Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has delivered an address to Papua New Guinea's parliament. It's first time a foreign leader has addressed the country's parliament. Mr Albanese is on a state vcisit to finalise a defence treaty between Australia and Papua New Guinea. The Prime Minister also renewed his call for there to be a Papua New Guinea-based team in the N-R-L. ----------- Victoria Premier Daniel Andrews says there will be no state funeral or memorial service for Cardinal George Pell, as it would be too distressing for victim-survivors of child sexual abuse. Cardinal Pell, who served as the former archbishop of Melbourne and Sydney, died in Rome on Tuesday ((10 Jan)), after a hip surgery resulted in heart complications. The 81-year-old was committed to stand trial in 2017 in Melbourne for child sexual abuse offences. He was convicted of offences that took place in 1996 - but in 2020, his convictions were quashed by the High Court. ---------- Around 2,000 patients who underwent a colonoscopy at health services along the Victoria-New South Wales border will have to have the procedure repeated. Safer Care Victoria says an investigation into Dr Liu-Ming Schmidt has revealed that colonoscopies she supervised or performed between 2018 and 2022 were incomplete. It includes procedures at Albury Wodonga Health, Albury Wodonga Private Hospital and Insight Private Hospital. Each patient will be contaced over the next week - but it is expected many will have to have another colonoscopy as a precaution. --- Australia is maintaining an elevated trade surplus, with new data from the Bureau of Statistics ((ABS)) data revealing it hit $13.2 billion in November last year. Economists had expected it to be just over $11.5 billion dollars for the month. But the trend from September and October, which saw the balance on goods and services remain over $12 billion has continued. The A-B-S data has also revealed a dip in exports by 0.4 per cent, while imports fell by 1.5 per cent over the month ------- Japanese tennis star Naomi Osaka has announced she's pregnant, just three days after withdrawing from this year's Australian Open tournament. The four-time grand slam winner announced the news in a Twitter post, with an image of a pregnancy scan. The 25-year-old says she's expecting to return in time for the 2024 Australian Open. Naomi Osaka has already won the Australian Open twice.]]
