CHARLOTTE GRAHAM-McLAY

In this photo provided by the New Zealand Defence Force, divers survey the area around HMNZS Manawanui on the southern coast of Upulo, Samoa, after the Manawanui ran aground and sank on Oct. 6. (AC Jese Somerville/New Zealand Defence Force via AP, File)
Crew of New Zealand navy ship that sank off Samoa lacked training and experience, inquiry finds
A lack of training, qualifications and experience among the crew on board a New Zealand navy ship that ran aground, caught fire and sank off the coast of Samoa have been identified by a military Court of Inquiry in a final report into the disaster released Friday.
 
This image taken from video provided by Viral Tonganz shows vehicles in traffic after a strong 7.1 magnitude earthquake hit near Tonga, prompting an initial tsunami warning that was later lifted for the Pacific island country. (Viral Tonganz via AP)
A 7.0 earthquake causes slight damage in Tonga and brief tsunami evacuations
A 7.0 magnitude earthquake has caused slight damage in Tonga and brief evacuations before the threat of a tsunami passed.
 
The Pony Club grounds in Julia Creek, a rural Queensland town with a population 500, Australia, Aug, 1, 2024. (Jo Thieme/ McKinlay Shire Council via AP)
A remote Australian town seeks a doctor, offering a $400,000 salary and free rent
A remote Australian town that will soon lose its only doctor is offering a salary package of up to $680,000 Australian dollars, plus free rent and a car, to attract a new candidate.
 
A tour guide at New Zealand's Parliament gives a spooky tour of the historical Parliament library, constructed in the late 19th century and rumored to be haunted, in Wellington, Thursday, March 20, 2025. (AP Photo/Charlotte Graham-McLay)
New Zealand parliament shows its spooky side in a tour of mysterious deaths and cat infestations
Mysterious deaths, unexplained noises and late-night apparitions are not the usual fodder of daily tours offered at New Zealand’s parliament in Wellington.
 
In this photo provided by New South Wales state police, a man, right, is arrested in Sydney, Monday, March 10, 2025, following a months-long wave of antisemitic crimes in Australia. (NSW Police via AP)
A cache of explosives in Sydney provoked antisemitic terrorism fears. Police now say it was faked
Police in Australia say an explosives-filled trailer that politicians earlier described as an antisemitic terrorism plot and a foiled mass casualty event was staged by criminals in a complicated hoax.
 
A vehicle sits in flood waters in the Brisbane suburb of Oxley, Australia, Monday, March 10, 2025. (Jono Searle/AAP Image via AP)
Floodwaters still threaten parts of Australia’s east coast as tropical storm cleanup begins
Australia’s Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has cautioned that the fallout from a vicious tropical storm over the weekend was “far from over.”
 
Then-Auckland Mayor Phil Goff talks to the media in Auckland, New Zealand, June, 16, 2021. (Ricky Wilson/STUFF via AP)
New Zealand’s top diplomat in London loses his job over remarks about Trump
New Zealand’s high commissioner to the United Kingdom has lost his job over remarks he made about President Donald Trump at an event held by the Chatham House think tank in London this week.
 
In this photo provided by the New Zealand Department of Conservation a dolphin is tended to at Waitangi, New Zealand, after it was removed from a fishing boat that the dolphin had jumped into on Feb. 28, 2025. (Department of Conservation via AP)
One moment, calm waters. The next, a 900-pound dolphin landed on their boat
A dolphin weighing more than 900 pounds appeared to fall out of the sky before landing in a small fishing boat off the coast of New Zealand, shocking the three men on board.
 
Speaker Gerry Brownlee stands during a question time at parliament in Wellington, New Zealand, on Oct. 17, 2024. (Robert Kitchin/The Post via AP)
New Zealand lawmakers told to stop complaining about use of the country’s Māori name in Parliament
The speaker of New Zealand’s Parliament has told lawmakers that he will not consider further complaints about the use of the country’s Māori name, Aotearoa, in Parliament, after one sought to have it banned.
 
In this photo provided by Michael Schade, tourists on a boat look at the eruption of the volcano on White Island, New Zealand, Dec. 9, 2019. (Michael Schade via AP, File)
Judge overthrows conviction of owners of New Zealand island where 22 died in volcanic eruption
The owners of an island volcano in New Zealand where 22 tourists and guides died in an eruption had their criminal conviction for failing to keep visitors safe overturned by a judge on Friday.
 
