Weekly News Roundup

FRIDAY, JULY 19

Powerball’s $110 million jackpot has been shared between three people with each getting $36.6 million.

Only one winner had been identified by this morning, a young Adelaide man who also scored division two 19 times, bolstering his total prize to $37,602,912.27.

“Wow,” he told TheLott after a pause.

“Thank you so much. That is incredible. I can’t believe that. I am shaking so much. This is going to change so many lives.”

Lottery officials have yet to contact the two other winners and have urged players from NSW and Victoria to check their tickets.

“The division one winning entry from Victoria is unregistered, which means we don’t have any way of contacting the winner to break the life-changing news and have to wait for them to come forward to claim their prize,” spokesperson for the Lott Bronwyn Spencer said.

“While the New South Wales entry was purchased online, unfortunately we don’t have their complete contact details so we are unable to make a mind-blowing phone call to them this evening.”

The massive jackpot had Australians clamouring to get their hands on an entry ticket, with long queues being reported at newsagents and other lottery outlets.

“When Powerball hits high jackpots like this it’s not only regular players who are keen to grab an entry,” The Lott’s Matt Hart said.

He told news.com.au the number of players surged last week when the jackpot ballooned to $80 million.

“Last week, the peak of sales on the day of the draw was at 6.44pm when more than 4700 entries were sold in 60 seconds,” Mr Hart said.

“That was about 45 minutes before the draw closed, so a lot of people were leaving it to the last minute.”

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Jacinda Ardern’s repeated demands for Australia to stop deporting New Zealand criminals back to NZ will again be dismissed today.

Even before the NZ PM had met with her Australian counterpart Scott Morrison in Melbourne this morning, Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton said the policy wouldn’t change.

The meeting between the two PMs is their first face-to-face talks since the Coalition won the May election.

Successive New Zealand governments have raised concern with the policy, after more than 1,500 Kiwi criminals were deported since the rules were tightened in 2014.

“There are a number of areas where it will be completely legitimate for a New Zealand citizen to be deported back to New Zealand if they engage in criminal activity,” she said on Thursday.

“But we have seen cases where there is also almost no connection of an individual to New Zealand who had been deported.

“I consider that to be a corrosive part of that policy, and it’s having a corrosive effect on our relationship.”

Examples often used are New Zealanders who moved to Australia as children, with limited to no family ties back across the Tasman.

“We need to stand up for Australians,” Mr Dutton told Channel Nine.

“And the New Zealand Prime Minister is rightly doing that for her people.

“But where we’ve got Australian citizens who are falling victim in certain circumstances where people are sexually offending against children, for example, we’ve had a big push to try to deport those paedophiles.”

Ms Ardern and Mr Morrison will also discuss global trade and the development of the Pacific, along with ways to combat extremist material being shared on social media in the wake of the Christchurch massacre.

Another policy area where the Australian Government is unlikely to shift is New Zealand’s ongoing offer to resettle refugees housed in offshore detention on Manus Island and Nauru.

Canberra has repeatedly knocked back the offer, suggesting it could provide asylum seekers with a “back door” into Australia, given the more immigration regime between the two nations.

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Donald Trump has revealed that a US warship has destroyed an Iranian drone in the Strait of Hormuz, after the aircraft came too close threatening the safety of the ship and all on board.

The US President said the USS Boxer, an amphibious assault ship carrying  2,000 Marines, took “defensive action” when the drone ignored “multiple calls to stand down and was threatening the safety of the ship and the ship’s crew”.

“The drone was immediately destroyed,” Mr Trump said.

“This is the latest of many provocative and hostile actions by Iran against vessels operating in international waters.”

Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said he was not aware of any downing of an Iranian drone in the Strait of Hormuz.

“We have no information about losing a drone today,” Mr Zarif told reporters at the United Nations before a meeting with Secretary-General Antonio Guterres.

The Pentagon said in a statement that the incident took place about 10 am local time as the Boxer was transiting into the Strait of Hormuz.

“A fixed wing unmanned aerial system (UAS) approached Boxer and closed within a threatening range,” Pentagon spokesman Jonathan Hoffman said in a statement, adding that “defensive action” was taken “to ensure the safety of the ship and its crew”.

The statement did not say to whom the drone which is capable of carrying four bombs, belonged, but Commander Rebecca Rebarich, a Pentagon spokeswoman, later confirmed “we do assess it was an Iranian drone”.

Mr Trump called on other countries to condemn Iran and protect their own ships.

The United States believes that Iran-linked militia in Iraq have recently increased their surveillance of American troops and bases in the country by using off-the-shelf, commercially available drones, US officials say.