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Surfing icon Kelly Slater will be banned from competing in Australia if he refuses to get the Covid jab, the Sports Minister Richard Colbeck has warned. The 11-time world surfing champion, 49, has is yet to reveal his vaccination status but has made waves online railing against jab mandates and posting anti-vax rhetoric to his social media pages during the pandemic. Mr Colbeck said the American will face a wipeout similar to world No. 1 tennis star Novak Djokovic who was sensationally booted from the country on the eve of the Australian Open, if he fails to prove he's vaccinated.

Novak Djokovic ... asked to be transferred to a rented apartment with a tennis court. But Australian Border Force have rejected all of the World No. 1's requests. Refugees staying at the hotel had complained about poor living conditions. Maggot-riddled food, mouldy bread and bugs in room were among complaints.. .... Novak Djokovic's lawyers have claimed the Australian government gave the tennis star a written vaccine exemption because he had Covid in December, as he remains in detention in a Melbourne hotel with 'maggot-ridden food'. The World No. 1 has been detained at an immigration facility in Melbourne after his...

I wanted to take a moment to recognize Novak Djokovic and his heroic defiance of the COVID regime, lending his enormous platform and status to the millions of people around the world who have been denied their unalienable rights in the name of a virus. You would never know it by his disposition, but “Djoker” has an amazing rags to richer story, and he’s well aware of how governments can cause great human suffering. Growing up in war-torn Belgrade, Djokovic had to learn to play tennis in between bombing raids. Far from a silver spooned prodigy, he had to defy...

More than 250 Australian residents were apprehended by police Saturday amid the country's anti-lockdown protests. People across several Australian cities defied the coronavirus stay at home orders and were arrested following altercations with police officers. At least cops endured injuries from the protests and Melbourne saw the most violent demonstrations, according to the Associated Press. More than 4,000 people protested the COVID measures in Melbourne while police released pepper spray into the crowds to stop demonstrators from crossing police lines. Police said in a statement that they had no choice but to unleash the pepper spray as altercations hospitalized six...

Only this time the inmates are Australians themselves. Australia is in a very dark place. The army has been drafted in to force people to stay in their homes, going door-to-door to check for compliance. Police helicopters circle overhead, threatening anyone in parks or public spaces with police action and fines; there is genuine fear over being caught outside without a permissible excuse. No one is allowed more than 5 kilometers from their home address, only one person per household may leave to purchase supplies once a day, and Sydney-siders are not permitted to speak to friends or stop to...

Moscow (AFP) - Russia's prison service on Friday announced it would transfer Pussy Riot punk Nadezhda Tolokonnikova to another penal colony after she went on hunger strike complaining of slave-labour conditions and threats. Tolokonnikova, 23, is serving a two-year sentence in a penal colony in the Mordovia region of central Russia for the band's protest against President Vladimir Putin in a Moscow church. On September 23 she began an eight-day hunger strike demanding to be moved to another penal colony. It ended with her being taken to a hospital run by the prison service and placed on a drip. On...

AFP - Jailed Pussy Riot band member Nadezhda Tolokonnikova is on her way to a new penal colony in Siberia, her husband said Tuesday, following fears after two weeks without information about her whereabouts. Tolokonnikova, 23, who alleged major prison abuses in her previous colony in central Russia, is on her way to a new prison colony deep in the Krasnoyarsk region, her husband Pyotr Verzilov wrote on Twitter, saying the information comes from a reliable source. The penal colony number 50 in the town of Nizhny Ingash lies about 300 kilometres (185 miles) from the regional centre Krasnoyarsk, four...

TWO hundred years ago its worst citizens were transported to the other side of the world, creating Australia in the process - now cash-strapped Britain wants its former colony to again keep its criminals. In the past 12 months, dozens of British-born paedophiles, rapists and career criminals - many aged in their late 50s and 60s - were deported to the UK after finishing their sentences in Australian jails, despite having lived most of their lives here. Among them was notorious paedophile Raymond Horne, who had to be given a police escort through Heathrow Airport amid British outrage over his...

A transsexual burglar with more than 85 convictions is free on bail, amid revelations she underwent a sex change operation three weeks ago – while in prison custody. Career criminal Joanne Martin is facing the prospect of another prison sentence for her latest burglaries, but prison officials must first decide whether she would go to a men's or women's prison. They are understood to require proof that she is a woman. It is thought that three weeks ago, while in a Wellington men's prison, Martin had a sex change operation to become a woman. She was arrested on September 18....