Try as it might to appease President Donald Trump, Canada remains a prized target in his trade wars and subject to the whiplash of his changes of heart.The giant North American neighbors are rushing to conclude a new trade accord by July 21 but the process is proving painful for Canada.Overnight Thursday, Trump threatened to slap a 35 percent tariff on imports from Canada starting August 1. But products complying with an existing accord, the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA), are expected to remain exempt, a Trump administration official and a source in Canada told AFP.”An agreement is of course possible but that shows how difficult it is for the Canadian government to negotiate with the US president,” said Daniel Beland, a political science professor at McGill University in Montreal, referring to Trump’s sudden announcement. -Six months of ups and downs-Canada has been a key trading partner and ally of the United States for decades. But along with Mexico, it now wears a bull’s eye for Trump in his second stint in the White House as he tries to reorder the global system of largely free trade by slapping tariffs on friends and foes alike to address what he calls unfair trading practices.Trump has also spoken frequently of his idea of absorbing Canada to make it the 51st US state, a concept most Canadians find repugnant.Canada was rocked by Trump’s first attacks after he took power in January. And bad blood between him and then-prime minister Justin Trudeau seemed to pour gas on the fire.Some degree of hope emerged when Mark Carney was elected in late April to replace Trudeau, pledging to stand up to Trump and defend Canada, its jobs and its borders.Since then, Carney and Trump have held two more or less cordial meetings — at the Oval Office in May and at a Group of Seven summit in western Canada last month.Many people thought a new era was opening, and Carney won praise for his diplomatic and negotiating skills.During the second of those meetings, the two sides agreed to sign a new trade agreement by July 21.But in late June Trump angrily called off the trade talks, citing a new Canadian tax on US Big Tech companies.Canada scrapped the tax two days later so the trade talks could resume. Now they have been rocked again by Trump’s new threat of 35 percent tariffs on Canadian goods.-Stay calm- Canada has taken to not reacting to everything Trump says. After Trump’s latest outburst, Carney simply said, “the Canadian government has steadfastly defended our workers and businesses.”But among Canadian people, Trump’s threat-rich negotiating style elicits contrasting reactions, said Beland. “There are people who want a firmer response while others want to keep negotiating,” he said.Since the beginning of this tug of war, Canada has responded to US action by imposing levies of its own on certain American products.Philippe Bourbeau, a professor at HEC Montreal, a business school, said people have to realize Trump has an underlying strategy.”You can criticize the aggressiveness of the announcements and the fact that it is done out in the open, but it is a negotiating tactic,” said Bourbeau, adding that the relationship between the two countries is asymmetrical.”It is illusory to think this is a negotiation between parties of the same size. Canada will surely have to give up more to reach an agreement,” he said.Before Trump came to power, three quarters of Canada’s exports went to the United States. This was down to 68 percent in May, one of the lowest such shares ever recorded, as shipments to other countries hit record levels.”We are Donald Trump’s scapegoats,” said Genevieve Tellier, a professor of political science at the University of Ottawa. “He sees us as vulnerable, so he increases the pressure. He is surely telling himself that it is with us that he will score the big win he wants on tariffs,” Tellier said.

