Public employees in Australia's most populous state have been told to end remote working in a directive from the premier of New South Wales as he seeks to reverse work-from-home habits established during the pandemic.

New South Wales has become the last Australian state to apologize for laws criminalizing homosexual acts, 40 years after decriminalization.

Police in Sydney say a man stabbed six people to death at a busy shopping center before he was fatally shot.

Three homes were destroyed by a forest fire and a man was injured by a falling tree in the Bega Valley region of southeastern Australia, prompting a government leader to warn that a “horror” wildfire season is approaching.

The Australian Border Force said staff found the 24-carat gold-plated handgun in the luggage of the 28-year-old, who traveled on a flight from Los Angeles on Sydney.

Hello, and welcome to November! Typically this can be a very active time for us here in Southeast Texas with cold air moving in and interacting with our warm moist Gulf air, forming a secondary severe weather season. Thankfully for us here, our tropical season is done, but that is NOT the case across the globe.

Homes have been flooded in Melbourne and other cities in Australia’s southeast with rivers forecast to remain dangerously high for days.

Flood warnings have been issued, hundreds of homes have been evacuated, thousands more have lost power and a man is missing as heavy rain lashes southeast Australia.

Thousands of residents in Sydney suburbs have been told to evacuate their homes after heavy rains caused floodwaters to rise and rivers to overflow in what authorities call life-threatening emergencies.

An Australian court has ordered Google to pay a former politician 715,000 Australian dollars ($515,000) over two defamatory YouTube videos.

Around 500,000 people in Sydney and its surrounding areas have been told to evacuate or prepare to flee floodwaters as torrential rain lashes an extraordinarily long stretch of the Australian east coast.

Tens of thousands of people have been ordered to evacuate their homes and hundreds of thousands more have been told to prepare to flee as parts of Australia’s southeast coast are inundated by the worst flooding in more than a decade.

Australia has reported its deadliest day of the pandemic with 80 coronavirus fatalities, as an outbreak of the omicron variant continues to take a toll.

Australia’s most populous state, New South Wales, has made the reporting of rapid antigen test results mandatory as it experienced its deadliest day of the pandemic.

New coronavirus infections have soared again in Australia to a record of more than 32,000, just days after surpassing 10,000 for the first time.

Coronavirus cases are surging across Australia as an outbreak of the omicron variant spreads, prompting Prime Minister Scott Morrison to schedule an emergency national cabinet meeting.

Australia’s New South Wales state has reported more than 6,000 new COVID-19 cases and confirmed its first death from the omicron variant.

Australia’s most populous state has reported a record number of new COVID-19 cases and a sharp jump in hospitalizations while thousands of people were isolating at home after contracting the virus or coming into contact with someone who has.

Australian authorities have announced that they will delay for at least two weeks plans to relax border restrictions as the country reported a fifth case of the omicron COVID-19 variant.

Sydney’s international airport has come alive with tears, embraces and laughter as Australia’s border opened for the first time in 20 months.

Sydney hairdressers, gyms, cafés and bars have reopened to fully vaccinated customers for the first time in more than 100 days after Australia’s largest city achieved a vaccination benchmark.

Pakistan’s planning minister says the government will begin a drive to vaccinate children aged 12 or above to protect them from coronavirus.

Voluntary euthanasia has become legal in a fifth Australian state, more than 20 years after the country repealed the world’s first mercy killing law for the terminally ill.

An Australian state leader is warning that Melbourne may be losing control of a COVID-19 delta variant outbreak that began in Sydney and has also spread to the New Zealand capital.

Australia’s most populous state has reported its worst day of the pandemic with 478 new infections and seven COVID-19 deaths as pandemic restrictions tightened in other parts of the country.

An Australian state leader says Sydney is going through one the “scariest” times of the pandemic as a cluster of the highly contagious delta variant infects more people.

At night, the floors of sheds vanish beneath carpets of scampering mice.

Spiders in Australia are seeking refuge after floods ravaged the New South Wales area. NEW SOUTH WALES, Australia – Residents in Australia’s most populous state are not only dealing with the aftermath of recent floods, but now, deadly arthropods are seeking refuge in homes. Williams noticed the “creepy crawlies” on the garage door and parts of the front of her house before evacuating from her home per New South Wales’ mandatory evacuation order. Many other residents also reported “thousands” of spiders seeking refuge from floodwaters, pushing them to residential homes, according to social media. AdOver 18,000 residents evacuated from their homes due to the devastating floods in most of southeastern Australia, and is in a state of emergency due to the evolving situation, CNN reported.

