National Party leader Christopher Luxon says MP Simon O’Connor was asked to delete a social media post saying it was a “good day” after abortion rights in the US were curtailed because it “was causing distress and does not represent…

History is in the making with American space agency NASA set to launch a rocket into the skies above east Arnhem Land tonight.

It is the first time since 1995 that a rocket will take off from Australian soil and the first time for NASA launching a commercial rocket.

NASA's rocket will take off from the red dirt at the Arnhem Space Centre outside Nhulunbuy about 10.44pm local time tonight.

READ MORE: Human rubbish found on Mars by NASA rover

Those on the ground and in surrounding areas will be able to track the rocket as it makes its way through the skies, just seconds after lift-off until it exits the Earth's atmosphere.

The space centre is privately owned and operated by Equatorial Launch Australia (ELA).

READ MORE: NASA launches study of UFOs despite 'reputational risk'

Tonight's launch will be the first of three the centre has scheduled with NASA over the next three weeks. 

But this is just the beginning, with ELA planning for up to 50 launches each year. 

By RNZ New polling shows most New Zealanders support changing the country’s drug laws to remove criminal penalties and instead offer education, treatment, and other health-based approaches.The new polling, conducted by The Navigators…

Public Interest Journalism funded through NZ On Air For centuries, Māori have marked the reappearance of the small cluster of Matariki stars in the mid-winter sky, by gathering to enjoy the bounty of harvest from the earth,…

A man has been taken to hospital in a critical condition after being found outside a Rotorua address with a stab wound to the chest.A police media spokesperson said a man was located outside a Victoria St address with a stab wound…

OPINION: For a country that holds itself up as a beacon of hope and freedom, America sure has a warped way of showing it. 

The freedom to own and carry a weapon has been extended in some US states, despite mass shootings on a daily basis, including 19 innocent children gunned down in their classroom a month ago in Uvalde Texas. 

Even basic restrictions like tougher background checks for gun licences have been rejected by lawmakers, with no hope of bringing in bans on assault weapons that should only ever belong in the hands of the military. 

READ MORE: First US states introduce new abortion laws

So the freedom to be armed to the teeth is enshrined in law in the country with the highest number of mass shootings of any wealthy country on the planet. 

But the freedom to have an abortion is now gone for more than half the country. 

The conservative majority US Supreme Court has overturned the landmark Roe v. Wade decision, which enshrined the reproductive rights of women across the country since the 1970s. 

A decision that is so personal and should only ever be up to the individual has now been hijacked by the courts and exposed the deep fault-lines of division that are tearing America apart. 

It also begs the question – what other freedoms will be wound back in the land of the free?

Same-sex marriage? Contraception? What will be next? 

I lived in the United States for more than three years right after the September 11 attacks that changed that country and the world, and despite the upheaval and uncertainty, it was still a country with enormous hope and appeal and opportunity. 

There is no way I would want to live in America today. 

Overturning Roe v. Wade means that women who live in half the country – in the state's that will now ban abortion, or have done so immediately with trigger laws – will have to travel to the states that have vowed to continue protecting their reproductive rights if they make the deeply personal decision to terminate a pregnancy. 

Reproductive rights will now be determined by geography. 

Companies like Amazon, the second-largest private employer in the US, acted as soon as leaked information emerged of the Supreme Court ruling, guaranteeing workers $4000 in travel expenses every year for non-life threatening medical procedures like abortion. 

READ MORE: With Roe dead, some fear rollback of LGBTQ and other rights

For women who don't work for companies like Amazon and who can't afford to travel, or are unable to, the brutal days of backyard procedures will return.

And the warped reality is that in some parts of America, women will no longer have the choice of terminating a pregnancy, but there are few protections for children from the scourge of gun crime that claims young lives each and every day. 

America is no longer the land of the free or of the brave.

Deborah Knight is a presenter on 2GB and 4BC, hosting Afternoons With Deborah Knight from 12-3pm, Monday to Friday.

The eastern Ukrainian city of Severodonetsk is "completely under Russian occupation," the city's head of military administration says, following months of grueling and bloody fighting.

"The [Russians] appointed a commandant. But the city is so destroyed that it will be difficult for people to cope with this situation," said military administration chief Oleksandr Striuk.

Regional military officials said that the last troops in Severodonetsk had been ordered to leave, as it was impossible to keep defending their positions.

