Canberra

Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison on Sept. 19 rejected France's accusations Canberra lied about plans to cancel a contract to buy French submarines, saying he had raised concerns over the deal "some months ago".

Australian police arrested 235 people in Melbourne and 32 in Sydney on Saturday, at illegal rallies against quarantine and "measures" imposed due to the coronavirus pandemic, while several police officers were injured in clashes with protesters.
Victoria State Police said six police officers were hospitalized.

France has recalled its ambassadors to the U.S. and Australia for consultation, Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian announced on Sept. 17, after Canberra ditched a deal to buy French submarines in favor of U.S. vessels.

President Joe Biden's decision to form a strategic Indo-Pacific alliance with Australia and Britain to counter China is angering France and the European Union. They're feeling left out and seeing it as a return to the Trump era.

The United States announced a new alliance on Sept. 16 with Australia and Britain to strengthen military capabilities in the face of a rising China, with Canberra to get a nuclear submarine fleet and American cruise missiles.

Also, due to the growing number of newly infected even among children, online classes have started in high schools in 40 cities and municipalities in Serbia. A member of the Crisis Staff, Dr Predrag Kon, estimated that the epidemiological situation in Serbia will worsen.

Hajdin Abazi, Kosovo's ambassador to Australia, posing with his photo with Ambassador Richard Holbrooke. Photo courtesy of Hajdin Abazi.

Following the easing of COVID-19 lockdown measures in Australia in June this year, I met Kosovo's then ambassador to the country, Hajdin Abazi, at a restaurant in Canberra to discuss the ongoing Serbia-Kosovo dialogue.

Australia's capital Canberra was ordered into a seven-day lockdown on Aug. 12, after a single COVID-19 case was detected in the city that has largely avoided virus restrictions.

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About 400,000 people in the nation's political hub will be under stay-at-home orders from 5:00 pm local time, joining millions more already under lockdown in Australia's southeast.

Australian authorities have been forced to introduce a lockdown in Sydney due to the new epidemic wave and reintroduce restrictive measures in other parts of the country.
Reuters report states that 18 out of a total of 25 million Australians, or 70 percent of the population, are under some form of anti-epidemic restrictions in almost all parts of Australia.

Australia was battling to contain several COVID-19 clusters around the country on June 28 in what some experts have described as the nation's most dangerous stage of the pandemic since the earliest days.