Iran shot down a U.S. warplane on Friday, setting off a search by both sides for surviving crew as the war looked set to intensify with U.S. President Donald Trump threatening more attacks on civilian infrastructure.

Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps said it was combing an area near where the plane came down in southwestern Iran. The regional governor promised a commendation for anyone who captured or killed the pilot.

A U.S. military official confirmed that a fighter jet had been shot down and a search was under way.

Iranian news agencies said U.S. helicopters were flying low on apparent search missions and carried videos of residents shooting at them.

There were no confirmed details of the searches or the type of aircraft shot down, which the Iranian military said was an F-35, a single-seater. The Pentagon and U.S. Central Command did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

The loss underlined the risk still faced by U.S. and Israeli aircraft over Iran, despite assertions by Trump and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth that their forces had total control of the skies.

Nearly five weeks after the U.S. and Israel opened the campaign with a wave of strikes that killed Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, there is no sign of an end to the war, which has already killed thousands and threatened lasting damage to the global economy.

On Thursday, Trump posted footage on social media showing dust and smoke billowing up as U.S. strikes hit the newly constructed B1 bridge between Tehran and nearby Karaj, which was due to open this year, and said more attacks would follow.

“Our Military, the greatest and most powerful (by far!) anywhere in the World, hasn’t even started destroying what’s left in Iran. Bridges next, then Electric Power Plants!,” he wrote in a subsequent post.

Despite the pressure, Iran has been able to hit back at Israel and strike Gulf countries allied to the U.S., which have so far held back from joining the war directly for fear of further escalation.

On Friday, as Trump threatened to hit its bridges and power plants, Iran struck a power and water plant in Kuwait, underlining the vulnerability of Gulf States that rely heavily on desalination plants for drinking water.

Trump urged Iran’s leaders to seek peace, saying on social media that Iran “knows what has to be done, and has to be done, FAST!.”

But Tehran has shown no sign of acquiescence and Trump faces growing pressure to find a quick resolution, with anger building at home and his Republican Party in danger of losing control of Congress at elections in November.

Negotiations conducted via intermediaries with new leaders in Iran have shown little sign of progress, and polls indicate most Americans oppose the war.

At the same time, the economic impact has been global, with Iran’s grip on the strategic shipping lane in the Strait of Hormuz giving it a choke hold on oil and gas.

Trump has expressed anger at U.S. allies that have refused his calls to help re-open the strait, through which a fifth of global oil and liquefied gas passes in normal times. On Friday, he said reopening it would not be difficult.

“With a little more time, we can easily OPEN THE HORMUZ STRAIT, TAKE THE OIL,& MAKE A FORTUNE,” he said on Truth Social.

The U.S. and Israel say they have degraded Iran’s military capacity. But Iranian media have issued daily reports of attacks on civilian sites too, including schools, pharmaceutical suppliers and health facilities. On Thursday, the century-old Pasteur Institute in the heart of Tehran was severely damaged, the Health Ministry said.

On Friday, a drone hit a Red Crescent relief warehouse in the Choghadak area of the southern Bushehr province.

Over 100 American international law experts said the conduct of U.S. forces and statements by senior U.S. officials “raise serious concerns about violations of international human rights law and international humanitarian law, including potential war crimes.”

For its part, Iran has continued to strike targets around the Gulf.

Kuwait Petroleum Corporation said its Mina al-Ahmadi refinery had been hit by drones. Other attacks were also reported to have been intercepted in Saudi Arabia and Abu Dhabi. Missile debris landed near the Israeli port of Haifa, site of a major oil refinery.

Global financial markets have whipsawed in response to expectations of a possible end to the war and the re-opening of the Strait, which only isolated vessels have been able to transit.

The closure has also squeezed shipments of fertilizer, threatening a humanitarian crisis in developing countries in Asia and Africa, underlined by data showing a sharp rise in global food prices in March.

On Friday, a container ship belonging to the French shipping group CMA CGM passed through, MarineTraffic vessel tracking data showed, a sign that Iran may not consider France hostile. A liquefied natural gas ship belonging to Japan’s Mitsui OSK Lines also transited.

Oil markets were closed after benchmark U.S. crude prices gained 11% on Thursday following a speech by Trump that offered no clear sign of an imminent end to the war.

