taken hostage in retaliation for the U.S. welcoming Shah Pahlavi for medical treatment and haven.

 

Under the Ayatollah and his ruling mullahs, including the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, the scheme was laid for minority Shiites to form a pincer-like geographic move to challenge the primacy of the Arab Sunni majority in the Middle East through violent insurrection. Aryan Iran under the regime, was determined to become the driving political/cultural/religious/social force, using its oil wealth and the manipulation of Shiite fundamentalism to gain its goal of conquest.

 

That led to its al-Quds division of the IRGC forming Shiite-led militias trained, armed and loyal to the regime to act as its enforcement arms locally and abroad. In Lebanon the Hezbollah militia was formed, separate and apart of and a challenge to, the official Lebanese military. As was Islamic Jihad. Hamas, the governing group in Gaza, came under Iranian aegis as well, as did tribal Shiite militias in Iraq, prepared to do the Iranian regime's bidding. In Lebanon in the 1980s, Hezbollah introduced itself through suicide bombers who blew up a U.S. military base in Beirut, killing 241 U.S. marines. 

 

BREAKING

I just received a death threat by Islamic Regime-linked hacker group "Handala Hack Team" from the e-mail address: Handala_Team@outlook.com

"Death to Elica le Bon and Goldie Ghamari

 

The X post that Goldie Ghamari was ordered to take down by the Ottawa Police Service was accompanied by a video illustrating an IRGC rally taking place within a Tehran mosque. She was warned she would be charged under Section  319 of the Criminal Code if she failed to comply with the order. This, at a time in Canada when for the last three years mobs of pro-Hamas supporters surged through the streets of Ottawa accusing Israel of 'genocide' for striking back against Palestinian terrorists who slaughtered Jewish children, women and other civilians, in a rampage of rape and dismemberment and hostage-taking.

 

Despite that the protesters wearing masks and keffiyehs chanted hate messages and threats against Jews in Canada, police forces across the country did little to warn them against offending Canada's hate laws in their invective of hate, harassment and threats. An omission of public duty that reflected the federal Liberal government's own lack of responsible reaction, followed by provincial and municipal governments in turn, alongside the nation's police forces, as the marches went on week after week, proclaiming 'globalize the intifada', 'Final Solution', and 'Palestine will be free from the river to the sea'...all understood as threats against the existence of Israel.

 

Iran, through its minions that have infiltrated Canadian society, politics and academia, along with the Muslim Brotherhood and operatives of the regime's terrorist groups, has a malign presence in Canada, threatening the safety and security not only of Canadian Jews, but Iranian-Canadians who detest the Iranian regime and want their country freed from its malevolent tyranny. Goldie Ghamari is one of the leaders of those campaigning for the end of the Islamic Republic. The presence of Iranian proxies in Canada, of members of the IRGC, of the regime itself represents a danger to Canada, their presence ignored by government despite that they are on Canada's terrorist list.

 

Goldie Ghamari has made herself a public figure of great respect, appearing on U.S. cable news and Piers Morgan Uncensored. She has a Iranian affairs YouTube channel with hundreds of thousands subscribers. And she has been threatened by terrorist groups operating out of the North America with assassination. Threats she has relayed to police and with local authorities. An American-Iranian was also threatened with assassination by the same group. A $250,000 beheading bounty was posted for their assassination.

 

FBI Director Kash Patel responded to those threats where Canadian officials failed to: "This FBI will hunt down every actor behind these cowardly death threats and cyberattacks and will bring the full force of American law enforcement down on them", he stated in March. In Canada, Masood Masjoody, an anti-regime Canadian math professor of Iranian birth was was found murdered a month ago. Two Iranians now face charges of first-degree murder in his death.

 

Laptop and source code on the screen composing flag of Iran.

(photo credit: max.ku/Shutterstock)

 

"By 2011, she [Charlotte Kates] helped to found Samidoun, which boasts chapters around the world and has the stated purpose of seeking “to achieve justice for Palestinian prisoners,” in Israeli detention through demonstrations and other public events. Earlier this year she travelled to Iran to accept a human rights award, where it also has a chapter."

"Many of the prisoners she advocates to be freed have links to “terrorism, assassinations and countless attacks against Israel,” according to Public Safety Canada."

"By listing a group as a terrorist entity, it becomes a crime to provide them with material support. Leading up to its listing, Kates’ organization had long sparked concern from political leaders and companies. One point, she told supporters they could only take paper cheques, in light of the restrictions placed on them."

