Sombre mood at WA Labor HQ

IT was such a somber mood among the WA Labor camp on election night that one of the only cheers from the crowd came when an image of the party's leader appeared on the television.

Less than 100 people gathered in Mark McGowan's electorate of Rockingham on Saturday night.

Heading into the state election, it looked like Labor was going to lose.

But no one expected political experts to begin calling the result before 7.30pm (WST).

"It looks terrible. What a bloodbath," one Labor supporter lamented.

Deputy leader of the Opposition Roger Cook was the only Labor politician to front the venue early in the evening and admitted to reporters that it was looking like a tough night ahead for his party.

"We need to just wait and see how the night develops," he said.

Mr Cook said there was still a sense of anticipation because it was early in the count.

He said there was a sense of pride in how the election campaign had been run by Labor.

"We believe we've run a very competitive campaign for a party that obviously doesn't have the resources to draw upon that the Liberal party does," he said.

"We've brought forward bold policies, bold visions for Western Australia."

Mr Cook also admitted there had been some damage to the Labor brand from the federal government.

"To what extent it had a role to play in the state election is very difficult to say," he said.

They may be headed for a whitewash in the election, but at least there is plenty of good food to eat while Labor supporters drown their sorrows.

20.07 | 0 komentar | Read More

Four Qld councils vote 'yes' to reform

RESIDENTS from four amalgamated former Queensland councils have all voted to break away and reform their old councils.

Those in favour of de-amalgamation of the old Douglas, Mareeba, Livingston and Noosa areas were celebrating as the results from Saturday's poll came in.

"This is a fabulous outcome, not only for our community and democracy, but also for our region," Yeppoon ward councillor Bill Ludwig, of the former Livingstone shire, told AAP.

"Our community has slogged away for two-and-a-half years to get this done."

De-amalgamation supporters say the decision - which will take effect from 2014 - will bring back smaller, more personalised councils.

Those against the return to the old structure, including Cairns Mayor Bob Manning, say the current set-up has been more cost effective and made regions more powerful.

Mr Manning says he fears the stark reality of state and federal budget squeeze, which is seeing less money flowing to local councils, will kick in and prove former Douglas shire residents' decision to be a retrograde step.

"There's a financial imperative here, and no one can hide from that," he said.

"I think it's going to be a long hard road."

Deputy mayor and Mareebra ward councillor Evan McGrath welcomed the result, saying his community had never wanted amalgamation.

"I'm glad now that we've got our council back," he said.

The number of councils in Queensland was more than halved from 157 to 73 in 2008 to save costs.

The Queensland's Liberal National Party government made an election promise to give councils a vote to reverse that 2008 decision.

An interim CEO will be appointed at all four councils, with new councils to be voted in at the end of the year.

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Federal Labor weighed on McGowan

FEDERAL Labor's sinking popularity and ailing image has dragged down the party's West Australian leader Mark McGowan, who was heading for a massive defeat in one of the state's most swiftly called elections.

ABC election analyst Antony Green called the result in favour of the incumbents, as polling predicted, about one hour after counting began.

With 12.71 per cent of the votes tallied at 7.15pm WST, the Liberals accounted for 47 per cent of valid votes and the Nationals 10.04 per cent, compared to 30.43 per cent for Labor.

Labor's federal defence minister Stephen Smith said from the outset that it was going to be a tough night for Labor.

"If there is a swing on, it's a swing to the coalition, a swing to Colin Barnett," Mr Smith said.

"That means we'll lose seats and the question for us is what will be the extent of that."

Mr Smith acknowledged it was very tough to defeat a first term government, and had only happened twice in Australia's history.

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Japanese man drowns on Gold Coast beach

A JAPANESE man has drowned on a Gold Coast beach.

Police say the 34-year-old man was unconscious when he was rescued from the water at Northcliffe Beach in Surfers Paradise about 10.30am (AEST) on Friday.

He was taken to Gold Coast Hospital, but resuscitation attempts failed.

A report is being prepared for the coroner.

No further details were available.

