Earthquake in Australia Forces Hospitals and Residents to Evacuate

THE NEW YORK TIMES: The 5.9-magnitude quake damaged buildings in Melbourne, but there were no immediate reports of serious injuries or deaths.

Damaged buildings along Chapel Street in Melbourne after an earthquake on Wednesday. | Asanka Ratnayake/Getty Images
THE NEW YORK TIMES: The 5.9-magnitude quake damaged buildings in Melbourne, but there were no immediate reports of serious injuries or deaths.

MELBOURNE, Australia — A magnitude 5.9 earthquake hit southeast Australia on Wednesday morning, damaging buildings and forcing hospitals to evacuate staff members and patients. It was an unusually large quake in a country less susceptible to major temblors than neighboring countries.

There were no immediate reports of serious injuries or deaths, Prime Minister Scott Morrison said at a news conference from New York, where he was attending the U.N. General Assembly.

It was the largest onshore earthquake in the state of Victoria in recorded history, according to Adam Pascale, chief scientist at the Seismology Research Center. And it was the largest land earthquake in the country since 2016, when a 6.1-magnitude temblor hit the Northern Territory, according to Geoscience Australia.

The quake on Wednesday collapsed the walls of buildings in Melbourne, Australia’s second-largest city and the capital of Victoria. It forced residents to flee apartments, shattered windows, left cracks in roads and led to power outages.

Photos and videos shared widely on social media show a damaged building in Melbourne, with bricks spewed across the street. » | Yan Zhuang | Tuesday, September 21, 2021

Australia Anti-lockdown Rallies: Protesters Violently Clash with Police in Melbourne

THE GUARDIAN: Thousands march through streets of Melbourne and Brisbane, as police try to prevent Sydney rally

Protesters opposed to Covid lockdowns clash with police in Melbourne, Australia. Photograph: Dave Hewison/Speed Media/Rex/Shutterstock
Anti-lockdown protesters clashed violently with police as thousands of unmasked people marched through the streets of Melbourne on Saturday.

Victoria police said they had made 218 arrests and that six officers were hospitalised during a series of altercations. Police said in a statement the majority of the estimated 4,000 demonstrators “came with violence in mind”.

“The behaviour seen by police was so hostile and aggressive that they were left with no choice but to use all tactics available to them,” the statement said.

Footage posted on social media showed protesters cheering, throwing objects at police officers and letting off flares as well as police pepper-spraying protesters.

The Melbourne protests took place after Victoria’s premier, Daniel Andrews, announced a lockdown in place across Melbourne would be extended across the entire state. The state recorded 77 new cases of coronavirus on Saturday.

More than 700 extra Victorian police officers were deployed to contain the lockdown protest.

Police said they had, for the first time during a lockdown protest, used non-lethal tactics that included rounds of pepper spray projectiles and canisters.

Two police officers suffered broken noses. One officer was hospitalised with a broken thumb and others suffered concussion. » | Ben Smee and Graham Readfearn | Saturday, August 21, 2021

Clashes Erupt At Anti-Islam And Anti-racism Rallies In Melbourne, Australia

Anti-racism Protesters and Nationalists Clash in Demonstrations

Anti-Islamic group Reclaim Australia and the United Patriots Front clash today at demonstration held in Melbourne. Contains lots of capsicum spray, protesters and cops throwing punches.

THE TELEGRAPH: Australia police use capsicum spray on protestors at race rally »

Australian Teens Held Over Alleged Terror Attack

BBC AMERICA: Police in Australia say they have foiled an Islamic State-inspired plot to carry out an attack at a World War One centenary event.

Police arrested five suspects, including two 18-year-olds being held for alleged terrorism-related offences.

They said the men were planning to target police at an Anzac memorial event in Melbourne next week.

Some 200 police officers took part in the counter-terrorism operation in the city early on Saturday.

Acting deputy police commissioner Neil Gaughan told reporters that evidence gathered by police led them to believe the suspects had been influenced by Islamic State. » | Saturday, April 18, 2015

Reclaim Australia and No Room for Racism Rallies Clash Across Australia

NEWS.COM.AU: VIOLENCE erupted at protests across Australia as anti-Islamisation and anti-racism groups clashed at rival rallies.

Around the country Reclaim Australia protesters held rallies to oppose “sharia law, halal tax and Islamisation”, where they waved Australian flags and carried signs saying “Yes Australia. No Sharia”.

More than 3000 people clashed in Federation Square and blocked surrounding streets in the Melbourne CBD as it became a battleground of competing ideologies, with a rally by the Reclaim Australia movement and counter-protest by the left-wing No Room for Racism group.

Hundreds of police formed barricades to separate protesters but scuffles still broke out and paramedics had to treat assault victims for minor injuries.

Victoria Police arrested two men and one woman, with all three released pending summons.

Tempers flared as a Reclaim Australia supporter scuffled with a Guy Fawkes mask-wearing socialist protester.

More than 100 officers put up a line of bodies to separate the two groups. (+ videos) » | Sunday, April 05, 2015

Islam a 'Dangerous and Totalitarian Ideology': Wilders
THE SYDNEY MORNING HERALD: FAR-right Dutch politician Geert Wilders has called the Prophet Mohammed a murderer and used Anzac soldiers as an example of the courage needed to speak out against Islam at a speech to Melbourne supporters.

Tight security surrounded Mr Wilders' hour-long speech to members of the ultra-conservative local group the Q Society of Australia at La Mirage reception centre in Somerton in Melbourne's north on Monday night.

