World Report - July 14: Monday's top stories in 10 minutes

Episode Date: July 14, 2025

More communities near Manitoba's northeast border preparing to evacuate under threat of wildfires. Recovery efforts to resume in parts of central Texas after weekend of rain. US President Donald Trump says he will send Patriot air defence missiles to Ukraine. US President Donald Trump is facing growing backlash over his administration's handling of the Jeffrey Epstein files.13 jailed Hong Kong pro-democracy activists back in court for a trial Amnesty International calls a pivotal test for freedom of expression in HKNew research shows more Canadians are obese and a lot of weight gain happened during the pandemic. 

A lot of news podcasts give you information, the basic facts of a story. What's different about your world tonight is that we actually take you there. Paul Hunter, CBC News, Washington. Margaret Evans, CBC News, Aleppo, Jerusalem. Prince Albert, Iqaluit, Susan Ormiston, CBC News in Admiralty Bay, Antarctica. Correspondence around the world where news is happening. So don't just know, go. I'm Susan Bonner, host of Your World Tonight

from CBC News. Find us wherever you get your podcasts. This is a CBC Podcast. This is World Report. Good morning, I'm Marcia Young. More communities near Manitoba's northeast border are under evacuation order. Wildfires are burning out of control in the Island Lake region. The Minister of Emergency Management says Ottawa has approved a request for more emergency evacuation and shelter support. People are trying to get away from the smoke, but it is also traveling and causing poor air quality in the rest of Manitoba. The CBC's Sarah Reid reports.

For thousands of Garden Hill First Nations residents, the arrival of a Hercules military plane to airlift them out of their remote community is bittersweet. Relief to be relocated safely to Winnipeg, but also fear about having to leave their homes behind. Tim Matak was on one of those flights. Last time I heard when we left our entire area was totally surrounded by fire and the ashes were getting pretty bad and the smoke was thick. There are more than 4,000 people living in the area.

Over the weekend most of them were flown to Winnipeg, leaving behind only 1,200 essential workers to fight the fires. There's smoke here this morning. Garden Hill resident Duane Chornoby gave his community an update about the worsening smoke. Holded in pretty good last night. It's not just the communities near the fire that are experiencing the smoke. It's also blanketing the rest of the province, including in Winnipeg, where some people are struggling with an air quality that spiked to 10 plus.

My eyes, they get really red at times. And now we're out on our bikes again today. Maybe it should be stopping us, but it hasn't. University of Manitoba physiology professor Andrew Heleko says he worries people will start normalizing poor air quality. You're inhaling chemicals, you're inhaling toxicants. These things are poisonous to your lungs and they are causing damage. Air quality in Manitoba is expected to vary over the coming days while crews fight the fires responsible for the dangerous conditions. Sarah Reid, CBC News, Edmonton.

Recovery efforts are expected to resume today in parts of central Texas. Rain forced emergency crews to pause their work over the weekend. It's been more than a week since a flash flood led to the death of more than 130 people. This weekend, the Guadalupe River breached its banks again. Steve Futterman is in Kerrville, Texas. The search for the missing here goes on, but in the last five days, very few bodies have been discovered. The sad reality hitting this town is that many people may never be found. This woman, a volunteer, hopes search crews can help the families of those missing get

some closure. Help them find people and bring these families peace. On Sunday, however, the search had to be suspended. Torrential rains hit the area. Flash flood warnings were issued. There was some flooding, some rivers overflowed, some streets were closed. This search crew member had to stop what he was doing.

We'll probably end up not being able to do anything today and just try to get back at it in the morning. Many people were not taking any chances. Some of my thoughts were, should we just go back home and get back out of the way? But it seems to have cleared up enough. In the end, there was no massive river surge. Any damage was relatively minor.

But with everyone still on edge, the mayor of Courville, Joe Herring Jr. is urging residents to seek help. I personally went to get counseling this week and it helped me and I think it can help you. Yesterday at many Sunday church services, the names of the victims and their families were read. The Eastland family, the Stewart family, Gail. Today there could be some additional rain. Steve Futterman for CBC News, Kerrville, Texas.

The relationship between Ukraine and the United States appears to be improving. U.S. President Donald Trump now says he will send Patriot air defense missiles to Ukraine. We will send the Patriots which they desperately desperately need, because Putin really surprised a lot of people. He talks nice and then he bombs everybody in the evening. So there's a little bit of a problem there. I don't like it. Patriot missiles are effective, but they're also expensive.