20.08 | 0 komentar | Read More

Japan clones 26 generations from a mouse

JAPANESE scientists have produced 26 generations of clones from a single mouse, the lead researcher said, possibly paving the way for the mass replication of valuable livestock.

The team have so far produced 598 mice that are genetic copies of one original creature in an experiment that has so far been going for seven years, said Teruhiko Wakayama of the Riken Center for Developmental Biology.

"This is by far the largest cloning project using a mammal," he said on Friday.

"By applying our study, mass reproduction of prized animals should become possible even after the original animals die," he said.

Reliable methods for cloning over an extended number of generations could be a boon to farmers who have, for example, a cow that produces a lot of milk, or an animal that is expected to produce particularly high-quality meat.

Natural breeding does not guarantee that an animal's offspring will have the same qualities, but a clone is an exact copy.

Wakayama has significantly improved on existing capabilities that had a low success rate and tended only to last for a few generations.

The team used a technique called somatic cell nuclear transfer, whereby a cell's nucleus, which contains the genetic information of the original animal, was inserted into a living egg that had its own nucleus removed.

The egg was then planted in a surrogate who delivered the clone. That cloned result then became a donor for another cell nucleus, which was implanted into a host cell, allowing the cycle to continue.

Overall, the cloned mice have normal biological features, including normal longevity and reproductive capability.

Detailed genetic analysis showed limited abnormalities in non-vital aspects, such as large placenta, but the clone-specific abnormalities neither increased nor decreased over generations of recloning, Wakayama said.

Wakayama's team has found that use of a certain chemical agent, called a histone deacetylase inhibitor, and other technical improvements allowed recloning to continue for many generations, he said.

"Our results show that repeated iterative recloning is possible," he said.

"I want to say we should be able to continue this forever. We will continue our study until we see the end of it," he said.

The study was published in the US-based journal Cell Stem Cell.

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UN agency to feed 2.5 million Syrians

THE World Food Program says it aims to feed 2.5 million Syrians next month, up from 1.7 million now, because of rising needs as more Syrians are displaced by the civil war.

The UN estimates that nearly 4 million of Syria's 22 million people have been driven from their homes by the fighting, including those who fled to neighbouring countries and some 2 million who are moving from shelter to shelter inside Syria.

Many of the internally displaced need food aid, along with those who remain in their homes but have trouble finding food as the Syrian economy is collapsing.

Spokeswoman Elisabeth Byrs said on Friday that World Food Program fed 1.7 million Syrians in February.

She says that will rise to 2 million in March and 2.5 million in April.

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60 dead in Borneo stand-off

CLASHES between Filipino militants and security forces in Borneo have left 60 people dead, including 52 of the armed intruders, according to Malaysian police.

Malaysia's police chief Ismail Omar told reporters on Thursday that since 3pm local time on Wednesday, 32 followers of a self-proclaimed Philippine sultan were killed in two confrontations.

Eight Malaysian policemen died in earlier skirmishes last week, during a three-week stand-off over the group's claim to the state of Sabah on the eastern coast of Borneo.

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More gang rapes reported in India

TWO women have been kidnapped and gang-raped near Delhi, in two separate incidents that highlight the persistent risk of sexual assault in India.

In one case, three men abducted and attacked a 19-year-old woman, who hailed an auto rickshaw carrying two male passengers near a popular shopping centre in Delhi's satellite city of Ghaziabad last weekend, a police official said.

"The driver drove the rickshaw to a remote forested area where he and the two other men repeatedly raped her before fleeing the area," said Nitin Tiwari, Ghaziabad's senior superintendent of police.

The teenager then made her way to a local police station where she filed a case against her attackers, two of whom confessed to their crimes earlier this week, Tiwari said.

Police are still in pursuit of the third man, he added.

The second incident involved a 25-year-old woman who met one of her alleged attackers in a park in east Delhi on Wednesday to discuss a possible job opportunity, said Delhi police press officer Satbir Singh.

"She said the man offered her a soft drink, which she drank before passing out due to some illicit substance in the drink. When she woke up, she found herself trapped in a car with a few other men inside," Singh said.