Stephanie Taylor, National Post 

Almost a year-and-a-half after Samidoun was listed as a designated terrorist group in Canada, no move has yet been made by any government authority to disband their Canadian operations. For that period as well Samidoun retained charitable status with Revenue Canada, continuing to raise funds in Canada to be sent abroad to Hamas and to the PFLP where Samidoun's founder Charlotte Kate's husband, Palestinian Khaled Barakat is a member of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine. Both husband and wife, incidentally, have Canadian citizenship. 

 

Anti-Israel protesters at a Samidoun-organized rally burn a Canadian flag outside the Vancouver Art Gallery on October 7, 2024. Photo by Jarryd Jaeger/X

 

"[It is completely unacceptable [that Samidoun remained a federally registered not-for-profit]."

"I have therefore directed government officials to urgently look at any and all options to formally dissolve Samidoun as well as any and all listed terrorist entities in Canada."

Melanie Joly, Industry Minister, September 2025  

Oops, big splash, but never carried through. Samidoun remains headquartered in Vancouver. Finally, Corporations Canada pulled Samidoun registration on March 27, stating that Samidoun, accused not only of advocating for violent terrorism, but of helping to fundraise for active Gazan terror groups, took action -- actually no, they did not. A statement on that very same day by the U.S. Department of the Treasury elaborated more fully, accusing Samidoun of exploiting the charitable sector to bankroll extremist violence. A "sham fundraiser whose efforts have supported terrorism".

 

Samidoun, advocating for Palestinian prisoners...Photo: Fatin al-Tamimi

 

Samidoun remained an active listing on Corporations Canada's official database, including a business number and names and addresses of three Samidoun directors. The listing eventually had a note appended to warn observers Corporations Canada was in the process of reviewing details of a terrorist organization, that any contact with the group might risk criminal prosecution. "It is a criminal offence for anyone in Canada ... to directly or indirectly provide property knowing that it will be used by or benefit a terrorist group", they alerted.

 

The registration remained active and only after a technical violation of the Canada Not-for-profit Corporations Act was resolved would their registration be wiped out. That violation seems to have been that Samidoun ceased submitting annual filings, following its terror designation; an oversight that was ultimately responsible for its being "dissolved for non-compliance". Really.

 

Since Samidoun's official federal terrorist designation none of its organizers have faced any charges. Co-founder Charlotte Kates remains free to enter and exit the country as she wishes. Despite the terror designation the Samidoun website and social media accounts remain active. On the website a statement appears that Samidoun intends to ignore the error designation, where Canada is referred to as a "settler-colonial state built on genocide". 

 

A screenshot of the Samidoun-led anti-Israel protest outside the Vancouver Art Gallery where Charlotte Kates was arrested, April 26, 2024. Photo by freepalestinetricitiesbc/Instagram

  

"I am proactively applying a conflict of interest filter to Alto, a wholly owned subsidiary of the government of Canada."

"This measure is being implemented due to a personal connection to someone close to me in the organization, to safeguard against any real or perceived conflict of interest." 

Francois-Philippe Champagne letter to Mark Carney 

 

"This is a good situation, because we have the partner who can pursue her career."

"So we have to look at them as individuals. We need to have a system that will enable them to have those careers."

"There are rules, there are regulations and the minister of finance has followed those rules and regulations in notification of the ethics commissioner, in recusing himself from dealings with respect to Alto."  

"[This is a] really exciting project for Ontario, for Quebec and for the whole of Canada."

Prime Minister Mark Carney

 

"The prospect of a finance minister making decisions as part of the federal government's budgetary process which present distinct benefits and advantages for his partner and her employer — and acting and voting in Parliament to give those effect — is a very troubling development."

"An investigation is absolutely essential here, including to validate the existence and application of his unpublished — and only now revealed — 'conflict of interest filter' in addition to all of his parliamentary engagement on this matter."

Conservative ethics critic Michael Barrett 

A public consultation on the Alto project in Ottawa earlier this year was packed with displays. (Mathieu Deroy/Radio-Canada)

"From the outset, she disclosed her personal connection to the minister."

"The Office of the Conflict of Interest and Ethics Commissioner was consulted proactively, and clear measures were put in place to prevent any real or perceived conflict."

"[Gaudet] is strictly focused on interactions with the federal public service [and ] is not involved with ministerial offices, including those of Transport or Finance."

Benoit Bourdeau, manager, media relations, Alto 

Finance Minister Francois-Philippe Champagne released a letter written in September by him and addressed to the prime minister, in it vowing he would not participate in any decision relating to the government-backed organization tasked with the high-speed rail link proposal that would travel back and forth from Toronto to Quebec City. This is no casual undertaking. And there is no guarantee that it will be well-used, much less that it is even needed, with a price tag of $90 billion, which critics say with certainty will end up costing more, perhaps much more.

