Greenpeace activists broke law: Putin

Russian agents will detain the "most active" of the protesters on the Greenpeace Arctic Sunrise. Source: AAP

RUSSIAN President Vladimir Putin says the 30 Greenpeace activists arrested in Russia over their open-sea protest in the Arctic were not "pirates" but they did break the law.

"I do not know the details of what has happened but it's completely obvious that of course they are not pirates," Putin told an international Arctic forum in the far northern city of Salekhard on Wednesday in televised remarks.

But he said that: "It's completely obvious these people violated the norms of international law," and that the activists had "come dangerously close to the platform."

Putin said that it was not immediately clear to Russian officials at the time that those storming the platform really were ecological campaigners from Greenpeace.

"Our law enforcement agencies, our border guards did not know who was trying to seize the platform under the guise of Greenpeace," he said.

He added that the siege of a shopping centre in Kenya heightened fears.

"And against the background of the bloody events that happened in Kenya, anything could happen after all," he said.

The Greenpeace incident happened before the Kenyan siege began, however.

Greenpeace activists tried to storm the platform a week ago on Wednesday and their ship was taken over by border guards the next day. The siege of a Nairobi shopping centre by Islamist militants began on Saturday.

17.01 | 0 komentar | Read More

Community pool opens in shadow of Uluru

IT gets hot and dusty in the Aboriginal desert community of Mutitjulu and for seven years the kids near Uluru have had nowhere to cool down.

That has changed with a community investment of $1.6 million of rent money from the Uluru-Kata Tjuta National Park to partly fund a swimming pool.

Opened on Tuesday, the pool should help improve both the health and welfare of the children.

"There's a number of sites around (neighbouring) Yulara with swimming pools but the kids weren't necessarily welcome there and were moved on, on many, many occasions," director of the Central Land Council David Ross tells AAP.

"There's all sorts of reasons: tourists, paying guests, maybe they didn't like the behaviour of the kids. Kids are pretty noisy, and people are there for their vacation."

Not everyone has access to a car in that southwestern corner of the Northern Territory, and it is hard for the children to get around.

"The kids were looking for something to do in the community, and were swimming and playing in muddy sewer water," Mr Ross says.

So in 2006, the traditional owners put $100,000 of the national park's annual rent toward the construction of the Mutitjulu Tjurpinytjaku Centre pool, with a $3 million grant coming from the Aboriginals Benefit Account.

The traditional owners also added another $1.5 million to ensure the pool operates until 2017.

Mr Ross says it will benefit the community in innumerable ways, by providing employment and lifting social, health and educational standard.

"We hear all sorts of anecdotal evidence that, if you have a pool, it'll improve long-term health and welfare for children with breathing problems, eye problems, ear, nose, throat, all those issues," he says.

"People are in water, so they're going to be much cleaner and they're physically doing something in that water rather than breathing in dust all the time."

A 'no school, no pool' policy will keep kids attending classes, he says.

"It's an improvement not just to the Commonwealth but the Northern Territory government's bottom line in terms of how much they spend on health and welfare and whatnot in communities," Mr Ross says.

After 2017, the community will need additional funding, so Mr Ross hopes the economic argument will sway the government to invest in an area.

However, he knows of three other community pools at Areyonga, Kintore and Santa Teresa in Central Australia that have had to close because they aren't receiving any funding.

Mr Ross said that costs would ideally be shared so traditional owners can invest their rent money in other community projects.

The Labor party promised to fund them all if re-elected, but Mr Ross says the CLC is still waiting on word from the new coalition government on whether it will support what he says is a great asset to the community.

"If you'd seen these kids jumping in the pool, they don't need to tell you (how happy they are)," he says.

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ADF releases Afghan insider attack report

A defence report questions the protection give to three Australian diggers killed in Afghanistan. Source: AAP

A DEFENCE inquiry into a rogue Afghan soldier's murder of three Australian soldiers is highly critical of the "relaxed" security at the time of the attack.

Vice Chief of the Defence Force Air Marshal Mark Binskin says there were shortfalls in protection and decisions made on the ground, but acknowledged that greater security still may not have prevented the deaths of Lance Corporal Stjepan Milosevic, Sapper James Martin and Private Robert Poate.

"No matter how much you put in place you can never, 100 per cent, stop someone trying to commit a crime like this," he said.

"You can mitigate the risk as best you can but I don't believe you could ever stop someone who is intent on doing this."

Air Marshal Binskin said insider attacks remained a complex and evolving threat.

The three men died and two other diggers were injured when Afghan sergeant Hekmatullah fired 10 to 15 automatic rounds at Australian soldiers who were playing cards inside a patrol base 20km north of Tarin Kowt in Oruzgan province on August 29, 2012.

