Health News at Your Fingertips

Travellers from Australia and New Zealand joined Turkish and other nations’ dignitaries at the former World War I battlefields at Gallipoli for a solemn service at dawn Monday to remember troops killed, reports Associated Press.

As the sun rose, participants held a minute of silence to reflect on the sacrifices of tens of thousands of soldiers from the Australia and New Zealand Army Corps, known as Anzacs, who landed at the beaches at Gallipoli, in northwest Turkey.

“At this time 107 years ago, on ships that covered the ocean off this tiny bay, thousands of Australians and New Zealanders were preparing to land on this rugged coast,” New Zealand army chief, Maj. Gen. John Boswell, said during the ceremony. “For all but a few, this was to be the first experience of the horrors of combat.”

“Most were convinced that, as one New Zealand soldier wrote in his story: It will be the greatest day in our lives.’ The sunrise they witnessed that day was for all too many to be the last they ever saw,” he continued. “Across our countries, home after home was plunged into mourning.”

Among those who made it to the ceremony was 27-year-old Taylor Murphy from Victoria, Australia, who said the pros of being at Gallipoli “outweighs the cons of the pandemic.” “It feels quite surreal to be here,” she said. “We are feeling quite emotional.”

The tragic fate of troops from Australia and New Zealand is believed to have inspired the two nations to carve up national identities distinct from the British. Anzac Day is marked as a coming of age for the two nations.

Western Australia has recorded 5,639 new Covid-19 cases and one death – a man in his 80s.

There are 240 Covid patients in hospital in the state, including nine in intensive care.

Here are the latest coronavirus numbers from around Australia, with at least 17 Covid-19 deaths recorded today:

NSW

• Deaths: 4
• Cases: 7,985
• In hospital: 1,631 (with 64 people in ICU)

Northern Territory

• Deaths: 0
• Cases: 333
• In hospital: 51 (with 1 person in ICU)

Queensland

• Deaths: 2
• Cases: 4,639
• In hospital: 478 (with 12 people in ICU)

South Australia

• Deaths: 6
• Cases: 3,175
• In hospital: 247 (with 11 people in ICU)

Tasmania

• Deaths: 0
• Cases: 867
• In hospital: 43 (with 1 person in ICU)

Victoria

• Deaths: 4
• Cases: 7,643
• In hospital: 441 (with 31 people in ICU)

Western Australia

• Deaths: 1
• Cases: 5,639
• In hospital: 240 (with 9 people in ICU)

The deputy prime minister, Barnaby Joyce, has responded after police arrested a man who allegedly yelled abuse at him on a rural highway, saying he was “very grateful to the police for their quick work in dealing with this matter”.

“It was a sad and unsavoury incident but we have important work to do as elected officials and this incident in no way overshadows that,” Joyce said in a statement.

“Once again, I thank my protective detail for their bravery in keeping myself and my staff safe and I look forward to continuing our work on the campaign trail.”

News Corp reported that Joyce had been travelling between Tamworth and Armidale on Friday, when he pulled off the road to make a call. A passing car was said to have stopped 40 metres away, with the driver allegedly getting out and yelling at Joyce.

The deputy PM’s federal police detail prevented the man from coming closer, but the man is reported to have directed explicit criticisms at Joyce. The 52-year-old man is due in court today, after being charged with threatening to cause harm to a commonwealth public official and failure to comply with bail conditions,

The arrest was made by Operation Wilmot, a special AFP taskforce set up to “ensure the security of high-office holders and parliamentarians during the 2022 federal election” in conjunction with the electoral commission.

West Australian authorities are working to contain a Covid-19 outbreak aboard one of the first cruise ships allowed back in the state, reports AAP.

WA Health has confirmed it is managing an undisclosed number of positive cases aboard the Coral Discoverer, docked at Broome in the state’s north-west.

Infected passengers and close contacts are isolating and all passengers and crew are being tested.

Small cruise ships carrying no more than 350 passengers and crew have been permitted to enter WA waters since 17 April.

The Coral Discoverer, which departed from Darwin earlier this month, has a capacity of 72 passengers.

“Maritime vessels are permitted to allow positive cases to disembark and move to suitable accommodation to complete their isolation/quarantine requirements,” a WA Health spokesperson said.

“All precautions will be taken to ensure the Broome community is protected.”

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Vietnam veteran Gware Green does not look forward to Anzac Day.

“It brings back all the bad memories, all of your friends that didn’t come back in one piece,” he says.

Green was one of 11 schoolmates from Gilgandra who served in Vietnam. Only 10 came back.

Green’s close friend Michael Noonan was 21 when he died in Vietnam. He and Green were in the same battalion, but served in different companies. “I was almost alongside of him but didn’t know until two days later.”

