Over 300,000 Canadians faced power outages in parts of Ontario on Sunday as an ice storm pummeled the region over the weekend, according to electricity provider Hydro One.

Environment Canada issued winter storm warnings for freezing rain in Ottawa, parts of Quebec and Ontario, with the risk of snow mixed with or transitioning to ice pellets expected to continue until Monday morning in some regions.

“Outages are largely being caused by tree limbs and branches being weighed down from the accumulation of freezing rain,” Hydro One said on its website, noting there is also the risk of flooding for central Ontario.

More than 350,000 customers were affected as of Sunday afternoon, according to the website, with power expected to be restored on April 1.

Utilities provider Alectra said there were about 35,000 customers without power, primarily in Barrie, a town north of Toronto. “Progress has been slow due to the ice on the lines, but all available resources have been deployed,” it said on Sunday.

The city of Orillia in Ontario declared a state of emergency due to the storm as prolonged freezing rain continues to cause widespread power outages, hazardous road conditions, downed trees and hydro lines, and damage to public and private infrastructure.

“This is a very serious situation with hazardous road conditions, downed trees and hydro lines, and damage to public and private infrastructure,” the city said on its website.

Several residents across Ontario said on social media that roads were closed due to uprooted trees and they had heard crashing tress since the storm began.

The bodies of more than a dozen aid workers have been recovered in southern Gaza from what a United Nations agency described as a “mass grave,” a week after they went missing following attacks by Israeli forces.

Eight of the 14 bodies recovered Sunday from the site in the southern Rafah area were identified as members of the Palestine Red Crescent Society (PRCS), five as civil defense, and one as a UN agency employee, PRCS said in a statement. One PRCS medic remains missing.

Last week, PRCS said nine of its emergency medical technicians had been missing since March 23 following an incident in which Israeli forces fired on ambulances and fire trucks in southern Rafah.

In response to the initial incident, the Israeli military said it had fired on the ambulances and fire trucks because they were being used as cover by Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad militants.

Aid organizations and the UN have expressed outrage over the attacks, which the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent said were the “single most deadly” for IFRC workers in almost a decade.

“This massacre of our team is a tragedy not only for us at the Palestine Red Crescent Society, but also for humanitarian work and humanity,” PCRS said in its statement, calling the targeting of its medics “a war crime” punishable under international law.

The attacks come amid Israel’s renewed assault on the enclave and as its complete blockade of humanitarian aid nears the one-month mark.

Buried beneath the sand

OCHA, the UN’s Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, said the bodies were recovered after a “complex, week-long rescue operation” that involved using bulldozers and heavy machinery to unearth the victims and their battered vehicles from under sand.

“Health workers should never be a target. And yet, we’re here today, digging up a mass grave of first responders and paramedics,” Jonathan Whittall, the head of UNOCHA in the occupied Palestinian territories, said from the site.

Video shared by the UNOCHA showed a bulldozer digging through dirt and moving debris as emergency responders used shovels to reach the victims. Several bodies were seen being pulled from sand, some wearing PRCS vests and showing signs of decomposition.

Early information indicates the first team of aid workers dispatched to the area were killed by Israeli forces on March 23 and other emergency aid crews were struck over the following several hours as they searched for their missing colleagues, UNOCHA said.

“One by one, they were hit, they were struck, their bodies were gathered and buried,” Whittall said. “We’re digging them out in their uniforms, with their gloves on.”

Ambulances, as well as UN and civil defense vehicles, were found crushed and buried under the sand, Whittall added, accusing Israeli forces of trying to cover up the scene.

According to the PRCS, their aid workers were dispatched to Rafah’s Al-Hashashin area on March 23 to respond to Israeli attacks when they came under assault.

“Israeli forces besieged the area, leading to (the) complete loss of communication with our teams,” PRCS said.

Hours later, Gaza’s Civil Defense said that six of its staff also went missing after being dispatched to the same area following what it described as a “sudden incursion by the Israeli occupation forces, the killing and injuring of dozens, and the besieging” of PRCS vehicles.

