Staff at churches that share a building or campus with a school must be vaccinated if they will be there at the same time as students, the Ministry of Education says.The Ministry last night clarified exactly who is included in the…
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'Exceptionally frightening': 20 shots fired at innocent family as gang tensions boil over in Māngere
Police say it’s “very, very lucky” an innocent family escaped death when more than 20 shots were fired at their home in what is believed to be a case of mistaken identity amid rising gang tensions.A young Auckland family with a…
No charges for southern cops who used MDMA at concert
Southern police officers obtained and used MDMA while at a concert, the Independent Police Conduct Authority has found.But the officers involved will not be charged.In a summary released on the IPCA’s website, it outlined how…
Queensland COVID-19 update hijacked by anti-vax protester
A Queensland COVID-19 update given by Health Minister Yvette D'Ath had to be cut short after she was interrupted by a woman protesting against the vaccine.
Ms D'Ath was discussing vaccinations rates in Cairns when a woman appeared beside her and starting yelling.
She claimed her friends had suffered adverse reactions to the vaccine and that one had died.
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Ms D'Ath said she was happy to talk to the woman after the presser conference but she continued speaking over the politician.
"Excuse me, could you just let me speak," Ms D'Ath said.
"I have a voice … you've said enough," the woman said.
The woman was holding up her phone and appeared to be filming.
The press conference ended shortly after.
The woman continued to abuse Ms D'Ath.
Drought reveals ancient boomerangs hidden in Cooper Creek
Four ancient wood boomerangs, hundreds of years old, have been found in a dried-up arm of Coopers Creek in remote South Australia.
The discovery was "significant", a professor involved in the carbon dating of the objects told 9News.com.au, with the four boomerangs – including one with a wing span of one-metre – busting the misplaced belief of a "stereotypical returning boomerang".
Instead, the four boomerangs showed the "diverse" range of activities they were probably used for, including fighting, hunting, digging, fire management and possibly in ceremonies, Flinders University Professor Amy Roberts said.
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Radiocarbon dating revealed the boomerangs ranged in age from 1650 – 1830, a time spanning the two centuries leading up to European incursions into the region by explorers Charles Sturt, Robert Burke and William Wills.
Had it not been for severe drought exposing parts of Cooper Creek under permanent or near permanent water, the boomerangs may never have discovered near Innamincka, in SA's far north east.
Katheryn Litherland, a traditional owner, and Jason Litherland, from National Parks and Wildlife South Australia, found the boomerangs while clearing rubbish left by visitors in a dried up creek bed in December 2017 and January 2018.
Following the discovery, keen to determine their age and document the artefacts, the Yandruwandha Yawarrawarrka community contacted Flinders University to help analyse the boomerangs.
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Under close examination, even before they had been radiocarbon dated, Professor Roberts could tell the boomerangs likely came before European colonisation.
"When we looked at them under the microscope you can see some of the manufacture traces on them, which we know have been made using stone tools or implements.
"Often after European invasion communities might have used metal implements … so we knew they were from a period where stone implements were being used."
There are a lot of boomerangs from Aboriginal communities which have been collected all over Australia now exhibited in museums across the country, Professor Roberts said, "but they're collected during the early period after European invasion."
The Cooper Creek discovery was doubly rare, she said, "because there's so few that are found like this, in-situ, like possibly where they were left".
Ms Litherland, a Yandruwandha Yawarrawarrka traditional owner who found the boomerangs in the creek bed, said it was important to "protect and preserve" her people's artefacts.
"That's what our ancestors would want us to do," she said.
"When you see them old people in whirly winds you know they are here watching and protecting our Country."
Former champion team Parsons upset by Sylvers in #7 Domino League
BASSETERRE, ST. KITTS, November 3, 2021 (MMS-SKN) — Six of the seven games on Tuesday evening November 2 in the eleventh segment of play in the 26th edition of Constituency Number Seven Dr the Hon Timothy Harris Domino League, played at the new Lodge-Ottley’s Community Centre, saw winning teams humble and muzzle their opponents to earn maximum point.
This was however not the case as it related to the seventh game, as it went down to the wire with Phillips Domino Club winning by the skin of their teeth over Small Corner Bar Domino Club whom they edged out 13-12 to share the spoils, as the losing team collected one point.
First results of the evening were posted by Captain of the defending champion team Tabernacle Domino Club, Lionel Nisbett, after his team that was leading 12-5 crushed Ottley’s Domino Club with a splendid final game by Kerone Roache and Ryan St. Marie who handed their opponents a 100-0 whitewash that earned them a bonus game for the overall 14-5 win.