 

The issue at hand is that Minister Champagne's wife, Anne-Marie Gaudet, was hired as vice-president of the environment for Alto, back in August of 2025. Writing his intention to "proactively apply a conflict of interest filter", reflecting the fact that he has a "personal connection" with someone who works for Alto, as finance minister, Mr. Champagne produced a federal budget providing the organization with hundreds of millions of dollars. How this can be construed as 'no problem' as far as conflict of interests are concerned is baffling.

 

Prime Minister Mark Carney was asked whether Finance Minister François-Philippe Champagne has a conflict of interest regarding his partner's role as a vice-president of Alto's high speed rail project. Carney said the minister is following the rules by notifying the ethics commissioner and recusing himself from Alto-related dealings.  Still from video/CBC

 

As finance minister, responsible for steering Canada's finances and budgetary allocations, with his wife deeply involved as a high-functioning employee who stands to benefit materially, her husband is in a position where he allocates government financing of tax money to an enterprise of no particular value to transporting people from Toronto to Quebec city, particularly when other alternatives by rail and air are already in existence. They cost less to operate, are already in operation, the cost of their use to the public is less than will be the case of a high-speed version, which promises to lop an hour off the current time.

 

Minister Champagne's wife Anne-Marie Gaudet has occupied senior roles in environmental assessment and in the transportation sector, including that of a senior role at the Port of Quebec. She is obviously well qualified to take up this position, or would be under circumstances other than being the wife of Canada's Minister of Finance; a clear and obvious issue of unethical decision-making on their part; husband and wife, despite being approved by the ethics commissioner and given a stamp of approval by the prime minister. Entirely inappropriate and inexcusable.

 

Yet Prime Minister Mark Carney sees nothing amiss in the situation, insisting that Mr. Champagne is following government ethics rules in recusing himself from the project. As finance minister disbursing immense sums of government (taxation) funding in the billions of dollars for a splashy infrastructure project, how can he not be involved in matters pertaining to the high-speed rail link? The very prospect is beyond ludicrous and epitomizes this government's penchant for evading basic ethics requirements to ensure public trust.

 

Alto, a wholly owned subsidiary of the federal government, means Champagne, through the filter, may not take part in any discussion, decisions or communications with government representatives on the high-speed rail project he is responsible for funding and in so doing, obviously supporting his wife's pecuniary interests in the process, and by extension, his own.   

 

Prime Minister Mark Carney says Finance Minister François-Philippe Champagne, pictured, has followed ethics rules. (Adrian Wyld/The Canadian Press)

"Ethics screens should be banned because they are secretive smokescreens that are not independently enforced and do not prevent cabinet ministers and top government officials from participating in decision-making processes when they have a conflict of interest."

"[They] hide the fact that the office holder is participating even when they or their family members or friends can profit or benefit from the decision."

"That is clearly a secretive, closed-circle, unethical system that provides no evidence that Champagne actually recused himself from decisions concerning Alto." 

Duff Conacher, Democracy Watch 

Associated Press, Propagandists for Iran

"Iran wanted to negotiate for peace with [U.S. President Donald] Trump, but Trump responded with war."

'He started the war, but we will definitely be the victorious side."

Jaafar Mohammadi, Zanjan, Iran, provincial director of cultural and Islamic guidance 

Pedestrians walk by a destroyed building within the Grand Hosseiniyeh, with the mosque visible in the background, which officials at the site say was hit by U.S.-Israeli airstrikes Tuesday, in Zanjan, Iran, Saturday, April 4, 2026. (AP Photo/Francisco Seco)

 

In an obvious edification exercise for the great readership of the Associated Press, permission was given by whoever passes as an authority figure now in the Islamic Republic of Iran to set out on a day's journey through part of Iran, not far from the capital Tehran, for a group of Associated Press reporters. Clearly, 'authorities' in Iran recognize the non-hostile attitude taken by the Associated Press in its reportage, picked up by mainstream legacy media all over the English-speaking world. 

 

One can recall the Third Reich in WWII exercising a high degree of alertness to positive propaganda that belied the extent of Fascist Germany's master plan to conquer Europe, one country at a time, from the Nordic nations to Eastern and then Western Europe in its inexorable military push for territory and the advance of fascism with Berlin at the helm of a brave new world subservient to Nazi ideology.

