The World This Hour - The World This Hour for 2025/02/06 at 08:00 EST

Episode Date: February 6, 2025

The World This Hour for 2025/02/06 at 08:00 EST

When a body is discovered 10 miles out to sea, it sparks a mind-blowing police investigation. There's a man living in this address in the name of a deceased. He's one of the most wanted men in the world. This isn't really happening. Officers are finding large sums of money. It's a tale of murder, skullduggery and international intrigue. So who really is he? I'm Sam Mullins and this is Sea of Lies from CBC's Uncovered, available now.

From CBC News, it's the World This Hour. I'm Joe Cummings. We start in the United States where today is the deadline for millions of federal employees to accept a buyout being offered by Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency. And Musk says if they don't take the buyout, they could be fired. Richard Madden reports. It's fight or flight for the federal workforce, and it's believed roughly 40,000 government workers have accepted buyouts, which is far short of Elon Musk's ambitious goal of cutting

roughly 200,000 jobs or 10% of the federal workforce. Now many legal experts are questioning the terms because those who accept the buyout have to sign a waiver agreeing not to take legal action. They're also skeptical if workers will actually get severance because it could be delayed by lawsuits. Now in the past two and a half weeks we've seen Musk and his team completely dismantle several government agencies from USAID, Treasury, Labor, intelligence agencies. Now critics are describing Musk and his team of 20-somethings that they're treating government like a tech startup, stripping each agency for parts and even gaining access to sensitive

databases and intel of Musk's corporate competitors. Richard Madden, CBC News, Washington. Israel's defense minister has instructed the military to draw up plans for large numbers of Palestinians to leave the Gaza Strip. It follows U.S. President Donald Trump suggesting this week that the U.S. could take over and rebuild the territory. Israel Katz says the plan will include options for departing at land crossings as well as by air or by sea.

But he doesn't say when Palestinians would be able to return to Gaza, which has been devastated by 16 months of war. Claiming it has an institutional bias against Israel, the Israeli government is withdrawing the country from the United Nations Human Rights Council, it's the international body created to protect and promote human rights. On Tuesday, President Trump did the same thing. Indian opposition MPs are outraged about the treatment of more than 100 illegal migrants flown back to India this week on a US military plane. Salema Shivji reports from Mumbai.

Fury outside India's parliament as members of the opposition hold up signs in protest. Humans not prisoners, one says. It comes after an American military plane landed in India's northern Punjab state yesterday, carrying 104 Indians who were living illegally in the US. Forcibly deported as part of the Trump administration's new immigration crackdown, several complained they were handcuffed and shackled during the entire 40-hour journey. India's Foreign Minister Subramaniam Jayashankar stood up in parliament to respond, saying women and children on the flight were not restrained in any way. We are, of course, engaging the US government to ensure that the returning deportees are not mistreated in any manner during the flight.

But he says the focus needs to be on cracking down on illegal migration. Salima Shivji, CBC News, Mumbai. Now to Ottawa, where CBC News has learned Canada Post is carrying out another round of management layoffs. Marina Van Stalkenburg has the details. CBC News has learned nearly 50 Canada Post managers are being laid off this week. Nearly half of them are in Ottawa but also in Toronto, Montreal and other regions. Spokesperson John Hamilton says it's only internal managers losing their jobs. To the public this will largely be invisible. This won't impact their day-to-day mail.

Last month Canada Post also cut 20 percent of its senior executive team. Canada Post's finances are so bad it was going to run out of the money it needed to operate by the spring. But the federal government stepped in last month with a $1 billion loan. The Canadian Union of Postal Workers has argued the corporation's money problems are in part because it's become too top-heavy. Jim Gallant is a national negotiator with the union. There are a lot of managers, they get paid a lot of money. Canada Post says no unionized employees are being laid off. Marina von Stackelberg, CBC News, Ottawa.

And that is The World This Hour. I'm Joe Cummings.