Green didn’t return to Gilgandra until 10 years after the war because “it was very hard to front Michael’s mother”.

On Monday, Green stood at the front of the dawn service in Armatree, a western NSW town of 150. He was joined by an Afghanistan veteran as well as those who still farm the land their fathers and grandfathers were given as soldier settler blocks.

At dawn, a small crowd gathered in the tiny town to remember their service, as soldiers and settlers, to carve out a place in the community’s history.

Read more of this dispatch from Natasha May, Guardian Australia’s rural network reporter, with pictures from Mike Bowers:

Paul Karp

Labor has hit back at Peter Dutton’s claim that the only way to “preserve peace is to prepare for war”, suggesting the Coalition’s actions fall short of its words.

The defence minister made the comments on Anzac Day morning, warning that “people like Hitler” are not “consigned to history” and Australia must do more to stand up to China’s aggression in the region.

China’s security agreement with Solomon Islands has injected national security as a central issue of the federal election campaign, with Labor declaring it the worst foreign policy failure since the second world war.

On Monday, Scott Morrison said that Australia shares the same “red line” as the US and that a Chinese base in the south Pacific would be unacceptable, but did not spell out what Australia would do if this occurred.

Dutton told Channel Nine’s Today program the comments reflect “the reality of our time”, and the past sacrifices of the Anzacs in conflicts will not “see us through to eternity without conflict in our region”.

Dutton said:

We have to be realistic that people like Hitler and others aren’t just a figment of our imagination or that they’re consigned to history … We’re in a period very similar to the 1930s now and I think there were a lot of people in the 1930s who wish they had spoken up much earlier into the decade.

Labor’s deputy leader, Richard Marles, responded that “we certainly need to prepare, but we have not seen the preparation under this government”.

Marles said:

Words are one thing, action is another … This is a government which beats its chest.

When it comes to actually delivering, and doing what needs to be done, it’s a government which repeatedly fails.

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Katharine Murphy

Scott Morrison has told the UN that Australia will reach net zero emissions by 2050 – but according to the Coalition’s candidate in Flynn, this commitment is a flexible, non-binding plan that leaves plenty of “wiggle room”.

Colin Boyce, who has previously been on the record opposing the government’s net zero target, even though it is National party policy, on Monday suggested the government’s net zero plan may not happen because of the uncertain geopolitical climate.

“Zero net carbon emissions by 2050, Morrison’s document, is a flexible plan that leaves us wiggle room as we proceed into the future,” Boyce told the ABC. “We’ve seen the world change significantly in the last three months in terms of the use of fossil fuels, all in relation to the geopolitical situation in Europe”.

Boyce also noted Morrison’s net zero “statement” last year was “not binding, there will be no legislation attached to it”. The LNP’s Flynn candidate said it had been made clear on page 81 of the government’s transition plan that the future of gas and coal would ultimately be determined by international demand.

In Australia’s nationally determined contribution submitted to the UN last October, the Morrison government said: “Australia adopts a target of net zero emissions by 2050. This is an economy-wide target, covering all sectors and gases included in Australia’s national inventory.”

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Federal police have arrested and charged a man who allegedly yelled abuse at the deputy prime minister, Barnaby Joyce, on a rural highway last week.

News Corp reported that Joyce had been travelling between Tamworth and Armidale on Friday, when he pulled off the road to make a call. A passing car was said to have stopped 40 metres away, with the driver allegedly getting out and yelling at Joyce.

The deputy PM’s federal police detail prevented the man from coming closer, but the man is reported to have directed explicit criticisms at Joyce.

On Monday, the Australian Federal Police (AFP) said a man had been arrested over the incident. In a statement, the AFP said:

The 52-year-old man was refused police bail and is expected to appear in Tamworth local court today (Monday, 25 April 2022), after police charged him yesterday with threatening to cause harm to a commonwealth public official and failure to comply with bail conditions,

Police will allege the man verbally threatened an AFP officer and adopted a fighting stance during Friday’s incident.

The arrest was made by operation wilmot, a special AFP taskforce set up to “ensure the security of high-office holders and parliamentarians during the 2022 federal election” in conjunction with the electoral commission.

AFP detective acting superintendent Jeremy Staunton said:

The AFP supports political expression and freedom of speech. However, when it leads to disruption, harassment, intimidation, threatening behaviour and damage to property, it can reach the threshold of a criminal offence.

Politicians, candidates and the people who work with them should be able to do their jobs safely and we will not tolerate criminal behaviour.

The charge of threatening to cause harm to a commonwealth public official carries a maximum penalty of five years’ jail, the AFP said.