Across Asia: Australia

PM's Chinese skills help

Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd's ability to speak fluent Chinese is helping increase trade opportunities for Australian businesses, a survey shows.

A national poll of 200 small and medium enterprises found 42 percent believe Rudd's fluency in Mandarin had created a more positive environment for Australian companies doing business in China.

Many of the companies surveyed also believe Rudd's command of the language could make it easier for them to forge future trade deals in China.

Hundreds of kangaroos culled

Protesters failed yesterday to stop the controversial cull of hundreds of kangaroos on a military base near the Australian capital, Canberra, which animal rights activists had branded as "barbaric".

Two protesters who broke through security and police lines in a bid to free kangaroos penned inside a screened enclosure reached the wrong animals, with vets tranquillizing and killing almost 400 kangaroos in a separate area, the military said.

Authorities said the 400 eastern grey kangaroos, which feature on Australia's coat of arms, threatened other endangered local species through overgrazing.

A total of 600 kangaroos lived on the 200-hectare (495-acre) military communications base on the outskirts of Canberra, and the military said they would all have starved had not 400 of them been darted and killed with barbiturates.

(China Daily 05/21/2008 page23)