January 11, 2012

Regional

New KIA president says social programming, mining top priorities (January 10, 2012): “Right now, our doors are wide open.” Beneficiaries want to see change, says the Kivalliq Inuit Association’s new president – and that’s what David Ningeongan says he plans to bring to the region while in office. For starters, Ningeongan hopes to expand the association’s partnerships with government agencies and other regional organizations to deliver better quality programming to Inuit across the region.

Baffinland directors accused of insider trading in takeover (January 10, 2012): Two men who launched a hostile takeover bid of Baffinland Iron Mines in 2010 now face charges of insider trading. The Ontario Securities Commission alleges that Jowdat Waheed and Bruce Walter used privileged information to attempt the takeover. Baffinland has plans to develop an iron mine at its Mary River site 160 km south of Pond Inlet, Nunavut.

Catholic priest back in Nunavut court this month (January 10, 2012): Roman Catholic priest Father Eric Dejaeger must appear in Nunavut Territorial court Jan. 23 for arraignment on up to 39 criminal charges, most related to the sexual molestation of children, Justice Robert Kilpatrick said Monday. Crown prosecutor Paul Bychok and defence lawyer Andrew Mahar participated via a teleconference, and Dejaeger did not make an appearance.

Dejaeger back in Nunavut court this month (January 10, 2012): List of allegations has swollen to 40 counts Roman Catholic priest Father Eric Dejaeger must appear in Nunavut Territorial court Jan.23 for arraignment on up to 39 criminal charges, most related to the sexual molestation of children, Justice Robert Kilpatrick said Jan. 9. Crown prosecutor Paul Bychok and defence lawyer Andrew Mahar participated via a teleconference, and Dejaeger did not put in anappearance. The list of allegations Dejaeger faces, which has swollen to nearly 40 counts, involves a long list of sex offences alleged to have occurred in Igloolik against children between 1978 and 1982.

High Grade Assays From 2011 Exploration Drilling at Angilak Received (January 10, 2012): Assay results from 1,732 metres of diamond drilling in 14 holes conducted in 2011 at the Blaze/Spark, Pulse and Joule Zones were announced by Kivalliq Energy Corporation (TSXV:KIV). These zones are all located within a 3.0 kilometre radius of the high grade Lac Cinquante uranium deposit, within the 225,000 acre Angilak Property in Nunavut, Canada.

Aglukkaq spent more cash than challengers in May election (January 10, 2012): Financial reports from the last federal election suggest money counts, as candidates in Nunavut who spent the most money last spring won the most votes. Conservative member of Parliament Leona Aglukkaq had tens of thousands of dollars at her disposal from the Conservative Riding Association and private donors.

PUB says not enough time for full Muskrat review (January 11, 2012): The province's Public Utilities Board says it's not getting the time it needs to properly review the $6.2-billion Muskrat Falls hydroelectric project. The Tory government has imposed a deadline of March 31 for the PUB report. Premier Kathy Dunderdale says there will be no extension, to ensure the report can be debated during the spring session of the legislature.

City of Iqaluit denies wrongful firing of former planner (January 10, 2012): The City of Iqaluit said it did nothing wrong in firing a former senior planner, Michele Bertol. Bertol is suing the city for more than $700,000. She says the way she was fired was humiliating and hurt her reputation. The city denied her allegations in a statement of defence. Bertol was Iqaluit's director of planning and lands when the city fired her last January. In her lawsuit, she accuses the city of failing to manage her dismissal properly.

Mental health service backlog in Mackenzie Delta (January 10, 2012): Long wait times, increased caseload after summer TRC event People in the Mackenzie Delta are growing frustrated with a backlog for counselling in the region. Long wait times and an increased caseload are contributing to the problem, especially after hundreds travelled to Inuvik, N.W.T., in June for a Truth and Reconciliation Commission national event. Those who made the journey were told they would receive support from Health Canada when the event was over. But as CBC News found out, that support is not always available.

Better housing, less disease (January 10, 2012): This past mid-December, when most Arctic residents started shifting their lives around to get ready for the holiday season, the National Aboriginal Health Organization released a big report on what it calls the “ongoing Inuit housing crisis in Canada.” Chances are few people, inside or outside government, will even read this or be motivated to act on its findings. Some people, long inured to the Arctic’s housing dysfunctions, look at overcrowded housing the way they look at spring blizzards and January darkness: an ineluctable feature of Arctic life.

