Australia
Australia says it’s reached a free trade deal with Britain
Britain and Australia had agreed on a free trade deal that will be released later Tuesday, Australian Trade Minister Dan Tehan said.
The agreement is the first for Britain since it left the European Union.
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson and his Australian counterpart Scott Morrison had reached agreement on the deal during negotiations in London, Tehan said.
Read:Odds of settling US-EU trade rifts? Hope may outrun progress
“Both prime ministers have held a positive meeting in London overnight and have resolved outstanding issues in relation to the FTA,” Tehan said in a statement, referring to the Free Trade Agreement.
“Their agreement is a win for jobs, businesses, free trade and highlights what two liberal democracies can achieve while working together,” Tehan added.
Both prime ministers would make a formal announcement on Tuesday morning in London and release further information, he said.
Tehan said he spoke to Morrison on Tuesday. Australian Agriculture Minister David Littleproud described the deal as a “in-principle agreement.”
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“The details are being nutted out from the in-principle agreement that our two prime ministers were able to get to last night over dinner,” Littleproud told Australian Broadcasting Corp.
“Our departments and the Trade Department are working through feverishly to make sure that an announcement can be made at our time tonight so that Australians will see exactly what is in that in-principle agreement,” he added.
The agreement is Australia’s 15th free trade agreement.
RMIT University international business expert Gabriele Suder said the deal was good news for both Britain and Australia.
Read:Australian court upholds ban on most international travel
“It’s wonderful news for the U.K. ... in particular because this is the first post-Brexit deal that has been really constructed from scratch, negotiated from scratch, and in addition has been negotiated in a record time of just one year, which is very, very unusual for free trade agreement negotiations,” Suder said.
Britain is Australia’s fifth-largest trading partner. Suder said she expected the deal would add 1.3 billion Australian dollars ($1 billion) a year to the Australian economy.
Australian court upholds ban on most international travel
An Australian court on Tuesday rejected a challenge to the federal government’s draconian power to prevent most citizens from leaving the country so that they don’t bring COVID-19 home.
Australia is alone among developed democracies in preventing its citizens and permanent residents from leaving the country except in “exceptional circumstances” where they can demonstrate a “compelling reason.”
Most Australians have been stranded in their island nation since March 2020 under a government emergency order made under the powerful Biosecurity Act.
Read:Hundreds evacuated, some by chopper, from New Zealand floods
Libertarian group LibertyWorks argued before the full bench of the Federal Court in early May that Health Minister Greg Hunt did not have the power to legally enforce the travel ban that has prevented thousands of Australians from attending weddings and funerals, caring for dying relatives and meeting newborn babies.
LibertyWorks lawyer Jason Potts argued that Australians had a right to leave their country under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights that Australia had ratified.
But the three judges ruled that submission was based on the “erroneous premise that the right is absolute.”
LibertyWorks’ lawyers also argued that such a biosecurity control order could only be imposed on an individual rather than an entire population. The order could only be imposed if that individual had symptoms of a listed human disease, had been exposed to such a disease or had failed to comply with travel requirements.
The judges ruled that that interpretation of the law would frustrate Parliament’s clear intentions when lawmakers created the emergency powers in the Biosecurity Act in 2015.
“It may be accepted that the travel restrictions are harsh. It may also be accepted that they intrude upon individual rights,” the judges said in their ruling. “But Parliament was aware of that.”
LibertyWorks President Andrew Cooper did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the ruling.
He had expected hundreds of thousands of Australians to fly within weeks if he had won.
Read:Plague of ravenous, destructive mice tormenting Australians
Critics of the emergency order argue it is harshest for the 30% of Australians who were born overseas.
The government says tough border controls have played an important part in Australia’s relative success in containing COVID-19 spread.
Surveys suggest most Australians applaud their government’s drastic border controls.
The Australian newspaper published a survey last month that found 73% of respondents said the international border should remain closed until at least the middle of next year.
Australian Broadcasting Corp. last week reported its own survey had found 79% of respondents agree the international border should stay shut until the pandemic is under control globally.
Critics of the Australian travel restrictions argue that decisions on who can travel and why are inconsistent and lack transparency.
