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Sunday's news in under 5 minutes.

Welcome to Sunday’s news in under 5 minutes.

1. An 11 year-old girl has given birth to her step-father’s child, after being denied an abortion.

At the age of only 10, a young Paraguayan girl was raped by her step-father.

However, due to strict abortion laws, the little girl, now 11, was forced to give birth via C-Section earlier this week.

Despite being a victim to heinous abuse, abortions are not legal in the country unless the mother’s life is thought to be in danger. Local health officials claimed that the girls life was, in fact, not in danger. The young girl’s mother requested for her daughter to have access to an abortion, but the Government denied it.

Lawyer for the 11-year-old’s mother, Elizabeth Torales, confirmed that there were no complications during birth, and that both mother and child are healthy.

The girl’s step father was arrested for rape and is still awaiting trial, while her mother was charged with negligence.

The decision to deny an abortion to the young girl has drawn widespread criticism from international groups, including officials from the UN.

2. PM wants the Parliament to be less “blokey”.

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Prime Minister, Tony Abbott, has called for the Liberal Party to increase the number of women in Parliament.

At a Liberal function in Adelaide this weekend, Mr Abbott urged his fellow supporters and Parliamentarians to pre-select more women, but steered clear of recommending quotas on women.

“If we don’t get the percentage of women up, we will be letting ourselves down,” said Mr Abbott.

“It would be entirely reasonable for our party to have, not a quota, but a target to increase the number of women in parliament and in our government at every opportunity.”

“It’s up to every pre-selection panel to choose the best candidate regarless of gender.”

The PM said that the Parliament is lagging far behind the army in female representation and inclusiveness.
“If even the Australian Army can become less blokey, then so can we,” he said.

Mr Abbott says that increasing the number of women in Parliament could be key to his party winning the next election.

“More women, please.”

“To be serious about winning elections, we must be more serious about engaging, pre-selecting and sending to parliament the representative of 50 per cent of the electorate.”

The Prime Minister’s speech follows a Liberal Party report being suggesting targets on female representation in parliament.

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“The Liberal Party has an issue with female representation – but so does Australian politics in general,” the report concluded.

“Less than a third of federal and state parliamentarians are women.”

Currently, there are two women, Julie Bishop and Susan Leys, in the Federal Cabinet. Co-author of the report, Nick Cater, said only 22 per cent of Liberal MPs, in both federal and state/territory parliaments, were female.

3. Outrageously lavish wedding stops traffic. Literally.

It was labelled “AUSTRALIA’S BEST WEDDING”, by the groom, himself.

However, not everyone seemed as pleased as him when the Auburn deputy mayor, Salim Mehajer, married in lavish settings that even Bronwyn Bishop would be uncomfortable with.

Salim and his wife.

In the ceremony on Saturday, Mehajer arrived to a local park in a helicopter, along with his wedding party, and descending upon a red carpet, surrounded by flashing cameras. With a fleet of cars worth $50 million, the group travelled to a nearby home, where his soon-to-be wife was waiting for him.

In preparation for his wedding, Mehajer event sent alert notices to residents on Frances Street, where he was getting married.

The letter titled, “Important Notice Attention Frances Street Residence” warned neighbours that they should move all their vehicles from the street, otherwise they would be towed and removed by police.

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However, police dispute any knowledge in the matter, claiming they were only there in crowd control.

“We were never told, and you can see it was out of control”, Inspector Chris Laird told media. “We’ll be asking regional command to send the family the bill.”

The wedding also included a plane holding a sign with a love heart, a jet flyover, and security from former footballer, John Hopoate.

Mahajer has shrugged off people who have labelled the wedding ridiculous and over the top.

“To all the haters,” the groom said, “Keep hating. I work hard. 100% legit.”

4. PM announces a new “Dob in a Dealer” ice hotline.

The Prime Minister is set to announce a new hotline called “Dob in a Dealer”, in the hop that members of the public will name and shame drug dealers.

The hotline is based on the Victorian Crime Stoppers hotline, which is a confidential service to residents who would like to report the manufacturing, distribution and other drug-related crimes.

“Dob in a Dealer.”

Mr Abbott told The Sunday Telegraph that, “Ice is the worst drug scourge that we’ve faced.”

“Information from the public is an essential part in helping police and other agencies bust drug manufacture and distribution. To encourage the community fight against the ice epidemic, the Commonwealth Government will establish a national Dob in a Dealer campaign.”

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The Prime Minister is also talking with states to propose harsher penalties on those dealing the drug.

5. Coaches with a history of sexual harassment or abuse will be banned from the Olympic Games.

Brand new rules introduced by the Australian Olympic Committee will ban all coaches and officials who have any history of child sexual harassment or abuse. The code of conduct changes precede next year’s Olympic Games in Rio, which also promise to back athletes who report related crimes.

The AOC chief executive, Fiona De Jon, says that this will hopefully filter out coaches who have had a history of committing child abuse.

“If we do run a check and it does come up, it’s a zero-tolerance approach. You’re not welcome on our team, no ifs, not buts,” she said.

The guidelines state that anyone who has been convicted or charged with a serious offence, including sexually-related crimes, will not be allowed on the team.

Despite reports saying there a number of officials in sporting organisations who have concerning backgrounds, De Jong claims that no one has yet raised alarmed bells.

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The agreement, which has been worked on by AOC boss, John Coates for the last nine months, will hopefully be officialised at a meeting with the royal commission into child sexual abuse.

6. Is this our first alien contact?

Scientists are currently investigating whether we could be receiving message from aliens, after an Australian team found a very interesting phenomenon.

Over the last 15 years, 10 strange radio waves, which appear as flashes, have been intercepted by experts. New Scientist reports that they last only a few milliseconds, but contains as much energy as the sun releases in a whole month.

The search for where these waves are coming from started when a CSIRO telescope, in central New South Wales in 2010, recorded a radio burst and has since identified nine similar events.

Originally thought to be just random events, mathematicians are now searching for answers. Many believe that characteristics of the flashes are more than just weird coincidences, as each burst is always a close multiple 187.5 in their arrival times.

It is currently hypothesised that the source of waves is very small, and could be hundreds of kilometres away, possibly in another galaxy.

Have you got a news tip? We’d love to hear it: news@mamamia.com.au.

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