More than 1,300 State Department employees were fired Friday in a downsizing ordered by President Donald Trump and touted as cutting bloated government — but which critics predict will hamstring US influence around the world.Diplomats and other staff clapped out departing colleagues in emotional scenes at the Washington headquarters of the department, which runs US foreign policy and the global network of embassies.Some were crying as they walked out with boxes of belongings.A State Department official said 1,107 members of the civil service and 246 Foreign Service diplomatic employees were terminated.The layoffs at the department came three days after the Supreme Court cleared the way for the Trump administration to begin carrying out its plan to gut entire government departments.The conservative-dominated top court lifted a temporary block imposed by a lower court on Trump’s plans to lay off potentially tens of thousands of employees.The 79-year-old Republican says he wants to dismantle what he calls the “deep state.” Since taking office in January, he has worked quickly to install fierce personal loyalists and to fire swaths of veteran government workers.His secretary of state, Marco Rubio, says the foreign policy department is too cumbersome and requires thinning out of some 15 percent.The American Foreign Service Association (AFSA) — the union representing State Department employees — condemned the “catastrophic blow to our national interests.””At a moment of great global instability — with war raging in Ukraine, conflict between Israel and Iran, and authoritarian regimes testing the boundaries of international order — the United States has chosen to gut its frontline diplomatic workforce,” AFSA said in a statement.”We oppose this decision in the strongest terms.”The State Department employed over 80,000 people worldwide last year, according to a fact sheet, with around 17,700 in domestic roles. The US Agency for International Development, long the primary vehicle to provide US humanitarian assistance around the world, has already been mostly dismantled.According to The Washington Post, State Department employees were informed of their firings by email.Foreign Service officers will lose their jobs 120 days after receiving the notice and will be immediately placed on administrative leave, while civil service employees will be separated after 60 days, the newspaper said.Ned Price, who served as State Department spokesman under Democratic former president Joe Biden, condemned what he called haphazard firings.”For all the talk about ‘merit-based,’ they’re firing officers based on where they happen to be assigned on this arbitrary day,” Price said on X. “It’s the laziest, most inefficient, and most damaging way to lean the workforce.”Former ambassador Barbara Leaf, Biden’s top Middle East diplomat, said the move “will have terrible consequences for our ability to protect American citizens abroad, pursue and defend the national interest and our national security.””This is not a re-org. This is a purge,” Leaf said in a post on LinkedIn.

Ecuador’s most notorious drug lord has agreed to be extradited to the United States to face cocaine and weapons smuggling charges, a court in Quito said Friday.Adolfo Macias, alias “Fito,” was captured in June after escaping from a maximum security prison last year in a jailbreak that sparked a severe wave of gang violence.Macias, head of the “Los Choneros” gang, is wanted in the United States on charges of cocaine distribution, conspiracy and firearms-related crimes, including weapons smuggling.The former taxi driver turned crime boss became the prime target of Ecuadoran law enforcement early last year after escaping from prison in the southwestern port of Guayaquil. President Daniel Noboa’s government at the time released “wanted” posters and offered $1 million for information leading to Macias’s capture. In a country plagued by drug-related crime, Los Choneros members responded with violence — using car bombs, holding prison guards hostage and taking over a television station during a live broadcast.After months of pursuit, Fito was recaptured last month in a massive military and police operation in which no shots were fired. He was found hiding in a bunker concealed under floor tiles in a luxury home in the fishing port of Manta.Fito, dressed in an orange prison uniform, took part in a court hearing Friday by video from a prison in Guayaquil.In response to a judge’s question, he replied, “Yes, I accept (extradition).”Given his consent, the court said in a statement “the pertinent procedure for the transfer process” will now follow, with Noboa having to sign the official handover papers.This would make Macias the first Ecuadoran extradited by his country since the measure was written into law last year after a referendum in which Noboa sought the approval of measures to boost his war on criminal gangs.

Fast-spreading wildfires have forced the evacuation of part of the Grand Canyon, with the US National Park Service saying at least 500 people had been guided out of the danger zone.The canyon’s North Rim, which is less popular with tourists than the South Rim, was cleared of all visitors due to a blaze called the White Sage Fire.”Last night, Grand Canyon staff safely evacuated approximately 500 guests,” the Park Service said in an update Friday.”All visitors have left the area, and park employees and residents remain sheltering in place. Day use access to the North Rim is closed until further notice.”Jon Paxton, press officer for the Coconino County sheriff’s office, told AFP that a hotel and some businesses had all been emptied.”Most of the folks we evacuated were campers,” he said. “This area is high desert and mostly open forest for camping.”The fire is burning outside the Grand Canyon National Park but approaching Jacob Lake, Arizona, a small settlement known as the gateway to the North Rim.About 8,700 acres (3,500 hectares) have been scorched and the blaze is zero-percent contained, according to authorities, who released images of large columns of smoke rising above the scrubby desert.- Started by lightning -The fire was started by lightning during a thunderstorm on Wednesday.”Crews encountered very extreme fire behavior due to the dry conditions (and) gusty and erratic winds inhibiting the ability for fire fighters to safely engage the fire,” the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) said.One of the greatest wonders of the natural world, the Grand Canyon is the result of the Colorado River eating away at layers of red sandstone and other rock for millions of years, leaving a gash up to 18 miles (30 km) wide and more than a mile (1.6 km) deep.The Park Service advised against any hiking into the canyon, due to extreme heat and wildfire smoke. A 67-year-old man died on Tuesday while attempting to reach the river in hot conditions.Last year almost five million people visited the world-famous site.Another popular site, Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park in Colorado, was also closed Friday because of a wildfire.

