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JANUARY 13 (GMT) – JANUARY 14 (AEST), 2020

AUSTRALIAUKNORTH AMERICA

Trump facing 2nd impeachment

President Donald Trump is on the verge of being impeached for a second time, with the House planning the unprecedented vote one week after he encouraged a mob of loyalists to fight against election results and the US Capitol became the target of a deadly siege. While the first impeachment of Trump last year brought no Republican votes in the House, a small number of lawmakers are breaking with the party to join Democrats.

Pence won’t remove Trump

Vice President Mike Pence is ruling out invoking the 25th Amendment to remove President Donald Trump from power, less than a week after the president fomented the violent protest at the Capitol. In a letter to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Pence said the mechanism should not be used “as a means of punishment or usurpation” and reserved for cases of medical or mental incapacitation.

Three weeks to squash clusters

NSW will require at least another three weeks to fully extinguish COVID-19 clusters around Greater Sydney, health authorities have warned. The state recorded one new local COVID-19 case in the 24 hours to 8pm on Tuesday – a child who was a close contact of a case linked to the 28-person Berala cluster in western Sydney. Six COVID-19 cases were uncovered in NSW hotel quarantine.

Minority ‘putting nation at risk’

Home Secretary Priti Patel has said a minority of the public are “putting the health of the nation at risk” as she backed a tougher police approach to lockdown rules. Speaking at a Downing Street press briefing, she said that officers are moving more quickly to issuing fines where people are clearly breaching coronavirus regulations, with nearly 45,000 fixed penalty notices issued across the UK since March.

Call for urgent virus measures

London Councils and Mayor Sadiq Khan have implored Prime Minister Boris Johnson to immediately implement tougher coronavirus measures – including closing places of worship – or risk putting an “unsustainable strain” on the NHS and public services. After a major incident was declared in the capital last week due to rising COVID-19 cases, Khan and London Councils chair Georgia Gould have called for measures similar to those in place last March and April.

Mixed response to measures

The government is feeling the pressure from all sides on COVID-19 with critics calling the latest border controls both too strong and too weak. New rules mean nearly all New Zealanders living abroad will soon have to show a negative COVID-19 test before boarding their flight home. Only travellers from Australia, Antarctica and some Pacific Islands will be exempt.

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JANUARY 13 (GMT) – JANUARY 14 (AEST), 2020

AUSTRALIAUKWORLD

Iran navy holds missile drill

Iran’s navy began a short-range missile drill in the Gulf of Oman, state TV reported, amid heightened regional tensions over Tehran’s nuclear program and a US pressure campaign against the Islamic Republic. The two-day missile drill was being held in the gulf’s southeastern waters and two new Iranian-made warships joined the exercise: The missile-launching Zereh, or “armour,” and the Makran, a logistics vessel with a helicopter pad.

Hunt on for voice recorder

Divers looking for a crashed plane’s cockpit voice recorder were searching in mud and plane debris on the seabed between Indonesian islands to retrieve information key to learning why the Sriwijaya Air jet nosedived into the water over the weekend. Indonesian navy divers have recovered the flight data recorder from the jet that disappeared last weekend minutes after taking off from Jakarta with 62 people aboard.

Expert calms vaccine concerns

Australia’s chief medical officer has sought to ease concerns about the effectiveness of a leading coronavirus vaccine. Some doctors are concerned that the vaccine developed by Oxford University and AstraZeneca may not be enough to achieve herd immunity. The drug has an efficacy rate of between 62 and 90 per cent in clinical trials, which is well below both the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines.

Peers back troops in Afghanistan

International troops should remain in Afghanistan until a peace deal with the Taliban is secured, a committee of peers has said. The Lords International Relations and Defence Committee urged the Government to press the incoming US administration of President-elect Joe Biden to maintain an international military presence in the country until an agreement is reached.

UK roads see fall in congestion

Urban traffic congestion has fallen more significantly in the UK than in many other countries during the coronavirus pandemic, according to new figures. Location technology firm TomTom said only four of the world’s 100 most gridlocked cities of 2020 were in the UK, compared with 10 during 2019. Congestion in UK cities fell by an average of 24 per cent, due to the virus crisis leading to many people working from home and schools being closed.

Quarantine staff facing stigma

Managers at managed isolation facilities say their workers are encountering unfair stigma in the community, and the pressure has been so bad that some have quit because of it. Christchurch charge nurse Kerry Winchester said she has been shocked by the way some people have treated her staff when they realised where they work. Her nurses had been confronted in supermarkets and barred from going to their children’s school meetings or onto school grounds.

