NEWS IMAGE COLLAGE / for 01-2008

Here at a glance are countries contributing more than 1,000 troops to NATO's International Security Assistance Force

Dell Inc. announced Thursday that it is closing its Edmonton call centre, a move that will affect more than 900 employees.

TORONTO - The Toronto Maple Leafs, Toronto Raptors and Toronto Marlies will honour the Canadian military during the teams' respective home games on February 1 and 2, Maple Leaf Sports & Entertainment announced Thursday. MLSE has designated this event as

LAKE LOUISE, Alta. - The mountain of twisted metal and debris scattered along the Trans-Canada Highway in the Alberta Rockies looked like the scene of a plane crash to crews who worked Thursday to carefully pry apart wreckage from a spectacular chain-reac

An insider who once worked at the Chalk River plant has told CTV News that two replacement reactors being assembled at the site are fundamentally flawed and may never work.

VANCOUVER - The military is preparing to commit "thousands" of troops to ensure security at the 2010 Olympics in Vancouver, the Forces' Pacific coast commanding officer said Wednesday.

OTTAWA - In the three years he's been married, Maj. Jay Adair has been either in Afghanistan or getting ready to travel to or from Afghanistan.

OTTAWA - The chief of personnel and the surgeon-general of the Canadian Forces say the military can do significantly better when it comes to helping soldiers who return from Afghanistan with post-traumatic stress disorder.

A man who used an electrical cord to stimulate his wife during a night of kinky sex allegedly gave her a deadly shock.

What do you get when you cross a Geo Metro with an electric forklift, a golf cart, and a bunch of used batteries? You get a ridiculously inexpensive, home-built, street-legal electric car.

It gets its name from the word ahuacatl, Aztec for, well, testicle -- which it clearly resembles. And because of its shape, the Aztecs prized it as a powerful aphrodisiac. After several centuries and many name changes (geez, thank goodness!), we now know

CALGARY - Two weeks shy of his 36th birthday, Owen Nolan showed he's still got plenty of game left in him.

Swedish newspaper Aftonbladet reports that Peter Forsberg has told Modo that he won't be signing with his former Elite League team with the objective of returning to the National Hockey League this season.

ATLANTA - The Atlanta Thrashers had to wait to find out how costly their slump-ending victory over Pittsburgh would prove to be

DETROIT - The Detroit Red Wings waited until the third period to strike, and that was good enough.

DENVER - A fast start was all the scoring-challenged Colorado Avalanche needed to break out of their injury-induced funk

With 27 days until the National Hockey League's trade deadline, the Mats Sundin watch continues to intensify around the Toronto Maple Leafs.

Ray Emery's inability to be on time may now have the goaltender running out of it

The Calgary Stampeders have reached an agreement with free agent quarterback Dave Dickenson, according to several media outlets.

PONOKA, Alta. - Wait until all the other pooches in balmy San Diego hear about Jake's journey to the frozen countryside of rural Alberta!

An Okanagan winery has received a rare honour, but the recognition was not for its wine, but for its food.

RCMP are investigating a passport mix-up that involves a teenager from Manitoba and people in Halifax and Vancouver.

A WestJet flight en route to Toronto from Calgary on Wednesday night was forced to make an emergency landing in Winnipeg.

Calgary police and social services are investigating after one-year-old twins were left in a locked SUV in -20 C temperatures for at least half an hour.

Barrie, Ont., judge is under investigation for insisting a witness who is HIV positive and has hepatitis C wear a mask in his courtroom.

If you're a sports fan, you may be at greater risk of heart attack when the home team is playing a high-stakes game, says new research out of Germany.

A Quebec man accused of killing his wife and their four children blames his spouse for setting the fire that claimed the children's lives, a newspaper reported Wednesday.

Extreme cold has forced the cancellation of surgeries at the only hospital in western Labrador.

OTTAWA -- A spokesman for the maker of Taser stun guns defended the powerful weapons before a Commons committee that's studying their growing use.

WASHINGTON -- The first pictures from the unseen side of Mercury reveal the wrinkles of a shrinking, aging planet with scars from volcanic eruptions and a birthmark shaped like a spider.

OTTAWA -- The man who investigated the sponsorship scandal says Prime Minister Stephen Harper seems to have abandoned any commitment he once had to transparent government in favour of a top-down style that centralizes power in his own hands.

OTTAWA -- Defence Minister Peter MacKay expressed Canada's outrage and dismay directly to Kandahar's governor within hours of diplomats discovering a clear case of prisoner abuse last fall.