"The men raped her before dumping her near a dustbin, where police found her lying unconscious at two o'clock in the morning."

Police are hunting the alleged attackers.

A three-year-old child who was allegedly kidnapped and gang-raped had been admitted to a hospital in the southern state of Kerala, local media reported on Thursday.

The toddler went missing on Tuesday morning, before a group of school students found her lying unconscious outside and called the police, according to NDTV news channel.

The child sustained several injuries and has already been through two surgeries at a hospital in Kozhikode city, where she is under observation.

The crimes come amid debate in India over the status of women and girls and their safety in the country.

Rape incidents in Delhi alone have doubled this year, India's minister of state for home affairs Mullappally Ramachandran told the upper house of parliament on Wednesday.

The Indian capital has seen around four rape cases a day since January 1, compared to an average of two rape cases registered daily in 2012, though the increase could be attributed, in part, to more reporting by emboldened women.

Thousands took to the streets to protest against India's treatment of women following the fatal gang-rape of a 23-year-old student on a moving bus in Delhi in December.

20.07 | 0 komentar | Read More

Morrison stands by refugee comments

Scott Morrison has explained the behavioural protocol he thinks asylum seekers should live by. Source: AAP

OPPOSITION immigration spokesman Scott Morrison has explained the kind of behavioural protocol he thinks asylum seekers should live by when they are released into the community.

Mr Morrison was last week criticised for his comments after a Sri Lankan asylum seeker, released into the community on a bridging visa, was charged with the indecent assault of a female university student in Sydney.

He said communities must be notified when asylum seekers are released from detention and that behavioural protocols be applied.

Mr Morrison on Thursday said one "obvious" behavioural protocol would be about setting a limit on the number of people allowed in a room where asylum seekers are housed.

"If there were two people who are supposed to be in a room, then there should be two people in that room," he told Sky News.

Setting clear rules around behaviour would help asylum seekers understand how they're supposed to use the services and how to interact with the people providing those services, Mr Morrison said.

"When people go and work on resources projects, they're subject to behaviour protocols to be on site," he said.

"You go and play a game of golf, you're subject to behavioural protocols.

"You go and walk into a club or a pub, you're subject to behavioural protocols."

Meanwhile, the first man to be transferred to Australia's offshore processing centre on Papua New Guinea's Manus Island has abandoned his asylum claim and has returned to Iraq.

This takes the total number of voluntary returns of would-be refugees in 2013 so far to 44.

Immigration Minister Brendan O'Connor said it showed the government's no-advantage policy was working.

"The Gillard government is determined to deter people from risking their lives on perilous journeys to Australia on unseaworthy vessels by ensuring there is no advantage over people who seek to come to Australia through regular channels," he said in a statement.

Mr Morrison later said he came up with the idea of behaviour protocols himself.

"This is my proposal," he told ABC television.

But he wouldn't be drawn on whether he ran the idea past the shadow cabinet or Opposition Leader Tony Abbott.

"I'm not going to go into our internal processes," Mr Morrison said.

"I'm telling you I had the full authority to do it and I did and I would do it again."

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Police face Philippines murder charges

PHILIPPINE investigators will file a murder case against 35 police officers and soldiers for allegedly executing 13 people at a checkpoint, the justice secretary says.

An investigation ordered by President Benigno Aquino III into the killings concluded that the victims were summarily executed and there was no shootout as claimed by the security personnel.

Presidential spokeswoman Abigail Valte said Aquino directed Justice Secretary Leila de Lima to file a criminal and administrative complaint after reading the report by the National Bureau of Investigation.

"The conclusion is that no shootout occurred," de Lima said on Wednesday. "The victims were summarily executed."

She said prosecutors would decide whether there was enough evidence against the 21 police and 14 soldiers before filing the case in court.

The investigation found that the killings were a plan by the police colonel who led the security force at the checkpoint, Hansel Marantan, to eliminate his rival in the illegal gambling operation. Local newspapers have reported that Marantan was a protector of an illegal numbers game called "jueteng".

Marantan has denied any wrongdoing.

20.08 | 0 komentar | Read More