Canada is shutting its embassy in Tehran and severing diplomatic relations with Iran, Canadian Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird has said.

A Canadian porn actor suspected in the dismemberment of a Chinese student has arrived in Canada via military transport from Germany, where he was arrested this month.

Prime minister Stephen Harper made an official government apology to native Canadians for the country’s past practice of taking aboriginal children from their families and forcing them to attend state-funded schools meant to assimilate them.

CANADIAN farmer Percy Schmeiser brings his international fight against genetic modification to West Cork this week.

THE World Health Organisation said last night it was lifting its warning against unnecessary travel to Toronto less than a week after it was imposed amid fears over the spread of the SARS virus.