Australia Urged to Ease COVID-19 Border Controls
Voice of America
More than 70,000 people have signed a petition urging the Australian government to ease COVID-19 entry restrictions on foreign-born parents of Australian citizens, who are allowed into the country only on compassionate grounds. Campaigners argue the rules are having a “profound impact” on family relations and mental health.
Foreign-born parents of Australian citizens are not considered to be “immediate family” under the law. They need an exemption on compassionate grounds to be allowed into the country under strict COVID-19 border measures. Campaigners argue that few cases are approved and that the regulations should be changed because families have been separated and children have not met grandparents. Celia Hammond, a member of the House of Representatives, the lower house of Australia’s Federal Parliament, from the governing Liberal Party, told the House that parents were a key part of an emotional support system for many immigrants and their families. Kateryna Dmytrieva has tried unsuccessfully to bring her mother back to Australia from Ukraine.Palestinians gather at the site of an Israeli strike on a camp for internally displaced people in Rafah on May 27, 2024. Fire rages following an Israeli strike on an area designated for displaced Palestinians, amid the ongoing conflict between Israel and Hamas, in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip, in this still picture taken from a video, May 26, 2024. Palestinians gather at the site of an Israeli strike on a camp for internally displaced people in Rafah on May 27, 2024. A member of the bomb squad of the Israeli police collects debris after a rocket fired by Palestinian militants struck in the Israeli city of Herzliya on May 26, 2024.
Georgian President Salome Zourabichvili, right, and Prime Minister Irakli Kobakhidze, left, leave a podium after marking Independence Day in Tbilisi, Georgia, May 26, 2024. Demonstrators with Georgian national and EU flags rally during an opposition protest against a foreign influence bill as they mark their country's Independence Day, in the center of in Tbilisi, Georgia, May 26, 2024.