It said it had “eliminated” a number of Hamas and Islamic Jihad militants by firing on the vehicles and condemned what it claimed was “the repeated use of civilian infrastructure by the terrorist organizations in the Gaza Strip, including the use of medical facilities and ambulances for terrorist purposes.”

The news also follows Israel’s decision before the ceasefire collapsed to block humanitarian aid from entering the enclave, in what it described as a move to pressure Hamas into accepting new terms for an extension of the ceasefire rather than proceed with phase two of the truce.

UNOCHA and aid groups accuse Israel of violating international law by blocking the flow of aid into Gaza and of using starvation as a weapon of war. The same organizations have accused Israel of restricting or creating hurdles to the entry of aid throughout the war.

‘Health services must be protected’

International aid and humanitarian organizations have repeatedly condemned the Israeli military’s attacks on medical facilities and personnel.

“Even in the most complex conflict zones, there are rules. These rules of International Humanitarian Law could not be clearer – civilians must be protected; humanitarians must be protected. Health services must be protected,” Jagan Chapagain, Secretary General of the IFRC, said in a statement on Sunday.

Hospitals in Gaza – including Nasser Medical Complex, the enclave’s largest functioning hospital – have seen intense bombardment and raids from Israeli forces accusing the facilities of harboring Hamas operatives.

About 400 aid workers, including teachers, doctors and nurses, have been killed in Israeli attacks in the enclave since October 7, 2023, according to OCHA’s latest update released Tuesday. The PRCS says the number of its staff killed in line of duty by Israeli forces in Gaza since October 2023 has now reached 27.

“The occupation’s targeting of Red Crescent medics … can only be considered a war crime punishable under international humanitarian law, which the occupation continues to violate before the eyes of the entire world,” PCRS said.

Meanwhile, Gaza health officials said the death toll in Gaza since October 7 has surpassed 50,000, marking a grim milestone for a war with no end in sight.

The prime minister of Greenland pushed back Sunday against assertions by U.S. President Donald Trump that America will take control of the island territory.

Greenland, a huge, resource-rich island in the Atlantic, is a self-governing territory of Denmark, a NATO ally of the United States. Trump wants to annex the territory, claiming it’s needed for national security purposes.

“President Trump says that the United States ‘will get Greenland.’ Let me be clear: The United States will not get it. We do not belong to anyone else. We decide our own future,” Jens-Frederik Nielsen said in a Facebook post.

Nielsen’s post comes a day after the U.S. president told NBC News that military force wasn’t off the table with regard to acquiring Greenland.

In Saturday’s interview, Trump allowed that “I think there’s a good possibility that we could do it without military force.”

“This is world peace, this is international security,” he said, but added: “I don’t take anything off the table.”

Greenland’s residents and politicians have reacted with anger to Trump’s repeated suggestions, with Danish leaders also pushing back.

Trump also said “I don’t care,” when asked in the NBC interview what message this would send to Russian President Vladimir Putin, who has invaded Ukraine and annexed several of its provinces in defiance of international law.

A South Korean man tending a family grave is suspected of sparking one of the record wildfires that ravaged the southeastern part of the country last week, the National Police Agency said on Monday.

The multiple fires, which left 30 people dead and thousands of structures – including a centuries-old Buddhist temple – destroyed, were described as unprecedented in South Korea.

Police said the man, who is in his 50s, was booked in connection with the fires. In South Korea, a booking is not an arrest but rather indicates the man’s information was collected for the investigation.

He was looking after a family grave on a hill in Uiseong County, North Gyeonsang province, on March 22 when he was suspected of igniting a blaze amid windy conditions, police said.

Tending to family or ancestral graves is common in South Korea, especially during the spring and autumn months, and similar traditions exist across East and Southeast Asia.

The fires, which burned about 48,000 hectares in total, had been extinguished by Monday, the Korea Forest Service said in a statement.

More than 3,100 people were evacuated to 114 shelters due to the fires, and five areas – Uiseong, Andong, Cheongsong, Yeongyang, and Yeongdeok – have been declared special disaster zones, the service said.

South Korea’s military deployed approximately 7,500 ground troops and more than 420 helicopters, including four from US Forces Korea, to help in the wildfire fight, according to the Defense Ministry.