 

This kind of devious white-washing of the gritty swamp of ideology and conquest allied with the duping of bystanding nations to the belief that the anti-human-rights, averse-to-freedom and constant lethal attacks on sovereign nations who reject totalitarianism and tyrannical rule of despots whose malign agendas are meant to disrupt world order and social  cohesion, is not uncommon, and Iran, the foremost supporter of terrorism globally is a past master of feigning innocence of any malignant purpose to its future plans.

A picture of the late Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei hangs on the side of the road in the outskirts of Tehran, Iran, early Sunday, April 5, 2026. (AP Photo/Francisco Seco)

 

A just-published piece meant for global uptake under the AP byline ostensibly written by a Bassem Mroue, Middle East correspondent to AP, logged the 12-hour impressions gathered by AP reporters as they drove toward Tehran to report the continuation of daily life "with only occasional signs of the continuing war, including a Shiite religious centre that officials say was  damaged by a recent airstrike". 

 

The writer mentioned that AP operates within Iran, aside from this more recent permission granted for an additional 'team' to enter to gain a "glimpse of the country at the centre of a regional war that has jolted the world economy and shows no sign of ending five weeks after Khamenei was killed in the opening U.S. and Israeli salvo". Foreign press would be permitted to report directly from within Iran only if their perspective vis-a-vis Iran is known to be 'friendly'. And AP does not disappoint.

 

Iran International

 

While hastening to assure the reader that AP 'retains full editorial control of its content'. Well, of course it does, since whatever it writes gilds the lily of the brazen nuclear-seeking regime with its  Shiite axis intention of dominating the majority Sunni states in the Middle East and above all its often-declared mission of exterminating Israel from the geography of a region that Jews were historically ancestral to. All of which sits nicely with the AP agenda.

 

Entering  the northwestern city of Zanjan, some six hours from the border of Turkey, where the team started out from, Iranian officials informed of an airstrike that hit a religious community centre causing the death of two people, and destroying a library and a clinic in a centuries-old compound whose golden dome was damaged by the strike. AP reports the Israeli military having stated "a military headquarters" was hit, and it is never their intention to harm civilian facilities. While AP quoted that Israeli explanation, it adds there was no further 'elaboration'. Why would there be? 

 

Iran, as well as its proxies, has a habit of installing military bases, weapons depots, nuclear installations, alongside civilian enclaves, hospitals included. Priceless for cover, and all the more so for propaganda purposes. 

A leaked internal directive from the IRGC’s missile command appears to show that the use of civilian locations to conceal, support and in some cases facilitate missile launch operations is not ad hoc, but structured, documented and built into operational planning.

The 33-page document shared with Iran International by the hacktivist group Edalat-e Ali (Ali’s Justice) has been marked “very confidential” and is titled Instruction for Identification, Maintenance, and Use of Positions.

The document is attributed to the Specialized Documents Center of the Intelligence and Operations Deputy of the IRGC's missile command.

Arash Sohrabi, Iran International 

People walk near Iranian missiles in a park in Tehran, March 26, 2026.  Iran International 

 

"It has hurt me a lot and distressed me a lot."

"With these airstrikes, [The U.S. and Israel] are showing their malicious intent to the whole world."

Somayeh Shojaei, local Zanjan resident 

Conveniently, AP finds Iranians eager to condemn not their repressive, human-rights-abusing regime that has kept the country prisoner to a fundamentalist theocratic regime for over 45 years, to be quoted as proof that Iran is innocent of all and any charges of malevolent intent, and is an innocent victim of a power-hungry duo, intent for no good reason on toppling the regime and destroying as much of the civilian infrastructure of an ancient country as it can manage before the UN makes good on its threats of charging both with war crimes.

 

Trump, the article intones has threatened to bomb Iran "back to the Stone Ages where they belong", after the IRGC closed the Strait of Hormuz once the U.S. and Israel carried out thousands of airstrikes countrywide. Most of Iran's leaders have been assassinated; those would be the leaders, needless to say, complicit in the slaughter of an estimated 40,000 Iranians who last came out on the streets of cities across Iran to demand the end of the regime and freedom for their country.

 

The AP article goes on to state that daily life in Iran carries on, in city after city where they witnessed normal traffic, businesses open and people walking the streets. Women, observed the article were seen without the mandatory head covering demanded by the ruling theocracy. They paid dearly for that. But AP made no mention of other women covered head to toe in black shrouds. With no little amount of inferred skepticism, mention is made of the U.S. and Israel aiming at military and internal security forces.