European and US stock markets retreated Friday as US President Donald Trump ramped up his trade offensive, threatening a 35-percent levy on Canada.Trump dampened earlier optimism by firing off more than 20 letters to governments outlining new tariffs if agreements are not reached by August 1.Bitcoin meanwhile pushed on with its climb, reaching an all-time high above $118,000.The dollar was higher against its main rivals, and oil prices gained.Wall Street’s three main indices fell, with both the S&P 500 and Nasdaq retreating from records.But the pullback was relatively modest, implying that many investors are taking a wait-and-see approach to Trump’s latest tariff broadsides.”We have yet to see new substantial tariffs actually be enforced,” said Adam Sarhan of 50 Park Investments, describing investors as skeptical the biggest levies will actually be enacted.A note from Oxford Economics characterized Trump’s moves as “more tariff theatrics,” while allowing that the levy on Canada produced “jitters.”In Europe, where investors were awaiting news of Trump’s new tariff level targeting the European Union, the Paris stock market dropped 0.9 percent and Frankfurt 0.8 percent.”The fallout hasn’t been more pronounced because the market still continues to view all of this as a point of negotiating leverage,” said analyst Patrick O’Hare of Briefing.com.Trump dialed up his trade war rhetoric Thursday, warning that Canada faced a 35-percent tax, while other countries would be handed blanket tariffs of up to 20 percent, from the current 10 percent.That came after he outlined plans to impose 50-percent tariffs on copper imports, while threatening 200-percent levies on pharmaceuticals, and hit Brazil with a new 50-percent charge.The moves are the latest by the White House in a campaign it says is aimed at ending decades of the United States being “ripped off”.Trump’s initial bombshell tariffs announcement in April sent markets into turmoil until he paused them for three months, and the latest measures have had less impact.London’s FTSE 100 and the pound retreated after data showed the UK economy unexpectedly shrank in May — its second consecutive monthly decline.That followed a mixed session in Asia, where Hong Kong rose, Tokyo fell and Shanghai flattened by the close.Shares in BP jumped 3.4 percent in London after the energy giant said it expected to report higher oil and gas production for its second quarter.Levi Strauss & Co. shot up 11.3 percent after reporting higher profits on a 6.4 percent rise in revenues. The denim company scored especially solid growth in the Americas and Europe.- Key figures at around 2050 GMT -New York – Dow: DOWN 0.6 percent at 44,371.51 (close)New York – S&P 500: DOWN 0.3 percent at 6,259.75 (close)New York – Nasdaq Composite: DOWN 0.2 percent at 20,585.53 (close)London – FTSE 100: DOWN 0.4 percent at 8,941.12 (close)Paris – CAC 40: DOWN 0.9 percent at 7,829.29 (close)Frankfurt – DAX: DOWN 0.8 percent at 24,255.31 (close)Tokyo – Nikkei 225: DOWN 0.2 percent at 39,569.68 (close)Hong Kong – Hang Seng Index: UP 0.5 percent at 24,139.57 (close)Shanghai – Composite: FLAT at 3,510.18 (close)Euro/dollar: DOWN at $1.1690 from $1.1701 on ThursdayPound/dollar: DOWN at $1.3497 from $1.3579Dollar/yen: UP at 147.38 yen from 146.26 yenEuro/pound: UP at 86.59 pence from 86.16 penceBrent North Sea Crude: UP 2.5 percent at $68.64 per barrelWest Texas Intermediate: UP 2.8 percent at $66.57 per barrelburs-jmb/des