The team from Hidden Alley in Lodge Village, and the only one in the fourteen-team tournament captained by a female, Sylvers Domino Club, sent shock waves around the ultra-modern community centre, by handing former champion team Parsons Domino Club a 13-5 beating.
Current points standing table leader and former champion team, Unity Domino Club, handed Saddlers Domino Club a similar beating – 13-5, while the other former champion team Lodge Domino Club beat Mansion Domino Club 13-6; Unstoppable Domino Club beat Guinness Domino Club 13-7; and Molineux Domino Club beat Christ Church Domino Club 13-9.
In a rescheduled game that was played on Sunday October 31, at the new Lodge-Ottley’s Community Centre, Mansion Domino Club edged out Molineux Domino Club 13-12.
Meanwhile, at an arbitration meeting held on Sunday October 31, it was decided that the disputed game between defending champion team Tabernacle Domino Club and Saddlers Domino Club will continue on Sunday November 7. The game will resume at 4-2 in favour of the defending champion team.
At the end of the eleventh segment of play in the 26th edition of Constituency Number Seven Dr the Hon Timothy Harris Domino League, former champion team Unity is still firmly at the top on the points standing table with 54 points. It is followed by Lodge who have 44 points, Phillips 41 points, and Molineux 38 points.
Others, in order, are Parsons 37 points, Sylvers 36 points, Mansion 36 points, Christ Church 33 points, defending champion team Tabernacle 31 points, Saddlers 30 points, Unstoppable 22 points, Guinness 21 points, Small Corner Bar 20 points, and bringing up the rear is Ottley’s with 12 points.
Constituency Number Seven Dr the Hon Timothy Harris Domino League, which is the longest running such league in the Federation of St. Kitts and Nevis, is sponsored by Prime Minister and Area Parliamentary Representative for St. Christopher Seven (Bellevue to Ottley’s), Dr the Hon Timothy Harris.
Twelfth segment of play in this single round of play in the 26th edition of the league plays off on Thursday November 4 at the new Lodge-Ottley’s Community Centre, where defending champion team Tabernacle will face it off with former champion team, Parsons, and leader on points standing table Unity will come up against Molineux.
Other games will be, Saddlers vs. Guinness, Mansion vs. Ottley’s, Phillips vs. Unstoppable, former champion team Lodge vs. Sylvers, and Small Corner Bar vs. Christ Church.
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Magnitude 5.9 Earthquake Strikes Chile Seismological Centre
MEXICO CITY, 3rd November, 2021 (WAM) — A magnitude 5.9 earthquake has occurred near the city of Los Andes in Chile, Sputnik quoted the National Seismological Centre of the University of Chile as saying Wednesday.
According to the preliminary information, the earthquake took place at 00:17 am local time (03:17 GMT) with its centre located 35.57 kilometers (23 miles) east of Los Andes. The National Emergency Office of the Chilean Interior Ministry says there is no risk of tsunami.
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‘The Polluter Must Pay’ – PM Browne Seeks Legal Redress Against Major Polluting Nations
By Orville Williams
Antigua and Barbuda Prime Minister Gaston Browne has declared that a recently-formed commission, representing the climate change interests of Small Island Developing States (SIDS), is actively planning to seek legal redress from industrialised countries for their role in the impact of climate change on the SIDS.
The Commission of Small Island States on Climate Change and International Law was established on Sunday with an official agreement between Antigua and Barbuda and Tuvalu, an archipelago in the Pacific Ocean.
“It is the heavy polluters, they are the ones who are creating the problem and as far as we see it, the polluter must pay.
“There has to be a mechanism [to allow for] compensation for loss and damage, which incidentally is one of the areas that was not discussed in any significant way at this [event],” PM Browne said while speaking to the BBC at the COP26 climate summit in Glasgow, Scotland.
The partnership between Antigua and Barbuda and Tuvalu echoes the sentiments of the overwhelming majority of small islands in the Caribbean, the Pacific, the Atlantic and Indian Oceans and the South China Sea.
Two of those most important sentiments are that SIDS collectively contribute less than one percent of global carbon emissions, yet are arguably most vulnerable to the effects of climate change, and that wealthier countries which are responsible for most of the world’s pollution are not contributing anywhere near the level of support – financial or otherwise – required to prevent and/or mitigate the climate change effects on SIDS.
For these reasons, Browne said, the time has passed for SIDS to be merely asking for the needed assistance.
“We’re now seeking legal advice on the issue of loss and damage, and to go the legal route to develop a compensatory mechanism for loss and damage.
