Australia

MELBOURNE, Australia (AP) — Secretary of State Antony Blinken and key allies are “voting with their feet” by flying to Australia to focus on challenges in the Indo-Pacific region, Australia’s foreign minister said Wednesday, as fears rise of a Russian invasion of Ukraine on the other side of the globe.

Blinken landed in the Australian city of Melbourne on Wednesday ahead of a meeting with Australian Foreign Minister Marise Payne as well as their Indian and Japanese counterparts who form the so-called “Quad.”

SYDNEY, Feb 7 (NNN-AGENCIES) – The COVID-19 cases in three of Australia’s worst-hit states have dropped, easing restrictions today, according to official data.

The state of New South Wales (NSW) recorded 7,437 cases and 14 deaths today, the third consecutive day NSW has reported fewer than 10,000 cases.

Hospitalisations in NSW cases, also plummeted to 2,099, while ICU admissions dropped to 137.

CANBERRA, Australia (AP) — Australia will open its borders to all vaccinated tourists and business travelers from Feb. 21 in a further relaxation of pandemic restrictions announced Monday.

Australia imposed some of the world’s toughest travel restrictions on its citizens and permanent residents in March 2020 to prevent them from bringing COVID-19 home.

Feb 5 (Reuters) - Australian Deputy Prime Minister Barnaby Joyce apologised on Saturday to Prime Minister Scott Morrison for calling him "a hypocrite and a liar" and said that Morrison had rejected his offer to resign.

Morrison said in a statement that he accepted Joyce's apology.

In a leaked message the deputy prime minister, who heads the junior partner in Morrison's coalition government, said last year that he had never trusted Morrison.

SYDNEY, Feb 2 (NNN-AGENCIES) – The emergency department, in Western Australia (WA), issued warnings of two separate bushfires, in the state’s south-west and the capital of Perth.

The blaze in Perth, started in the suburb of Canning Mills and it has burned at least 96 hectares of land, so far.

The bushfire in WA’s south-west town Kirup, is also at emergency warning level, which is moving “slowly” in a north-western direction.

CANBERRA, Australia (AP) — Aid flights from Australia, Japan and New Zealand carrying food, water, medical supplies and telecommunications equipment landed in Tonga over the weekend, as the Pacific nation grapples with the aftermath of an underwater volcanic eruption and tsunami.

The main airport runway has been cleared of ash spewed when the nearby Hunga Tonga Hunga Ha’apai volcano erupted a week ago. The explosion also set off a Pacific-wide tsunami that smashed boats in New Zealand and caused an oil spill as far as Peru.

CANBERRA, Australia (AP) — Three flights from Australia carrying food, water, medical supplies and telecommunications equipment landed in Tonga on Saturday, as the Pacific nation grapples with the aftermath of an underwater volcanic eruption and tsunami.

Planes from other nations, including New Zealand and Japan, have also brought sorely needed aid to the Tongan people, said Zed Seselja, Australian minister for international development and the Pacific.

SYDNEY (AP) — Three of Tonga’s smaller islands suffered serious damage from tsunami waves, officials and the Red Cross said Wednesday, as a wider picture begins to emerge of the destruction caused by the eruption of an undersea volcano near the Pacific archipelago nation.

SYDNEY, Jan. 12 (Xinhua) -- An Australian-led international research team has unlocked a key to making existing frontline antibiotics work again against the deadly bacteria that cause pneumonia.

The research, led by Peter Doherty Institute for Infection and Immunity, was published in Cell Reports on Wednesday. It discovered how to repurpose a molecule called PBT2 -- originally developed as a potential treatment for disorders such as Alzheimer's, Parkinson's and Huntington's diseases -- to break bacterial resistance to commonly used frontline antibiotics.

SYDNEY (AP) — Like millions of others in the most locked-down place on the planet, Melbourne resident Rav Thomas dutifully spent 262 days confined to his home as the COVID-19 pandemic raged. He got vaccinated. And the single father of two found ways to pay the bills as Melbourne’s lockdowns battered his entertainment and events company.

Then in October, the city’s restrictions began to lift, along with Thomas’ spirits. His company once again began booking events as Melbourne’s nightclubs and bars reopened.

And then, omicron arrived.