A car got trapped in floodwater northwest of Sydney at dawn Wednesday and emergency services later recovered it with a body inside, officials said. While rain has eased across New South Wales and southern Queensland, flooding has persisted. Most rivers had peaked by Thursday, but 20,000 people were still evacuated from their homes, New South Wales Premier Gladys Berejiklian said. Parts of New South Wales, Australia’s most populous state, have received one-in-50-year and one-in-100-year rainfall records in the past week. AdInsurance companies expect the damage in New South Wales to exceed 1 billion Australian dollars ($760 million).

Paul Zammit carries his pet emu, Gookie, after rescuing her from floodwater in Windsor, northwest of Sydney, New South Wales, Australia, Tuesday, March 23, 2021. (AP Photo/Rick Rycroft)SYDNEY – Heavy rainfall was forecast to ease across Australia’s east coast but floodwaters will linger for days across New South Wales state where 15,000 people were nervously waiting on Tuesday for potential orders to evacuate. New South Wales Premier Gladys Berejiklian on Tuesday said several weather fronts continued to effect large swaths of the state. Morrison said the New South Wales government had already requested 1,000 defense personnel to help clean up after the floods. The flooding rain had extended along the New South Wales coast across the Queensland state border in the north and almost as far as Victoria border to the south.

Hundreds of people have been rescued from floodwaters that have isolated dozens of towns in Australia's most populous state New South Wales and forced thousands to evacuate their homes as record rain continues. (AP Photo/Rick Rycroft)CANBERRA – Hundreds of people have been rescued from floodwaters that have isolated dozens of towns in Australia’s most populous state New South Wales and forced thousands to evacuate their homes as record rain continues to inundate the country’s east coast. New South Wales Premier Gladys Berejiklian said up to 38 parts of the state had been declared natural disaster areas. Heavy rain will remain a serious risk on Tuesday for the Mid North Coast, where communities are facing the worst flooding conditions since 1929. Communities along the Hawkesbury River were also bracing for the worst flooding in the area since 1961.

A truck drives through a flooded road at Old Pitt Town north west of Sydney, Australia, Sunday, March 21, 2021. Australia's most populous state of New South Wales on Sunday issued more evacuation orders following the worst flooding in decades. (AP Photo/Mark Baker)SYDNEY – Australia's most populous state of New South Wales on Sunday issued more evacuation orders following the worst flooding in decades. The New South Wales State Emergency Services responded to 640 calls for help on Saturday night, including 66 for flood rescues. New South Wales Premier Gladys Berejiklian said that hundreds of people have been rescued from the waters.

New South Wales state Police Commissioner Mick Fuller addresses the media during a press conference in Sydney Thursday, March 18, 2021. Fuller suggested on Thursday a phone app be developed to document sexual consent in a bid to improve conviction rates in sex crime cases. (Dean Lewins/AAP Image via AP)CANBERRA – A senior Australian policeman suggested on Thursday a phone app be developed to document sexual consent in a bid to improve conviction rates in sex crime cases. “Consent must be active and ongoing throughout a sexual encounter.”Responses to the consent app suggestion have been largely negative or skeptical. Lesley-Anne Ey, a University of South Australia expert on harmful sexual behavior involving children, said she didn’t think the app would work.

This 2016 photo provided by Murray Chambers shows a male regent honeyeater bird in Capertee Valley in New South Wales, Australia. For five years, ecologist Ross Crates has tracked the singing ability and breeding success of critically endangered regent honeyeaters. While male birds once formed large winter flocks, now they are sparsely distributed across the landscape, so many fly solo. About 12% of male regent honeyeaters wind up producing mangled versions of songs typically sung by noisy friarbirds and black-faced cuckooshrikes, among other species. Some birds learn from their fathers, but regent honeyeaters leave the nest before they learn to sing, so the males need to find other mentors.

(AP Photo/Mark Baker)SYDNEY – More Australian states and territories are reimposing travel restrictions to prevent the spreading of the coronavirus from new outbreaks in New South Wales and Victoria states. The Australian Capital Territory has shut out non-residents who have been on the northern beaches of Sydney, where the outbreaks are most concentrated, Greater Sydney and other smaller centers, unless they have an exemption. In total, there have been 21 locally acquired Victorian cases over recent days, all linked to the New South Wales outbreak. Victoria’s border is now closed to all travelers from New South Wales. Officials said that 294 of the new cases reported Sunday were local infections.