Air Marshal Binskin said the inquiry into the attack highlighted serious issues and made six recommendations to which defence has agreed.

Four relate to possible administrative action against three ADF members, including the patrol commander, which the chief of the defence force has referred to the chief of army for consideration.

The fifth concerns instant response capability that has been implemented and the sixth is that a commission of inquiry was not warranted.

Air Marshal Binskin said the decisions and actions made at the time were at the minimum level of authorised force protection to provide security for the soldiers.

"However, they did not adequately address the specific situation at the patrol base, that potentially placed personnel at significant risk to the threat of fire."

The inquiry officer found the decision to adopt a relaxed level of security was not in accordance with orders and meant the troops were not ready.

Some soldiers were dressed in gym gear and not wearing body armour. Two soldiers have since been disciplined over their inappropriate dress.

Air Marshal Binskin said it wasn't possible to make a link between protection arrangements and the reasons behind the insider attack.

"There were no weaknesses or deficiencies in our intelligence preparation and no information to Australian or coalition forces to suggest Hekmatullah was a threat to Australians," he said.

"In fact, his existence was unremarkable from a personnel or intelligence perspective."

He said they may never know what prompted the attack but bringing Hekmatullah to justice remained a key focus.

"Let me assure you, we will not let this go."

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Blunders from the top down led to fraud

A SERIES of blunders by officials and the state's crime watchdog allowed $16.6 million of taxpayers' money to fall into the hands of a Queensland Health employee who claimed he was a Tahitian prince.

One of the biggest mistakes was the failure to thoroughly investigate a tip-off in 2010 that Joel Morehu-Barlow would abscond to Paris to live a life of luxury after defrauding Queensland Health.

That email landed in the Crime and Misconduct Commissions's inbox 15 months before Barlow, a financial officer with the health department, took $11 million in a single transaction.

On Wednesday, the CMC conceded the handling of the complaint, received on August 5, 2010, had exposed a number of failures.

CMC Assistant Commissioner Kathleen Florian said investigations into the handling of the 2010 complaint revealed shortcomings in Queensland Health, Queensland Police and the crime commission.

Queensland police only conducted an Australian criminal check, despite the email stating Barlow was wanted in New Zealand.

The CMC had handballed the complaint to Queensland Health to deal with - but only on the day the email tip-off claimed Barlow was planning to skip the country.

Ms Florian said the CMC officer was right to refer the complaint to Queensland Health because it didn't allege the fraud was systematic or was being committed by a very senior officer.

"Where the CMC could improve was the timeliness of that referral," she told reporters on Wednesday.

"It was fortunate Mr Barlow did not in fact leave Australia for Paris."

Queensland Health also failed to thoroughly probe the claims made in the email.

The body's ethical standards unit contacted Barlow's then manager who advised there were no concerns about Barlow in the workplace and he had no opportunity to commit fraud.

The reality was Barlow had taken long absences from work and showered his colleagues with lavish gifts he told them he could afford because he was a member of the Tahitian royal family.

However the $11 million Barlow siphoned into a phantom health organisation in November 2011 was the red flag that couldn't be ignored.

In March, Barlow was sentenced to 14 years' jail over the $16.6 million fraud which occurred between 2007 and 2011.

The CMC's misconduct investigation found Barlow acted alone but some Queensland Health staff had inadvertently helped him.

The CMC report into the crime, tabled in state parliament on Wednesday, found enough evidence to substantiate 24 misconduct claims against nine Queensland Health officers, including Barlow.

One worker has already been sacked and Queensland Health Minister Lawrence Springborg says more may be given their marching orders.

However, some will remain in the public service.

Mr Springborg said two officers who had been exonerated would keep their jobs, while another three had been retrained.

He said a raft of changes had already been implemented to ensure a crime of similar scale could not occur again.

Three signatures are now required for any payments over $100,000, while crime checks for employees had been extended to include New Zealand, he said.

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Community vote for NSW Labor candidates

NSW Opposition Leader John Robertson says Labor will hold community preselections in five NSW seats. Source: AAP

LABOR will hold community preselections in five NSW seats, in a bid to open up the party.

NSW Opposition Leader John Robertson says members of the community will be able to join with local branch members to vote for their Labor candidate for at least five seats before the 2015 state election.

The community preselections will be held for the seats of Balmain, Newtown, Campbelltown, Londonderry and Strathfield.

"This is an exciting moment for the Labor party and shows we are serious about opening our party up to new people and new ways of thinking," he said in a statement on Sunday.

In addition to the five seats, community preselections would also be held in other seats where locals were eager to embrace the new process, he said.

"I want this process to begin as soon as possible and for all community preselections to be completed by March next year."

The announcement comes as Labor's Anthony Albanese and Bill Shorten campaign for the federal Labor leadership.

