Australia & Pacifics

SYDNEY, June 6 (Reuters) - China leads research in 19 of 23 technologies set as priorities by the AUKUS defence partnership of Australia, Britain and the U.S., including hypersonics, electronic warfare and undersea drones, highlighting the need for Western allies to pool research results, an Australian security think-tank says.

The Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI) said on Tuesday its survey of the world's top science papers showed China led research in most of the technologies likely to come under the defence partnership's so-called Pillar Two.

WELLINGTON, New Zealand (AP) — New Zealand police on Thursday filed five murder charges against the man they say lit a deadly fire at a Wellington hostel two weeks ago.

Police had earlier filed arson charges against the 48-year-old man, accusing him of setting fire to a couch and to the hostel itself. He has remained in jail since his arrest two days after the fire.

More than 100 people were staying at the four-story Loafers Lodge hostel when the fire tore through the building soon after midnight on May 16.

SYDNEY, May 31 (NNN-AAP) – Scientists announced today that, an examination of 107-million-year-old fossils revealed, giant flying reptiles once soared Australia’s skies.

Two tiny fossils were found in the Australian state of Victoria in the 1980s, but researchers have only just confirmed its origin.

CANBERRA, Australia (AP) — Papua New Guinean Prime Minister James Marape said a proposed security treaty with Australia has been delayed over “certain wordings and provisions,” a week after the strategically important South Pacific Island nation signed a new security pact with the United States that sparked protests.

Marape informed Australian Deputy Prime Minister Richard Marles of the delay on Monday on the sidelines of an international forum in South Korea, the Papua New Guinean leader’s office said in a statement Tuesday.

CANBERRA, Australia (AP) — The Australian branch of the PricewaterhouseCoopers consultancy network said Monday that nine of its partners were ordered to take leave during an inquiry into the leaking of confidential Australian tax avoidance policy changes to corporate clients who could benefit from the information.

PwC’s acting chief executive Kristin Stubbins apologized in announcing the directors are on leave pending a review of the firm’s governance, accountability and culture. A report is due in September.

SYDNEY, May 25 (Xinhua) -- A major fire has broken out at a building in the suburb of Surry Hills in central Sydney on Thursday afternoon.

Fire and Rescue New South Wales (NSW) said emergency calls were received when flames started engulfing the building just after 4:00 p.m. local time. More than 100 firefighters and over 30 fire trucks are working on the scene to contain and extinguish the blaze.

The building partially collapsed, while the inferno spread to several neighboring buildings, including residential apartments.

SYDNEY, May 24 (Xinhua) -- More than 100 scholars of the humanities, social sciences and other disciplines have signed an open letter as of Tuesday expressing their concerns over Australia's participation in the AUKUS trilateral security agreement.

CANBERRA, Australia: (AP) — Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said he was working in the “most effective way possible” to secure the release of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, but declined an invitation Monday to meet the Australian citizen’s wife.

Independent lawmaker Andrew Wilkie asked Albanese if he would meet Assange’s wife Stella Assange, who was watching Parliament from the public gallery. Albanese said a meeting with Stella Assange wouldn’t help her 51-year-old husband who is in a London prison fighting extradition to the United States.

SYDNEY, May 20 (NNN-AAP) – An earthquake with a magnitude of 7.1, jolted south-east of the Loyalty Islands at 01:51 GMT last night, the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) said.

According to the latest update from the USGS, the epicentre, with a depth of 36 km, was determined to be at 23.062 degrees south, latitude, and 170.456 degrees east, longitude.

WELLINGTON, New Zealand (AP) — A 7.7 magnitude earthquake caused a small tsunami to wash ashore on South Pacific islands Friday. No damage has been reported, and the threat passed in a few hours.

Waves 60 centimeters (2 feet) above tide level were measured off Lenakel, a port town in Vanuatu, the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center said. Smaller waves were measured by coastal or deep-ocean gauges elsewhere off Vanuatu and off New Caledonia and New Zealand.