Australia & Pacifics

CANBERRA, Jul 20 (NNN-AGENCIES) – Australian Prime Minister, Anthony Albanese, asked people to wear masks when needed, amid soaring COVID-19 cases.

Albanese today said, the Chief Health Officers have not recommended the return of nationwide mask mandates, with the government instead relying on people to do so, where appropriate.

“We do want to encourage that behaviour,” Albanese told reporters.

He said, there were four things Australians could do to “make a difference” during the current spike in infections.

SYDNEY, July 16 (Reuters) - Australia will reinstate support payments for casual workers who have to quarantine due to COVID-19, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said on Saturday, as a fresh wave of Omicron-driven infections sweeps the country.

Australia is battling a major virus outbreak driven by the highly transmissible new Omicron subvariants, BA.4 and BA.5, with authorities warning it could lead to more people ending up in hospitals and further straining the health system.

CANBERRA, Australia (AP) — Papua New Guinea police shot a young mother dead at a polling station in the capital, Port Moresby, in the latest violence to mar national elections, according to a news report on Friday.

Homicide detectives were investigating the fatal shooting, which occurred on Monday, a police statement said.

Annaisha Max, 22, was holding her 1-year-old son when she was shot, Australian Broadcasting Corp. reported citing witnesses.

SUVA, July 14 (Xinhua) -- The Pacific Islands Forum (PIF) on Thursday launched the 2050 Strategy for the Blue Pacific Continent (2050 Strategy), which sets the vision and direction for the region and provides a framework for all development partners to align their cooperation with the island countries.

SUVA, Fiji (AP) — U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris assured Pacific island leaders of more U.S. engagement after acknowledging Wednesday the United States may not have previously provided the diplomatic attention the region deserved.

Harris’ virtual address to the Pacific Islands Forum, meeting in the Fijian capital Suva, comes as China vies for more influence in the Indo-Pacific region.

She proposed new embassies in Tonga and in Kiribati, a Micronesian state that split this week from the 18-nation forum in a major blow to regional harmony.

WELLINGTON, Jul 12 (NNN-AGENCIES) – New Zealand recorded 11,548 new community cases of COVID-19 and 19 more deaths from the pandemic, the Ministry of Health said today.

In addition, 311 COVID-19 cases have recently travelled overseas.

Currently, 710 COVID-19 patients are being treated in hospitals, including 17 in intensive care units or high dependency units.

New Zealand reported 1,441,186 confirmed cases of COVID-19 since the pandemic hit the country in early 2020.

The ministry also reported a second confirmed case of monkeypox.

SUVA, Fiji, July 11 (Reuters) - Tensions between China and the United States, and the withdrawal of the remote Pacific island nation of Kiribati, have overshadowed the Pacific Islands Forum as leaders arrived in Fiji on Monday for the first in-person summit in three years.

During the four-day meeting, Pacific island leaders will discuss how to gather more international support and funding to fight the impact of rising sea levels and climate change, as well as China's ambitions for greater security ties across the region.

CANBERRA, Australia (AP) — Australia’s new government on Thursday dropped the 4-year-old prosecution of a lawyer over his alleged attempt to help East Timor prove that Australia had spied on the then-fledgling nation’s government during multibillion-dollar oil and gas negotiations in 2004.

Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus maintained the government’s longstanding stance of refusing to confirm or deny whether the Australian Secret Intelligence Service, a spy agency that operates out of Australian embassies, bugged government offices in the East Timorese capital Dili.

SYDNEY, July 6 (Xinhua) -- Health authorities in Australia's most populous state of New South Wales (NSW) warned on Wednesday that monkeypox is likely to be transmitted within the country, as two cases may have been acquired domestically.

The NSW health department said 11 cases of monkeypox have been identified in the state, among which nine cases are likely to have been acquired overseas.

NSW Health's Executive Director of Health Protection Dr. Jeremy McAnulty said the local transmission of the virus may be occurring, particularly among men who have sex with men.

RICHMOND, Australia (AP) — Hundreds of homes have been inundated in and around Australia’s largest city in a flood emergency that was causing trouble for 50,000 people, officials said Tuesday.

Emergency response teams made 100 rescues overnight of people trapped in cars on flooded roads or in inundated homes in the Sydney area, State Emergency Service manager Ashley Sullivan said.

Days of torrential rain have caused dams to overflow and waterways to break their banks, bringing a fourth flood emergency in 16 months to parts of the city of 5 million people.