OTTAWA -- Alleged terrorist Adil Charkaoui says he is appearing before the Supreme Court of Canada today to denounce the investigation against him.

The Canadian dollar has dropped more than a full U.S. cent, dragged down by more bad news related to the U.S. credit crisis.

LOS ANGELES -- Britney Spears was taken from her home by ambulance early Thursday and escorted to the hospital by more than a dozen police officers in cars, on motorcycles and in helicopters.

Police have released a picture of a car they believe is connected to a baby girl found abandoned in a North York shopping plaza stairwell Wednesday afternoon.

A Saskatchewan First Nation reeling from the deaths of two toddlers left outside in the bitter cold was trying to declare itself a dry community, the reserve's chief said Thursday.

People who ate at the Sun Peaks ski resort near Kamloops between Jan. 7 and 24 may have been exposed to hepatitis A, the Interior Health Authority is warning.

A local brewing company says the time has come to find an answer to one of life's most perplexing questions: How long can beer sit outside in winter before freezing?

An arrest warrant has been issued for former hockey Hall of Famer Guy Lafleur over testimony at his son's trial this year according to his attorney Jean-Pierre Rancourt.

If you take a bus, ride the train, drive your car or hop on a boat, you must have the correct papers or you could be refused entry at the border. It will be mandatory to have two government-issued documents - one with a photo - or a passport to cross t

Boating enthusiasts looking for a new way to cruise the B.C. coast in style this summer might want to check out some vintage vessels recently put up for sale.

There is a three-letter answer for those searching for a simple, cold-hearted, calculated interest Canada holds in Afghanistan - a dusty, isolated backwater some 10,000 kilometres away.

Piotr Kucy is a man who's dead tired of trying to prove he's alive and well and living in the city of Polkowice in southwest Poland.

OTTAWA - The Manley commission's recommendation that Canada acquire helicopters and aerial drones before continuing the Afghan mission has sent the military into a frantic, worldwide hunt for equipment.

KANDAHAR, Afghanistan - Canadian soldiers fired shots today at a car speeding towards a stopped convoy that had moments earlier been the target of a suicide attack.

TORONTO - Ontario's once-faltering bald eagle and peregrine falcon populations are soaring, but the number of southern grassland birds, like swallows and nighthawks, is on the wane, an exhaustive new study of breeding birds suggests.

WASHINGTON - A top U.S. wildlife official has been accused of stalling on protecting polar bears to make it easier for drilling companies to get oil leases in the Arctic.

ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. - New research shows an asteroid that exploded over Siberia a century ago wasn't nearly as large as previously thought.

A small increase in sea temperature can lead to a big increase in hurricane activity, according to British researchers.

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. - The International Space Station's two American astronauts went out on a riskier-than-usual spacewalk Wednesday and fixed one of two equipment failures that crippled their power system and threatened to stall construction at the orb

Some Yukoners woke up Wednesday feeling tremors from an early-morning earthquake

LARGE tracts of land and ancient vegetation that has not seen the light of day in 1,600 years have been liberated from ice caps on Baffin Island, confirming the unprecedented scale of climate change underway in Canada's North.

Fierce winter winds and blowing snow knocked out power to more than 50,000 Ontario residents today and created zero-visibility conditions that forced police to shut down numerous roads and highways across the province.

Strong winds, blowing snow and freezing rain continued to pound cities and towns across Canada Wednesday, leaving behind numerous power outages, school closures and commuting headaches.

Ashes of Indian independence leader Mahatma Gandhi have been scattered off the coast of Mumbai to mark the 60th anniversary of his assassination.

Outside Royal Canadian Legion Branch 91, the Canadian flag is once again flying at half-mast in honour of another Canadian military casualty in Afghanistan.

The Canadian Forces will lease unmanned aerial vehicles for the Afghanistan mission and is in discussions with the U.S. government for early delivery of Chinook helicopters

Canada has been quietly, and unsuccessfully, scrambling to secure a handful of desperately needed medium-lift helicopters for Afghanistan, Canwest News has learned.

BRUSSELS - Prime Minister Stephen Harper is engaging in unnecessary, irrelevant and "overheated" speculation when he suggests a Canadian troop pullout from Afghanistan could jeopardize the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, a NATO official said yesterd

With food prices rising, Haiti's poorest can't afford even a daily plate of rice, and some take desperate measures to fill their bellies.

BRUSSELS, Belgium - NATO is urging Canada not to pull its troops out of Afghanistan's dangerous Kandahar province.

