Covid: Sydney extends lockdown as other Australian cities reopen

 Sydney's lockdown has been extended by another month as Covid cases continue to rise.

Australia's largest city has been under stay-at-home orders since late June due to an outbreak of the Delta variant.

More than 2,500 people have been infected in Sydney's worst outbreak this year.

New South Wales - of which Sydney is the capital - reported 177 new cases on Wednesday, the most in a day since March 2020.

Premier Gladys Berejiklian said it was not possible for the city to exit lockdown on Friday as had been planned.

She announced further curbs on movement - including a 10km (6.5 miles) limit on essential shopping.

Victoria and South Australia both came out of lockdowns on Wednesday, after containing smaller outbreaks.

Sydney's five million residents had enjoyed a fairly normal lifestyle this year until the outbreak happened.

For most of the pandemic, Australia has kept infections relatively low by closing its borders and ordering hotel quarantine for arrivals.

State governments have plunged cities into rapid lockdowns to curb outbreaks, using aggressive contact tracing.

There have been over a dozen snap lockdowns in the past year.

But experts warn that restrictions in Sydney could last until September or even later.

Authorities say they cannot re-open until the transmission rate is back to near zero.

At least one in three cases from the past week had been infectious in the community. Reasons included undertaking critical work and grocery shopping.

The highly policed lockdown has fuelled discontent among some in the community.

Several thousand people staged "freedom" protests in Sydney, Melbourne and other cities on the weekend.

• Anger as half of Australians back in lockdown
• Sydney lockdown protesters condemned as selfish

It has also highlighted the nation's bungled vaccine programme, which began in February.

Just 16% of Australia's adult population is vaccinated.

Critics have blamed the low rate on the federal government's failure to secure more supplies of the Pfizer vaccine.

They also attribute it to confidence in the AstraZeneca vaccine being undermined by mixed messaging about its rare blood clot risk.

The national regulator has recently updated its guidance to urge Sydney residents to get the AstraZeneca jab, of which Australia has a large supply.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison apologised for his government's handling of the rollout last week, following months of criticism.

Excerpt from BBC News Homes......

Capitol riot: Policeman tells 6 January hearing he feared he would die

 A police officer who defended the US Capitol during a riot by Donald Trump supporters on 6 January has said he feared he would be crushed by the mob.

"This is how I'm going to die," a tearful Aquilino Gonell told a Congressional committee as an inquiry opened into the Washington DC attack.

Another officer, Harry Dunn, who is black, said he was racially abused.

At least 535 rioters have been arrested since the attack that left five dead, including one police officer.

Prosecutors have so far secured only a few convictions.

The assault led to the political impeachment and acquittal of Republican Mr Trump, who was accused by lawmakers of inciting the riot - a claim he has repeatedly denied.

• What to look for as inquiry begins
• Capitol riots: What we have learned six months on

The inquiry in the House Select committee is being conducted almost entirely by Democrats, after most Republicans boycotted the proceedings.

However, two Republicans - Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger - have broken ranks to join the investigation.

"If those responsible are not held accountable... this will remain a cancer on our constitutional republic," Ms Cheney said as the hearing began on Tuesday.

The nine-member select committee was formed after Republicans objected to an independent commission such as the one that investigated the 11 September 2001 attacks.

The panel - which has powers to summon witnesses - is expected to investigate the circumstances leading up to the riot and why law enforcement bodies were ill-prepared.

A 'medieval battlefield'

On Tuesday, four police officers described being beaten and assaulted by rioters who had come to disrupt the certification by Congress of President Joe Biden's election victory.

Officer Gonell described the scene as a "medieval battlefield".

Wiping away tears, he described returning home and pushing his wife away from him because of the amount of chemical irritant that had soaked into his uniform.

The Iraq War veteran went on to criticise Republicans for what he described as their "continuous shocking attempt" to "ignore or destroy the truth" about that day.

Asked by Ms Cheney about Mr Trump's claim that they were a "very loving crowd," Sgt Gonell hit back: "I'm still recovering from those hugs and kisses."

"If that was hugs and kisses, we should all go to his house and do the same thing to him."He later said that he did not mean for anyone to go to Mr Trump's home, and apologised for the "outburst".

Officer Dunn said he told several protesters that he had voted for Mr Biden.

"Does my vote not count? Am I nobody?" he told them, after they wrongly claimed that the election was fraudulent.

"That prompted a torrent of racial epithets," he testified. "One woman in a pink Maga [Make America Great Again] shirt yelled, 'You hear that, guys, this [expletive] voted for Joe Biden!"

"No-one had ever - ever - called me a [expletive] while wearing the uniform of a Capitol police officer."

'Those words are weapons'

Officer Michael Fanone slammed his fist on the desk as he accused Republicans of a "disgraceful" violation of their oaths of office.

Mr Kinzinger, one of the only Republicans who voted to impeach Mr Trump for his role in the riot, appeared to hold back tears as he criticised his colleagues.

"We still don't know exactly what happened. Why? Because many in my party have treated this as just another partisan fight. It's toxic and it's a disservice to the officers and their families," Mr Kinzinger said.

Officer Dunn said he did not fully process the racial comment until the following days.

"I was just trying to survive that day, and get home.

"When I was able to process it, it was so emotional. It was so disheartening and disappointing that we live in a country like that, where they attack you because of the colour of your skin.