READ MORE: 'Red flag': Shocked former classmates of alleged Russian spy speak

This effectively ceded the city to Russia and put the eastern Ukrainian region of Luhansk almost fully under Russian control.

Severodonetsk was one of the last major Ukrainian strongholds in the area. Serhiy Hayday, a top military commander in east Ukraine, said Saturday the military made the decision to evacuate "because the number of dead in unfortified territories may grow every day."

"Currently, there is no possibility to leave the city, people can try to leave only in the direction of the occupied territory. We will facilitate the evacuation, but so far there is no such opportunity," Striuk said.

Several hundred civilians had taken shelter at the Azot chemical plant and rejected pleas to leave. Earlier on Saturday, Hayday said Russian forces were still shelling the plant.

"Civilians are leaving the territory of the Azot plant, they [the Russians] shoot propaganda videos with them. People spent almost 3 months in basements, shelters. At the moment, they need physical and psychological help," Striuk added.

Avalanche of missile strikes

Ukraine has been hit by an avalanche of missile strikes, with official accounts there estimating that Russia fired more than 40 missiles at targets in Ukraine in the past 24 hours.

The General Staff of the Ukrainian military said there was more shelling around Kharkiv, and the Russians had tried to launch an assault near the settlement of Uda, north of Kharkiv, but "were decisively suppressed by our soldiers."

READ MORE: Biden signs landmark gun measure, says 'lives will be saved'

North of Sloviansk, the Ukrainian military reported continuing battles in areas that have been on the front lines for months.

The Russians used artillery and air strikes against Ukrainian positions some 20 kilometres north of the city.

On the southern front, the Ukrainian military reported that a Russian assault to recover previously lost ground in Kherson had been repulsed.

Ukrainian forces have been pushing into Kherson, with limited success, from Mykolaiv region.The mayor of the city of Mykolaiv, Oleksandr Sienkevyck, reported explosions there overnight.

On Friday, he urged "everyone who wants to stay alive to leave the city," and said it was being "shelled every day," with 111 people killed so far.

Explosions were also reported by the regional military administration in Zhytomyr in central Ukraine, killing one soldier and wounding another, although the city's mayor said Zhytomyr itself was "not hit."

The head of the military administration said "about 10 missiles" had been shot down by Ukrainian defenders. Regional authorities in Lviv in western Ukraine also reported missile strikes against military facilities.

Offensive continues in eastern Ukraine

Two US officials with direct knowledge of US intelligence assessments told CNN Russian forces were gaining an advantage in eastern Ukraine as they learned from mistakes made during the earlier stages of their invasion of the country, including better coordination of air and ground attacks as well as improvements to logistics and supply lines.

Meanwhile, Ukrainian troops in the eastern city of Lysychansk are under growing pressure from Russian forces that have taken territory to the south of the city.

Hayday said Russian forces tried to enter Lysychansk from the south and to surround the city – and had also carried out an airstrike on the city.

The Ukrainian military's General Staff said Saturday that Russian efforts to cut off the main route from Bakhmut to Lysychansk continued. It said Ukrainian soldiers had stopped the advance of Russian infantry near Volodymyrivka, which is 5 kilometres from the highway.

But the General Staff acknowledged the Russians had advanced 1 kilometre as they close in on Bakhmut.

The Russian goal appears to be to cut off Ukrainian forces in a pocket of Luhansk and Donetsk regions. If they capture Bakhmut they would be able to prevent most resupply efforts to Ukrainian defenders in Lysychansk and surrounding districts.

Ukraine claims attacks launched from Belarus airspace

As Ukrainian authorities assessed the damage from dozens of missile strikes overnight, the Defense Ministry's Main Intelligence Directorate said that many of the missiles were fired from Belarusian airspace.

The Directorate said that "missile strikes from the territory of Belarus are a large-scale provocation of the Russian Federation in order to further involve Belarus in the war against Ukraine."

It said '"Russian bombers hit directly from the territory of Belarus. Six Tu-22M3 aircraft were involved, which launched 12 Kh-22 cruise missiles."

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The Directorate said the missiles had been launched from airspace above the district of Petrikov in southern Belarus.

"After launching the missiles, they returned to Shaikovka airfield in Russia. The strike was launched on Kyiv, Chernihiv and Sumy regions."

"This is the first case of an air strike on Ukraine directly from the territory of Belarus," the Directorate said.

CNN cannot confirm that allegation.