In this photo provided by the Australian Defense Force, the People's Liberation Army-Navy Jiangkai-class frigate Hengyang travels in the Torres Strait off Australia's coast, on Feb. 11, 2025. (Australian Defense Force via AP, File)
Here’s why Chinese warships near Australia and New Zealand have prompted alarm
An unusual series of military exercises by Chinese warships in the sea between Australia and New Zealand has prompted reproval from leaders in both countries about the amount of warning given.
 
Belle Gibson arrives at the Federal Court in Melbourne, Australia, May 14, 2019. (David Crosling/AAP Image via AP)
Wellness blogger Belle Gibson lied about having cancer. Years later, Australia is still chasing her
The consumer watchdog in the Australian state of Victoria said this week it’s still pursuing the disgraced wellness influencer Belle Gibson, who lied about having terminal brain cancer and curing it through healthy living, for the hefty fines she was ordered to pay in 2017.
 
In this photo provided by the Australian Defense Force, the HMAS (His Majesty's Australian Ship) Arunta, left, shadows the People's Liberation Army-Navy Jiangkai-class frigate Hengyang and a Fuchi-class replenishment vessel in the Tasman Sea, on Feb. 13, 2025. (Australian Defense Force via AP)
China issued ‘disconcerting’ warning of live-fire exercises to planes flying above, Australia says
Australian Defense Minister Richard Marles says airliners were over the Tasman Sea crossing between Australia and New Zealand when the Chinese navy warned they were flying over a secret live-fire exercise.
 
Cook Islands Prime Minister Mark Brown speaks during a plenary session at the COP28 U.N. Climate Summit, on Dec. 2, 2023, in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. (AP Photo/Rafiq Maqbool, File)
Cook Islands gives some detail of its China deal that has upset close partner New Zealand
The South Pacific country of Cook Islands has unveiled the details of a deal with China to boost cooperation after the pact provoked a rare diplomatic clash with the nation’s chief benefactor, New Zealand, and protests at home.
 
Dawn breaks at Waitangi, New Zealand, Thursday, Feb. 6, 2025, as the country begins to mark the anniversary of its founding document, the Treaty of Waitangi. (David White/STUFF via AP)
Protests and a New Zealand leader’s absence overshadow a day marking the founding treaty with Māori
The anniversary of New Zealand’s founding document, the Treaty of Waitangi, has passed in a muted fashion.
 
A police officer stands near where anti-Israel graffiti is painted on a wall in Sydney, Australia, on Dec. 11, 2024. (Mick Tsikas/AAP Image via AP)y
How a wave of antisemitic attacks roiled Australia and provoked claims of foreign influence - test
A wave of antisemitic attacks has roiled Australia, with a dozen arrests for vandalizing or setting homes, schools, and synagogues on fire since October. Australia’s federal lawmakers on Thursday advanced hate crime laws almost unanimously.
 
Floods kill 2 people and wreak havoc in Australia’s Queensland after monsoon rains
Monsoon rains have unleashed flooding in Australia’s Queensland that claimed the lives of two people. The week-long deluge dropped months of rainfall in a few days, devastating small rural towns on the state’s north coast.
 
Prime Minister Tuilaepa Sailele Malielegaoi, foreground right, shakes hands with Robert F. Kennedy Jr. before he left the the 57th Independence Celebration in Mulinu'u, Samoa, on June 1, 2019. At foreground left is Kennedy's wife, actress Cheryl Hines. Kennedy said the trip was arranged by Edwin Tamasese, a local anti-vaccine influencer. (Misiona Simo/Samoa Observer via AP, File)
RFK Jr. misled the US Senate on measles deaths, Samoa’s health chief says
Samoa’s top health official has denounced as “a complete lie” remarks that Robert F. Kennedy Jr. made during his bid to become U.S. health secretary. Kennedy has said that some who died in a 2019 measles epidemic in Samoa didn’t have measles.
 
A man takes a picture of his wife with Mount Taranaki, also known as Mount Egmont, in the background in New Plymouth, New Zealand, Sept. 26, 2011. (AP Photo/Dita Alangkara, File)
A New Zealand mountain is granted personhood, recognizing it as sacred for Māori
A mountain in New Zealand considered an ancestor by Indigenous people has been recognized as a legal person after a new law granted it all the rights and responsibilities of a human being.
 
New South Wales Police Deputy Commissioner David Hudson speaks in Sydney, Wednesday, Jan. 29, 2025, about the discovery of explosives stashed on Sydney's outskirts suspected to have been intended to escalate a campaign of antisemitic arson and graffiti crimes. (Steven Saphore/AAP Image via AP)
Australia wakes to more antisemitic graffiti after a discovery of explosives was revealed by police
As three more episodes of antisemitic graffiti were discovered across Sydney on Thursday morning, Australian political leaders warned of an escalation in hatred and decried as terrorism an incident of explosives found in a trailer on the city’s outskirts.
 
