Tag Archives: Australian

MNA International Desk: The heavy smoke from devastating Australian bushfires cloaked Auckland, turning the city’s skyline into eerie orange colour on Sunday afternoon. New Zealand meteorology service MetService forecast that an upper level jet of westerly winds was driving the smoke across the Tasman Sea towards New Zealand. The smoke was expected to arrive Sunday evening and was likely to be largely gone by the morning. It is the second layer of smoke coming from the Australian bushfires, which is cloaking the North Island and upper parts of the South Island. Much of the South Island awoke to sepia skies ...

MNA International Desk: Australia’s Deputy Prime Minister Barnaby Joyce said on Tuesday that he did not break any parliamentary rules while conducting an extramarital affair with a former staffer as he faced down calls for his resignation. Joyce, a practicing Catholic who has campaigned on “family values” and has been married for 24 years, is expecting a child with his former press secretary Vikki Campion. Joyce is under immense pressure for failing to declare his relationship with his former staffer when she was given two highly paid positions working for the ruling coalition government. Australia’s ministerial code of conduct requires ...

MNA Sports Desk: A deal has been reached to resolve Australian cricket’s protracted pay dispute, paving the way for the nation’s professional players to be re-contracted and for this month’s scheduled Test tour to Bangladesh to proceed as planned, said a report on the CA website. The in-principle agreement was signed after a final round of face-to-face negotiations between Cricket Australia chief executive James Sutherland and his Australian Cricket Association counterpart Alistair Nicholson in Melbourne this morning. The central sticking point throughout the sometimes rancorous stand-off has been the model by which the players are paid. In previous iterations of ...