Category: Australasia

CloseMoment federal agents shoot man in MinneapolisThe man shot and killed by federal agents in Minneapolis Saturday has been named as Alex Pretti, a 37-year-old ICU nurse.
Federal officials accused Pretti of attempting to assassinate officers with a pistol.
Publicly available video doesn’t show Pretti pointing or drawing any weapon and threatening officers.
Another video shows him attempting to stand between federal agents and a person one of them has just pushed to the ground.
A group of about six officers then stand over Pretti and wrestle him to the ground, scattering after shots ring out. One angle of the encounter seems to show an officer pulling a pistol resembling the one found on Pretti just before the shooting begins.
Minneapolis police chief Brian O’Hara said Pretti was a “lawful gun owner” with a permit.
Federal officials didn’t provide any footage or a detailed timeline of the encounter, merely pointing to the gun as evidence Pretti was attempting an attack.
State offic..

Under the Trump administration, immigration and border agencies have received an unprecedented windfall of nearly $170 billion in new funding, but their operations have also come at a major cost to the taxpayer, according to newly released data.
The cost of a single enforced deportation is $18,245, the Department of Homeland Security announced on Wednesday. Last year, the figure was just over $17,000.
The agency announced the statistics while touting its CBP Home process, which offers a $2,600 stipend to migrants willing to self-deport, arguing the program saves taxpayers thousands of dollars.
During the president’s first year in office, there were more than 675,000 deportations, and an estimated 2.2 million self-deportations.
The Trump administration’s military-style deportation crackdowns have also caused major expenditures and economic disruptions in cities across the country, most recently Minneapolis.
open image in galleryIt costs $18,245 to carry out a single deportation, accor..

The formidable reality confronting any US, NATO, or European plans for Greenland is its ice. The relentless frozen expanse obstructs harbours, encases valuable minerals, and transforms coastlines into treacherous fields of white and blue shards, posing a year-round threat to shipping.
Navigating this challenging environment necessitates a specific solution: icebreakers. These colossal vessels, equipped with powerful engines, reinforced hulls, and heavy bows, are engineered to crush and cleave through thick ice.
However, the United States currently possesses only three such ships, with one reportedly in such disrepair as to be almost unusable. While agreements are in place to acquire an additional eleven, procurement faces significant geopolitical hurdles, as potential sources include either adversaries or recently alienated allies.
Despite toning down his rhetoric, U.S. President Donald Trump seems set on the U.S. owning Greenland for security and economic reasons: to keep what he call..

US president Donald Trump has provoked anger among British politicians and veteran fighters by claiming Nato soldiers avoided the front lines in the war in Afghanistan.
Around 1,186 non-American Nato troops died in the conflict that began in 2001, according to Help for Heroes. More than 2,300 members of the US armed forced were killed.
But Mr Trump ramped up tensions with Nato on Thursday, saying he was not sure the alliance would “be there if we ever needed them”.
He told Fox News: “They’ll say they sent some troops to Afghanistan … and they did, they stayed a little back, a little off the front lines.”
Lord Sedwill, a former British ambassador to Afghanistan, told Times Radio that Mr Trump’s claim was offensive and simply wrong, and that Afghanistan veterans and the families of those who died would be right to feel deeply offended.
open image in galleryMr Trump saw US Afghanistan veterans’ bodies repatriated (Copyright 2019 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.)He said: “The Ame..

CloseTrump drops Europe tariffs threat over Greenland after Nato talks at DavosA Danish MP has said that the deal U.S president Donald Trump claims to have struck over Greenland is “definitely not a deal” and that his so-called negotiations with Nato were “not real”.
Trump yesterday backed down from his threat to impose tariffs on European nations after reaching the “framework of a future deal” over Greenland, hours after giving a fiery speech in Davos.
He abandoned plans to impose tariffs on allies who had objected to his efforts to acquire the Danish-controlled territory after what he described as a “very productive” meeting with Nato secretary general Mark Rutte.
Sascha Faxe told Sky News that “there can’t be a deal without having Greenland as part of the negotiations, first of all”.
“So we have a Greenlandic MP in Denmark – and she’s very clear that this is not a prerogative of Rutte and Nato; they can’t trade the underground in Greenland, or Greenlandic security without Greenlande..

Rescuers in New Zealand were searching for several people, including at least one child, after a landslide tore through a popular holiday campsite as days of record-breaking rain and flooding continued to batter the country.
The landslide struck a campground at the base of Mount Maunganui on Thursday morning, overturning campervans, crushing tents, and hitting a toilet and shower block, according to emergency officials.
Rescue teams said they initially heard voices calling for help from beneath the rubble but had detected no further signs of life by late afternoon, as concerns grew about the stability of the hillside.
The landslide came after days of torrential rain linked to a tropical weather system, which has dumped extraordinary volumes of rain across large parts of the North Island.
New Zealand’s emergency management minister, Mark Mitchell, said parts of the east coast resembled “a war zone”, with helicopters deployed to rescue families trapped on rooftops and local states of em..

A 12-year-old mauled by a shark in Australia’s Sydney Harbour has been identified as Nico Antic, with a family friend saying the boy had suffered “devastating injuries”.
Antic was attacked on Sunday afternoon while swimming with friends near Shark Beach in Vaucluse, an affluent harbourside suburb in Sydney’s east.
The incident happened shortly after 4.20pm as the boys were jumping from rocks along the Hermitage Foreshore Walk, a popular coastal path.
Police believe a bull shark – a species known to inhabit murky, brackish waters – was responsible. The boy was bitten on both legs.
Antic was taken to Sydney Children’s Hospital in Randwick, where he remains in a critical condition.
On Wednesday morning, the hospital said it could not provide an update on his condition, the Guardian reported.
A GoFundMe appeal launched by Victor Piñeiro, who described himself as a close friend of the family, said the boy had suffered “devastating injuries”.
“Despite all efforts, this heartbreaking event ..

Donald Trump's flight to Switzerland was abruptly cut short on Tuesday evening, with Air Force One returning to Joint Base Andrews an hour after departure. The presidential aircraft turned back after its crew identified a “minor electrical issue” shortly after takeoff.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt confirmed the decision was made “out of an abundance of caution.” A reporter on board noted that lights in the press cabin briefly failed, with passengers informed of the turnaround roughly half an hour into the flight.
Trump was on his way to Davos, Switzerland, and is likely to use the World Economic Forum to escalate his push for acquiring Greenland despite European protests in the biggest fraying of transatlantic ties in decades.
Trump boarded another aircraft, an Air Force C-32, a modified Boeing 757 normally used by the president for domestic trips to smaller airports, and continued on with his trip to the World Economic Forum in Davos shortly after midnight.
The tw..

Australia has closed dozens of beaches and urged people to stay out of the ocean after a fourth shark attack was reported within 48 hours.
The latest incident took place on Tuesday morning near Point Plomer, in New South Wales’s (NSW) mid-north coast, where a 39-year-old surfer was bitten by a shark while surfing near a national park campground.
The man was taken to the hospital in a stable condition with minor injuries, according to the local health district.
The latest attack followed a series of shark incidents across Sydney and its surrounding coastline since Sunday, prompting police, lifeguards, and marine authorities to warn that ocean conditions remain dangerous after days of heavy rain.
Steven Pearce, the chief executive of Surf Life Saving NSW, an organisation that promotes safe coastal enjoyment in NSW and the Australian Capital Territory, said the water quality along much of the coast was currently unsafe and urged people to avoid swimming altogether.
“If anyone’s thinking o..