Esther and Charles Baker, an ultra-Orthodox Jewish couple from Melbourne, were twice refused exemptions to fly to New Jersey to attend their youngest son’s wedding in June last year.
They appealed to the Federal Court, citing religious and cultural reasons among their exceptional circumstances. But a judge dismissed their case and ordered the couple to pay the government’s legal costs for their challenge.
Read:Australia’s Victoria state to return to lockdown
A person at the center of a coronavirus cluster in Australia’s second-largest city, Melbourne, had been allowed to attend a wedding in India. He was not infected in that country but rather during the required 14-day hotel quarantine upon his return. Authorities say he was infected by a traveler in another room on his floor and that the virus was carried in the air.
Melbourne began a seven-day lockdown on Friday due to the cluster that by Tuesday had grown to more than 50 cases.
Australia and New Zealand opened a quarantine-free travel bubble in April and hope to create such bubbles with other countries in time.
Hundreds evacuated, some by chopper, from New Zealand floods
Several hundred people in New Zealand were evacuated from their homes Monday with some recounting dramatic helicopter rescues as heavy rain caused widespread flooding in the Canterbury region.
Authorities declared a state of emergency after some places received as much as 40 centimeters (16 inches) of rain over the weekend and into Monday. Forecasters warned of possible heavy rain through Monday evening before conditions improved.
The military helped evacuate more than 50 people including several overnight in an NH-90 military helicopter.
Read:Australia’s Victoria state to return to lockdown
One man was clinging to a tree near the town of Darfield when he jumped into floodwaters and tried to swim to safety but was swept away, the military said.
Helicopter crews scoured the water for 30 minutes before finding the man and plucking him to safety. The military helicopter also rescued an elderly couple from the roof of their car.
“Seeing the community overnight pull together and support the displaced residents who were evacuated from their homes has been heartening,” said Army Liaison Officer Cpt. Jake Faber.
Read:111-year-old Australian recommends eating chicken brains
Another man was rescued by a civilian helicopter pilot Sunday after he was swept from his farm as he tried to move his stock to safety.
Paul Adams told news organization Stuff he thinks he got hit by a wall of water he didn’t see coming. He was swept down the raging Ashburton River before managing to drag himself onto a fence and then into a tree. Another farmer spotted his headlamp and organized a rescue mission.
“The rescuers are fantastic,” Adams told Stuff, adding that he was now back on his farm and “good as gold.” He said that so far he’d only found about 100 of his herd of 250 animals alive.
Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison, who was visiting New Zealand, told reporters that he was thinking of those caught up in the floods.
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“Australia is no stranger to floods,” Morrison said. “Or fires, or cyclones, or, indeed, even mouse plagues. We have, both countries, endured a large amount of challenge over the course, particularly, of these last few years.”
New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern planned to travel to Christchurch later Monday to be briefed on the situation firsthand.
Plague of ravenous, destructive mice tormenting Australians
At night, the floors of sheds vanish beneath carpets of scampering mice. Ceilings come alive with the sounds of scratching. One family blamed mice chewing electrical wires for their house burning down.
Vast tracts of land in Australia’s New South Wales state are being threatened by a mouse plague that the state government describes as “absolutely unprecedented.” Just how many millions of rodents have infested the agricultural plains across the state is guesswork.
“We’re at a critical point now where if we don’t significantly reduce the number of mice that are in plague proportions by spring, we are facing an absolute economic and social crisis in rural and regional New South Wales,” Agriculture Minister Adam Marshall said this month.
Bruce Barnes said he is taking a gamble by planting crops on his family farm near the central New South Wales town of Bogan Gate.
Read:Australia’s Victoria state to return to lockdown
“We just sow and hope,” he said.
The risk is that the mice will maintain their numbers through the Southern Hemisphere winter and devour the wheat, barley and canola before it can be harvested.
NSW Farmers, the state’s top agricultural association, predicts the plague will wipe more than 1 billion Australian dollars ($775 million) from the value of the winter crop.
