Proving that art transcends borders and geopolitics, the fourth Mediterranean Biennale in Haifa opened April 6 at WIZO Haifa Academy of Design & Education with works by 60 artists and art collectives from 17 countries — including Iran, Afghanistan and Turkey. The biennale was created in 2010 as a model for multicultural cooperation and dialogue between diverse outlooks held by different communities and groups. The theme this year is “Living Together — Crossing Borders.” Artists’ countries of origin include Afghanistan, Austria, Bahrain, France, Germany, Israel, Italy, Iran, Kazakhstan, Mexico, Portugal, Romania, Russia, Spain, Turkey, United Kingdom and United States. The…
Author: zenger.news
CANBERRA, Australia — Australian Treasurer Josh Frydenberg is confident that the country has bounced back from the coronavirus recession but concedes there could still be some “choppy” jobs figures ahead. Unemployment has fallen for the sixth month in a row and now sits at 5.6 percent. The jobs market is growing much faster than anticipated, with more than 70,000 jobs created in March. There are now more than 13 million people employed in Australia. “Australia has come so far from the depths of the crisis when we were standing on the edge of the economic abyss,” Frydenberg said on April 16.…
DARWIN, Australia — Australia’s Northern Territory needs more dams to store wet season rains for use in droughts or potential pipeline export to other states, a Top End senator says. “When we get a good wet, we get huge amounts of water dumped in the Top End, and we have minimal water storage facilities,” senator Sam McMahon said on April 15. “In fact, we haven’t built any large-scale water storage facilities for the last 40 years, and it’s ridiculous that when we do get all this rainfall, we catch very little of it.” She said dams were part of the solution…
CANBERRA, Australia — Australia’s Queensland academic and former James Cook University professor Peter Ridd has announced he will challenge his dismissal regarding criticism of the university in the High Court. In a post to Ridd’s Facebook on April 15, the academic said the High Court would hear his controversial dismissal from the university on June 23, 2021. “We just got a notification that the High Court appeal hearing will be by the Full Court at 10 am on June 23, 2021, in Court No. 1, Parkes Place, Canberra,” the post read. “My understanding is that appeals can be heard by between…
GEELONG, Australia — The mother of a Victorian man killed by his intellectually disabled housemate has described her grief as a “coat you cannot take off”. Michael Allan Ackerley, 50, has admitted to the fatal stabbing of Mathew Baum, 41, at home in Lara, outside Geelong, Victoria, Australia, in February 2020. Baum’s mother, Dianne Martin, spoke on April 16, 2020, about the loss of her son, a road worker and local cricketer. “When I do sleep, the dreams of Mathew are so real,” Martin told Victoria’s Supreme Court. “I wake up with feelings of such joy to realize it is only…
SYDNEY — An elderly Sydney barrister who described his sexual harassment of a young female solicitor (name cannot be disclosed) as “attempted chivalry” has been ordered to have at least eight hours of counseling. After the junior solicitor started crying, David Raphael placed his arm on her shoulder and kissed the top of her head. “Don’t worry, you poor thing,” he said. Raphael, who was admitted as a solicitor in 1965 and has practiced as a barrister since 1995, admitted sexually harassing the solicitor in a conference room in Australia’s New South Wales Supreme Court in 2017. “Won’t your husband get jealous because we are spending so…
BRISBANE, Australia — The man accusing former Australia reality TV star Suzi Taylor of assault and extortion admits he knew she was famous and tried to charm her the night he hired her as an escort in Brisbane. David Butler was drunk when he found the former Block contestant’s picture on escort site Scarlet Blue in the early hours of Oct. 30, 2019. The 50-year-old, whose real name is Suellen Jan Taylor, was posing as an escort called Katie when she agreed to meet with Butler through the website. The attempted charm offensive allegedly ended with Butler claiming to have been…
PERTH, Australia — The clean-up bill for Tropical Cyclone Seroja will stretch into the hundreds of millions, with 126 homes along Western Australia’s mid-west coast rendered uninhabitable. Around 170 properties have been destroyed or severely damaged, and 491 have sustained moderate or minor damage. Around 250 properties are to be assessed. Department of Fire and Emergency Services Commissioner Darren Klemm estimates the cost could be many times spent on the Wooroloo bushfires, which destroyed 86 homes near Perth in February. “It’d be much more than that. You’re into AUD 100 million ($77.38 million) to AUD 200 million ($154.75 million) — somewhere around…
BRISBANE, Australia — Beth Mooney has been given the 2021 ‘Leading Woman Cricketer in the World’ award by Wisden. But, typical of Australia’s low-profile World Cup-winning heroine, she would rather not have the honor at all. The new edition of Wisden, the annual English cricketing bible, reports that on hearing of her prestigious award, Mooney protested: “I don’t want that tag. I want to be me and fly under the radar.” But once again, after her heroics in 2020, it appears there is little chance for the brilliant 27-year-old Victorian to avoid the limelight as she follows teammates Ellyse Perry, the 2019 and 2016 winner,…
SYDNEY — Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison has warned of escalating regional tensions and stressed the need for like-minded countries to band together against a multitude of threats. In a recorded speech to the Raisina Dialogue in India, the prime minister described the Indo-Pacific as the epicenter of strategic competition. He said the region was dynamic, diverse, and full of promise. “But we’re also not blind to the geopolitical realities,” Morrison said. He said tensions over territorial claims were growing, and military modernization was happening at an unprecedented rate. “Democratic sovereign nations are being threatened and coerced by foreign interference. Cyber…