Fifty police, some on horseback, separated about 100 vocal but peaceful protesters standing on the Hume Highway verge outside the venue.

Protest organiser Feiyi Zhang said: "we're here to show we will not stand for Wilders' racism and Islamophobia". She said his speech could incite violence against Muslims "and general fear of Islam".

Protester Nadia Shamsuddin, a doctor and a Muslim, said she was "repulsed" by Wilders' visit and views. "His promotion of oppression and racism is appalling in civilised world".

Her husband Raj Rao said: "Wilders accuses Islam of promoting hatred and violence but I think that's what he's doing."

Mr Rao said the message of the Qu'ran was of "peace and submission to God".

Inside the venue, audience member Inez, a Dutch immigrant, said she had come from Ringwood to hear Wilders, "because we have built this country into something very, very beautiful but I can slowly see it getting spoiled by people who want to impose their beliefs and laws.

"When I hear Muslim people wanted to introduce Sharia law here, I shudder. I thought it too horrible to contemplate." » | Carolyn Webb | Tuesday, February 19, 2013

Cold Reception for Anti-Islam Campaigner

SBS: Right-wing Dutch MP Geert Wilders has told SBS he is "happy" to be in Australia despite getting a frosty reception from local politicians.

Right-wing Dutch MP Geert Wilders has told SBS he is "happy" to be in Australia despite getting a frosty reception from local politicians.

"Even your Prime Minister said not the most kind things about me, and your former Minister of Immigration stalled granting me a visa," he said.

"Freedom of speech is one of the most important things in our free society and I am happy to be here."

Wilders is visiting Melbourne at the invitation of Q Society, where he will speak about his anti-Islamic platform in what he calls a warning to Australia. » | Source: SBS Staff | Monday, February 18, 2013

Protesters Clash at Anti-Muslim Rally in Melbourne
THE AUSTRALIAN: MUSLIM groups are worried by a new nationalist body that claims Australia is in danger of being Islamicised.

Australian Defence League supporters clashed with Left-wing protesters in the city yesterday as the group held its first local rally, sparking a warning from the Baillieu Government that bigotry would not be tolerated.

A small team of police initially kept the groups apart, but ADL supporters were forced to end their protest early when activists encircled them and tore up placards.

The ADL is an offshoot of the English Defence League, which has staged demonstrations in areas of high Muslim concentration in the UK.

About 40 ADL members, including women dressed in mock hijabs, protested in Federation Square yesterday over issues such as the certification of halal meat and concern sharia law would be introduced.

Protest organiser Martin Brennan claimed the group had 1400 members but denied it was anti-Muslim.

"We are not racist whatsoever, we are against radical Islam infiltrating Australia," he said.

Australian Federation of Islamic Councils president Ikebal Patel said the group was provocative and wrong to believe that most Australian Muslims wanted to bring in sharia law. » | John Masanauskas | Herald Sun | Sunday, May 15, 2011

Police Foil 'Suicide Plot' to Storm Australian Army Base
TIMES ONLINE: An Australian man has been charged with planning a terrorist act after police today foiled a plot by Islamic extremists to launch a suicide attack on army bases in Sydney and Melbourne.

Three other men are under arrest and a fifth is being questioned after a series of counter-terrorism raids across Melbourne shortly before dawn local time.

Around 400 police officers and members of the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO) swooped on 19 properties detaining several men, all Australian citizens of Somali and Lebanese background.

Authorities believe the group was at an advanced stage of preparing to storm an Army barracks in retaliation for Australia’s military involvement in Muslim countries. Members of the group had been observed carrying out surveillance on Holsworthy Barracks in Western Sydney and on other Army bases in Victoria.

Electronic surveillance also picked up discussions about how to obtain weapons to carry out what would have been the worst terror attack on Australian soil.

“The men’s intention was to get into the army barracks and kill as many as they could,” Tony Negus, Australian Federal Police acting commissioner said. They were “planning to carry out a suicide terror attack . . . a sustained attack on military personnel until they themselves were killed,” he said.

"This operation has disrupted an alleged terrorist attack that could have claimed many lives," he said. >>> Anne Barrowclough in Sydney | Tuesday, August 04, 2009

Melbourne, Australia: Muslim Students Demand Their Own Prayer Facilities
HERALD SUN: UP TO 1000 Muslim students at RMIT* are protesting against sharing a multi-faith prayer room with Christians, Jews and worshippers of other faiths.

RMIT Islamic Society vice-president Mohamed Elrafihi said the university had promised Muslim students their own prayer room at the Swanston St campus.

Five refurbished multi-faith prayer rooms -- including a foot-wash room for Muslims and a prayer room with Arabic signs and oriented towards Mecca -- were opened to students earlier this year.

But Mr Elrafihi said the Islamic-themed prayer room can be booked by other religions, which would interrupt evening Muslim prayer times.

Islamic students have refused to use the new facilities, insisting one room be dedicated for use by Muslims.

"We have nothing against multi-faith, we support multi-faith," Mr Elrafihi said.

He said RMIT had misled international students in previous promotions about Muslim prayer facilities.

"The Muslims were promised a dedicated room and that was taken from them. That has caused a lot of stress," Mr Elrafihi said.

While refusing to use the new prayer facilities for the past eight months, up to 600 Muslim students have been worshipping outdoors each Friday in nearby Bowen St, or on other days on the lawns outside RMIT's prayer halls in part of the old Melbourne jail. Muslim Students Protest about Prayer Room at RMIT >>> Mark Dunn | October 14, 2008

*Melbourne University

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