More than 10,000 firefighters, police and civil servants were deployed to multiple areas in the south last week since dozens of blazes broke out.

Among the casualties were civil servants dispatched to fight the wildfire. Many of the civilians killed were age 60 or older, including some who struggled to escape quickly or others who did not want to evacuate. A pilot was also killed when his helicopter crashed.

The 1,300-year-old Gounsa temple in Uiseong County, a major Buddhist landmark, was among the dozens of buildings that have burned to the ground with its ceremonial bell the only piece appearing somewhat intact, according to photos from the Jogye Order of Korean Buddhism.

Some of the artifacts that were in the historic site, including the seated stone Buddha designated a treasure by the state, were spared from the fire as they were relocated to other temples ahead of the approaching blazes, it added.

Han Duck-soo, South Korea’s prime minister and acting president, said the fires were the worst the country has seen in recent years and had caused “unprecedented damage.”

Wildfires are caused by a tangle of factors but as the climate crisis escalates, it’s fueling the hot and dry weather that helps fires burn faster and more intensely.

Unusually warm spring temperatures in South Korea dried out the landscape and, combined with strong winds, set the stage for fast moving fires to eat through the region’s dense forest.

This year alone, 244 wildfires have been reported in South Korea, 2.4 times higher than the same period last year, according to Han.

At least two miners died on Monday and four were missing in an accident in a mine in the northern Spanish region of Asturias, the regional emergency service said.

The emergency service said another three people had been injured due to a machine malfunction inside the mine in Degana at 9:32 a.m. (0732 GMT) local time. Three helicopters and two ambulances have been sent to the scene.

El Mundo newspaper said earlier there had been an explosion in the mine and that several people were trapped.

This is a breaking news story. More to follow.

At least 17 Tesla cars were destroyed after a fire broke out at a dealership on the outskirts of Rome on Monday morning, according to Italian fire officials. No one was at the dealership when the fire broke out and no injuries have been reported.

Rome’s fire service said it was investigating “all avenues” while looking into how the fire started, but it did not rule out arson. Local police said officers interviewed the dealership owners and are looking at surveillance footage.

The fire comes after a string of reports across Italy in recent weeks of Tesla vehicles being vandalized and defaced, with anti-Elon Musk and anti-Donald Trump sentiments written with spray paint.

In Rome, several cars in the Garbatella neighborhood, where Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni grew up, were defaced, according to police and social media posts. Meloni and Musk are self-described close friends, but the Italian leader has not commented on the vandalism. Tesla dealerships in Milan have also been targeted by environmental groups in recent weeks.

The Tesla fire comes just one week after another car dealership burned down in northern Rome, destroying 30 cars, including used Teslas. That fire was initially blamed on an electrical fault, but an investigation is underway.

A Paris court has convicted far-right figurehead Marine Le Pen of embezzlement and banned her from running for political office for five years with immediate effect, meaning she is unable to stand in the 2027 presidential election.

The court’s president, Bénédicte de Perthuis, said Le Pen’s actions amounted to a “serious and lasting attack on the rules of democratic life in Europe, but especially in France.” Le Pen left the courtroom before her sentence had been read out in full.

Currently a member of the French parliament, Le Pen was found guilty alongside eight MEPs from her party and 12 assistants. They were accused of using European Parliament money to pay staff who were in fact working for her political party, the National Rally (RN), in France.

The Paris prosecutor had requested a prison sentence of five years, including two suspended; a €300,000 ($325,000) fine and ineligibility to run for office for five years. Prosecutors had requested the ban to stand even if she appeals.

Following her trial in November, current French Justice Minister Gerald Darmanin posted on X that it would be “profoundly shocking” if Le Pen were to be barred from elections.

Previous polls showed that Le Pen was on course to replace Emmanuel Macron, who will be unable to seek a third consecutive term in office.

Under her leadership, the RN has attempted to distance itself from its racist and antisemitic roots, hoping to give the party a more acceptable – and potentially electable – face.

The court’s politically explosive decision has already sparked Le Pen’s right-wing European allies to rally to her defense. Just minutes after the ruling, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban sent a message of solidarity to Le Pen. “Je suis Marine!” he wrote on X.