The state government has ordered 5,000 liters (1,320 gallons) of the banned poison Bromadiolone from India. The federal government regulator has yet to approve emergency applications to use the poison on the perimeters of crops. Critics fear the poison will kill not only mice but also animals that feed on them. including wedge-tail eagles and family pets.
“We’re having to go down this path because we need something that is super strength, the equivalent of napalm to just blast these mice into oblivion,” Marshall said.
The plague is a cruel blow to farmers in Australia’s most populous state who have been battered by fires, floods and pandemic disruptions in recent years, only to face the new scourge of the introduced house mouse, or Mus musculus.
The same government-commissioned advisers who have helped farmers cope with the drought, fire and floods are returning to help people deal with the stresses of mice.
The worst comes after dark, when millions of mice that had been hiding and dormant during the day become active.
By day, the crisis is less apparent. Patches of road are dotted with squashed mice from the previous night, but birds soon take the carcasses away. Haystacks are disintegrating due to ravenous rodents that have burrowed deep inside. Upending a sheet of scrap metal lying in a paddock will send a dozen mice scurrying. The sidewalks are strewn with dead mice that have eaten poisonous bait.
Read:111-year-old Australian recommends eating chicken brains
But a constant, both day and night, is the stench of mice urine and decaying flesh. The smell is people’s greatest gripe.
“You deal with it all day. You’re out baiting, trying your best to manage the situation, then come home and just the stench of dead mice,” said Jason Conn, a fifth generation farmer near Wellington in central New South Wales.
“They’re in the roof cavity of your house. If your house is not well sealed, they’re in bed with you. People are getting bitten in bed,” Conn said. “It doesn’t relent, that’s for sure.”
Colin Tink estimated he drowned 7,500 mice in a single night last week in a trap he set with a cattle feeding bowl full of water at his farm outside Dubbo.
“I thought I might get a couple of hundred. I didn’t think I’d get 7,500,” Tink said.
Barnes said mouse carcasses and excrement in roofs were polluting farmers’ water tanks.
“People are getting sick from the water,” he said.
The mice are already in Barnes’ hay bales. He’s battling them with zinc phosphide baits, the only legal chemical control for mice used in broad-scale agriculture in Australia. He’s hoping that winter frosts will help contain the numbers.
Farmers like Barnes endured four lean years of drought before 2020 brought a good season as well as the worst flooding that some parts of New South Wales have seen in at least 50 years. But the pandemic brought a labor drought. Fruit was left to rot on trees because foreign backpackers who provide the seasonal workforce were absent.
Plagues seemingly appear from nowhere and often vanish just as fast.
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Disease and a shortage of food are thought to trigger a dramatic population crash as mice feed on themselves, devouring the sick, weak and their own offspring.
Government researcher Steve Henry, whose agency is developing strategies to reduce the impact of mice on agriculture, said it is too early to predict what damage will occur by spring.
He travels across the state holding community meetings, sometimes twice a day, to discuss the mice problem.
“People are fatigued from dealing with the mice,” Henry said.
Australia’s Victoria state to return to lockdown
The city that was once Australia’s worst COVID-19 hot spot on Thursday announced a seven-day lockdown, its fourth since the pandemic began.
The lockdown for Melbourne and the rest of Victoria state comes after a new cluster in the city rose to 26 infections, including a person who was in intensive care.
Victoria Acting Premier James Merlino said: “Unless something changes, this will be increasingly uncontrollable.”
The new Melbourne cluster was found after a traveler from India became infected with a more contagious variant of the virus while in hotel quarantine in South Australia state earlier this month. The traveler was not diagnosed until he returned home to Melbourne.
Read:Australia won’t buy J&J coronavirus vaccine
Australia’s second largest city last year underwent a second wave of infections that peaked at 725 new cases in a single August day at a time when community spread had been virtually eliminated elsewhere in the country.
That lockdown lasted for 111 days. A third lockdown that lasted for five days in February was triggered by a cluster of 13 cases linked to hotel quarantine near Melbourne Airport.
Victoria accounts for 820 of Australia’s 910 coronavirus deaths during the pandemic.
Australia to provide A$5 million to help Bangladesh in Covid-19 combat
Australia has announced an additional fund of A$5 million or Tk 330 million t to support Bangladesh’s COVID-19 preparedness and response, the country’s envoy said on Saturday.