Solar panels system funded by United States Agency for International Development (USAID) are seen in the Lebanese-Syrian border town of Majdal Anjar, eastern Bekaa valley, Lebanon, Nov. 9, 2022. (AP Photo/Bilal Hussein, File)
A US shutdown on foreign aid is hitting from Africa to Asia to Ukraine. Here’s how
U.S-funded aid programs around the world have begun firing staff and preparing to shut down their operations as an unprecedented Trump administration freeze on foreign assistance brings their work to a sudden halt.
 
A boy scavenges for saleable items at Red Beach dump, on Tarawa atoll, Kiribati, March 30, 2004. (AP Photo/Richard Vogel, File)
New Zealand reviews its aid to Kiribati after the Pacific island nation snubs an official’s visit
New Zealand’s government is reviewing its aid to Kiribati after the Pacific island nation’s leader snubbed a planned meeting with New Zealand’s foreign minister.
 
People view an endangered plant known as the "corpse flower" for its putrid stink, which is about to bloom at the Royal Botanical Gardens in Sydney, Australia, Thursday, Jan. 23, 2025. (AP Photo/Rick Rycroft)
A blooming plant that reeks of gym socks and rotting garbage has thousands lining up for a whiff
An endangered tropical plant that emits the stench of a rotting corpse during its rare blooms has begun to flower in a greenhouse in Sydney. It is the first time a corpse flower has bloomed at the Royal Sydney Botanic Garden in 15 years.
 
Margo Neas holds her cat Mittens at her home in Melbourne, Australia Wednesday, Jan. 22, 2025. (AP Photo/Rod McGuirk)
Mittens the cat is mistakenly left on a plane and becomes a frequent flyer
A Maine coon cat named Mittens accidentally flew three times between New Zealand and Australia this month after her cage was mistakenly left in the plane’s cargo hold.
 
British scientists Dr. E.T.S. Walton, left, and Dr. F.D. Cockroft, right, stand with Lord Rutherford outside the Cavendish laboratory in Cambridge, U.K, May 2, 1932. (AP Photo/Len Puttnam, File)
Trump vexes New Zealanders by claiming one of their proudest historical moments for America
U.S. President Donald Trump’s declaration in an inauguration speech that Americans “split the atom” prompted vexed social media posts on Tuesday by New Zealanders, who said the achievement belonged to a pioneering scientist revered in his homeland.
 
An albatross looks at the camera while nesting at Taiaroa Head, New Zealand on June 18, 2024. (Michael Hayward/New Zealand Department of Conservation via AP)
Test 2 An albatross couple shares egg duty in this captivating low-drama reality show
A popular New Zealand bird “reality show” that each year follows a pair of northern royal albatrosses as they breed and raise a chick has drawn a global audience of devoted fans in its current 10th season.
 
An Interislander ferry battles heavy seas after leaving Wellington, New Zealand, on its way to Picton on March 5, 2006. (Andrew Gorrie/Dominion Post via AP).
Wild weather halted ferries between New Zealand’s main islands again. Why isn’t there a tunnel?
Wild weather during New Zealand’s peak summer holiday period has disrupted travel for thousands of passengers on ferries that cross the sea between the North and South Islands.
 
A missing surfer in Australia is believed dead in a shark attack, police say
Authorities say a surfer missing in Australia is believed dead in a shark attack and they are searching the waters where the man disappeared.
 
Police forensic officers photograph the scene at Buxton Square where a police officer was killed after a driver ran her and colleague down as they patrolled on foot in the early hours of New Year's Day, Nelson, New Zealand, Wednesday, Jan. 1, 2025. (Braden Fastier/Stuff via AP)
Driver runs down 2 New Zealand police officers, killing 1
A New Zealand police officer died in hospital on Wednesday and another was seriously hurt after a driver ran them down as they patrolled on foot in the early hours of New Year’s Day, the country’s police chief said.
 
Fireworks explode over the Las Vegas Strip during a New Year's Eve celebration Wednesday, Jan. 1, 2025, in Las Vegas. (AP Photo/David Becker)
The world welcomes 2025 with light shows, embraces and ice plunges
From Sydney to Mumbai to Paris to Rio de Janeiro, communities around the world are welcoming 2025 with spectacular light shows, embraces and ice plunges. Auckland became the first major city to celebrate.
 
Load More