 

"The AP reporters saw several government buildings and police stations that had been destroyed. They passed a number of checkpoints operated by plain-clothes Basij, an internal security force, and uniformed members of the paramilitary Revolutionary Guard." That would be, of course, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps considered a terrorist organization by a number of Western countries; they and their offshoot Basij slaughtered Iranians at will just several months earlier. But to read the AP account they're merely agents of the regime as any national guard would be in any Western nation of note.

 

Iranian missiles displayed in a park (March 26, 2026) Iran International 

 

 

(Image credit: Space.com / Josh Dinner)

 

"That's one of the big, big events in the mission. Really leaving Earth's orbit ... to conduct the rest of the mission ... I think that will definitely make a number of people both up on the Orion and here on Earth breathe a little easier."

"Depending on the precise timing when they get there [dark side of the moon], they will probably see some parts of the lunar surface on the far side sunlit that the Apollo astronauts did not have an opportunity to see." 

Jake Bleacher, chief exploration scientist, NASA

 

"Humanity has once again shown what we are capable of, and it's your hopes for the future that carry us now on this journey around the moon."

Jeremy Hansen, Astronaut, Artemis II 

 

"With this burn to the moon, we do not leave Earth, we choose it."

"[I] was proud to call myself the 'space plumber' after fixing Orion's toilet."

"I like to say that it is probably the most important piece of equipment on board, so we were all breathing a sigh of relief when it turned out to be just fine." 

Christina Koch, Astronaut, Artemis II 

NASA's Artemis 2 Orion space toilet is taking a starring role on the historic astronaut mission to the moon. (Image credit: NASA/Canadian Space Agency)

 

Orion's mission to the moon, around the moon, taking the four astronauts aboard -- Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover, Christina Koch and Jeremy Hanson -- to the furthest, highest point that humans have ever soared to beyond Earth, is to take ten days in total, from blast-off Thursday to eventual return the following Friday. On the mission, astronauts are to test scientific operations while on the far side in a bid to assist NASA in comprehending how human crews at the site can collaborate with Earth-bound science teams. 

 

It will be the gravitational pull of the moon and the Earth that will facilitate the return trajectory, without the requirement of mechanical propulsion, when Orion slingshots around the moon in a figure eight. The crew on its return will then experience one of the most tense-expectancy moments of the mission with re-entry into Earth's atmosphere, when splashdown in the Pacific Ocean brings their precedent-setting mission to a conclusion next Friday.

 

On Thursday evening, before sendoff, the Orion took six minutes to burn its engine for liftoff. In the general excitement of the mission proceeding, thoughts may have momentarily drifted to the sheer isolation the crew would be experiencing in outer space beyond Earth's orbit; a distance so vast that the crew would be totally dependent on their own resourcefulness should anything go awry, when no outside source could be depended on for reaction. 

 

Jeremy Hansen, Christina Koch, (mission commander) Reid Wiseman, Victor Glover   NASA

 

However, the minds within the spacecraft no doubt disciplined to focus on the minutiae of the mission, would not linger on exposure to deep-space radiation from solar activity or cosmic rays once they reached beyond the protection of Earth's magnetic field, and how that experience might affect the state of their health. They are themselves a living experiment.

 

Following meticulous checks of life-support systems sufficed for confidence the Orion spacecraft was prepared and ready to leave, the order NASA officials gave to the "translunar injection" manoeuvre was finalized and Integrity fled the surly bonds of Earth, taking four courageous, prepared souls with it.  "When the engine ignites, you embark on humanity's lunar homecoming arc and set the course to return Integrity and her crew safely home", Chris Birch, a NASA astronaut, said to the crew from mission control in Houston. 

 

Four days to reach the moon and each day of the 10 aboard the Orion capsule has its roles to be played out by each of those aboard. It took speed of 1,275 feet per second in liftoff to initiate the spacecraft's sojourn to the moon. Once on the far side, which they reached on Monday they will witness the effects of an eclipse. When the moon blocks the sun they will have the opportunity to observe the outermost layer of the sun's atmosphere, the corona in a brilliant display of jetting gases.

 

Earth as seen from the Orion capsule in a new image taken last week   Reid Wiseman/NASA

 

"On the far side of the Moon, 252,756 miles away, Reid, Victor, Christina, and Jeremy have now traveled farther from Earth than any humans in history and now begin their journey home."

"Before they left, they said they hoped this mission would be forgotten, but it will be remembered as the moment people started to believe that America can once again do the near-impossible and change the world."

"[The mission] isn't over until they're under safe parachutes, splashing down into the Pacific."

NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman

NASA