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JANUARY 13 (GMT) – JANUARY 14 (AEST), 2020

NORTH AMERICA

Vice President Mike Pence. - AP

Pence rebukes push to remove TrumpVice President Mike Pence is ruling out invoking the 25th Amendment to remove President Donald Trump from power, less than a week after the president fomented the violent protest at the Capitol.

In a letter to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Pence said the mechanism should not be used “as a means of punishment or usurpation” and reserved for cases of medical or mental incapacitation. Pelosi has called on Pence to secure the majority of the Cabinet and vote to declare Trump unfit to serve.

As the House appears on the cusp of a bipartisan impeachment of Trump, Pence encouraged Congress to avoid actions to “further divide and inflame the passions of the moment” and to focus on smoothing the transition to President-elect Joe Biden’s administration.

Pelosi has said if Pence rejects use of the 25th Amendment, the House will move to impeach him. Already, at least three Republicans have said they would vote for that. ■

President Donald Trump. - AP

NORTH AMERICA

Trump on verge of 2nd impeachmentPresident Donald Trump is on the verge of being impeached for a second time, with the House planning the unprecedented vote one week after he encouraged a mob of loyalists to fight against election results and the US Capitol became the target of a deadly siege.

While the first impeachment of Trump last year brought no Republican votes in the House, a small but significant number of leaders and other lawmakers are breaking with the party to join Democrats, unwilling to put American decency and democracy at further risk, even with days remaining in the president’s term.

The collapse of Trump’s final days in office, against alarming warnings of more violence ahead by his followers, leaves the nation at an uneasy and unfamiliar juncture before Democrat Joe Biden is inaugurated on January 20.

“If inviting a mob to insurrection against your own government is not an impeachable event, then what is?” said Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-Md., a drafter of the articles of impeachment.

Trump, who would become the only US president twice impeached, faces a single charge of “incitement of insurrection.”

The four-page impeachment resolution relies on Trump’s own incendiary rhetoric he spread about Biden’s election victory, including at a White House rally on the day of the January 6 attack on the Capitol, in building its case for high crimes and misdemeanors as demanded in the Constitution.

Confronting his potential place in history, Trump warned lawmakers off it, suggesting it was the drive to oust him rather than his actions around the riot that was dividing the country.

“To continue on this path, I think it’s causing tremendous danger to our country, and it’s causing tremendous anger,” Trump said, his first remarks to reporters since last week’s violence. ■

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JANUARY 13 (GMT) – JANUARY 14 (AEST), 2020

UK

- PA

Demand for urgent tougher virus measuresLondon Councils and Mayor Sadiq Khan have implored Prime Minister Boris Johnson to immediately implement tougher coronavirus measures – including closing places of worship – or risk putting an “unsustainable strain” on the NHS and public services.

After a major incident was declared in the capital last week due to rising COVID-19 cases, Khan and London Councils chair Georgia Gould have written to Johnson calling for measures similar to those in place last March and April.

Aside from the closure of places of worship, they have called for the PM to make mask-wearing mandatory outside the home – including in supermarket queues, on high streets and in other possibly crowded outdoor settings.

Also among four major demands is for the Government to provide greater financial support for Londoners who need to self-isolate and are unable to work, backed by improved asymptomatic testing for key workers.

The two leaders also called for the the rollout of vaccines across London to be accelerated, and for the provision of daily vaccination data by borough and ethnicity.

“We recognise how difficult these decisions are and how they will impose further tough restrictions on Londoners,” the letter said. “With new levels of infection remaining high we are left with little choice but to ask that you implement them.”

Khan and Gould said places of worship were “crucially important for communities” and that “we wouldn’t be making this request if the situation wasn’t very serious”.

The letter also urges four other more temporary measures: an urgent review of what constitutes essential and non-essential retail, stricter guidance on how retailers can prevent unsafe queues and crowding, prohibiting click and collect services at non-essential retail chains, and stronger guidance on size restrictions for weddings, funerals and similar gatherings. ■

Home Secretary Priti Patel

UK

Patel: Minority of Brits putting nation at riskHome Secretary Priti Patel has said a minority of the public are “putting the health of the nation at risk” as she backed a tougher police approach to lockdown rules.

Speaking at a Downing Street press briefing, she said that officers are moving more quickly to issuing fines where people are clearly breaching coronavirus regulations, with nearly 45,000 fixed penalty notices issued across the UK since March.

Chairman of the National Police Chiefs’ Council Martin Hewitt said that more officers will be out on dedicated patrols to deal with rule breakers, while Communities Secretary Robert Jenrick has also spoken to councils about enforcing the regulations.