The announcement comes a day after the company declared a new deal with the Alberta government that would require up to a 20 per cent increase in royalties applied to its mining operations.

Canada's military mission in Afghanistan cost $3.1 billion up to last September, with more than half of that spent after Canadian troops established a combat toehold in Kandahar two years ago, a government report to the Commons says.

"Watch out!" a voice bellows. Then there is a thunderous crunch as one German navy boat rams into another. It is the kind of moment that any captain would like to consign to history and forget all about - but there is little chance of that in the age of

Smoking one joint the same as 20 cigarettes in terms of risk, researchers in New Zealand warn

Girls may have gone wild, but have they gone bad? No question that, according to a Statistics Canada report last Thursday, the number of females age 12 and up accused of violent crime climbed between 1986 and 2005.

The baby was coming. There was no way to make it to the hospital in time. Their daughter was born in the front seat of the car.

It's never too early to start talking about the Olympic hockey tournament! Canadians have often bragged that they could send two teams to the Olympics and win two medals. When you can only pick one team, however, the choices are very tough due to the

EDMONTON - Edmonton head coach Craig MacTavish wasn't surprised that Evgeni Nabakov shut out his Oilers, but he was absolutely shocked that that he had such an easy time doing it.

MONTREAL - Cristobal Huet got the shutout, but was quick to share the credit with the Montreal Canadiens checking line.

TORONTO - With each passing loss, Toronto Maple Leafs interim GM Cliff Fletcher brings himself closer to a conversation he knows he'll need to have.

UNIONDALE, N.Y. - For the Ottawa Senators, it was just another methodical win. For the New York Islanders, it was just another maddening loss.

RALEIGH, N.C. - The Carolina Hurricanes first went about settling old scores with the New York Rangers.

COLUMBUS, Ohio - Peter Mueller has come full circle and the Phoenix Coyotes have turned around their season

PHILADELPHIA - Scott Hartnell couldn't hear the referee, so he listened to the fans.

TAMPA, Fla. - Jason Pominville and the Buffalo Sabres probably wouldn't mind playing the Tampa Bay Lightning more often.

BOSTON - Best known for his defence, Glen Metropolit gave the Boston Bruins a boost on the offensive end against Nashville.

NEWARK, N.J. - Erik Christensen had a goal and assist during Pittsburgh's three-goal second period, and the injury- and illness-plagued Penguins rallied from a pair of deficits to beat the New Jersey Devils 4-2 Tuesday night.

VANCOUVER - Trevor Daley, Mike Modano and Stephane Robidas took advantage of shaky netminding by backup Curtis Sanford as the Dallas Stars earned a 4-3 victory over the Vancouver Canucks on Tuesday night.

TORONTO - The Toronto District School Board narrowly approved a proposal to create the city's first Afrocentric public school during a meeting Tuesday night.

Two boys on a New Brunswick high school basketball team have been removed from the team after teaching younger players how to create a feeling of euphoria by cutting off the flow of blood to the brain.

A Halifax Youth Court judge criticized three police officers Tuesday for their arrest of a teenage girl, who was tackled in her own bed and shocked twice with a stun gun last February.

TORONTO -- Canada's National Microbiology Laboratory is reporting a high level of Tamiflu resistance among H1N1 viruses circulating so far this flu season in this country, one of a number of labs to see a phenomenon that is unsettling influenza experts.

An 18-year-old man is recovering in hospital after four young men baited him into a fight, poured gasoline on him, and lit him on fire in Burnaby, B.C., police said.

OTTAWA -- Suspected terrorist Mohamed Harkat has been arrested by federal authorities for allegedly violating his strict bail conditions.

Rescue crews were searching an area in and around Alberta's popular Castle Mountain Ski resort after an avalanche happened around 2 p.m. MT on Tuesday

OTTAWA -- A publisher has cited legal considerations in halting Canadian shipments of a book that alleges a former Conservative MP from Calgary was a paid informant for the Russian intelligence service.

Police are searching for a one-year-old girl after her sister was found frozen to death Tuesday on the Yellow Quill First Nation east of Saskatoon.

Canada is at the top of the list in a new study comparing housing affordability in six countries.

Two emergency cooling pumps have been hooked up and are ready to go at the Chalk River nuclear facility, CTV News has learned.

TOKYO, Japan (AP) -- Ten Japanese were sickened, including a child who fell into a coma, after eating Chinese-made dumplings contaminated with insecticide, police and health officials said Wednesday.