Australian Foreign Minister Marise Payne has made the announcement, according to Australian High Commission in Dhaka Jeremy Bruer.
This fund will be given through the International Federation of the Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) to procure and distribute essential supplies, including oxygen and related equipment, to help communities withstand the health and social impact of the pandemic, said the high commissioner.
The money is in addition to the A$5.7 million Australia provided last year to Bangladesh for personal protective equipment, COVID-19 awareness campaigns, and emergency food and income support.
Australia said it is also working to increase the global supply of safe and effective COVID-19 vaccines, including through an A$80 million commitment to the COVAX Advance Market Commitment, of which Bangladesh is a beneficiary.
High Commissioner Jeremy Bruer said, "As one of Bangladesh's oldest friends, Australia is committed to supporting Bangladesh in its fight against COVID-19, to help ensure our shared region remains safe, stable, prosperous and resilient. Australia and our partners stand with Bangladesh in responding to the pandemic.”
Macher Jhol in Melbourne: Transcending borders through food!
The quintessential Bengali 'Macher Jhol’ or fish curry has now reached the table of Masterchef Australia. All thanks to 38-year-old Bangladeshi expat Kishwar Chowdhury who has made it to the celebrated show this season.
A mother of two, Chowdhury is pursuing her dream of becoming a cookbook author aiming to showcase recipes handed down by her mother Laila Chowdhury (recent one being the macher jhol or fish curry).
The homemaker made her way to MasterChef Australia Season 13 with her sardines in green mango broth, served with black lentils, beetroot and blood orange bhorta.
Read: Kishwar wins Australians hearts with her Bangladeshi recipe on Masterchef
Later, she cooked several drool-worthy Bengali cuisines on the show -- from Chingri Bhorta (mashed prawns) to the humble Maach Bhaja (fish fry).
She aims to put Bangladeshi cuisine on the global culinary map with her passion for cooking, bringing international recognition to homegrown flavours but with a twist.
“If I don’t do that this food recipe and flavor will fade with me, I really want to pass them to my children,” she said in an earlier interview.
“This is testament to the fact that simple food, you have nowhere to hide with it, can be the best and most triumphant in the world," one of the judges said about Kishwar’s dishes in the competition.
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MasterChef Australia is an Australian competitive cooking show based on the original British MasterChef.
Initial rounds consist of a large number of hopeful contestants from across Australia individually "auditioning" by presenting a food dish before the three judges in order to gain one of 50 semi-final places.
The semi-finalists then compete in several challenges that test their food knowledge and preparation skills.
The contestants will then be whittled down through a number of individual and team-based cooking challenges and weekly elimination rounds until a winning MasterChef is crowned.
Read Most creative ways to eat more fruits for the non-fruit eaters
The contestants of MasterChef Australia, play for a prize that includes chef training from leading professional chefs, the chance to have their own cookbook published, and $ 250,000 in cash.
111-year-old Australian recommends eating chicken brains
Australia’s oldest-ever man has included eating chicken brains among his secrets to living more than 111 years.
Retired cattle rancher Dexter Kruger on Monday marked 124 days since he turned 111, a day older than World War I veteran Jack Lockett was when he died in 2002.
Kruger told Australian Broadcasting Corp. in an interview at his nursing home in the rural Queensland state town of Roma days before the milestone that a weekly poultry delicacy had contributed to his longevity.
“Chicken brains. You know, chickens have a head. And in there, there’s a brain. And they are delicious little things,” Kruger said. “There’s only one little bite.”
Read:Australia won’t buy J&J coronavirus vaccine
Kruger’s 74-year-old son Greg credits his father’s simple Outback lifestyle for his long life.
Nursing home manger Melanie Calvert said Kruger, who is writing his autobiography, was “probably one of the sharpest residents here.”
“His memory is amazing for a 111-year-old,” Calvert said.
John Taylor, a founder of The Australian Book of Records, confirmed that Kruger had become the oldest-ever Australian man.
The oldest-ever verified Australian was Christina Cook, who died in 2002 aged 114 years and 148 days.