“It’s unfair to these countries that repeatedly have to borrow to repair damaged infrastructure.”
The PM explained that, under the commission, the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea will be tapped and they will contact the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea – the independent judicial body established by the convention – to “get some directions as to how we deal with the issue of the liabilities arising from these heavy polluters”.
He added that the judgement they receive from the tribunal will be used as a mechanism to force the “heavy polluters” to settle wherever there is damage [as a result of climate change].
The Prime Minister also spoke on the general discussions taking place at COP26, with many world leaders issuing ‘doomsday’ warnings and renewed commitments to address climate change.
He told the BBC that, for far too long, there have been countless empty promises and failed objectives. “We want to see increased ambitions, not just talk,” he stated.
And one of those “increased ambitions” he has been calling for for some time is an adjustment to the lending criteria that is based on GDP per capita. This, he maintained, does not adequately account for the significant losses faced by small states as a result of climate change.
“A country like Antigua and Barbuda has been placed at a significant disadvantage. We’re considered to be a wealthy small island state and, generally speaking, the international community does not take into consideration the vulnerability of the country.
“We’ve been pushing for the developed countries [and] the international financial institutions to eliminate that per capita income criteria and to [instead] look at the vulnerability of the country, because when your country is destroyed by a hurricane, you have human suffering and [they’re] using this per capita income criteria, then it is insensitive.”
The 26th United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP26) kicked off in Glasgow last Sunday and is scheduled to run until November 12.
PM Browne led the Antigua and Barbuda delegation to the event and is joined in Scotland by Minister of Health, Wellness and the Environment, Sir Molwyn Joseph and Director of the Department of Environment, Ambassador Diann Black-Layne.
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Jamaican-Born Woman Makes History as Virginia Lt Governor
Jamaican-born Winsome Earle Sears is the next lieutenant governor of Virginia after defeating her Democratic opponent Hala S Ayala in yesterday’s election, running on a Republican ticket.
Sears, 54, who emigrated to the United States with her parents at age six, won 52.25 per cent of the votes in the elections to her opponent’s 47.75 per cent.
She made history as the first black Republican woman elected to the Virginia House in 2002, becoming the first naturalised US citizen to serve in the House and is now the first woman of colour to be elected to statewide office in Virginia.
The lieutenant governor is seen as a shoo-in for the prize of Virginia governor, if and when the position becomes vacant.
A staunch supporter of Donald Trump, at the time of her nomination in the Republican primary in May this year, Sears had said: “From the time my family arrived in America from Jamaica we have realised and appreciated the opportunity that the US provided us.”
She was featured in the Jamaica Observer April 26, 2021 edition of Jamaica in the World, shortly after throwing her hat in the ring for what was a tough challenge from one of the seven Democrats seeking their party’s nomination.
Virginia is described as blue, with Democrats winning the former Republican stronghold since 2004. No Republican has won a statewide election there since 2009, and President Joseph Biden won last November’s polls by double-digits, the first Democrat to do so since 1988.
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Poor Vaccine Take Up Forces Jamaica to Trash 185,000 Expired Astra Zenica Doses
Jamaicans have bee so slow in getting vaccinated the country confirmed that it has had to discard 185,000 doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine after they had expired over the last weekend.
But more is on the way. A government statement said that more than half a million doses of vaccines will be received “over the next few days,” even as the island received 369,000 doses of AstraZeneca on Monday.
It said that these vaccines are a gift from the Canadian government.
“Another 204,000 doses of Pfizer is also expected to arrive in the country on Wednesday. These vaccines, as previously announced, will be used to inoculate members of the population, who are awaiting their second dose of the Pfizer vaccine. The balance will be prioritized for children 12-17 years old,” the statement said.
It said people awaiting their second dose must schedule an appointment and that they will be able to choose their preferred date, time and vaccination centre.
“Members of the public should take a government-issued identification (school ID for students) or letter from a Justice of the Peace and their vaccination card to their appointments.”
Meanwhile, the country reported 47 new cases of COVID-19 and three virus-related deaths on Tuesday, pushing the total number of confirmed cases on the island since the outbreak to 89,170 and the confirmed deaths to 2,246.
The authorities said the new cases comprise 21 females and 26 males with ages ranging from 42 days to 96 years.
They said the latest victims are three males ranging in ages from 67 to 86-years-old and that another death was reported as under investigation.
The ministry further reported 176 new recoveries, which pushed the total recoveries to 58,267. There are 28,036 confirmed active cases on the island.
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