Trace testing has linked the new Melbourne coronavirus cluster to the New South Wales outbreak. The newest occurred at midnight Friday when Victoria closed its border to New South Wales, prompting traffic bottlenecks as people raced to beat the closure. Once in Victoria, COVID-19 testing sites saw long queues as travelers lined up for mandatory testing. South Korea reported 824 new cases, raising the national tally to 62,593 with 942 deaths. — Thai authorities are planning to launch two levels of restrictions of activities for highly controlled areas where coronavirus cases are on the rise.

(AP Photo/Craig Ruttle)CANBERRA – This New Year’s Eve is being celebrated like no other in most of the world, with many bidding farewell to a year they’d prefer to forget. Some countries and cities canceled or scaled back their festivities, while others without active outbreaks carried on like any other year. Instead, we should bring in 2021 in our own homes with just our own households," Scotland’s First Minister Nicola Sturgeon said. Many around the world looked toward 2021 with hope, partly due to the arrival of vaccines that offer a chance of beating the pandemic. Initial reports about a mystery respiratory illness sickening people in the Chinese city of Wuhan emerged exactly a year ago.

Health workers record migrant workers ahead of collecting nasal swab samples from them to test for COVID-19 in Samut Sakhon, south of Bangkok, Thailand, Sunday, Dec. 20, 2020. Thailand on Sunday reported a few new local infections, a day after identifying more than 500 cases south of Bangkok in a country that had largely brought the pandemic under control. (AP Photo/ Chalida Ekvitthayavechnukul)SYDNEY – The outbreak in Sydney’s northern beach suburbs has grown to 70 cases with an additional 30 in the last 24 hours, and authorities say they may never be able to trace the source. A new list of cases, however, shows the virus had spread to greater Sydney and other parts of the state. Thailand’s Disease Control Department said Sunday that they found 141 more cases linked to the market outbreak.

The state has had few new COVID-19 cases in the past month. Arizona health officials reported 1,406 new confirmed COVID-19 cases and 79 coronavirus-related deaths. ___MEXICO CITY Mexico has posted 6,717 newly confirmed coronavirus cases, increasing the countrys accumulated total to 469,407. The state health department says the virus hasnt stopped there were 1,265 newly diagnosed cases Friday. More than 128,000 coronavirus cases have been confirmed in Louisiana, which has 4.6 million residents.

A woman wearing a face mask to help protect against the spread of the new coronavirus walks through a field of sunflowers at a park in Ansan, South Korea, Wednesday, July 15, 2020. (AP Photo/Ahn Young-joon)MELBOURNE Australias coronavirus hot spot Victoria state moved to increase its available hospital beds Thursday and reported a record daily high of 317 infections. But we cannot be complacent and expect thats going to happen automatically.New South Wales, the only other state regarded as an active Australian virus hot spot, reported 10 new cases on Thursday. In other developments in the Asia-Pacific region: South Korea reported 61 new cases, most of them tied to international arrivals. South Korea has been requiring two-week quarantines on all passengers arriving from overseas since April.

Andrews also announced that the state border with New South Wales will be closed from late Tuesday night in an agreement between the two state premiers and Prime Minister Scott Morrison. New South Wales had previously banned travel from dozens of Melbourne suburbs that were locked down last week for a month due to high rates of infection. New South Wales Premier Gladys Berejiklian had criticized states that closed their borders to New South Wales residents when Sydney, the state capital and Australia's largest city, had most of the country's COVID-19 cases. The Department of Health reported 2,434 cases in recent days, the majority in metropolitan Manila, raising cases nationwide to more than 44,250, including 1,297 deaths. China reported four new cases, three from outside the country and one transmitted locally in Beijing, the National Health Commission reported.

Women hold signs outside housing commission apartments under lockdown in Melbourne, Australia, on Monday, July 6, 2020. The border between the states of New South Wales home to Sydney and Victoria home to Melbourne is due to be shut late Tuesday. The infections announced Monday surpassed the first surge of infections in Melbourne that peaked on March 28 at 111 cases recorded in a day. The federal government had previously opposed any internal border closures aimed mostly at stopping spread from Victoria and New South Wales. Of those, 10 had been in hotel quarantine in New South Wales and three in Western AustraliaNew South Wales police will enforce the Victorian border closure.