This is a breaking news story. More to follow.

Seven thousand head of cattle used to roam Ziwa ranch, a 27-square-mile (70-square-kilometer) expanse of grassland in central Uganda. Today, the cattle have gone and grazing in their place are rhinos – the only ones in the country living in their natural habitat.

Not long ago, Uganda used to be home to both the black and northern white species of rhinoceros. But by the early 1980s, due to poaching, trafficking and political turmoil under the dictatorship of Idi Amin, native populations – once thought to number around 700 – were wiped out.

More than a decade later, an initiative to bring back the majestic animals was born, with newly formed charity Rhino Fund Uganda approaching Captain Joseph Charles Roy, former pilot and owner of Ziwa cattle ranch, which they had targeted as prime rhino habitat, with the idea that he should move the herds of cattle out, and rhino in.

Roy – a lover of animals and an aspiring conservationist, according to his daughter – agreed, and in 2005 and 2006, six southern white rhinos were relocated to the ranch; four coming overland from Kenya and two flown over from Disney Animal Kingdom Florida on Roy’s own cargo airline. Numbers of northern white rhinos were so low (today, there are only two left in the world, both females) that the native subspecies could not be reintroduced.

No one fully expected what happened next. The team knew the ranch was an ideal habitat for the species – a mix of swamps, savannah and woodland – but they didn’t envisage the scale of success. Today, there are 48 rhinos at Ziwa, with five born in the last three months. In contrast, a pair of rhinos moved to Uganda’s Wildlife Conservation Education Center, formerly known as Entebbe Zoo, at the same time as the Ziwa rhinos were introduced, and have had no offspring whatsoever.

However, if the birthrate continues, the rhinos will soon outgrow the ranch – begging the question: where will they go, and will they be safe?

Rhino refuge

Wendy Roy, daughter of Captain Roy, has since taken over some of Ziwa’s management in collaboration with the Ugandan Wildlife Authority (UWA). The ranch has lodges for tourists and offers walking safaris to see rhinos, shoebills, leopards, antelopes, warthogs and other wildlife, with the funds generated going back into rhino conservation.

Brought up between the UK and Uganda, she is the first to admit that she was not born a conservationist, but now, as she gets more involved, she is starting to see the magic in it.

“Sometimes in the evenings, when I see the rhinos coming towards HQ, I think, ‘Wow, this looks like the Garden of Eden,’” she says. “It’s incredible: not just rhinos but zebras, antelopes, waterbucks. It’s surreal, it’s peaceful and, of course, you have to respect your environment and be equally as peaceful as the animals.”

Roy believes this serene environment is one of the secrets to Ziwa’s success: “It is just conducive for breeding: they’re not stressed.” Also key are the rangers who provide 24/7 protection. Each rhino family is monitored day in and day out by at least two wardens, while other rangers patrol Ziwa’s perimeter fences. This deters poachers seeking rhino horns for the illegal wildlife trade, and it allows wardens to monitor rhino behavior, gathering detailed data that can be used to inform rhino conservation globally.

Sharif Nsubaga has worked as a ranger at Ziwa for more than 10 years. “Every hour, we record the rhino activities and their behaviors, like feeding, urinating, defecating, resting, eating,” he says, adding that as a result, he has formed a close bond with the rhinos. “I know how each individual behaves: I know that this one is more aggressive, this one is unpredictable.”

His favorite, he confides, is Bella, one of the original rhinos brought over from Kenya who has birthed around seven calves and is now a grandmother. “She is one of the calmest rhinos in the sanctuary,” he says.

Right to roam

It has always been Ziwa’s central mission to breed enough rhinos so that they can be translocated to other areas of the country, such as national parks where rhinos once roamed. But the reality of replicating this stable environment has been a challenge.

Many of the national parks are unfenced and suffer from high levels of poaching from communities living nearby, as well as the encroachment of human settlements and resulting human-wildlife conflict.

