NEWS IMAGE COLLAGE / for 11-2008

The Vancouver Canucks defeated the Pittsburgh Penguins 3-1 on Saturday afternoon, overcoming an injury to star goaltender Roberto Luongo.

Brady Bunch star Maureen McCormick has a hit again at last, her tell all book of post-fame depravity is a whopper

One year after researchers discovered a major alternative to embryonic stem cells, the remarkable bit of modern-day alchemy is still shaking the scientific world.

The pigs, pale pink and bristly, trot around the pen, stopping every so often to root in piles of bedding. They grunt and squeal and wag their short curlicue tails. All three like a hard scratch on the rump.

ATHENS, Greece - Somali pirates have released a Greek-owned tanker that was hijacked in September, Greece's Merchant Marine Ministry said Saturday

Southbrook Vineyards, which opened its new state-of-the-art winery building in Niagara this summer, now has become the first Canadian winery to achieve biodynamic certification.

JAKARTA, Indonesia -- The U.S. geological agency says a strong earthquake has struck in the waters off western Indonesia.

At least 200 narwhal whales in Canada's Arctic, trapped by winter ice that is setting in around them and facing starvation or suffocation, must be culled, officials said Friday.

NFL gets rough ride; stable Canadian league prepares for Grey Cup

CORNWALLIS, N.S. - The United States will send about 20,000 more soldiers into Afghanistan next year in a bid to make the country secure enough for elections expected there in the fall, U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates said yesterday

Amid record-high fuel prices, government inspectors this summer cited more than 600 gas pumps across Canada for shortchanging consumers, data obtained by the Citizen show

They've made headlines around the world, collected millions of dollars in ransom, and terrorized the high seas.

A winter storm has blanketed parts of the Maritimes with as much as 30 centimetres of snow, knocked out power to more than 1,000 hydro customers and closed a major highway between Nova Scotia and New Brunswick.

Anti-smoking campaign an example of the way even frightening images can trigger pleasure

Eight Canadian soldiers were injured in Afghanistan after their armoured vehicle struck a roadside bomb north of Kandahar city

Punk musician Travis Barker has sued over the South Carolina plane crash that injured him and killed two friends.

A college student in southern China was bitten by a panda after he broke into the bear's enclosure hoping to get a hug, state media and a park employee said Saturday.

Consumers 'big winners' as holiday merchandise goes on sale and deals offered on big-ticket items

Davidson Chrysler, a family business and neighbourhood fixture for decades, has fallen victim to the economic storm that's battering the auto industry

LIMA, Peru - Prime Minister Stephen Harper, speaking here on the eve of the APEC leaders' summit, said markets "remain in a state of fear" and vowed to take "unprecedented fiscal actions if they are necessary" to stimulate economic growth and ease tighten

Canada's air force has recommended a multimillion-dollar overhaul of its Cormorant helicopters to deal with structural cracks that have restricted the use of the search-and-rescue aircraft over the last several years

CORNWALLIS, N.S. - Defence ministers with troops in southern Afghanistan are holding talks today about how to control the rising violence in the region.

Researchers say the fireball that blazed across the Prairie sky Thursday evening was most likely a meteor, but expert's opinions about where - and if - the galactic object hit the Earth are divided.

On one side of the narrow path a cliff dropped straight to the Ligurian Sea.

10:42 p.m. 7,986 BC Hydro customers in the Lower Mainland are without power. The Central Interior, with 1,255 customers still out of power, is the area second-most affected by outages.

Police are looking for three suspects in an armed robbery Friday evening inside a busy shopping mall in Langley, B.C.

An addictive preparation made from parts of the poppy flower is creating a major enforcement problem for Toronto police because of its hazy legal status.

HALIFAX- Three men were rescued from a barge 25 nautical miles north west of Yarmouth NS Wednesday afternoon by a CH-149 Cormorant helicopter from 413 (Transport and Rescue) Squadron based at 14 Wing Greenwood, N.S

The Harper government's plans to ease regulations on environmental assessments for natural gas exploration will lead to an ecological crisis in the Canadian Arctic, a group of leading international scientists said yesterday

A visit from notorious clothes horse Don Cherry powered the Rick Mercer Report back over a million viewers Tuesday night.

B.C. Ferries' brand new vessel, the Coastal Celebration, set off today from Swartz Bay for its first voyage with passengers aboard.