Latest figures showed that a further 1243 people had died within 28 days of testing positive for COVID-19, which brings the UK total to 81,960.

Separate figures published by the UK’s statistics agencies for deaths where COVID-19 has been mentioned on the death certificate, together with additional data on deaths that have occurred in recent days, show there have now been 99,000 deaths involving COVID-19 in the UK.

The Government also said that there had been a further 45,533 lab-confirmed cases of coronavirus in the UK. It brings the total number of cases in the UK to 3,118,518.

Hewitt told the briefing that officers will not “linger” trying to encourage the public to obey lockdown rules.

He said: “It is very clear that we are now at the most dangerous stage of the pandemic.

“There is a real and present risk that our health service could be overwhelmed and people – our friends and family – could die needlessly from this virus.

“So, we must all play a part in stopping that from happening.“Ten months on, the rules are clear and I urge everyone to

abide by them“With a virus spreading so rapidly through contact with

others we should all be asking ourselves whether our reason to leave home is truly essential.

“Those personal decisions are critical.” ■

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NEW ZEALAND

COVID-19 recovery minister Chris Hipkins. - RNZ / Dan Cook

Mixed response to new coronavirus measuresThe government is feeling the pressure from all sides on COVID-19 with critics calling the latest border controls both too strong and too weak.

New rules mean nearly all New Zealanders living abroad will soon have to show a negative COVID-19 test before boarding their flight home.

Only travellers from Australia, Antarctica and some Pacific Islands will be exempt.

The Health Ministry is expected to announce a phased roll-out of countries affected over the coming weeks, beginning with the United Kingdom and United States this week.

It is a shift in position for the government, which last year described blanket pre-departure testing as ineffective and unnecessary.

COVID-19 recovery minister Chris Hipkins said the government’s strategy had evolved in response to the global environment and a new strain of the virus running rampant abroad.

“More and more countries are now adopting pre-departure testing which makes it a lot more feasible,” Hipkins said.

“If only New Zealand was doing it, it would actually be very difficult for people to comply.”

National leader Judith Collins said her party had been calling for such action since August and the government had been “lackadaisical” and “complacent” in its response.

“There seems to be a real lack of urgency. These pre-departure tests should already have been in place, as they have in other countries. Canada, for instance, took a week. How come it’s taken us so long?”

Epidemiologist Michael Baker said National’s criticism had validity as most airlines already required a negative test now anyway.

“We have been quite slow with this,” he said. “I don’t think it’s enough.” ■

NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian. - AAP

AUSTRALIA

NSW: Three more weeks to squash virus clustersNSW will require at least another three weeks to fully extinguish COVID-19 clusters around Greater Sydney, health authorities have warned.

NSW will require at least another three weeks to fully extinguish COVID-19 clusters around Greater Sydney, health authorities have warned.

Six COVID-19 cases were uncovered in NSW hotel quarantine.

NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian also confirmed a COVID-positive man, who presented to Mount Druitt Hospital with respiratory symptoms, and his partner are linked to the Berala cluster.

While Berejiklian said NSW was in the “mopping-up” phase of the outbreak, Chief Health Officer Dr Kerry Chant said more time was required to fully squash outbreaks in the northern beaches and Berala.

The government earlier said it was unlikely coronavirus-prompted restrictions in Greater Sydney would be eased this week, while mandatory mask usage would not change in the near future.

The northern beaches cluster numbers more than 150 people, but on Wednesday had its federal COVID-19 hotspot status revoked by Chief Medical Officer Paul Kelly.

“It would take at least three, maybe four weeks, and so I need the community to be on track with us,” Chant said.

“As an epidemiologist, we like to see around two incubation periods before we assess that we are free of the disease … There are multiple factors.”

Berejiklian backed her state’s contact tracing teams, saying their work enabled the government to make decisions that didn’t place “unnecessary burdens” on residents, such as keeping interstate borders open.

NSW came in for criticism from Western Australia Premier Mark McGowan, who argued the state was the sole proponent of a COVID-19 suppression strategy, as opposed to elimination. ■

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WORLD

Indonesian navy personnel remove a part of aircraft recovered in the Java Sea where a

Sriwijaya Air passenger jet crashed, near Jakarta, Indonesia. - AP

Hunt on for crashed plane’s voice recorderDivers looking for a crashed plane’s cockpit voice recorder were searching in mud and plane debris on the seabed between Indonesian islands to retrieve information key to learning why the Sriwijaya Air jet nosedived into the water over the weekend.

Indonesian navy divers have recovered the flight data recorder from the jet that disappeared last weekend minutes after taking off from Jakarta with 62 people aboard. The information on both black boxes will be key to the crash investigation.

