A row erupted here yesterday over a police ban on traditional Aboriginal women doing as they have done for 70,000 years -- dance topless in public.
Aborigines are furious that a group of traditional Aboriginal women were moved on by police, including an Aboriginal officer, from a public park in Alice Springs last week because they were dancing without their tops.
The women pointed out that dancing topless is part of Aboriginal culture and millions of people around the world have seen them dancing like that on television, such as at the opening ceremony for the Sydney Olympics in 2000.
The women, from the remote Aboriginal community of Papunya near Alice Springs, were practising the traditional ceremony ahead of an exhibition performance in Sydney.
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission (ATSIC) commissioner Alison Anderson said she is considering an urgent, formal complaint to the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission.
Anderson, ATSIC's only female commissioner, said she would defy authorities to dance topless at a ceremony in Alice Springs this afternoon.
"This is part of our law, this is part of our culture, this is what makes us Aboriginal," Anderson told ABC radio.
"They were just starting to paint the young girls up when two police officers approached them on motorbikes and one happened to be an Aboriginal.
"One would have thought that APCO [Aboriginal community police officers] get employed to teach white police cultural stuff. This is really insulting that an Aboriginal man approached a group of Aboriginal women.
"These women have been at the forefront of land rights, native title."
The Central Land Council, which represents traditional owners, called on the local authorities to reconsider the ban and for an immediate apology from police.
"This is part of our culture and thousands and thousands of people around the world have seen Aboriginal ladies dancing without their tops on television, theaters and many public occasions," CLC chairman Kunmanara Breaden said.
"Just a few weeks ago, the Warumungu ladies welcomed the [Adelaide-Darwin] train to Tennant Creek -- dancing without their tops -- and everybody loved it.
"This issue needs some common sense and the minister for police should be ringing his workers now and telling them to stop being stupid and grow up."
The police said they stood by their officers' actions.
Acting Commander Southern Region Trevor Bell said police had yet to receive a formal complaint.
"While police are sensitive to cultural issues which arise from time to time, we support the actions of one of our members to move on [the women]."
He said any member of the public was entitled to pursue a complaint through the proper channels.
The team behind the long-awaited Vera Rubin Observatory in Chile yesterday published their first images, revealing breathtaking views of star-forming regions as well as distant galaxies. More than two decades in the making, the giant US-funded telescope sits perched at the summit of Cerro Pachon in central Chile, where dark skies and dry air provide ideal conditions for observing the cosmos. One of the debut images is a composite of 678 exposures taken over just seven hours, capturing the Trifid Nebula and the Lagoon Nebula — both several thousand light-years from Earth — glowing in vivid pinks against orange-red backdrops. The new image
Canada and the EU on Monday signed a defense and security pact as the transatlantic partners seek to better confront Russia, with worries over Washington’s reliability under US President Donald Trump. The deal was announced after a summit in Brussels between Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and European Council President Antonio Costa. “While NATO remains the cornerstone of our collective defense, this partnership will allow us to strengthen our preparedness ... to invest more and to invest smarter,” Costa told a news conference. “It opens new opportunities for companies on both sides of the
ESPIONAGE: The British government’s decision on the proposed embassy hinges on the security of underground data cables, a former diplomat has said A US intervention over China’s proposed new embassy in London has thrown a potential resolution “up in the air,” campaigners have said, amid concerns over the site’s proximity to a sensitive hub of critical communication cables. The furor over a new “super-embassy” on the edge of London’s financial district was reignited last week when the White House said it was “deeply concerned” over potential Chinese access to “the sensitive communications of one of our closest allies.” The Dutch parliament has also raised concerns about Beijing’s ideal location of Royal Mint Court, on the edge of the City of London, which has so
OVERHAUL: The move would likely mark the end to Voice of America, which was founded in 1942 to counter Nazi propaganda and operated in nearly 50 languages The parent agency of Voice of America (VOA) on Friday said it had issued termination notices to more than 639 more staff, completing an 85 percent decrease in personnel since March and effectively spelling the end of a broadcasting network founded to counter Nazi propaganda. US Agency for Global Media (USAGM) senior advisor Kari Lake said the staff reduction meant 1,400 positions had been eliminated as part of US President Donald Trump’s agenda to cut staffing at the agency to a statutory minimum. “Reduction in Force Termination Notices were sent to 639 employees at USAGM and Voice of America, part of a