As emergency crews prepared for a blustery night on B.C.'s South Coast, officials with Vancouver's crown jewel Stanley Park say they are ready if a windy blast hits the popular park.

MOHAMMED BIN RASHID VILLAGE, Afghanistan - Officially, the modest village just off the major highway west of Kandahar city bears the name of its benefactor, Sheik Mohammed bin Rashid, the Ruler of Dubai, who has a penchant for helping the less fortunate.

SOFIA, Bulgaria -- Archaeologists have unearthed an elaborately decorated 1,800-year-old chariot sheathed in bronze at an ancient Thracian tomb in southeastern Bulgaria, the head of the excavation said Friday

OTTAWA -- Canada's top military commander has a message for job-seekers in tough economic times: We want you.

A group of armed Islamist militants is reportedly headed to a Somali port Friday to attack pirates holding hostage a massive Saudi Arabian oil tanker.

The Canadian army will conduct a formal review of whether its soldiers were ordered to turn a blind eye to the sexual abuse of boys by Afghan security forces in Kandahar

Prime Minister Stephen Harper approved a free-trade deal with Colombia on Friday, the day before the beginning of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in Peru.

Ontario Provincial Police responded Friday to a single-vehicle crash and found a young woman covered in milk and cereal.

U.S. president-elect Barack Obama should look to other NATO allies for additional help in Afghanistan rather than ask countries who are already carrying a "disproportionate share of the load," Defence Minister Peter MacKay said Friday.

It will be an early start for the red-hot Vancouver Canucks as they put their points streak on the line against the equally scorching Pittsburgh Penguins in a Saturday matinee (2 p.m. ET).

From Edmonton to Edgeley, Sask., and points in between, people reported that the brilliant fireball streaking across western Canadian skies on Thursday seemed mighty close

SASKATOON - A leading researcher says one of the largest meteors to streak over Canada in the last decade broke up into pieces that may have landed in central Saskatchewan.

EDMONTON - James Gush knows the deal if a buddy overdoses on morphine or heroin: take out his vial of Naloxone, fill a clean syringe with the liquid anti-opiate and jab his friend in the arm or leg.

CALGARY -- Love letters passed between triple-murder suspect Jeremy Steinke and his 12-year-old girlfriend -- including an apparent marriage proposal -- were shown to jurors yesterday.

TORONTO -- A German shepherd dog died last night from what appears to be stray voltage from a hydro pole in the city's west end

WASHINGTON -- Any chance that Canada would muscle in to play a central role in the U.S. arm-wrestling over an auto bailout vanished faster than cash from the Detroit 3 bank accounts yesterday.

A boy in northern B.C. singled out because of his red hair was bullied at school Thursday in an incident that appears to have been incited by a group on the social networking site Facebook.

Fredericton police are asking for the public's help investigating a strange incident of vandalism that involved the carcasses of two raccoons.

Falling gas prices between September and October significantly slowed Canada's inflation rate last month.

HALIFAX -- RCMP say a set of conjoined twins travelling from Brussels to New York died aboard a plane that diverted to Halifax.

With the U.S. set to send more troops to Afghanistan, Defence Minister Peter MacKay says he expects to learn more details about the surge at a meeting he's hosting in Nova Scotia Friday.

The fireball that blazed across the Prairie sky Thursday evening was likely a meteor travelling at an incredible velocity, according to one expert.

NAIROBI, Kenya - The UN, African Union and Arab nations are struggling to deal with a surge of pirate attacks.

BEIJING - China has acknowledged for the first time that more than 19,000 students died in the massive earthquake that struck Sichuan province in May.

British Columbia politicians returned to work unexpectedly Thursday with a promise that the province will continue to post surpluses even as economies around the world crumble.

A sophisticated speaker system, described as a "bull-horn on steroids," may be one of the most effective weapons designed at repelling hijackers on the high seas, according to an anti-piracy expert.

LAKOKHEL, Afghanistan -- South of this tiny Afghan village west of Kandahar city, the throaty twin-engine roar of Sea King and Chinook helicopters echoed through the air as they disgorged the first wave of what would turn out to be an entire battalion of

Transportation safety officials are investigating whether a pilot was relying too heavily on his GPS device moments before his plane crashed off B.C's Sunshine Coast Sunday morning, killing himself and six other passengers

The veteran Montreal Alouettes quarterback won the CFL's most outstanding player honour at the league's annual awards ceremony Thursday night in Montreal, claiming the award for the second time in his career

An extremely rare sighting of a cougar has been confirmed in the Lac du Bonnet area of Manitoba

Vancouver Canucks fans witnessed a rarity Thursday night: Roberto Luongo in a ball cap and Curtis Sanford between the pipes.