The U.N. Security Council is set to vote on Saturday on a Bahraini resolution to protect commercial shipping in and around the strait, diplomats said, but veto-wielding China made clear its opposition to authorizing armed intervention.

© 2026 Reuters

American employers added a surprisingly strong 178,000 new jobs last month, rebounding from a dismal February. And the unemployment rate dipped to 4.3 per cent.

The U.S. Labor Department reported Friday that hiring marked a rebound from the loss of 133,000 jobs in February. The job gains were about three times what economists had forecast.

The unemployment rate was down from 4.4 per cent in February. That is partly because the labor force — those working and looking for work — dropped by 396,000 in March so fewer people were competing for jobs.

Health care companies added 76,400 jobs last month, boosted by return of 31,000 Kaiser Permanente employees to work after the end of a strike in February. Factories added 15,000 jobs last month but have still shed jobs for 14 of the last 16 months. Construction companies added 26,000 jobs, probably partly because of warmer weather last month.

Average hourly wages were up 0.2 per cent from February and 3.5 per cent from March 2025, a number consistent with the Federal Reserve’s two per cent annual inflation target.

The U.S. job market has been in a slump over the past year, and the war in Iran has clouded the outlook. Most economists say the impact of the war and higher energy prices was probably not fully reflected in the March jobs numbers.

“The data is mostly backward-looking, and likely does not incorporate any impact from the recent rise in energy prices, or other risks related to the war in Iran,’’ Thomas Simons, chief U.S. economist with the investment firm Jefferies, wrote in a commentary.

Last year, employers added an average of just 9,700 jobs a month, the weakest hiring outside a recession since 2002. Businesses have been reluctant to bring on new workers partly because of uncertainty arising from President Donald Trump’s trade and immigration policies. One measure released by the Labor Department on Monday showed the weakest hiring since April 2020 – in the middle of COVID-19 lockdowns.

But firms have also been reluctant to let go of their existing employees, creating what economists describe as a “no-hire, no-fire’’ scenario that locks young applicants out of the job market. At the same time, there are growing worries that artificial intelligence is taking entry-level jobs.

New jobs are heavily concentrated in health care and social assistance (which includes day care and vocational rehabilitation centers). That category accounted for more than half the jobs created last month. The trend reflects an aging U.S. population. A graying Japan saw the same thing in the early 2010s, Vanguard economist Adam Schickling wrote in a commentary ahead of Friday’s jobs report.

“The larger-than-expected rebound in nonfarm payrolls in March mainly reflects a reversal of the strike and weather effects that weighed on hiring in February, rather than being a sign that the labour market is rapidly gaining momentum,” said Stephen Brown, chief North America economist at Capital Economics. Citing higher oil prices, he warned of the risk that “the hit to consumers’ purchasing power will weigh on demand and therefore hiring in the near term.”

© 2026 The Canadian Press

Ontario’s Special Investigations Unit is appealing for witnesses following the arrest of a woman at a Cardi B concert in Hamilton.

The SIU said preliminary information suggests that on the evening of March 31, during a concert at TD Coliseum, security requested assistance from paid duty officers with the Hamilton Police Service to remove a woman.

Officers attended and used physical control to escort the woman from the venue, the watchdog said.

The SIU, which investigates incidents involving police where there has been death, serious injury or allegations of sexual assault, did not provide details about the woman’s condition.

Global News reached out to the SIU regarding the cause of the investigation but have not heard back in time for publishing.

SIU are now appealing to the public for witnesses who may have seen the incident including videos or photos.

The incident occurred during a stop on Cardi B’s “Little Miss Drama” tour.

The rapper earlier posted a video to social media calling out Canadians over ticket sales for the Hamilton show, saying it was the only stop on the tour not close to selling out.

By showtime on March 31, however, the concert was sold out, with the rapper later calling Hamilton the “winner of Canada’s crowds.”

© 2026 Global News, a division of Corus Entertainment Inc.

Advanced polls are now open for three key byelections to the House of Commons, Elections Canada said Friday.

Byelections are scheduled to be held on April 13 in two Liberal stronghold seats in the Toronto area – Scarborough Southwest and University-Rosedale – and the contested riding of Terrebonne in Quebec, north of Montreal.

Voters in Scarborough Southwest and University—Rosedale will choose new members of Parliament after two former Liberal cabinet ministers stepped down.

