Live Breaking News: Sydney Zoo in lockdown after Chimpanzee death; Facebook, Instagram affected by worldwide outage; Weekend weather and Tropical Cyclone Seroja updates ? - NEWS.com.au

Sydney Zoo announced the tragic death of the young primate on Facebook this morning.

“Sydney Zoo is sad to announce the death of Mogli a beloved member of our chimpanzee troop. Mogli was found in the chimpanzee habitat this morning by our team,” the zoo said.

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The team at Sydney Zoo said they are in a state of "deep shock" after a beloved chimpanzee was found dead in his enclosure this morning.

Sydney Zoo announced the tragic death of the young primate on Facebook this morning.

"Sydney Zoo is sad to announce the death of Mogli a beloved member of our chimpanzee troop. Mogli was found in the chimpanzee habitat this morning by our team," the zoo said.

"We are currently investigating the circumstances and once more information is known we will make a further statement."

The zoo also put to bed false rumours that an animal had escaped from an enclosure.

"We would like to confirm that media reports of an escaped animal are false. The team are in a state of deep shock and grief."

Labor has issued a scathing attack against the Morrison government over the latest development in Australia's COVID-19 vaccine rollout.

Overnight, Australian regulators advised the AstraZeneca vaccine should only be administered to people aged 50 and over.

This jab was set to be the one administered to the majority of Aussies, with the overnight announcement throwing the already lagging rollout plan into chaos.

Labor Leader Anthony Albanese didn't hold back on Friday morning, labelling the rollout a "debacle" and lashing the government for not buying a wider range of vaccine candidates.

"Labor was warning for a long period of time that we needed to do what international best practice told us we should do, to have access to five or six vaccines," he said.

"The fact that we now have such uncertainty about the rollout is a direct result of an arrogant government that was too focused on the 24-hour media cycle and not focused on what Australia needed."

Picture: Flavio Brancaleone/NCA NewsWire

Mr Albanese then took aim at Prime Minister Scott Morrison, blaming him for Australia's poor COVID vaccination rates.

"Scott Morrison said that we were at the front of the queue. Nothing could be further from the truth,' he said.

"Australia’s struggling to get into the top 100 when it comes to the rollout of the vaccine. Where in areas like the United Kingdom we have 60% of the adult population have been vaccinated. Israel’s right at the top with 100% of their population being vaccinated. And we’re struggling to get beyond 2 or 3% at this point in time.

"Scott Morrison said and repeated on January 7 the clear commitment that 4 million people could be vaccinated by the end of March. We know that figure is less than one million to even receive their first jab.

"Scott Morrison has tried to redefine when people are vaccinated from having two jabs by the end of October, into having just one. Trying to change the goal posts and yesterday he couldn’t even say if people would be vaccinated by the end of 2021.

"Australians won’t forget who is responsible for failing to deliver on what are his own promises and his own commitments when it comes to these issues."

The world's biggest social media platforms are back online, after a brief outage earlier left users frustrated.

Facebook and Instgram were offline globally and users also reported intermittent issues with Messenger and WhatsApp.

But the outage was short-lived, with the services restored just after 8am AEST.

One person is dead and at least four others are injured after a mass shooting in the US state of Texas.

Authorities were called to an industrial warehouse in the town of Bryan after reports of gunfire.

The suspect, believed to have been an employee at Kent Moore Cabinets, is now in custody.

Follow our coverage for updates as they occur.

One of the questions that is being asked following the AstraZeneca announcement last night is why Australia's advice on the vaccine differs from the UK.

Overnight, the Australian government announced the AstraZeneca vaccine wouldn't be given to people under 50. In the UK, the advice is the vaccine shouldn't be administered to people under 30.

Chief Medical Officer Professor Paul Kelly said it was important that "local context" was taken into account when making this decision.

Picture: Gary Ramage/NCA NewsWire

"They (UK regulators) have used exactly the same data as we have been using because most of these extremely rare events have happened in Europe and in the UK and that's where many millions of doses have been used of the AstraZeneca vaccine," Professor Kelly told ABC News Breakfast.

"It is the same data but taking into account local circumstances. We have chosen the medical advisory group (to be above) 50. That's based on that risk-benefit equation for the Australian circumstances. So that's what we're going with."

The world’s biggest social media platforms are down this morning with Facebook and Instagram users questioning what’s gone wrong.

Down Detector, which tracks when technology fails, has reported both platforms are down.

The Instagram app was asking users to “please try again” when attempting to load the news feed.

