Tony Abbott wants Australia to suspend aid to the Palestinian Authority because “it keeps paying pensions to terrorists and their families”. The former prime minister made the call in an opinion piece published in the Spectator Magazine on Monday. Australia gives more than $40m a year in aid to Palestine, provided through United Nations agencies and some charitable organisations. The ...

A spate of new retailers is expected to expand into Australia in the coming year and even more are planning on expanding their online presence. Only seven percent of money spent in Australia’s retail sector is spent online, making Australia a very bricks and mortar dominant region. As a result, many international retailers have announced plans to expand their operations ...

SYDNEY —  Australian counter-terror officers arrested a 40-year-old man at Sydney Airport, after he disembarked from a flight from London, and charged him with making online threats “relating to New Year’s Eve” festivities in Sydney, police said Friday. The arrest follows police raids across the southern city of Melbourne a week ago, which authorities said foiled an Islamic State-inspired plot ...

An Australian man has found instant fame after being filmed pretending to fish during flash floods in Melbourne. Video of Paris Diaz Jordanou hamming it up for news crews has been viewed more than five million times since Thursday. In the footage, Mr Jordanou is heard yelling “I’ll catch him” as a car begins to float in floodwaters. Social media ...

The South China Sea dispute ripping Asia apart has landed in Australian waters, with authorities facing a surge in illegal Vietnamese fishing off northern Australia – a problem experts say is costing the country “millions”. About 150 illegal Vietnamese fishermen in 10 vessels have been arrested in Australian waters since March compared to none in 2015. With the Chinese coast guard excluding fisherman from the waters it claims around ...

The Australian based Refugee Action Coalition says the death of a man medivacced from Papua New Guinea to Australia is yet another casualty of the systematic neglect that characterises Manus Island, and offshore detention. Sudanese refugee Faysal Ishak Ahmed collapsed at the Australian run detention centre on Manus Island and was evacuated to hospital in Australia last week. Australia’s Department ...

Sunny and 100 degrees doesn’t exactly spell Christmas. But as Rebecca Doub ventured into the sizzling grasp of Melbourne, Australia, she was thrown into a kind of “Christmas in July” in December paradox. “I have to admit it’s been a little strange hearing songs like ‘White Christmas’ while we have the windows rolled down in the car because it’s so ...

Australia’s federal court has fined Valve AUD$3 million (USD$2.2 million) after ruling that the company breached consumer law when it didn’t offer refunds between 2011 and 2014. This is the maximum fine requested by Australia’s competition regulator and it’s 12 times more than Valve itself suggested it should pay, according to The Sydney Morning Herald. Justice James Edelman said he ...

Pakistan smelled some Australian panic in Brisbane and are a transformed cricket side after their first Test near-miss. Opener Sami Aslam said they were brimming with confidence heading into the Boxing Day Test. After collapsing for 142 in the first innings at the Gabba, the tourists were outstanding after being set 490 for an unlikely win. They only fell 39 ...

Police in Australia have detained five men suspected of planning a series of Christmas Day bomb attacks in the heart of the country’s second-largest city, officials said Friday. The suspects had been inspired by ISIS and planned attacks on Melbourne’s Flinders Street train station, neighbouring Federation Square and St. Paul’s Cathedral, Victoria state Police Chief Commissioner Graham Ashton said. The arrests came after someone hijacked ...