Bill Blair left his seat to become Canada’s high commissioner to the U.K., while Chrystia Freeland has a number of new roles, including as economic adviser to the Ukrainian president and CEO of the Rhodes Trust.

The race in Terrebonne last April was the closest in the country — the Liberals won by a single vote on election night. A court challenge was filed after it was found that Elections Canada put an incorrect return address on some mail-in ballots, which were never counted.

The Supreme Court of Canada invalidated the result in February, and the vote is being redone.

If the Liberals win all three seats, they’ll have 173 MPs in the House of Commons and a majority in the House of Commons.

Advanced polls began at 9 am Eastern in all three ridings on Friday, and polls will remain open until 9 pm. Voters can cast their ballots early on Friday, Saturday, Sunday and Monday, from 9 am to 9 pm Eastern.

https://x.com/ElectionsCan_E/status/2040044192529879047?s=20

The deadline to apply to vote by mail or to vote at the local Elections Canada office is Tuesday, April 7, 6 pm Eastern.

Voters casting their ballots early can either vote at their assigned polling stations or at any Elections Canada office until the Tuesday before election day.

To vote, you must be a Canadian citizen, be at least 18 years old on election day, and prove your identity and address.

To prove your identity, you can show your driver’s licence or any other card issued by the federal, provincial, territorial or local government with your photo, name and current address.

https://x.com/ElectionsCan_E/status/2039791272542560598?s=20

You can still vote if you don’t have an ID if you declare your identity and address in writing and have someone who knows you and who is assigned to your polling station vouch for you.

The voucher must be able to prove their identity and address. A person can vouch for only one person, except in long-term care institutions.

–with files from Canadian Press

© 2026 Global News, a division of Corus Entertainment Inc.

Ontario Provincial Police are taking aim at the authors of an April Fool’s article that claimed dozens of its officers were arrested.

The OPP said Wednesday the article also falsely claimed a state of emergency was declared in Huron County and that the policing responsibility for the community has been assumed by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.

It added the article erroneously stated the force’s detachment commander, five senior officers and 21 uniformed members were arrested.

“While today is April 1, and the article may be intended as an April Fools’ joke, the OPP considers this type of content to be inappropriate and irresponsible, particularly when it mimics legitimate news reporting with the potential to cause unnecessary concern in the community,” the OPP said in a news release.

“Alleging police officers have been charged affects public trust and confidence, as well as public safety.”

The OPP went added content presented as humour can have real-world consequences.

“To be clear, no state of emergency has been declared in Huron County,” the force said.

“No OPP or municipal council members have been arrested and the RCMP has not assumed control of OPP operations. The OPP continues to provide policing services in Huron County without interruption.”

© 2026 Global News, a division of Corus Entertainment Inc.

A large swath of southern Ontario is under a special weather statement as Environment Canada warns of heavy rainfall to start the Easter long weekend.

The federal weather agency issued the statement for regions like Toronto, saying total rainfall amounts of 25 to 50 millimetres is expected between Saturday morning and night.

“A Colorado low will bring heavy rain to the area. The heaviest rain is expected to fall Saturday evening and Saturday night, with locally higher amounts possible in thunderstorms,” the statement reads.

“There remains some uncertainty where the highest rainfall amounts will occur. Rainfall warnings may follow as the event nears.”

Environment Canada added for information concerning flooding, local conservation authorities or the Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources office will have the latest information.

© 2026 Global News, a division of Corus Entertainment Inc.

From the coalfields of northern England to the Arctic snows and the steaming jungles of Brazil, diamond hunter and scholar Graham Pearson has carved a name for himself that now lives on in rock.

Pearson, a mantle geochemist with the University of Alberta in Edmonton, has had a new mineral – Grahampearsonite — approved by the International Mineralogical Association.

It recognizes a lifetime of work on diamonds, including his work in Brazil where he and a team made discoveries over a decade ago that helped explain, through deep-mine diamonds the composition and water content of the Earth’s deep mantle.

“The most lasting legacy of our work as scientists is really the data we produce … but those ideas get modified,” Pearson said in a recent interview.

“So if you are lucky enough to have a mineral named after you, that’s not going to change.

“(And) we’re going to run out of new minerals soon. So it’s very humbling to think that one of those minerals found is named after me.”