The 26-year-old Boeing 737-500 had resumed commercial flights last month after almost nine months out of service because of flight cutbacks caused by the coronavirus pandemic.

The US Federal Aviation Administration sent an airworthiness directive requiring operators of various Boeing 737 aircraft models, including the 737-500, to carry out engine checks before they can be flown again after being out of service. The order followed reports of engines shutting down in mid-flight because of corrosion in a key valve.

Director General of Air Transportation Novie Riyanto said the plane was inspected on December 2, including checks for engine corrosion, and was declared airworthy by Indonesia’s Transportation Ministry on December 14. It resumed commercial flights on December 22, according to ministry data. After returning to service, the plane made 132 flights, including the last one, according to aviation-data firm Flightradar24.

Aviation experts said planes that are parked for long stretches can be returned to flight safely.

“It depends on how the airline maintains the aircraft while it is grounded,” said William Waldock, an aviation-safety expert at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University in Prescott, Arizona. He said airlines should run engines periodically and perform other maintenance. “It tends to keep everything lubricated, and it reduces the likelihood of corrosion building up in places you don’t want it to be.” ■

The Iran-made warship Makran. - AP

NORTH AMERICA

Iran holds missile drill amid tensionsIran’s navy began a short-range missile drill in the Gulf of Oman, state TV reported, amid heightened regional tensions over Tehran’s nuclear program and a US pressure campaign against the Islamic Republic.

The two-day missile drill was being held in the gulf’s southeastern waters and two new Iranian-made warships joined the exercise: The missile-launching Zereh, or “armour,” and the Makran, a logistics vessel with a helicopter pad named for a coastal region in southern Iran.

President Donald Trump in 2018 unilaterally withdrew the US from Iran’s nuclear deal, in which Tehran had agreed to limit its uranium enrichment in exchange for the lifting of economic sanctions. Trump cited Iran’s ballistic missile program among other issues in withdrawing from the accord.

When the US then ramped up sanctions, Iran gradually and publicly abandoned the deal’s limits on its nuclear development as a series of escalating incidents pushed the two countries to the brink of war at the beginning of the year.

In recent weeks, Iran has increased its military drills. Last weekend, the paramilitary Revolutionary Guard held a naval parade in the Persian Gulf and a week earlier Iran held a massive drone manoeuver across half the country.

Also last week, Iran seized a South Korean oil tanker and its crew members in the Gulf, and continues to hold the vessel at an Iranian port. The Islamic Republic has apparently sought to increase its leverage over Seoul ahead of negotiations over billions of dollars in Iranian assets frozen in South Korean banks tied to US sanctions on Iran.

This week, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo accused Iran of having secret ties with the militant al-Qaida network and imposed new sanctions on several senior Iranian officials. Iran has denied the accusation.

Iran’s President Hassan Rouhani said in a televised speech during a Cabinet meeting that US sanctions will fail. “We are witnessing the failure of a policy, the maximum pressure campaign, economic terrorism,” he said. ■

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UK

- PA

Britain’s roads see fall in congestionUrban traffic congestion has fallen more significantly in the UK than in many other countries during the coronavirus pandemic, according to new figures.

Location technology firm TomTom said only four of the world’s 100 most gridlocked cities of 2020 were in the UK, compared with 10 during 2019.

Congestion in UK cities fell by an average of 24 per cent, due to the virus crisis leading to many people working from home and schools being closed.

During April, the first full month of a coronavirus lockdown, rush hour traffic was typically 78 per cent lower than during the same month in 2019.

Edinburgh remained the UK’s most congested city, with average journeys last year taking 32 per cent longer compared with free-flow conditions.

This was down nine percentage points during the previous 12 months, making it the 43rd most gridlocked city in the world out of 416 analysed.

Cities with less of a decline in traffic jams include Paris (down seven percentage points), Moscow (down five percentage points), Istanbul (down four percentage points) and Berlin (down two percentage points).

The UK’s second most congested city was London, with average journeys taking 31 per cent longer due to traffic, followed by Hull (28 per cent), Brighton and Hove (28 per cent) and Belfast (26 per cent).

TomTom’s head of traffic innovation and policy Stephanie Leonard said: “Early last year, we announced that congestion levels were rising in the UK, and the country was moving in the wrong direction, but then everything changed in March 2020.

“Driven by the global pandemic, the UK saw a massive drop in traffic levels.