The pair are travelling the country in a bid to win over grassroots ALP members who will for the first time get a 50 per cent say in a ballot to elect the federal parliamentary leader.

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Flight chaos as HK readies for typhoon

SEVERE Typhoon Usagi is barrelling towards Hong Kong, shutting down one of the world's busiest sea ports and throwing flight schedules into disarray from Europe to the United States.

Usagi - which means rabbit in Japanese - packed winds of 165 kilometres per hour as it closed in on China's densely populated Pearl River Delta, forcing some residents in vulnerable areas to tape up windows and stock up on supplies.

The storm, described by meteorologists as the most powerful anywhere on Earth this year, killed two people in the Philippines and unleashed landslides in Taiwan en route to Hong Kong.

The Hong Kong Observatory, issuing the second of a five-step tropical storm warning, said it was likely to bring "severe" disruption to the city with transport systems affected and expectations of high waves and flooding in low-lying areas.

At the Chek Lap Kok airport, airline counters were besieged by anxious passengers hoping to rebook their flights after the Cathay Pacific group said it was cancelling all its flights from 6pm (2000 AEST)on Sunday.

With many other airlines following Cathay's lead, only a handful of flights were still scheduled to land or take off after 6pm.

Incoming flights from London, Sydney and Chicago among other cities were cancelled, and thousands of people risked being stranded at their point of origin or in Hong Kong.

Operators at Hong Kong's maritime cargo port, one of the busiest in the world, ceased work late on Saturday, stranding many giant tankers in sea channels not far from shore.

The financial hub is well versed in typhoon preparations and enforces strict building codes, so rarely suffers major loss of life as a result of tropical storms.

But the observatory warned against complacency, saying that Usagi was set to become the strongest storm to hit Hong Kong since 1979 when typhoon Hope killed a dozen people and injured 260.

On its way to Hong Kong and southern China, Usagi forced the evacuation of some 3400 people in southern Taiwan, dumped more than 70 centimetres of rain on Hualien city, and forced more than 100 flights to be cancelled to and from the island.

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Keith Urban has No.1 album in Australia

Country music star Keith Urban has scored his second No.1 album in Australia with Fuse. Source: AAP

KATY Perry has reclaimed No.1 on the ARIA singles chart with her track Roar.

Having been superseded by Redfoo last week, Perry returns to the top for a fourth week.

Redfoo's Let's Get Ridiculous has dropped to No.3, behind Miley Cyrus' Wrecking Ball.

At No.4 this week is Jason DeRulo with Talk Dirty, featuring rapper 2 Chainz.

Lana Del Rey's Summertime Sadness remix is steady at No.5.

Climbing to a new peak of No.6 is Something I Need for OneRepublic.

Avicii is back up one spot to No.7 with Wake Me Up, while Love Me Again by John Newman drops back two spots to No.8.

Drake's Hold on, We're Going Home has shot up five places to No.9 ahead of Eminem's Berzerk at No.10.

The top three albums in the country are all new entries this week, with Australian country music star Keith Urban taking out the top spot with his ninth studio album Fuse.

This becomes his second No.1 album in Australia after 2012's The Story So Far.

The debut album for Tom Bergling, better known as Avicii, enters at No.2.

Jack Johnson, who is heading to Australia for a national tour in December, has debuted at No.3 with his sixth studio album From Here to Now to You.

With three big new entries, it pushes last week's top four albums down three places each, with AM for The Arctic Monkeys down to No.4, If You Wait by London Grammar at No.5, The Truth About Love for Pink at No.6 and Fleetwood Mac's 25 Years - The Chain at No.7.

Passenger is back up one place to No.8 with All the Little Lights, followed by Loud Like Love from Placebo at No.9

Bruno Mars returns to the Top 10 at No.10 with Unorthodox Jukebox following the release of his new single Gorilla.

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5 Freo arrests as Dockers fans cheer

WA Police say only five arrests were made in Fremantle after the team won the AFL preliminary final. Source: AAP

THOUSANDS of euphoric Fremantle Dockers fans have celebrated wildly in the port city after the AFL team's convincing win against Sydney Swans, but only five arrests were made for minor offences.

West Australian police said the charges mostly stemmed from offences like failing to obey a move-on notice and obstructing police.

All arrests were in the Fremantle CBD after the Dockers 25-point win over the Sydney Swans in Saturday night's AFL preliminary final in Perth.

"Given the huge numbers, the crowds were actually pretty well-behaved," a police spokeswoman said.

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Firies save homes from large bushfires

LATEST:FIREFIGHTERS have brought a huge bushfire under control after residents had been advised to leave homes for their own safety.

At 5.34pm, the Department of Community and Safety advised the Watch and Act alert for Sunshine Acrews and Nikenbah near Hervey Bay had been cancelled.