Grahampearsonite is chemically known as calcium pyrophosphate, which can be found in toothpaste abrasive.

But Grahampearsonite is the real deal — discovered inside a diamond that crystallized at depths greated than 300 kilometres below the Earth’s surface in Brazil’s Juina region.

It got its official name in December.

“It might be arcane, but it’s really beautiful,” he said, as he points at a diagram of Grahampearsonite, which is made out of calcium and diphosphorus. The diagram shows oxygen flowing between the chemicals.

“Only natural-occurring minerals can be named (after a person),” Pearson said.

And someone has to discover it, put it in a huge amount of work to characterize it, justify its namesake and then get it approved by the International Mineralogical Association.

“The association decides whether what (researchers have) done is good enough and solid enough to warrant the name of a new mineral,” Pearson said.

Pearson is a trailblazer in diamond research.

In addition to mapping the history of the Earth’s mantle, Pearson has developed new techniques for geochemical analysis and pioneered methods for dating minute geological samples.

Born in the United Kingdom, he was brought up in an English mining town called Pontefract. “I’ve been surrounded by the products of mining,” he said.

And similar to the formation of diamonds, he said his love for the mineral was also a slow burn. His PhD adviser, who was researching a rare graphite mineral from Morocco that used to be a diamond, piqued his interest.

“That got me into the world of diamonds and studying the deep Earth,” he said.

In 2010, he moved to Canada to work for the University of Alberta. He established the world-class Arctic Resources Geochemistry Laboratory.

He continues to research minerals and diamonds in the Arctic.

He said ongoing mineral discovery is important.

“It’s hard to predict what applications some of these synthetic minerals have until you discover them,” he said.

“And I’m a natural scientist and something made synthetically just does not hold the same allure. All the story it tells is that someone put these elements together in a lab and cooked them.”

He said most people like the appearance of diamonds because they sparkle, but said there’s a lot more to them.

“It’s capable of trapping residual pressures inside it that no other mineral is capable of doing,” he said. “That’s what gives it the ability to retain these pieces of the deep Earth … Those elements are also able to tell us amazing things about plate tectonic cycles.”

He said advancement in microscope technology has also made it easier to identify new minerals and humanity will eventually discovered all the minerals Earth has to offer.

We’re about halfway there.

“About 4,800 minerals have been discovered,” he said.

“There’s about another 4,000 probably waiting to be discovered.”

© 2026 The Canadian Press

A leaked transcript of a meeting between Indigenous leaders and British Columbia Premier David Eby, about his plan to suspend the province’s Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Act, or DRIPA, shows them accusing him of “absolute betrayal” and colonialism.

Speaker after speaker in the 17,000-word transcript of Thursday’s meeting, obtained by The Canadian Press, criticizes Eby’s handling of DRIPA, which he says needs to be suspended for up to three years.

DRIPA is at the center of a legal and political storm after being cited by First Nations in two landmark court cases last year, including an appeal ruling that says the act should be “properly interpreted” to incorporate the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples into BC laws “with immediate legal effect.”

The transcript provided by a person in attendance, on the condition that no First Nations leaders are identified, shows one speaker telling Eby he has insisted on “fracturing the relationship between First Nations and BC” by saying this week that changing DRIPA was “non-negotiable.”

Another tells Eby the premise of the meeting is “disingenuous.”

The transcript shows Eby starting the meeting by telling attendees the so-called Gitxaala ruling by the BC Court of Appeal in December found the UN declaration had been implemented by the province “as a whole.”

He says the ruling, which had created “huge legal uncertainty,” effectively meant the province would “need to eat the whole elephant” of UNDRIP all at once and across all its laws, which the government lacked the staff and political capital to do.

Eby says the government proposed to introduce legislation to implement the suspension “the week after next,” and that the pause of up to three years is to give time for the Supreme Court of Canada to rule on the government’s appeal in the Gitxaala case, which centered on mining rules.

The transcript shows the meeting lasted almost two hours, until about noon Thursday. Ninety minutes later, Eby held a news conference to announce the suspension proposal.

At the conference, Eby declined to specify which sections of legislation would be suspended.

But the transcript and a document provided by The Canadian Press’ source in the meeting suggest they consist of four sections of DRIPA, plus a section of the Interpretation Act, which describes how BC’s laws must be interpreted.