Numerous people living in Edmonton and the surrounding areas are reporting seeing a meteorite-like fireball that light up the sky.

Two of the hardest-working athletes in NHL history, Patrick Roy and Wendel Clark, will be honored by their respective teams Saturday night.

The Los Angeles Kings are holding Russian Heritage Night on Thursday to mark a rare visit from Alex Ovechkin and the Washington Capitals.

Al-Qaeda's racist denunciations of Barack Obama are the figurative equivalent of splashing acid on defenceless schoolgirls, Defence Minister Peter MacKay said yesterday, and should embolden western efforts to defeat the Taliban insurgency.

WARSAW, Poland - Researchers believe they have identified the remains of Nicolaus Copernicus

The Minnesota Wild will try to match their longest winning streak of the season tonight, when they host the Vancouver Canucks in a Northwest Division showdown at Xcel Energy Center.

BRUSSELS, Belgium - The European Union gave notice Thursday it is keen to have a share of the much sought after oil, gas, mineral and fish resources in the Arctic region as the polar ice cap melts.

World stock markets tumbled Thursday, with benchmarks in Tokyo and Seoul losing almost seven per cent each, after recession fears sent Wall Street plunging and Japan suffered its biggest drop in exports in seven years.

Hunters are asking the Yukon government to add sheep and bison to the list of big-game animals that non-Yukoners can hunt in the territory, arguing that they want more opportunities to share their wilderness experience with outsiders

Canada's new fisheries minister says she supports the commercial sealing industry and doesn't expect any major changes for next year's commercial hunt, despite a European Union proposal that threatens to ban seal products as early as 2009

HERODIUM, West Bank -- King Herod may have been buried in a crypt with lavish Roman-style wall paintings of a kind previously unseen in the Middle East, Israeli archeologists said Wednesday.

With his election loss behind him, John McCain has found a new opponent in Jackson Browne.

LONDON (Reuters) - Oil plunged below $50 a barrel on Thursday, deepening losses over the previous four sessions as battered financial markets reflected ever lower confidence in the world economy and evidence mounted of falling fuel demand.

UNITED NATIONS - Iran is pulling out all the stops at the United Nations to short-circuit a Canadian-led censure of the Islamic republic's human rights record - and insiders say the Iranians may have the upper hand.

OTTAWA - Conrad Black is pursuing clemency from outgoing U.S. President George W. Bush in a bid to be released early from his 6 1/2-year prison term, according to media reports.

LONDON -- She'll have the breakfast burrito -- with a side order of a million bucks, thanks.

Put it under "Strange" cause we dont have a "Scary" section ;-)

EDMONTON -- City police are investigating after a three-year-old girl was found alone on a school bus three hours after she was supposed to be dropped off for pre-kindergarten.

CALGARY -- Police say a quick-thinking schoolboy might have saved lives yesterday when he jumped behind the wheel of an out-of-control school bus and slammed on the brakes after the driver collapsed.

LAKOKHEL, Afghanistan - A Canadian-led operation aimed at flushing out Taliban fighters and searching for caches of explosives and weapons is wrapping up in the volatile Zhari district of Afghanistan.

No one was hurt when a chain-link fence went through the windshield of a Calgary school bus filled with schoolchildren Wednesday morning.

Officials with a Newfoundland and Labrador school board are warning students they will be disciplined if they take a joke from the popular cartoon series South Park too far.

Investigators are trying to determine whether the plane that crashed off B.C.'s Sunshine Coast Sunday, killing seven people, was flying below the required minimum altitude, the Transportation Safety Board said Wednesday.

Canada is unlikely to avoid the effects of an expected global recession and faces the possibility of a deficit for the next three budgets, says a report by Canada's independent parliamentary budget officer.

OTTAWA -- The CRTC has sided with Bell Canada (TSX:BCE) in the controversial Internet "throttling" case, ruling that the telecommunications giant is within its right to regulate the flow of traffic on its network space.