“From lockdowns to closed borders, people movement changed and it changed very fast. Rush hour, once the bane of drivers and traffic planners, disappeared almost overnight as office workers set up their home offices." ■

Afghan security officers inspect the site of a bombing attack in Kabul, Afghanistan. - AP

UK

Peers back troops to ramain in AfghanistanInternational troops should remain in Afghanistan until a peace deal with the Taliban is secured, a committee of peers has said.

The Lords International Relations and Defence Committee urged the Government to press the incoming US administration of President-elect Joe Biden to maintain an international military presence in the country until an agreement is reached.

The appeal comes as peace talks have resumed in Qatar between the Afghan government and the Taliban amid continuing violence by both the Taliban and the local affiliate of so-called Islamic State (IS).

It follows an agreement between the US administration of Donald Trump and the Taliban which committed to the withdrawal of all foreign troops from the country by May 2021.

The committee expressed “regret” that the agreement was not conditional upon the outcome of the talks in Qatar.

It said the Afghan government’s position had been further weakened by Trump’s plans for 2500 US troops to pull out this week – although that has been called into doubt by legislation passed by Congress.

The UK ended combat operations in Afghanistan in 2014 but still has 850 troops with a Nato military training mission in the country.

“We urge the UK to emphasise to the US and to Nato allies the importance of their ongoing presence in Afghanistan until a peace deal is reached,” the committee said.

“The Government must engage with the incoming Biden administration on Afghanistan as a matter of urgency.”

Despite the UK’s heavy engagement in the country since the 9/11 attacks of 2001, the committee said that in recent years there had been “few traces of a coherent overall policy approach”. ■

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Quarantine staff face ‘huge’ stigmaManagers at managed isolation facilities say their workers are encountering unfair stigma in the community, and the pressure has been so bad that some have quit because of it.

Christchurch charge nurse Kerry Winchester said she has been shocked by the way some people have treated her staff when they realised where they work.

Her nurses had been confronted in supermarkets, barred from going to their children’s school meetings or onto school grounds to pick children up, and some have had difficulty getting routine doctor or dentist appointments.

She has had more than one staff member who found the barriers set against them so difficult they’ve resigned because of it.

“Lots of staff are feeling isolated, the stigma is huge, it can be quite hard, and the perception is we are a risk to the public – which is simply not true.

“We have not seen community transmission of COVID from managed isolation workers in the time that we have been running managed isolation facilities, so I think we can be fairly confident in our processes there.

“Just treat anyone that you know working in these facilities with kindness. Every single agency working for managed isolation has the same goal in mind, and that is to prevent COVID from reaching the community.”

Staff working at the Waipuna Hotel in Auckland have had friends and family reluctant to meet, and business contacts had repeatedly cancelled appointments where hotel staff had already travelled to another city to meet, after they realised what the hotel was being used for.

Navy Lieutenant Sam Wilson, who is managing the managed isolation operation at the Waipuna Hotel, said his own flatmates had moved out when they learned what he would be doing. And while they were still on good terms, he was frustrated at hearing the hurt and difficulty his workers were experiencing in their everyday lives. ■

NEW ZEALAND

Caption here…

Chief medic calms vaccine concernsAustralia’s chief medical officer has sought to ease concerns about the effectiveness of a leading coronavirus vaccine.

Australia’s chief medical officer has sought to ease concerns about the effectiveness of a leading coronavirus vaccine.

The drug has an efficacy rate of between 62 and 90 per cent in clinical trials, which is well below both the Pfizer and Moderna vaccines.

The federal government has ordered 54 million doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine and plans to give it to most Australians, pending approval by the Therapeutic Goods Administration.

Some medical professionals want the planned rollout suspended and are urging the government to pivot to other options.

But Chief Medical Officer Paul Kelly is standing by the strategy, which has been in planning for many months.

“The great advantage of the AstraZeneca vaccine is it is being made here in Australia. It will be available as soon as the TGA gives its tick, which we expect that it will in February,” Professor Kelly said.

“We’re not the only country in the world that has AstraZeneca ordered. AstraZeneca is one of the mainstays of the global response and remains so.

“The AstraZeneca vaccine is effective, it is safe and it’s a high quality vaccine, but those are the things that the TGA will be looking at with their full approval coming very soon.”

Australia has supply agreements in place for the AstraZeneca, Pfizer and Novavax vaccines.

The federal government has not struck a deal for Johnson and Johnson or Moderna, whose drug is easier to distribute than the Pfizer vaccine.

Labor health spokesman Chris Bowen is urging the government to secure more deals.

He is concerned about the potential risks if AstraZeneca fails to pass health and safety checks. ■

Chief Medical Officer Paul Kelly. - AAP

AUSTRALIA