The Interpretation Act section facing suspension says “every act and regulation must be construed as being consistent with” DRIPA, while a section of DRIPA to be paused says nothing should be construed as delaying its application to BC’s laws.

The section saying the act’s purpose is to “affirm the application” of DRIPA to BC’s laws is also to be paused, as is a section saying the government must take all measures necessary to ensure laws are consistent with it.

The final section of DRIPA to be suspended relates to how progress on its goals is reported.

In the transcript, Eby acknowledges the government’s previous plan to amend DRIPA has been “completely opposed” by the First Nations.

He says the alternative proposal of a pause is to find another solution, which he says “is really, bluntly, unavoidable.”

“Now, it’s my hope, it’s cabinet’s hope, it’s the government’s hope, that this is a better solution to address the legal risk we’re facing, as well as the concerns that you’ve raised with us,” he says.

The response in the transcript is far from enthusiastic.

“I don’t understand why you insist on fracturing the relationship between First Nations and BC by saying these things publicly?” one respondent says, referring to Eby’s remarks on changes to DRIPA being non-negotiable.

“It really shook my confidence in you as the first and your ability to work with us on something so important as DRIPA,” they say, adding that Eby is “not there anymore” as a partner.

One leader tells Eby he is making “rash” decisions, another tells of their “extreme feeling of disappointment in the steps taken,” and another tells the premier his government’s behavior “smacks of colonialism.”

One attendee accuses Eby of “Indian giving,” and says that after finally seeing “some light” in the way First Nations are treated by government, Eby’s moves “close the door.”

Another attendee tells of “an extreme feeling of disappointment in the steps taken.”

“And this act that you’re doing now … these feelings and this sentiment that you’re putting forward is the same sentiment of colonization, of piece by piece taking our rights, our purpose, away from us,” they say.

At least one leader expresses doubt about the wisdom of opposing the government, considering the Opposition BC Conservatives are “running on repealing DRIPA.”

They tell other leaders that they “cannot afford to not give a damn about” who is first, and suggest that fellow chiefs are “overestimating” their power.

Late in the meeting, one leader tries to inject a light moment, referring back to Eby’s elephant analogy.

“Eating an elephant, it can be done with help,” they say. “We could fry it, we could boil it… We could barbecue it. That lasagna I ate yesterday said I’m a family of four.”

Eby told the subsequent news conference that enacting the suspension government would represent a confidential vote for his.

He said the suspension was “least invasive way that we could think of” to mitigate DRIPA’s possible unintended impacts across the province’s legal system.

© 2026 The Canadian Press

Christians across Quebec are about to face a new legal landscape on Good Friday, only a day after the provincial legislature adopted a law that could crack down on their annual Way of the Cross processions.

In Montreal, several hundred people are expected to join Archbishop Christian Lépine in a march of “prayer, reflection and silence” that winds its way through the streets behind a large crucifix, stopping at several historic churches in a commemoration of Jesus’s journey to the cross.

But the Easter weekend tradition will likely become harder to organize in future years, now that the province has passed a law to ban public prayer.

The Quebec government adopted legislation on Thursday, extending a ban on wearing religious symbols in public workplaces to daycare workers, prohibiting prayer rooms in public institutions, and banning public prayer without explicit municipal consent.

“No public road … or public park may be used for the purposes of collective religious practice unless a municipality authorizes, exceptionally and on a case-by-case basis, such a use in its public domain by resolution of the municipal council,” the text of the law reads.

Martin Laliberté, the head of the Assembly of Quebec Catholic Bishops, believes the new law turns religious people into second-class citizens.

He notes that street closures and public demonstrations happen all the time, including for sporting events, protests, and cultural events.

“If we do it for religious reasons, we don’t have the right,” he said Wednesday in an interview. “So people in society who are believers become second-class citizens who don’t have the right, like any other citizen, to demonstrate (when it’s) in the name of their faith.”

He said organizers of Way of the Cross and other marches have always co-ordinated with local officials and respected municipal rules, but never before had to seek express permission to hold their events.

“It was a right, and now it’s not a right any more,” he said. The new law, he said, leaves churches relying on the goodwill of city councils, who can decide whether or not to grant permits for the event.

Laliberté says senior Catholic leaders are concerned the new law goes far beyond the effect on ceremonial processions. He notes that the legislation invokes powers that allow the province to override some sections of the Charter and shield the secularism law from court challenges.