HALIFAX, N.S. -- Hundreds of people spent the night stuck in their vehicles in Nova Scotia's Cobequid Pass as a severe snowstorm hit the province late Wednesday dumping as much at 20 centimetres over higher elevations.

OTTAWA -- The Supreme Court of Canada has put its stamp of approval on a regulatory order forcing major airlines to provide an extra seat for free to disabled or obese passengers who need the room.

An Air Canada co-pilot who suffered an apparent breakdown during a transatlantic flight earlier this year was replaced in the cockpit by a flight attendant before an emergency landing was attempted, according to a report released today by Irish authoritie

Canadian soldiers can't always count on the civilian population for support in this battle-ravaged province, but dogs and cats are jumping into the war effort with all four paws.

Canada's new heritage minister has ordered CBC executives to put a lid on their spending after revelations that a senior executive claimed $80,000 in a single year for theatre tickets, meals and travel.

VANCOUVER, B.C. - The airline that lost its pilot and six passengers in a crash on a remote B.C. island is resuming its float plane operations along the B.C. coast.

WELLINGTON, New Zealand -- Researchers studying a rare and endangered species of penguin have uncovered a previously unknown species that disappeared about 500 years ago.

VANCOUVER -- A man who astonished his family and doctors by surviving a plane crash in British Columbia has given investigators valuable information about what happened before the aircraft smashed into a hillside on a remote island.

The FBI is looking for four "eco-terrorists" who have been linked to a series of historical arson and sabotage attacks in the Western United States -- three of whom may be hiding out in Canada.

MOGADISHU, Somalia - Somalia's increasingly brazen pirates are building sprawling stone houses, cruising in luxury cars, marrying beautiful women - even hiring caterers to prepare western-style food for their hostages.

Scientists on Wednesday revealed they had unravelled much of the genetic code of a woolly mammoth, in what could be the first baby step in bringing the extinct creature, or at least characteristics of it, back to life.

The International Olympic Committee insists that its decision to keep women's ski jumping out of the 2010 Olympics in Vancouver is based on technical merit, not discrimination.

Cellphone providers are warning against a scam circulating via e-mail regarding the CRTC's recently implemented do-not-call telemarketing list.

Gov. Gen. Michaelle Jean unveiled the Harper government's five-point plan to protect Canada from the global economic meltdown in the speech from the throne.

It was a reunion of friends and former teammates, but the Vancouver Canucks were in no mood to reminisce about old times.

Winnipeg Regional Health Authority is making changes to ensure patients are properly monitored in city emergency rooms following the death of a man who sat 34 hours in a waiting room earlier this fall.

A Port Alberni man is in critical condition Wednesday after being mauled by a grizzly bear at Strachan Bay, about 100 kilometres northwest of Port Hardy, B.C

MONTREAL - The head of Formula One racing has a retort for a city so infuriated with him that a leading newspaper carried an editorial cartoon that depicted him being tortured.

Canada's public safety minister needs to stop a notorious American anti-gay group from entering the country, according to Vancouver NDP MP Libby Davies.

Somalia's increasingly brazen pirates are building sprawling stone houses, cruising in luxury cars, marrying beautiful women -- even hiring caterers to prepare Western-style food for their hostages.

It may be freezing, drizzling or an otherwise crummy game night, but season ticket-holders around McMahon Stadium's Section E, Row 18, know they'd better not wimp out and stay home, because Laura Stuart Patterson wouldn't. Patterson isn't just a diehar

OTTAWA - An Ottawa man described by his own lawyer as "totally unsympathetic" was found not guilty Tuesday of importing and possessing more than 22,000 images of child pornography after a judge ruled he never technically possessed the images in Canada.

CHATHAM, Ont. - Perhaps now Rony Salman, the Windsor man who earned notoriety and jail time earlier this year for cutting off the ears of A.K. the dog, knows what it feels like.

LONDON - A British man committed suicide by cutting off his own head with a chainsaw, an inquest into his death found Wednesday.

MOGADISHU - An Indian warship destroyed a pirate ship in the Gulf of Aden and gunmen from Somalia seized two more vessels despite a large international naval presence off their lawless country.

CALGARY -- Love drove Jeremy Steinke to agree to kill his 12-year-old girlfriend's parents, court heard yesterday

EDMONTON -- Being lied to by people seeking romance in Internet chat rooms helped a 49-year-old Edmonton man beat a criminal charge yesterday of luring a 13-year-old boy