There is no longer any threat to properties after the bushfire around Vanderwolf Road and Barrenjoey Road, Nikenbah and Pindari Crescent and Barrenjoey Road, Sunshine Acres was brought under control.

Authorities said fire crews will remain on scene to strengthen containment lines and will continue to patrol the blaze tomorrow.

Residents in the area are expected to be affected by a large smoke haze tonight, and are advised to close windows and doors and keep medication close by if suffering from a respiratory condition.

Motorists traveling in the area are advised to drive to conditions.

5.18PM: FIREFIGHTERS are still battling a blaze that has burned an area the size of almost 180 football fields near Hervey Bay.

The fire broke out at Nikenbah just before 3pm and was expected to affect parts of Sunshine Acres.

A Department of Community Safety spokeswoman said about 200ha of land had been burned and residents were urged to enact their bushfire plan.

Those who decide to stay and defend their property should take precautionary measures including:

• Put on protective clothing
• Drink lots of water
• Move car/s to a safe location
• Close windows and doors and shut blinds
• Bring pets inside and restrain them (leash, cage or secure room) and provide water
• Wet down fine fuels close to buildings
• Remove garden furniture, doormats and other items
• Seal all gaps under doors and screens
• Fill containers with water - eg bath, sinks, buckets and wheelie bins
• Have ladders ready for roof space access (inside) and against roof (outside)
• Have generator or petrol pump ready
• Check and patrol outside for embers and extinguish any spot fires and seek shelter as the fire front arrives.

Residents are advised to call Triple Zero (000) if their property comes under threat.

For regular updates, switch on your local radio station or visit the Rural Fire Service Queensland website at ruralfire.qld.gov.au or at fire.qld.gov.au.

EARLIER: A LARGE, fast moving bushfire is burning near Hervey Bay with residents advised to leave their homes for their own safety.

The Rural Fire Service has told residents near Old Rifle Range Rd at Nikenbah to enact their bushfire plan and to leave now if their plan is to do so or if they don't have a plan.

They have been told that leaving is the safest option.

A Department of Community safety warning said only people who had well prepared and defended homes should stay with fire fighters making no guarantees every home can be protected.

Currently, 15 fire crews are working to contain the blaze which is burning near Booral Road and Pindari Crescent at Sunshine Acres.

"Residents should not expect a firefighter at their door," the warning read.

They have warned that property may be consumed by the fire at Nickenbah with the chance power, water and mobile phone supply may be lost in the area over the coming hours while the fire rages.

The fire broke out about 2.45pm at Vanderwolf Rd at Nikenbah and is travelling quickly in a north west direction.

It is expected to effect the areas of Old Rifle Range Rd and Barrenjoey Rd at Nikenbah.

Fire fighters are having difficulty controlling the fire and are warning that spot fires may occur ahead of the fire front and embers are being thrown from the fire.

The Department of Community Safety is warning residents it will be very hot and windy as the fire approaches and it could make breathing, hearing and seeing difficult.

Police are asking motorists to stay away from Booral Road at Sunshine Acres due to the fire.

Motorists are also being urged to not travel to the area.

17.02 | 0 komentar | Read More

UK island swimmer going strong

AN endurance swimmer has made good progress through the night in her attempt to become the first person in nearly 30 years to swim solo, non-stop, around the Isle of Wight.

Anna Wardley is undertaking the challenge as part of her bid to complete circumnavigations of five islands.

The 37-year-old, from Gosport in Hampshire, set off yesterday at 10.31am from Ryde Sands and is expected to complete the 56.4-mile swim in about 30 hours.

Only three people have completed the feat, with the last successful attempt in 1984.

She has passed the famous Needles landmark and is making her way round to the east side of the island this morning.

Heather Ewing, spokeswoman for the challenge, said: "She's looking good this morning, although her arms are looking a bit tired and it has got to be hurting by now. That said, she's very cheerful and demanding a bacon sandwich if any are made for the support team."

Wardley said before setting off: "It's been nearly 30 years since this challenge was last successfully completed, so I'm under no illusions how tough it will be.

"There will be a time when I'll be swimming against the tide through the night, almost on the spot for hours. I'll also see the sun set and rise, and we'll be racing against the clock to reach critical points to beat the tide.

"However just knowing people are thinking of me and willing me on will definitely help when the going gets really tough, and it's a huge boost knowing that I'm raising money for such fantastic charities."

Wardley is attempting the swim under the rules of the British Long Distance Swimming Association wearing just a standard swimming costume, goggles and a swimming cap.

It is the culmination of her two-year Five Island Swim Challenge raising funds for the Samaritans, the Ellen MacArthur Cancer Trust and Sail Africa, with her target set at STG50,000 ($A85,470).

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