Ukraine's air force command has echoed the Defense Ministry's comments, saying on its Facebook page that "more than fifty missiles of various types were fired: air, sea and ground-based."

There has been no word from the Belarus government on the alleged use of its airspace for the latest strikes against Ukraine.

Ukraine denies Russian claim of attack on Polish 'mercenaries'

A Russian missile hit the town of Kostiantynivka in Donetsk Saturday, according to both local authorities and the Russian Ministry of Defense.But the two sides' versions of what was targeted differ. Oleksii Roslov, head of Kostiantynivka civil military administration, said an "object of critical infrastructure was hit," affecting gas supply and killing one person.

The Russian Ministry of Defense published a short video of the missile attack, saying it targeted Polish mercenaries based at the Megatex plant in Kostiantynivka and had killed up to 80 of them, as well as rocket launchers.

Russian Defense Ministry spokesman, Lieutenant General Igor Konashenkov, said: "The enemy continues to suffer significant losses.

Up to 80 Polish mercenaries, 20 armored combat vehicles and eight Grad multiple launch rocket systems were destroyed as a result of strikes with high-precision weapons of the Russian Aerospace Forces on the buildings of the Megatex zinc plant."Roslov denied the claim.

"There weren't any military there. Many people were there after the strike, everyone can confirm there were no military," Roslov told CNN.

Around 45,000 people remain in the town, which is some distance from the front lines.

Americans were taking stock a day after the Supreme Court overturned a woman's constitutional right to an abortion, as states began implementing bans and supporters and foes of abortion rights mapped out their next moves.

The depth of emotion unleashed by Friday's decision led to protests and prayer vigils across the country, with Arizona lawmakers even hiding in a basement for a time while police fired tear gas into a crowd.

In Charleston, West Virginia, at least 200 abortion supporters gathered on Friday night for a candlelight vigil in front of the federal courthouse after the state's last abortion clinic was forced to cancel all of its appointments.

READ MORE: Reproductive freedom to be 'determined by geography' after US ruling

Katie Quinonez, executive director of Women's Health Center of West Virginia, told the crowd she threw threw her phone against the wall of her office when she learned that Roe v. Wade had been overturned after almost 50 years. Her staff called 70 patients scheduled over the next month "to tell them that their abortion was cancelled and we would have to send them out of state, and that was it."

Quinonez vowed that the fight for abortion rights will continue: "This is not the end whatsoever. … Tonight we mourn, we rage. Tomorrow we get to work."

In Arizona, thousands of demonstrators — split between those who support and oppose abortion rights — gathered outside the state Capitol on Friday night.

Police fired tear gas to disperse anti-abortion demonstrators who banged on the glass doors of the Senate building, and lawmakers, rushing to complete their 2022 session, huddled briefly in a basement.

Clinics in Arizona stopped performing abortions after the decision, as did those in Alabama, Arkansas, Kentucky, Missouri, South Dakota, West Virginia and Wisconsin. Women considering abortions already had been dealing with a near-complete ban in Oklahoma and a prohibition after roughly six weeks in Texas.

READ MORE: Police find abandoned car linked to boxer's shooting in Melbourne

In Ohio, a ban on most abortions from the first detectable fetal heartbeat became law when a federal judge dissolved an injunction that had kept the measure on hold for nearly three years. Another law with narrow exceptions was was triggered by the ruling in Utah and went into effect.

Mississippi's only abortion clinic, which was at the center of the case before the Supreme Court, continued to see patients Friday. Outside, men used a bullhorn to tell people inside that they would burn in hell. Clinic escorts wearing colorful vests used large speakers to blast Tom Petty's "I Won't Back Down" at the protesters.

The ruling is likely to lead to abortion bans in roughly half the states, and people on both sides of the issue predicted the fight would continue.

In Minnesota, where abortion remains legal, Gov. Tim Walz signed an executive order to help shield people seeking or providing abortions in his state from facing legal consequences in other states. In neighboring South and North Dakota, the Supreme Court ruling triggered, respectively, an immediate abortion ban and one that takes effect in 30 days.

Walz also has vowed to reject requests to extradite anyone accused of committing acts related to reproductive health care that are not criminal offenses in Minnesota.

"My office has been and will continue to be a firewall against legislation that would reverse reproductive freedom," he said.

