The World This Hour - The World This Hour for 2025/03/15 at 15:00 EDT

Episode Date: March 15, 2025

The World This Hour for 2025/03/15 at 15:00 EDT

In Scarborough, there's this fire behind our eyes. A passion in our bellies. It's in the hearts of our neighbors. The eyes of our nurses. And the hands of our doctors. It's what makes Scarborough, Scarborough. In our hospitals, we do more than anyone thought possible. We've less than anyone could imagine.

But it's time to imagine what we can do with more. Join Scarborough Health Network and together, we can turn grit into greatness. Donate at lovescarborough.ca. From CBC News, The World This Hour. I'm Jasmine Sapiores. Canada, along with several European countries, took part today in a virtual summit on Ukraine.

And as Anna Cunningham reports the so-called coalition of the willing is planning to put military pressure on Moscow. Prime Minister Mark Carney joining French President Emmanuel Macron, Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelensky as well as leaders from Australia, New Zealand, European nations and EU and NATO chiefs. We agreed we will keep increasing the pressure on Russia, keep the military aid flowing to Ukraine and keep tightening restrictions on Russia's economy. Led by British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, he says the group rejects Russian President

Vladimir Putin's yes-but approach to a ceasefire. Starmer says his group is now moving to an operational phase. Our militaries will meet on Thursday this week here in the United Kingdom to put strong and robust plans in place to swing in behind a peace deal. Discussions then will be about the possibility of a peacekeeping force, something Moscow rejects. The US did not take part in the meeting. President Donald Trump still sounding positive on Russia agreeing a peace deal.

Anna Cunningham, CBC News, London. In Serbia, an estimated 100,000 people converged in Belgrade to protest the country's president, Aleksandar Vucic. The rally is believed to be the biggest anti-government protest ever held in Serbia. It comes after more than four months of demonstrations that have posed the biggest challenge to Vucic's grip on power after 13 years in charge.

The almost daily protest began after 15 people died in a railway station collapse last November. Some blame that disaster on the corruption under Vucic's leadership. A different kind of gathering in Rome, this one to show support for the European Union. Megan Williams has the details. Here in Piazza del Popolo in central Rome there are tens of thousands of people crammed into this massive square. I've never seen a protest this big in Rome.

They're holding up the European Union flags and they're here to show their support for the European Union. It was organized by a writer for a daily newspaper, La Repubblica, who felt that the pro-European sentiment in Italy was not coming across strongly enough through its political leader. So he's organized today to have all sorts of different people talk, expressing their love of the European Union project, and many of them as well talking about the need to create a unified military to defend the European Union.

Megan Williams, CBC News, Rome. Cuba's power grid collapsed last night, causing massive outages, putting more than 10 million people into darkness. Cuba's Ministry of Energy and Mines says an electrical substation in Havana failed, knocking out power to the capital and surrounding provinces. This follows a string of nationwide blackouts in the country late last year due to aging infrastructure and economic issues. British Columbia's Premier says his government is drafting legislation to

scrap the consumer carbon tax in his province. It comes immediately after Prime Minister Mark Carney's order in council to remove the federal carbon tax. Thomas Green is a senior climate policy adviser with the David Suzuki Foundation. He says now is the time to look at applying other climate policies to bring down emissions. Governments can improve incentives to install heat pumps. They can improve the building codes so that when we build new houses, they're really energy efficient,

so that there's less cost to heat and cool our buildings. And we end up with a more comfortable, more resilient living situations. Carney's decision to eliminate the carbon tax was his first move upon taking office. And that is your World This Hour. Remember you can listen to us wherever you get your podcasts updated every hour, seven days a week.

For CBC News, I'm Jasmine Sepulis.