The UWA has been preparing Ajai Wildlife Reserve, which was once a stronghold of the white rhino and lies 136 miles (220 kilometers) northwest of Ziwa, for reintroduction since 2021. But there have been several hold-ups, due to a lack of funding, challenges relocating people living within the park boundaries, and a shortage of rangers, says John Makombo, UWA’s conservation director.

Next month, community members who have agreed to compensation will be relocated to new homes outside of the reserve, he says, and in May, UWA will start constructing an electrified enclosure where the rhinos will be kept. He adds that they are already restoring the vegetation to make it a suitable habitat, and have started recruiting rangers, including people from the local community, who will be trained from June onwards.

Those at Ziwa are cautiously optimistic; they have been given dates before that have come and gone. This time however, there is more urgency. Roy estimates that Ziwa has the capacity for around 70 or 80 rhinos, but she adds that they are expecting a new intake of eight individuals from another African country soon, bringing its population to around 60. This new intake is much needed, she says, to diversify the gene pool and maintain a healthy population.

Symbol of stability

Moving rhinos from Ziwa to Uganda’s national parks is an exciting step, says Dr. Gladys Kalema-Zikusoka, a veterinarian who has revolutionized gorilla conservation in Uganda and is founder and CEO of the nonprofit Conservation Through Public Health, but she warns that it needs to be met with solid investment.

However, if the move is successful, the benefits could be significant. Makombo says that if rhinos start reproducing in Ajai, they will look to reintroduce them in Kidepo, Murchison Falls and other national parks across the country. This will not only help to enhance biodiversity, he says, but boost Uganda’s wildlife tourism.

There is also a symbolic importance, says Kalema-Zikusoka. “During the Idi Amin days, the elephants were almost poached to extinction; the rhino, sadly, was actually poached to extinction … By bringing back the rhino, it shows that Uganda is stable again and can look after rhinos in their natural setting, which will be amazing.”

Moldova on Monday accused Russia’s embassy of engineering the escape of a pro-Kremlin lawmaker to the breakaway region of Transnistria just as he was about to be jailed over illegal political funding allegations.

The case of Alexander Nesterovschii, who could not be reached for comment, is the latest in which Moldova’s pro-European government has accused Russia of meddling in its political landscape. Moscow denies the allegations.

In a statement, the Russian embassy said the allegations of interference in the lawmaker’s case were unfounded and unacceptable. It said it had called on the Moldovan authorities to “refrain from provocative speculation.”

Moldova’s security service released a video which it said showed Nesterovschii entering the embassy in Chisinau on March 18, a day before a court sentenced him to 12 years in jail.

Moldova’s Foreign Ministry said earlier on Monday that three Russian Embassy employees had been declared persona non grata and been told they were obliged to leave the country “based on clear evidence on the conduct of activities contrary to their diplomatic status.” Russia’s Foreign ministry said on Monday it would hit back after Moldova expelled three of its diplomats, the RIA state news agency reported.

Nesterovschii was found guilty of illegally channeling money to a pro-Russian party associated with fugitive businessman Ilan Shor at local elections in 2023, as well as the 2024 presidential vote and a national referendum on Moldova’s EU aspirations.

Nesterovschi denied the charges, calling them politically motivated.

The security service said that on the day of his sentencing he was driven in a white car with diplomatic plates that is also visible in the video to the Russian-backed Transnistria region that broke away from Moldovan control in the early 1990s.

“This type of activity is part of the mechanism of hybrid aggression directed against the Republic of Moldova,” Alexandru Musteata, director of Moldova’s Security and Intelligence Service, told a briefing.

Moldova’s government, which is trying to lead the formerly Soviet agricultural economy into the European Union by 2030, has repeatedly accused Russia of meddling and trying to destabilize it.

Moldova holds a parliamentary election this autumn that will be a test of the popularity of the pro-EU government’s course.

On Tuesday, Moldovan authorities said they had detained Eugenia Gutul, a pro-Russian governor of Moldova’s Gagauzia region, on charges of illegal political funding as she tried to leave the country. Gutul said the charges were politically motivated.

A court ruling then ordered her to be kept in custody for at least 30 days.

Police say that another lawmaker, Irinna Lozovan, who is facing similar charges, is hiding from law enforcement. Lozovan also said the charges were politically motivated.