News and politics live updates: Australia and Fiji sign new treaty

Anthony Albanese has finally found the ability to say sorry and it took Kylie Minogue to do it.

The PM has previously seemed impervious to criticism and has stubbornly refused to take any responsibility for the numerous stuff-ups and unforced errors he’s presided over.

But when the collective brains trust of fan girls who run his media unit saw his performance on comedian Nikki Osborne’s Bush Deep podcast, it was too bad for even them to ignore.

Albanese copped the rightful condemnation of women in high office across Australia, while his allies in Katy Gallagher and Penny Wong went silent, refusing to comment on the remark their boss made during a game of “shag, marry, date” that he would choose Kylie for all three.

His comments weren’t just denigrating of women and unworthy of the office of the Prime Minister, they were cringe and creepy.

Read the full opinion piece.

The Fijian Prime Minister Sitiveni Rabuka says he is not anticipating any retaliation from China after signing a defence pact with Australia on Monday.

“I do not expect China to have any severe pushback on either government,” he said.

“And I believe that they will welcome the understanding that is between Australia and Fiji.

“It is not threatening Fiji’s relationship with China, nor Australia’s relationship with China.

“We have made it very clear in the past, your enemies are not necessarily my enemies.”

When asked if he would consider boosting defence spending in light of the new alliances signed in the past year, Anthony Albanese did not make any commitments.

Instead, the Prime Minister pointed to his government’s Budget.

“We have had a Budget and that Budget had an additional... $54 billion of additional spending,” Mr Albanese said.

“We have increased spending, but importantly we have increased effectiveness.

“You cannot defend your country or any other country with a media release – what you defend it with is assets.

“That is what I think we have very effectively done.”

An attack on Fiji would “trigger full support for Fiji”, Anthony Albanese says.

The Prime Minister said the security agreement and the alliance was “not about troops in each other’s nations” but that it will allow “discussions about specifics” on defence co-operation.

“It will allow for a clearer area of co-operation and requests to be made over the full suite of challenges that confront our national security in 2026, that comes not just from traditional ways … but areas like cyber security and other areas as well,” the Australian Prime Minister said.

Meta officials have told the Royal Commission that people are using the terms “Zionism” or “Zionist” as a “coded word” online content to evade anti-Semitisim standards on their platforms Facebook, Instagram, Threads and WhatsApp.

An official for the tech giant told a hearing on Monday that Meta has been removing content that uses alternative words or code words in place of “Jews”, as it classifies these terms as anti-Semitic and fails their online standards.

Meta’s director of content policy Benjamin Good appeared via video link from the US and explained how the tech giant handles anti-Semitic content and the growing trend of coded messaging.

Mr Good said Meta had been cracking down on anti-Semitic tropes such as claiming Jewish people controlled governments, the media, or financial institutions.

Read the full story here.

Australia has struck a sweeping new defence alliance with Fiji as the Albanese government seeks to curb China’s rising influence in the Pacific.

The Ocean of Peace Alliance, also known as the Veitacini Treaty, will see Fiji become just Australia’s fourth military alliance partner after the United States, New Zealand and Papua New Guinea.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and his Fijian counterpart Sitiveni Rabuka signed the document in the capital Suva on Monday, which will allow both countries to “invite any other Pacific state” to join.

The Queensland government’s integration of bail laws into its signature “Adult Crime, Adult Time” legislation has been dismissed by experts as both sloganeering and unnecessary.

However, increasingly tougher sentences and treatment for children and teenagers found guilty of serious crimes have become a cornerstone of the Crisafulli government’s tough-on-crime measures.

The premier, elected in 2024 after campaigning on the laws, has increased the number of offences eligible for adult punishment since coming to office.

Mr Crisafulli used his keynote address on Sunday at the LNP state convention to pledge a new offence for under-agers who breach bail.

“We need to continue to have consequences for actions to make sure that we continue to restore safety,” he told delegates.

“If you’re a repeat offender, you’re wielding a machete, you’re stealing cars, you’re breaking into people’s homes ... if you breach bail, you will go to jail.”

AAP

Super Typhoon Bavi is crossing the Mariana Islands in the western Pacific Ocean, lashing Guam, Tinian and Saipan and blasting Rota with catastrophic winds and threatening an area still recovering from another destructive storm earlier this year.

The US National Weather Service warned residents to take cover as the Category 5 storm moved through the island chain, parts of which are the US commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands and the US territory of Guam, about 6000km west of Hawaii and 2500km east of the Philippines.

The weather service said Bavi’s eyewall was expected to make landfall at Rota - a territory of fewer than 2000 people northeast of Guam - shortly after dawn on Monday, with “catastrophically destructive” winds up to 290km/h.

Gusts to 350km were possible.

The US islands are a strategic defence hub in the western Pacific, hosting US military training facilities and bases including Andersen Air Force Base, Naval Base Guam and Marine Corps Base Camp Blaz.

Reuters

Three sons of slain Iranian leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei have prayed beside his coffin and those of four other family members but Mojtaba, the son who succeeded him as Iran’s supreme leader, did not make an appearance.

State TV showed Mostafa, Meysam and Masoud Khamenei praying behind the coffins laid out in the vast courtyard of Tehran’s Imam Khomeini Grand Mosalla, a sprawling religious complex.

Their father, alongside several other members of the family, was killed in an air strike when the United States and Israel launched a war on Iran on February 28.

The conflict, which raged for several weeks before the sides reached a shaky ceasefire, has caused death and destruction across the region and left Iran’s theocratic government, backed by the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, in power.

In a show of public devotion to the state and revolutionary zeal, the Islamic Republic is staging a week of mass funeral processions for Khamenei, including taking his remains to Shi’ite religious sites in neighbouring Iraq.

Reuters