Evening News Bulletin 21 April 2024

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Source: SBS News

Calls for a crackdown on social media posts after two Sydney stabbing attacks; At least one dead in a Japanese military helicopter crash; Swimming Australia investigating after revelations about Chinese athletes at the Tokyo Olympics.


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TRANSCRIPT:
  • Calls for a crackdown on social media posts after two Sydney stabbing attacks;
  • At least one dead in a Japanese military helicopter crash;
  • Swimming Australia investigating after revelations about Chinese athletes at the Tokyo Olympics.
The Coalition has called for a crackdown on misinformation laws in the wake of two Sydney stabbing incidents.

False theories and graphic content were posted to platforms following a stabbing at a Sydney church last week, and the deadly Bondi Junction attack.

The government's planned law reforms were intially delayed over freedom of speech concerns.

But Opposition Leader Peter Dutton says tougher penalties forcing social media companies to remove misinformation from their platforms need to be rolled out to set a benchmark for the rest of the world.

Nationals leader David Littleproud has told Channel 9 he also supports change.

"I'm a big supporter of protecting freedom of speech and we've got to be careful when government tries to censor that. But this is a platform that has a responsibility, has big resources, and I don't think anyone can argue that putting up those distressing images is a good thing for freedom of speech."

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One crew member has died and seven others remain missing after two Japanese military helicopters crashed into the ocean.

The two choppers had been conducting anti-submarine exercises near Torishima off the southern coast of central Japan.

Japan's Defence Minister Kihara Minoru says an investigation has begun to determine what might have happened - including the possibility that the two helicopters collided.

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Deadly clashes have erupted in the West Bank as Israeli forces strike the city of Rafah in the Gaza Strip.

Health ministry authorities say a Palestinian ambulance driver has been killed as wounded people were relocated during a raid by Jewish settlers.

In Gaza, Israeli strikes have hit the southern city of Rafah, where more than one million Palestinians are sheltering.

Rafah is the last Gaza area that Israeli ground forces have not entered in a more than six-month war aimed at eliminating the Islamist Hamas group, following their October 7 attack.

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The federal government says it's confident an inquiry into supermarket prices will result in better deals for primary producers.

Federal Agriculture Minister Murray Watt says progress is being made on farmers receiving a fair price, following the interrogation of the heads of Coles and Woolworths in parliamentary hearings.

The inquiry was set up over concerns supermarkets were price gouging at the checkout while also offering below market value prices to suppliers.

The Minister says major supermarkets need to be held more accountable for their actions, telling Sky News it is up to everyone to help relieve cost of living pressure.

"Yeah, this issue really blew up last year when we saw that massive gap between what farmers were receiving for their produce and what consumers were paying... You know, in the end, what we're seeking here is simply a fair deal for farmers and for families."

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Thousands of Armenian, Assyrian and Greek Australians have taken to the streets of Sydney this afternoon, days before the Armenian Genocide Remembrance Day on April 24.

The group is calling on Prime Minister Anthony Albanese to characterise the massacres of over 1.5 million Armenians and over million Assyrians and Greeks as a genocide.

Rally organisers say this is something that the United States, France, Germany and Canada has already formally done.

Executive Director of the Armenian National Committee of Australia Michael Kolokossian says the communities have had enough of what he's described as shortfalls and euphemisms.

"Our three communities expect nothing less than accurate recognition of the events that happened 109 years ago."

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Indigenous artist Archie Moore has become the first Australian to win the coveted Golden Lion award for best national pavilion at the world's oldest international art biennial in Venice.

Mr Moore's work, which took several months to complete, is titled "kith and kin" and traces his Aboriginal ancestry back 65,000 years through a sprawling family tree written in chalk writing on the pavilion's dark walls and ceilings.

Archie Moore says the work draws on connection to place.

"We opened the window upstairs, which is usually closed during exhibitions, with the idea of, so you could view the canal here, which flows to the Venice lagoon and then flows to the Adriatic Sea, and then flows to the rest of the world, enveloping the Australian continent as a way to show that human connection, that we're all connected in some way."

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To sport,

And swimming officials in Australia have launched their own investigation following reports that 23 Chinese swimmers tested positive for a banned drug before the Tokyo Games in 2021.

Without mitigating circumstances, athletes who fail doping tests are usually subject to bans of two to four years for a first offence and life for a second - but in this case, it appears Chinese officials argued that the squad member samples had been contaminated.

The 30-member Chinese team ultimately went on to win six medals at the Games, including three golds.

CEO of the US Anti-Doping Authority Travis Tygart says questions remain about the way the case was originally handled.

"Athletes around the world are coming to us or coming to the public saying what in the world is going on. How can the system let us down this bad? How could the rules have not been followed in the way that the rules are followed in many other countries to protect the integrity of competition and protect the rights of clean athletes."

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