“We're sorry, but something went wrong,” the app said.

Facebook is also showing a similar error message and is struggling to refresh its news feed.

WhatsApp briefly had issues, with a spinning wheel and a “connecting” message showing up for users.

All three social media platforms are owned and run by Facebook.

Police believe they may have found the man whose severed penis and testicle were discovered in a Brisbane man's freezer last year.

Ryan Andrew King was charged last year after allegedly cutting off a man's testicle in a Brisbane backpackers.

Emergency services were called to the backpackers in July 2020 where they allegedly found a 26-year-old Sydney man with his genitals partly removed.
It is alleged the man had arranged to be partially castrated by Mr King in one of the rooms, after meeting online – despite Mr King having no formal surgical or medical training.

This prompted a police search of Mr King's West End apartment, where investigators allegedly found a human penis and testicle stored in his freezer.

Now, police believe they have found the second alleged victim after analysing Mr King's GoPro footage, according to the Courier Mail.

It is alleged Mr King travelled to Melbourne in 2018 and performed another consensual surgery on a 66-year-old man to remove his penis and one testicle.

Mr King then allegedly brought the body parts home and stored them in his freezer. The following year he allegedly met with the Victorian man again to remove his remaining testicle.

He has since been charged for the second time with grievous bodily harm with intent to maim.

Foreign Minister Marise Payne says there are “credible reports of the systematic abuse and torture” of Uyghur women in response to an extraordinary press conference by the Chinese embassy.

Australian journalists were invited to a press conference on Wednesday where they were shown Chinese government propaganda videos denying the abuse of the Muslim minority Uyghur population in Xinjiang.

Chinese ambassador Cheng Jingye lashed out at what he described the “distorted coverage” of Xinjiang, and slammed Canberra for its criticism of Chinese human rights abuses.

But Ms Payne said Canberra would continue to be “very clear” about its “deeply held concerns” over Xinjiang, where human rights groups estimated a million Uyghurs had been detained in internment camps.

“These are matters which we have raised at the highest level,” she told Sky News on Thursday.

“I made a statement with my New Zealand counterpart at the end of last month about these issues, and we work closely with our international counterparts.”

Ms Payne claimed credible reports showed the “systematic abuse and torture of women” in Xinjiang, alongside re-education camps, religious oppression and forced sterilisations.

She said Australia had consistently pushed for the United Nations high commissioner for human rights to be granted “open and free” access to the region, but had been rejected by the Chinese authorities.

Additional reporting NCA NewsWire

Footage has captured the sickening moment a man’s head is repeatedly stomped on as he lays motionless on the ground amid a Melbourne street brawl.

The video shows a man laying still on the ground being punched in the head by an attacker. A man in a white shirt then joins in, kicking the motionless man in the head before repeatedly stomping on his face, causing the victim’s body to jerk.

Other people can be seen fighting in the background and the man in the white shirt runs off.

Picture: 7News

Despite the horrific footage, Victoria Police claim no one was seriously injured in the brawl.

The fight reportedly started inside the Albion Rooftop bar in South Melbourne in the early hours of Saturday morning before it spilled out onto the street after they were removed from the premises at about 2.20am.

Police claim up to 10 men were involved in the brawl, with two men in their 20s being taken to hospital with non-life threatening injuries.

No arrests have been made and police are calling on anyone with information to contact Crime Stoppers on 1800 333 000.

Australia will not give the AstraZeneca vaccine to most people under 50 following confirmation of a “rare but serious risk” of fatal blood clots, the Prime Minister said this evening.

Wherever possible, under 50s will only get the Pfizer vaccine.

The change in advice follows a number of blood clots that have occurred in a small number of younger people after receiving the vaccine.

“The use of the Pfizer vaccine is preferred over the AstraZeneca vaccine in adults aged less than 50 years who have not already received the first dose of AstraZeneca vaccine,” said chief medical officer Professor Paul Kelly during the snap press conference.

He said the decision was based on the increased risk of complications from COVID-19 with increasing age and the “potentially lower risk” of a rare blood clot in older people.

Professor Kelly said the fatal blood clotting was a “very rare event”.

“It seems to be around 4 to 6 per million doses of vaccine usually within 4 to 10 days after that vaccine. But it is serious, and it can cause up to a 25 per cent death rate.”

He said the AstraZeneca vaccine should only be given to adults under 50 years of age “where benefit clearly outweighs the risk for that individual’s circumstances”.