About two-thirds of Australians oppose their country's involvement in the Iraq War, and overwhelmingly believe joining Washington's war on terrorism has made them more at risk of attacks, a survey published yesterday showed.
The telephone survey of 1,213 Australians by the government-funded US Studies Center at the University of Sydney on defense, foreign and economic issues revealed a string of negative statistics about views on the US.
But the survey also showed that respondents strongly believe the US is an important security partner for Australia, and that the relationship will continue.
It also found that a majority of people believe global warming is a more serious threat than Islamic fundamentalism, reflecting rising concern about climate change.
The survey, conducted in July, was published in a heightened political climate as Australian Prime Minister John Howard prepares to call general elections anytime, with global warming and Iraq key campaign issues.
Australia's involvement in Iraq is a key policy difference between Howard and opposition leader Kevin Rudd, who opinion polls show is heading for a landslide victory.
The survey found 64 percent of respondents oppose Australia's involvement in Iraq, compared to 33 percent who support it, and 3 percent undecided.
Australia's involvement in Afghanistan, where about 1,000 troops are deployed, was more popular but still opposed by 51 percent, with 44 percent supportive and 4 percent undecided.
Responding to the survey, Howard said it was inevitable that Australia's commitment in Iraq was unpopular because the conflict had gone on so long.
"People after a time grow weary of it and think because it's not quickly concluded it must be wrong," Howard told Southern Cross Broadcasting.
Voters in Switzerland yesterday cast their ballots on an initiative championed by the top right-wing party to cap the Alpine country’s population at 10 million. As of press time last night, early results showed that Swiss voters were leaning against it. The populist Swiss People’s Party, which has the most seats in parliament, has stirred up and fostered anti-migration sentiment over the years, notably about an influx of workers from the neighboring EU. Critics called the bid a self-inflicted wound, saying the boom in migration over the past generation has brought foreign labor and skills to sectors such as healthcare, finance, pharmaceuticals
Arsenio Butil Jr fell to his knees and began to pray when last week’s deadly magnitude 7.8 earthquake began shaking his home on the coast of the southern Philippines. When he opened his eyes, he saw a once-familiar shoreline changing in real time, with swathes of previously submerged coral suddenly pushing above the waterline. The June 8 quake, driven by a shifting of the nearby Cotabato Trench, toppled buildings, triggered landslides and killed at least 76 people on the southern island of Mindanao. The tectonic forces at work also thrust chunks of the island’s coastline upward in a phenomenon known as “coastal uplift,”
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Growing up in Tahiti, Anna-Bella Failloux saw first-hand the threat posed by mosquitoes: Nearly one-third of adults on the picturesque island once had swollen limbs from elephantiasis caused by their bites. She has since dedicated her life to studying mosquitoes and the diseases they transmit — a concern that looms ever larger as climate change expands the area where the insects roam. “You have to accept being bitten by a mosquito from time to time,” the 63-year-old entomologist at France’s Pasteur Institute said. “But we have to avoid too many people getting sick and dying from the infections,” Failloux said, as she observed
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