“We have rights, according to the Charter, which say you have a right to express your faith publicly,” Laliberté said.

But with the new law, he said people don’t have this right any more.

“That’s a big shift for us.”

Laliberté said the Quebec Catholic bishops participated in consultations on the new law, where they expressed particular concern with the public prayer ban and the expansion of the religious symbol prohibition. He said politicians appeared to listen, but were unwilling to adopt the changes.

He said he believes the new law has “no utility,” because the government already has all the tools it needs to protect secularism.

The Quebec government did not respond to a request for comment by publication time.

John Zucchi, national director with Montreal Way of the Cross procession organizer Communion and Liberation Canada, says organizers always communicate with police about the event, but have been told in the past that it’s not necessary to inform the city.

He says the event last year drew nearly 1,000 people, who walk in silence behind a person carrying a crucifix to different churches, where there is singing, gospel readings and poems.

Unlike many church events, he says attendance has gone up in recent years, and numbers have roughly doubled since the COVID-19 pandemic.

“I think people are struck by the soberness of the event, by the simplicity of it and by the quiet dignity that surrounds the event,” he said. “It’s not meant to be clamour or something loud. It’s a meditation from start to finish.”

Zucchi says he shares the views of religious leaders who are concerned about the law, but isn’t worrying yet about its impact on the march in Montreal. “We’ve only encountered goodwill with the city, with the police service … and count on that continued goodwill in the future,” he said.

He also questioned what events will count as “public prayer.”

“With the case of a procession done in silence, what constitutes prayer?” he asks.

© 2026 The Canadian Press

After Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine began in 2022, nearly 300,000 Ukrainians were welcomed in communities across Canada as part of an emergency visa program that allowed those fleeing the war to temporarily work and study in the country.

Many of those who have chosen to stay face an uncertain future as their Canada-Ukraine Authorization for Emergency Travel visas expire. They have to apply to extend their status, without a clear path to permanent residency.

“What I’m hearing from people, from our community leaders … is there’s a lot of anxiety about their ability to stay in Canada,” said Ihor Michalchyshyn, the outgoing CEO and executive director of the Ukrainian Canadian Congress.

“People have four years in, children are growing up in Canada, and people are developing roots here, but they’re still on this temporary status.”

CUAET visa holders had until March 31 to apply for a new work or study permit or to renew their work permit for up to three years. That deadline has been extended for one more year, Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada announced this week.

Government data show that about 2,500 CUAET visa holders have become permanent residents. More than 25,000 permit holders applied for permanent residency through a temporary stream for those with family who were either Canadian citizens or permanent residents, but IRCC says only 3,200 of those applications have been approved so far.

The government has said Ukrainians could also apply to become permanent residents through regular work-based and regional immigration programs.

But Michalchyshyn said more needs to be done to ensure eligible Ukrainians have a smoother journey toward permanent residency.

He called on the government to simplify the process for those who have graduated from a Canadian post-secondary institution or have at least a year of Canadian work experience, similar to the permanent residence pathways offered to Hong Kong residents.

Increasing the number of slots for Ukrainians in the provincial nominee programs could also help, he said.

The federal government, however, said it still expects many Ukrainians who fled the war to return to their home country once the conflict ends.

The Canadian Press spoke with several Ukrainians about their hopes for a future in Canada.

———

When Mariia Bokovnia arrived in May 2022, she wasn’t sure she would stay after completing a short-term research program at Brock University in St. Catharines, Ont., because she felt doing so would be a betrayal of her country.

“Leaving felt like abandoning my family, my friends, my country in the hardest time in our history,” the 26-year-old said.

Her parents had never visited Canada but they urged her to stay in a country where immigrants feel safe, thrive and find work opportunities.

“It’s a very funny way to say it, but they just didn’t want me (back in Ukraine). They didn’t want to worry about me,” she said.

It wasn’t an easy decision to make, but Bokovnia eventually agreed with her parents.

“My heart belongs in Ukraine, but Canada has become a second home for me,” she said.

After her program at Brock University ended, she moved to Ottawa, where she started working with the Ukrainian Canadian Congress. Soon, her younger sister joined her and began attending high school in Canada.

Bokovnia said she left her job after more than two years and went back to Ukraine to see if she was ready to permanently return home, but she quickly realized it was a risky move.