Each one costs more than $4 million. But Ukraine says it needs those defensive capabilities to fend off daily missile and drone attacks from Russia. And Trump says he is frustrated Russian President Vladimir Putin will not agree to a ceasefire. It's not clear how many patriots the U.S. will send to Ukraine, but we could get more details today or tomorrow while NATO Chief Mark Rutte is in Washington. U.S. President Donald Trump is facing growing backlash over his administration's handling of the Jeffrey Epstein files.

The Justice Department says it would not release any additional files related to the convicted sex offender. Attorney General Pam Bondi says there is no client list that turned up in the investigation. Trump has admitted he was a friend of Jeffrey Epstein. Now the president is blaming his political opponents for making that relationship an issue. Tony Waterman joins me from Washington. And Tony, what is the latest? Well, the president spent at least part of the weekend trying to bring this revolt within his MAGA party under control. There are multiple reports that he and his team called up some of the Attorney General

Pam Bondi's most vocal critics to ask them to tamp things down and to also show support for her. This uproar though really started back in February when Bondi made quite a show of inviting some MAGA influencers to the White House to present them with what she had pitched as bombshell Epstein files, but it turned out to be basically all of the information that was already released to the public.

And she's also said that Epstein's client list was on her desk for review. She now says that she meant his case files, but after last week's memo that said that Epstein had no client list and also that he committed suicide, the calls have been growing louder for her to be fired. What could these files mean for the MAGA movement? Well, the conspiracy around Epstein that he has this client list and that he was murdered

to keep that list hidden is quite foundational to the MAGA movement. Because to them, it is proof of the so-called deep state covering things up to protect powerful people, particularly Democrats. And Trump and many in his administration really leaned into this conspiracy theory,

promising to bring all of these, in their view, horrific cover-ups to light. And now these people, the MAGA turned White House officials, are being seen as part of the deep state, willing to cover things up to stay in power. All right. Thank you so much, Toni. Thank you.

Toni Waterman in Washington. A group of imprisoned democracy protesters is appearing in a Hong Kong court today. A prisoner's van pulls up to the courthouse. The 12 activists inside are part of a national security case. They're appealing their convictions for organizing an unofficial election in 2020. Massive anti-government protests brought the city to a standstill. Dozens of pro-democracy activists were later arrested and charged with conspiracy to commit subversion. Their convictions have drawn international criticism. Many countries, including Canada, have condemned the case as politically motivated

and an attempt to silence critics of the Chinese government. If you packed on a few pounds during the pandemic years, you're not alone. and an attempt to silence critics of the Chinese government. If you packed on a few pounds during the pandemic years, you're not alone. New research shows more Canadians are obese, and a lot of weight gain happened during the pandemic. As Jennifer LaGrasse reports, experts are concerned the rise in obesity could cause other health issues. Looking back, like I was so not fine. That's Angela Martin. During COVID-19, she worked as a nurse and was going through a separation. All of this, along with the isolation,

caused her to gain a lot of weight. And according to new research, she's not alone. We found that the rate of obesity was steadily increasing. Laura Anderson is an associate professor at McMaster University in Ontario. Her research uses body mass index data from 2009 to 2023. It found that about one-third of Canadians have become obese, with more weight gain happening during COVID-19. The pandemic had such a profound

impact on our daily lives, including changes in our eating behaviours and access to healthy foods. The research also found that obesity increased the most in young adults and that more women became severely obese. The study didn't look into reasons for this, but one expert points to worsening mental health, especially during the pandemic. There was isolation and depression. Sean Wharton is an internal medicine doctor in Ontario. He helps people struggling with obesity and depression. Sean Wharton is an internal medicine doctor in Ontario.

He helps people struggling with obesity and has been a clinical advisor to weight loss drug companies. People who are living with depression, their depression may have got even worse and that's where we saw people having an increase in their weight. Researchers say more data is needed to see whether obesity rates continue to climb or if popular weight loss drugs like Wigovie will have an impact. Jennifer LaGrasa, CBC News, Toronto. And that is the latest national and international news from World Report News Anytime, CBC News.ca.

I'm Marcia Young.