In Fargo, North Dakota, the the state's sole abortion provider plans to move across the river to Minnesota. Red River Women's Clinic owner Tammi Kromenaker said Saturday that she has secured a location in Moorhead but gave no further details.

Thirteen states, mainly in the South and Midwest, already had laws to ban abortion in the event Roe was overturned. Another half-dozen states have near-total bans or prohibitions after 6 weeks, before many women know they are pregnant.

In roughly a half-dozen other states, including West Virginia and Wisconsin, the fight will be over dormant abortion bans that were enacted before Roe was decided in 1973 or new proposals to sharply limit when abortions can be performed.

Wisconsin's Democratic Gov. Tony Evers told The Associated Press on Saturday that he will support legal action to overturn a 173-year-old state abortion ban. He also said he would not appoint district attorneys who would enforce the law, and would commute prison sentences for anyone convicted under it.

"We're looking at everything," he said.

Four years after winning election by a narrow margin, Evers said he believes this issue will energise independents and he hopes to translate anger over Roe's demise into votes this fall.

"Any time you take half the people in Wisconsin and make them second-class citizens, I have to believe there's going to be a reaction to that," Evers said.

After the Supreme Court overturned Roe v Wade, holding that there is no longer a federal constitutional right to an abortion, protesters and supporters of the ruling gathered at the high court's building in Washington, DC, and in other cities nationwide.

Similar demonstrations are planned in at least 70 locations across the country on Friday and the weekend, according to CNN's research. Organisations like Planned Parenthood, Bans Off Our Bodies and Women's March are among the groups organizing the events.

In the nation's capital on Friday, one person led protesters in front of the Supreme Court in a chant of "Hands off! Hands off!" and a call-and-response of "My body! My choice!"

READ MORE: 'This is not over': Biden vows to fight for abortion rights

One woman told CNN affiliate WJLA the decision was an outrage.

"It's illegitimate. Abortion bans are illegitimate," the woman said.

"Forced motherhood is illegitimate."

Protesters asked those in attendance to donate to abortion advocates and purchase abortion pills to distribute to others.

READ MORE: First US states introduce new abortion laws

Abortion rights opponents were also present in front of the Supreme Court building in Washington, DC. After the decision came down, a man – standing amid placards including the messages "Roe is dead" and "I am the post-Roe generation" – sprayed champagne in the air above others who were celebrating.

There were several dozen abortion rights opponents at the site during the afternoon, but it appeared they had filtered out of the crowd by evening.

The demonstration has been peaceful and there have been no arrests or any reason for Capitol Police to intervene. Law enforcement is on hand because authorities are still concerned about domestic violent extremists who may see the large crowds as an opportunity for violence.

READ MORE: With Roe dead, some fear rollback of LGBTQ and other rights

In New York's Greenwich Village, thousands of people were marching and chanting in the streets in a peaceful demonstration. One of the chants directed the f-word at Justice Brett Kavanaugh. There were some anti-abortion activists at the march, but they were keeping a low profile and there were no confrontations seen by the CNN crew walking with the protesters.

Demonstrators in Los Angeles clogged the 110 freeway as it passed through downtown, blocking traffic. While abortion will remain legal in California, the protesters said they were showing their concern and support for women in other states.

In Atlanta, several hundred people in two different demonstrations merged and gathered in front of the Capitol. Almost all the people were protesting the decision. A CNN crew saw one counter-protester where one group began its march a few miles away.

In Texas, a large crowd gathered in front of a federal courthouse in downtown Austin. People took to a microphone to tell stories, many of fear and frustration. Some carried signs, including one that said "Pro-life is a lie, they don't care if we die."

In Washington, DC, an abortion rights activist climbed to the top of the Frederick Douglass Memorial Bridge, which was subsequently shut down. Guido Reichstadter posted videos and photos of himself on social media from the top of the bridge, where he unfurled a large green banner. Green is recognized as a symbol of abortion rights.

Reichstadter also planted a flag on the bridge that read "Don't tread on my uterus."

He told CNN while many people in the US oppose the Supreme Court's decision, their support is largely passive, which he says is not enough to ensure women have access to abortions across the country.

A helicopter with three people onboard has crashed at Echuca in Victoria.

While all three people survived, one person has been taken to hospital in a critical condition.

Two others are believed to be in a stable condition and will be transported to local hospitals.

Emergency services are trying to determine the cause of the crash, which happened at 4.30pm today.

The Australian Transport Safety Bureau has been notified.