TORONTO - A Toronto-area ( POS) man has been posting messages on the Internet supporting attacks against Canadian soldiers on Canadian soil, drawing the attention of RCMP national security investigators.

Chief of Defence Staff General Rick Hillier is denying reports he phoned the Prime Minister last week and vented his anger about being dragged into the controversy surrounding the issue of detainees in Afghanistan. Hillier says he's on vacation.

A Texas couple filed a lawsuit Tuesday afternoon alleging negligence and gross negligence against Huguley Memorial Medical Center of Fort Worth following a July incident where hospital staff sent their newborn's corpse to the cleaners with the dirty laun

Trustees with the Toronto District School Board have voted to approve an "operational model" for an Afrocentric school, a controversial plan to help struggling black students in the city's education system.

The United States military is developing contingency plans to deal with the possibility that a large U.S. spy satellite expected to fall to Earth in late February or early March could hit North America.

A blanket of snow that descended on Metro Vancouver Tuesday snarled traffic and caused headaches for frustrated commuters trying to get to work.

WELLINGTON, New Zealand -- U.S., New Zealand and Italian marine scientists began a two-month voyage to Antarctica's northern coast Tuesday as part of the first-ever census of Antarctic marine biodiversity, Prime Minister Helen Clark said.

OTTAWA - RCMP are looking into reports that a doctor in India who is said to have family connections in Canada was involved in the illegal sale of organs for transplant.

OTTAWA - Germany's ambassador to Canada says he's optimistic NATO will be able to meet the conditions for a continued Canadian combat role in Afghanistan - but strongly doubts any German troops will be moving south into Kandahar province.

All Air Canada Jazz flights in and out of Yellowknife have been cancelled since Sunday, due to the current cold spell that has kept temperatures in the minus-forties.

A Texas prosecutor who was accused of using the word "Canadian" as a racial slur in an e-mail could be part of the focus of an ongoing probe into the actions of another district attorney.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper said Tuesday he never received an angry call from Gen. Rick Hillier, chief of Canada's defence staff, last week over the government's handling of the Afghan detainee issue.

WASHINGTON -- The United States won't be sending more combat troops to Afghanistan despite Canada's demand for NATO reinforcements as a condition for staying in the battle, a U.S. Defence Department spokesman said Tuesday.

While spending much of Tuesday's question period deflecting jabs by the opposition accusing him of using the armed forces as a scapegoat, Prime Minister Stephen Harper still refused to share details about prisoners captured by the Canadian military in Af

As the ice jam on the Nechako River continues to grow, city officials in Prince George are pulling the "Amphibex" machine out of the river for good.

VANCOUVER - When snow falls on the West Coast, commuter chaos is never far behind - and snow is blanketing Metro Vancouver Tuesday.

Every game matters in the log-jammed Western Conference, especially those between major contenders like the Vancouver Canucks and Dallas Stars.

HMCS Protecteur left Esquimalt, B.C., in January for a two-month task as the mid-Pacific tanker responsible for replenishment at sea (RAS) to Canadian and allied navy warships.

BRUSSELS, Belgium - Canada would be the first NATO ally to turn its back on Afghanistan if it pulls troops out in 2009, a spokesman for the military alliance warned today.

The federal government needs to come up with money and some direct agreements with the City of Ottawa to ensure emergency preparedness in its own back yard, the Senate committee on national security and defence was told yesterday.

She might be a witch, but Stephanie Conover says that's no reason for officials at an upcoming Toronto beauty pageant to reject her as a potential judge.

Ottawa -- Prime Minister Stephen Harper twice said yesterday that crucial new helicopters and drones for the troops in Afghanistan are "on order."

Young women with large breasts have a significantly higher chance of developing Type 2 diabetes later in life than those who are less buxom, a Canadian-led study suggests

The former head of the Canadian Nuclear Safety Commission (CNSC) said Tuesday that the safety risk at the Chalk River nuclear reactor was 1,000 times higher than acceptable international standards prior to its temporary shutdown late last year.

The owner of a computer store outside of St. John's has uploaded surveillance video to the popular online video website YouTube in an effort to catch a thief.

TORONTO -- The Muslim Canadian Congress wants the Canada Mortgage and Housing Corp. to stop a study considering the introduction of so-called "Islamic banking" to Canada.

OTTAWA -- Some western farmers are arguing that the federal government wants to dismantle the Canadian Wheat Board and turn control of agriculture over to big business.

WASHINGTON -- U.S. senators made a last-ditch appeal to the administration Monday, asking security officials to delay plans requiring new documents at the Canada-U.S. border starting Thursday.