"Just to hurt you. Those words are weapons."

Officer Daniel Hodges' lip trembled with emotion as he was shown a video of himself trapped in a doorway being pummelled by rioters, who he repeatedly referred to as "terrorists" during his testimony.

"To my perpetual confusion, I saw the Thin Blue Line flag, a symbol of support for police, more than once, as the terrorists continued to ignore our commands and attacked us," he said.

Excerpt from BBC News Homes......

North and South Korea restore communication hotline

North and South Korea have restored a communication hotline that was cut off by Pyongyang last June.

According to the South's presidential office, the leaders of both countries have agreed to rebuild trust and improve ties.

The two leaders have exchanged multiple personal letters since April, the Blue House added.

North Korea cut the hotline in June 2020 as relations soured after a failed summit between the two countries.

Shortly afterwards, North Korea blew up an inter-Korean office near the border which was built with the intention of helping them communicate.

"According to the agreement made between the top leaders, the north and the south took a measure to re-operate all inter-Korean communication liaison lines from 10:00 on July 27,"said news agency AFP quoting North Korea's official KCNA news agency."The two leaders also agreed to restore mutual trust between the two Koreas as soon as possible and move forward with the relationship again," it added.

Ties between both countries improved in 2018, when South Korean President Moon Jae-in and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un met three times.

But this quickly broke down following the collapse of a second summit between Mr Kim and then US President Donald Trump.

Tensions later worsened, prompted by defector groups in the South sending propaganda across the border.

This eventually led North Korea to cut off all military and political communication links, including a hotline between their leaders.

South Korea's president had called for the hotline to be restored and talks aimed at dismantling North Korea's nuclear and missile programmes.

The two Koreas remain technically at war because the 1950-1953 Korean war ended with an armistice rather than a peace treaty.

01. https://www.bbc.com/news/topics/cp78wz6vexet

02 .https://www.bbc.com/news/topics/cywd23g0gz5t

03 . https://www.bbc.com/news/topics/cnx753jej1xt

Excerpt from BBC News Homes......

 

US combat forces to leave Iraq by end of year

President Joe Biden says US forces will end their combat mission in Iraq by the end of this year, but will continue to train and advise the Iraqi military.

The announcement came after Mr Biden held talks with Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi at the White House.

There are currently 2,500 US troops in Iraq helping local forces counter what remains of the Islamic State group.

Numbers of US troops are likely to stay the same but the move is being seen as an attempt to help the Iraqi PM.

The US presence in Iraq has become a major issue since top Iranian general Qasem Soleimani and the leader of an Iran-backed Shia Muslim militia were killed in a US drone strike in the capital Baghdad last year.

Political parties aligned to Iran have demanded the withdrawal of all forces from the US-led global coalition against IS, despite the continuing threat posed by the Sunni jihadist group.

Shia militias have meanwhile been accused by the US of carrying out hundreds of rocket, mortar and drone attacks on Iraqi military bases that host coalition forces in an apparent attempt to pressure them to leave.

For the US president, the announcement marks the end of another war that began under former President George W Bush. This year he said US troops would leave Afghanistan.

• Iraqis suffer as US-Iran shadow war shifts gear

Speaking at the White House, Mr Biden told his Iraqi counterpart "our counter-terrorism co-operation will continue even as we shift to this new phase."

Mr Kadhimi responded: "Today our relationship is stronger than ever. Our co-operation is for the economy, the environment, health, education, culture and more." He has insisted no foreign combat troops are needed in Iraq.

US-led forces invaded Iraq in 2003 to overthrow President Saddam Hussein and eliminate weapons of mass destruction that turned out not to exist.

Then President George W Bush promised a "free and peaceful Iraq", but it was engulfed by a bloody sectarian insurgency.

US combat troops eventually withdrew in 2011. However, they returned at the request of the Iraqi government three years later, when IS militants overran large parts of the country.

Following the military defeat of IS in Iraq at the end of 2017, US forces remained to help prevent a resurgence of the group.

"Our role in Iraq will be dealing with being available to continue to train, to assist, to help and deal with ISIS as it arrives," Mr Biden added at the meeting.

"But we're not going to be, by the end of the year, in a combat mission."

Advantage Iran?

Ever since Iran's Islamic Revolution in 1979 it has been trying to evict US forces from its neighbourhood and become the premier power in the region.

It has had little success in the Arab Gulf states where mistrust of Tehran runs deep and where the US military has facilities in all six countries.

But the US-led toppling of the Saddam Hussein regime in Iraq removed the most effective obstacle to Iranian expansion, and Tehran has not passed up on the opportunity since then. It has successfully inserted its Shia militias into the fabric of Iraq's security establishment, and its allies have a powerful voice in parliament.

Syria's civil war has opened the door for a major Iranian military presence there, while next door in Lebanon Iran's ally Hezbollah has become the most potent force in the country.

Iran is playing the long game. Its leaders hope that if it keeps up the pressure, both overt and covert, it will eventually make the Middle East a region not worth America's effort to stay engaged in, militarily.

Hence the frequent rocket attacks on US bases and Iran's support for civil protest calling for US troops to leave.

An agreement that sees the end of US combat operations in Iraq will be seen by many in Tehran as a step in the right direction.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-57976007

Excerpt from BBC News Homes..

 

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