Listen to Australian and world news, and follow trending topics with SBS News Podcasts.
TRANSCRIPT
Welcome to SBS News In Easy English. I'm Catriona Stirrat.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has defended Australia's monitoring of Chinese warships, as government officials faced questions about the timeline on information received on China's live-fire exercises in the Tasman Sea.
The aviation safety agency told Senate Estimates earlier this week it only became aware of the danger from the Chinese live-fire military exercise at 9:58am on Friday, Canberra time; after an alert from a Virgin commercial pilot.
Airservices Australia says it then notified Australian defence force about the drills 10 minutes after initial contact with the pilot.
Mr Albanese says Australia is working with New Zealand to monitor the Chinese warships.
"One was from the New Zealand vessels that were tailing, we're cooperating. We've been monitoring the vessels in the area by both sea and by air. So that occurred and at the same time, through the channels that occur when something like this is occurring, Air Services got notified as well."
—
A Sydney nurse has been charged with federal offences over a video in which she and her colleague allegedly threaten to harm Israeli patients and refuse to treat them.
Sarah Abu Lebdeh has been charged with three commonwealth offences including: threatening violence towards a group, use of a carriage service to threaten to kill; and use of a carriage service to menace/harass/offend.
The 26-year-old has been granted conditional bail to appear at the Downing Centre Local Court on March 19.
New South Wales Police Commissioner Karen Webb say the charges are a major development in an exhaustive investigation.
She has previously said police found no evidence that anyone at the hospital had been harmed, adding that New South Wales Health is continuing with its own investigation.
—
Local broadcaster Syria TV is reporting that Israeli warplanes have hit a town south of Syria's capital - as well as the southern province of Daraa.
A security source told Reuters, a military site was targeted.
Meanwhile, Syrian officials have condemned the presence of Israeli forces in a UN-monitored demilitarised zone within Syria.
Houda Atassi spoke at a one-day Syrian national dialogue event in Damascus on the future of the country after the fall of Bashar al-Assad.
She says Israel is being called upon to withdraw from the area.
"The condemnation of Israeli incursion into Syrian territories as it is a big violation of Syria's sovereignty, and calling for its immediate and unconditional withdrawal, the refusal of the provocative declarations by Israel's prime minister and calling the international community and regional organisations to take up their responsibilities towards the Syrian people and to pressure to stop the aggression."
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says Israel will not tolerate the presence of Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, a former Al Qaeda affiliate, in southern Syria, and has demanded the territory be demilitarised.
—
More than 1,000 musicians, including Kate Bush and Cat Stevens, have released a silent album to protest proposed changes to Britain's copyright laws, which could allow tech firms to train artificial intelligence models using their work.
The co-written album titled "Is This What We Want?" features recordings of empty studios and performance spaces to represent what organisers say is the potential impact on artists' livelihoods should the changes go ahead.
It sounds like this:
EXCERPT OF ALBUM that sounds like room noise
British composer and music producer Thomas Hewitt Jones says this issue is also affecting creative industries globally.
"Generative AI competes with the work that it's trained on and the people behind that work. And that's why this is so terrible. We're not saying get rid of AI, but all of us, thousands (of) musicians have come together and are absolutely adamant that we need to protect the value of copyright. Copyright protects our work, but also it enables us to create new music and create great content for the music industry. It's absolutely terrible that the blue chip companies are effectively going to be profiting from all our work before we've even released it."
That was SBS News In Easy English. I'm Catriona Stirrat.
