The World This Hour - The World This Hour for 2025/02/14 at 13:00 EST

Episode Date: February 14, 2025

The World This Hour for 2025/02/14 at 13:00 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, the world this hour, I'm Julianne Hasell Wood. The future of Ukraine topped the agenda at an international security conference in Munich. And while Russia was not invited, it is dominating discussions. Abbi Kovasin has the latest. A failed Ukraine would weaken Europe, but it would also weaken the United States. European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen repeated her message at the Munich Security Conference.

Allies on the continent are worried that the new US administration may already be looking to appease Vladimir Putin in order to lock up a peace agreement, even one that rewards the Russian president. Ukrainian president Vladimir Zelensky says his country must not be left out of any negotiations. This is a principle position we will never accept it. All our people, all our nation. I don't want to be those person in the history who helped Putin to occupy my country. U.S. Vice President J.D. Vance said a reasonable settlement is possible but provided no specifics. Europe says it's ready to do even more to support Ukraine, but acknowledges they need

Washington's ongoing support to ward off any future threats from the Kremlin. Abby Cuodas in CBC News, Berlin. A pair of Montreal app developers has come up with a way to help shoppers buy Canadian. By Beaver was launched by Alexandra Hamela and Christopher Dip earlier this month. The free app scans product barcodes and lets users know if it's Canadian or not. Hamela says he got the idea after seeing misinformation online. I came across a lot of different posts on social media sharing different lists of products

and some were plain out wrong and I thought what would be a better way to unite a list of all the products with correct scores to know which is Canadian and which is not. A recent Leger poll found 81% of Canadians surveyed said they're buying significantly more Canadian products. The Trudeau government's two month GST holiday comes to an end tomorrow. And now businesses are assessing

whether it was worth the effort. Bill Blishanuk has more. So I had to go in manually just turn off all the taxes. Toronto gift shop owner Trin Ngo put in extra hours prepping for the tax break just before Christmas. Ngo says it didn't help her sales due to the short time frame and limited number of products exempt from the tax. So is she looking forward to reversing her work this weekend? No, but at least it's a quiet time, so that's fine.

Statistics Canada data on the impact of the tax holiday won't be out for a while. But Dan Kelly of the Canadian Federation of Independent Business says it wasn't worth the bother. So it didn't move the dial very much with respect to sales, but did add a lot in terms of administrative complexity. But Kelly Higginson of Restaurants Canada disagrees. So really the GST holiday is doing what it was supposed to do.

She credits the tax holiday for pushing hiring to pre-pandemic highs. And she says with the threat of U.S. tariffs it should be permanent. Phil Tyshanok, CBC News, Toronto. The red and white maple leaf flag turns 60 tomorrow. Flag Day has been celebrated every year since February 15, 1965, the first time the flag was raised on Parliament Hill. Five former prime ministers, both conservative and liberal, are urging Canadians to raise the flag as a show of strength in the face of American threats.

Retired veteran Bruce Stock spoke at a news conference ahead of Flag Day. Without you dear flag, Canada wouldn't exist. Come every February the 15th, we will all celebrate your gift to us from coast to coast to blessed coast. The US President Donald Trump has been threatening the Canadian economy and Canada's independence. Parts of Western Canada continue to experience extreme cold. Windchill values fell below minus 50 in northern Saskatchewan and northern Manitoba overnight. Central Canada is digging out after yesterday's big dump of snow, 40 centimetres in some parts.

And that storm is hitting the Atlantic regions today. And that is Your World This Hour. For CBC News, I'm Julianne Hazelwood.