Court: Iqaluit pellet gun shooting was self-defence (January 10, 2012): An Iqaluit woman accused of shooting another Iqaluit woman in the face with a pellet gun acted in self-defence and is not guilty, Justice Earl Johnson ruled in a written judgment dated Dec. 16, 2011 and published Jan. 9, 2012. Eeta Inookie of Iqaluit faced charges of assault with a weapon and possession of a weapon with intent to commit an offence, laid after she used a pellet gun to shoot Mary Laisa of Iqaluit in the face Oct. 18, 2010 on a road near the Navigator Inn.

Climate Change

Climate change leaves some Hudson Bay polar bears starving (January 10, 2012): Experts say the slow formation of winter ice on Hudson Bay this year has pushed some of Canada's polar bears to the brink of starvation and forced them to scrounge for food near old garbage dumps. The bears weren't able to get onto the ice to hunt seals until late November this year, which observers say is becoming the norm. David Barber, one of the world's top Arctic researchers, said Hudson Bay polar bears have lost six weeks of hunting time on the ice due to climate change.

Exceptionally little ice in Barents- and Kara Seas (January 11, 2012): Satellite images used to monitor the extent of the Arctic sea ice, shows that the waters north of Spitsbergen and north of Novaya Zemlya are still not ice-covered this week. Scientists at the National Snow & Ice Data Centre at the University of Colorado are closely following the dramatic changes in the Arctic as the climate changes heat up the sea temperatures in the north. The January 9th map clearly shows that the waters covered by sea ice in the Barents- and Kara seas are far north of the median extent for the period 1979-2000.

Operators to Survey Groomed Trail (January 10, 2012): Trail operators in Postville will begin to survey the condition of the groomed trail next week. The trail acts as a highway for snowmobilers in this region during the winter months. Dennis Jacque is the Trail Operator in Postville. He says they will be surveying the condition of the section of the trail they are responsible for next week.

Nain’s Omatik Group Gathering Wood for Elders (January 10, 2012): A local volunteer group in Nain is hoping you will join them in gathering wood for elders in the community. Christina Hackett is a councilor with Labrador-Grenfell Health in Nain. She says the group is known as ‘Omatik’. It is made up of adults who meet to deal with anger management and substance abuse issues twice a week. Hackett says the group came up with the idea of gathering wood for elders as a way to give back to the community.

Other

Volcanic mercury aided climate change in causing prehistoric extinction: Canadian scientist (January 10, 2012): Canadian scientists probing ancient chemical deposits on the shores of a High Arctic lake have shed new light on the greatest mass extinction in Earth history — the “Great Dying” that wiped out about 90% of the planet’s species 250 million years ago. Sampling layers of sediment on Nunavut’s Axel Heiberg Island that contain fallout from a series of colossal volcanic eruptions in Siberia during that time, researchers with the University of Calgary and Geological Survey of Canada found evidence of enough mercury pollution to have “overwhelmed” marine ecosystems and contributed to the massive global die-off at the end the Permian age.

Icebreaker, tanker near Nome (January 10, 2012): Other Alaska towns still buried in snow A Coast Guard icebreaker and a tanker carrying 1.3 million gallons of petroleum products could arrive in icebound Nome, Alaska, as early as Thursday, the Coast Guard said. The Sitnasuak Native Corp. of Nome contracted the double-hulled, Russian-flagged tanker Renda to deliver the fuel products to the community of 3,600 on Alaska's west coast after ice formed over the Bering Sea in the wake of a ferocious November storm that prevented the last delivery of the season via barge.

Beluga numbers in Cook Inlet, Alaska lowest in 20 years (January 10, 2012): Cook Inlet's endangered beluga whale population in southwest Alaska has fallen to its lowest level in nearly 20 years, with just 284 of the enigmatic white whales counted last summer. But federal biologists caution the beluga numbers may not have fallen as steeply as the 20 percent decline from 2010 suggests. The number of beluga deaths reported in 2011 was particularly low, raising questions about the population survey conducted in June.