“I was constantly worried about dying,” she said. “It’s pretty intense in Ukraine, and a lot of civilian infrastructure is being destroyed, and lots of civilians are dying every day.”

Bokovnia returned to Canada and now lives in Montreal, where she is job hunting as she works on a documentary about the ethics of decision-making in the age of advanced aviation warfare technology, with a focus on Ukraine.

Because Bokovnia and her sister arrived in Canada on CUAET visas, they weren’t considered conventional refugees.

Her younger sister returned to Ukraine because it was too expensive for her to pay international student tuition fees for college or university in Canada. Bokovnia, who got an undergraduate degree in philosophy in Ukraine, said she would love to get a master’s degree but she can’t afford it. 

While a number of Canadian universities and colleges have offered CUAET permit holders the same tuition rates as domestic students, none of those schools are in the areas where Bokovnia has lived and worked.

Though she has built a strong network of mentors and friends, Bokovnia said she been struggling to find stability due to a lack of employment opportunities and the uncertainty surrounding her status.

“I’ve lived here for a few years. I understand the culture more than when I arrived, and I admire the people who are so ambitious to build a strong nation, and now I’m trying to build the long-term life in Canada,” she said.

———

Maryna Shum is seeing a psychologist once a week.

“I’m a pretty tough person … I can handle everything,” she said. “But at some point, I understood that I need help.”

The daily news coming out of Ukraine has been depressing, the 44-year-old Ottawa resident said. “Every single day, and when I see big damages or when people are dying, it’s really very hard to withstand.”

But she has another source of anxiety thousands of kilometres from her home country: an uncertain future because her work permit will expire next year.

“This unidentified status, it’s very stressful. It puts us on hold and in a state of limbo,” she said.

Shum said she is “extremely grateful” to the Canadian government and people for all the support she has received since moving to Canada with her daughter, mother and their dog in April 2022.

But the lack of clarity surrounding her legal status has affected every aspect of her life as the war drags on in Ukraine with no end in sight.

Simple decisions such as buying a car become difficult, she said, and employers can’t rely on workers whose immigration status is uncertain.

Before the war started, Shum worked as a tour guide for Ukrainians travelling overseas and lived in her own apartment where she enjoyed watching the “amazing” sunset over the Dnipro River in Kyiv.

On the morning of the invasion, she woke up to her dog growling, then heard blasts she initially thought were fireworks because she couldn’t imagine Russians would target her country’s capital.

She said her friends encouraged her to move to Canada because she spoke English. Shum began working with a settlement agency in Ottawa, where she helped fellow Ukrainian newcomers navigate bureaucratic challenges.

She now works as an event and portrait photographer and volunteers to help her community members as she continues searching for a full-time job.

Shum, who travelled internationally as part of her job in Ukraine, said she has grown fond of Canada’s multiculturalism, diversity and its acceptance of immigrants such as herself.

She is confident she has the skills to find a job, but the ambiguity surrounding her long-term status in Canada bothers her.

“Do I have to invest that much time and money here if by the end of the day they’re going to throw me out?” she said.

———

Solomiia Loik was 17 when the war forced her family to leave her home in western Ukraine and travel thousands of kilometres for safety. They settled in Manitoba, where she enrolled in high school.

“The first challenge was the language,” she said. “I had some basics, but I still struggled, and I had to put a lot of work in that in order to graduate in one year.”

Loik slowly overcame those challenges, made new friends, found a job and a boyfriend, and a year after her arrival she was accepted to study biochemistry at the University of Manitoba. The school allows CUAET visa holders to pay domestic tuition fees.

But she is still in constant fear about the situation in her home country.

“I miss Ukraine and I never wanted to leave Ukraine,” the now 20-year-old said.

Her family arrived in Winnipeg in August 2022. When Loik turned 18, her mother returned to Ukraine to reunite with her father, while Loik and her older brother stayed in Canada.

Loik, who started out working as a store cashier, now has two part-time jobs at a ballet school and her professor’s lab as she continues her third year in university.

Like others, Loik faces an uneven path toward permanent residency. She said she is far behind in points she needs to be invited to apply because she came here as a minor and doesn’t have a lot of work experience.

“I’m worried about it … I would be less stressed if I got my permanent residency,” she said.

© 2026 The Canadian Press