Australia

SYDNEY, Oct 15 (Reuters) - Australian Indigenous leaders called on Sunday for a week of silence and reflection after a referendum to recognise First Peoples in the constitution was decisively rejected.

More than 60% of Australians voted "No" in the landmark referendum on Saturday that asked whether to alter the constitution to recognise Aboriginal and Torres Strait Island people with an Indigenous advisory body, the "Voice to Parliament", that would have advised parliament on matters concerning the community.

SYDNEY, Oct 14 (Reuters) - Australia has cancelled two planned flights to repatriate citizens from Israel and the Palestinian territories due to the "highly challenging" situation, the foreign affairs department said on Saturday.

Repatriation flights scheduled for Saturday and Sunday will not depart as planned amid a "highly challenging and rapidly changing" situation, the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) said in a statement on social media.

CANBERRA, Australia (AP) — Australians resoundingly rejected on Saturday a referendum proposal to create an advocacy committee to offer advice to Parliament on policies that affect Indigenous people — the nation’s most disadvantaged ethnic minority.

The government proposed the first constitutional change since 1977 as a step forward in Indigenous rights. But the vote divided Indigenous leaders as well as the wider community.

CANBERRA, Oct 12 (NNN-AAP) – The Australian government announced it will run repatriation flights for citizens stranded in Israel.

Minister for Foreign Affairs, Penny Wong last night, confirmed that, flag carrier, Qantas, will operate two flights from Tel Aviv’s Ben Gurion airport to London, for Australians who do not already have plans to leave the area.

The flights will be operated free of charge for passengers, with Qantas to absorb the costs.

SYDNEY, Oct 7 (NNN-AAP) – Police in the Australian state of New South Wales (NSW), confirmed that four people, including children, are believed to have died, after a plane crashed near Canberra, yesterday noon.

According to the latest update by NSW Police, the Cirrus SR22 aircraft, took off from Canberra Airport at 2.30 p.m. local time, and was travelling to Armidale with four people, a man and three children on board. “They are yet to be identified. A report will be prepared for the information of the Coroner,” police noted.

SYDNEY, Oct 6 (NNN-AAP) – A plane crashed in the Australian state of New South Wales (NSW), today, with the number of people on board currently remaining unknown.

NSW Police Force confirmed in a statement that, emergency services are now at the scene of a fatal plane crash in Gundaroo, a small village located about 35 km north of Canberra.

According to the statement, officers were called to a property on Hadlow Drive in Gundaroo, just before 3:00 p.m. local time, following reports of a plane having crashed and caught fire.

SYDNEY, Sept 27 (Reuters) - Solomon Islands Prime Minister Manesseh Sogavare said he skipped a Pacific Islands leaders summit at the White House this week to avoid a "lecture" and because he had more pressing issues at home.

Sogavare, who has built close ties with China, held a press conference on Wednesday after arriving back in Solomon Islands from the United States, where he spoke at the United Nations but did not join other Pacific Island Forum leaders in Washington for a two-day summit.

CANBERRA, Australia (AP) — A senior Qatar Airways executive told an Australian Senate inquiry on Wednesday there would be no repeat of an incident at Doha’s international airport in 2020 in which female passengers were subjected to invasive gynecological examinations.

Australian Transport Minister Catherine King said three weeks ago that the examinations of 13 Australian women who had boarded a Qatar Airways plane to Sydney were a factor in her decision in July to refuse the Qatar government-owned airline additional flights to Australia.

SYDNEY, Sept 26 (NNN-AAP) – Police in the Australian state of New South Wales (NSW), confirmed today that, a man has been arrested, after an overnight shooting in the city of Lake Macquarie, which injured two people, last week.

According to NSW Police Force, at about 12:45 p.m. local time yesterday, a 31-year-old man was arrested in Wallsend, a western suburb of Newcastle.

Police also located two firearms during the execution of a search warrant, which were seized for further forensic examination.

CANBERRA, Sept 18 (NNN-AAP) – Three people have been hospitalised with injuries, following an alleged stabbing at the Australian National University (ANU), in the country’s capital today, state media reported.

The Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) reported that, police and ambulance personnel were called to the ANU campus in Canberra at approximately 2:45 p.m. local time today, to respond to reports of a stabbing.