Lawmakers must bolster Canada`s slowing economy in the coming year by helping its auto sector, signing new trade pacts and boosting energy output, the government said Wednesday.

The Canadian government said Wednesday it would `provide further support` for the country`s ailing auto sector and aerospace industry in a throne speech outlining its upcoming legislative agenda.

`The Canadian manufacturing sector, particularly the automotive and aerospace industries, has been under increasing strain,` Governor General Michaelle Jean said in the speech.

Pressure is mounting on Canada`s government to help bail out the struggling US Big Three automakers that have operations in Ontario province, as Washington considers a major rescue.

Industry Minister Tony Clement met with executives of Ford, Chrysler and General Motors in Detroit on Wednesday.

Authorities in Ivory Coast on Wednesday issued an international arrest warrant against a witness in a French inquiry into the disappearance of a Canadian journalist, a lawyer said.

Reporter Guy-Andre Kieffer, 59, who also has French citizenship, disappeared in Ivory Coast in 2004 while researching a story on corruption in the west African state`s cocoa industry.

A trans-Atlantic Air Canada flight diverted to Ireland after the co-pilot became `belligerent` and had to be removed from the cockpit, an official report said on Wednesday.

Quebec Premier Jean Charest`s federalist Liberals are closing in on a majority midway through an election campaign in Canada`s mostly French-speaking province, according to a survey Wednesday.

A poll conducted by Leger Marketing for the daily Globe and Mail and the Montreal newspaper Le Devoir put the Liberals ahead of the separatist Parti Quebecois by 11 points.

Seven people died and one man survived a plane crash Sunday on an island off Canada`s rugged west coast, a rescue center spokesman told AFP.

James Bond maintained his license to thrill movie-goers after new adventure `Quantum of Solace` scored a record opening at the North American box-office, preliminary figures showed Sunday.

VANCOUVER, Nov 17, 2007 (AFP) - Some 650 people attended the funeral Saturday of a Polish emigree who died at Vancouver airport after police stunned him with a Taser, a disturbing incident that was videotaped by a bystander and shown around the world.

'We were quite surprised. People came from everywhere,' said Kamloops Funeral Home employee Lawrence Schrader. The funeral home owner, Zofia Cisowski, also the mother of the 40-year-old victim, Robert Dziekanski, had planned for 100 mourners, he said.

OTTAWA, Nov 17, 2007 (AFP) - Two Canadian soldiers and their Afghan interpreter were killed by a roadside bomb Saturday in southern Afghanistan, Canada's defense ministry said.

Three other Canadian soldiers were also injured when their light-armored vehicle struck an improvised explosive device about 40 kilometers (25 miles) west of Kandahar in southern Afghanistan, the ministry said in a statement.