Kishwar wins Australians hearts with her Bangladeshi recipe on Masterchef
A Bangladeshi woman has won much applause following her participation in MasterChef Australia, a competitive TV cooking show that is a global phenomenon.
The Bangladeshi expatriate Kishwar is a 38-year-old lady with two kids who finds delight by presenting Bangladesh dishes to her family members, she said at the programme.
Kishwar, who lives in Melbourne of Victoria with her family, prepared a Bangladeshi dish with sardines at the competition.
Her dream was to write a cooking book presenting Bangladesh food recipes and Bangladeshi flavor, she explained at the show with wet eyes.
Also read: French chef Bocuse restaurant loses 3rd star after 55 years
“If I don’t do that this food recipe and flavor will fade with me, I really want to pass them to my children,” she said while describing her small dream.
The judges of the show immediately passed her a Yes card after tasting the food, making her qualify for the round of 24 in the competition. One of the judges said “This is testament to the fact that simple food, you have nowhere to hide with it, can be the best and most triumphant in the world.”
MasterChef Australia is an Australian competitive cooking show based on the original British MasterChef.
Initial rounds consist of a large number of hopeful contestants from across Australia individually "auditioning" by presenting a food dish before the three judges in order to gain one of 50 semi-final places.
Also read: Celebrity chef Gary Rhodes dies at 59 with wife by his side
The semi-finalists then compete in several challenges that test their food knowledge and preparation skills.
The contestants will then be whittled down through a number of individual and team-based cooking challenges and weekly elimination rounds until a winning MasterChef is crowned.
The winner plays for a prize that includes chef training from leading professional chefs, the chance to have their own cookbook published, and $ 250,000 in cash.
Read Iftar Items, Recipes for Ramadan in Bangladesh
Australian judge rules Google misled Android users on data
Google broke Australian law by misleading users about personal location data collected through Android mobile devices, a judge found Friday.
The Federal Court decision was a partial win for the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission, the nation’s fair trade watchdog, which has been prosecuting Google for broader alleged breaches of consumer law since October 2019.
Justice Thomas Thawley found that Google misled Android mobile device users about personal location data collected between January 2017 and December 2018.
Also read: Google celebrates Pahela Baishakh with new doodle
“This is an important victory for consumers, especially anyone concerned about their privacy online, as the court’s decision sends a strong message to Google and others that big businesses must not mislead their customers,” Commission Chair Rod Sims said in a statement.
“We are extremely pleased with the outcome in this world-first case,” he added.
Google is considering an appeal to the full bench of the Federal Court.
“The court rejected many of the ACCC’s broad claims,” a Google statement said.
“We disagree with the remaining findings and are currently reviewing our options, including a possible appeal,” Google added.
The judge ruled that when users created a new Google account during the initial set-up process of their Android device, Google misrepresented that the “Location History” setting was the only Google account setting that affected whether Google collected, kept or used personally identifiable data about their location.
But another Google account setting titled “Web & App Activity” also enabled Google to collect, store and use personally identifiable location data when it was turned on, and that setting was turned on by default.
The judge also found that when users later accessed the “Location History” setting on their Android device during the same time period to turn that setting off, they were also misled because Google did not inform them that by leaving the “Web & App Activity” setting switched on, Google would continue to collect, store and use their personally identifiable location data.
Similarly, between March 2017 and Nov. 29, 2018, when users later accessed the “Web & App Activity” setting on their Android device, they were misled because Google did not inform them that the setting was relevant to the collection of personal location data.
Also read: Google gets into sleep surveillance with new Nest Hub screen
Google said the digital platform provides “robust controls for location data and are always looking to do more.”
The commission is seeking court orders and financial penalties against Google to be determined later.
The Australia Institute Center for Responsible Technology, a Canberra-based think tank, said the case “highlights the complexity of Big Tech terms and conditions.”
“The reality is most people have little to no idea on how much of their data is being used by Google and online platforms,” the Center’s Director Peter Lewis said in a statement.
Lewis said reading most terms and conditions takes an average of 74 minutes and requires a university education, according to the institute’s research, and more comprehensive consumer data protection was needed.