The Melbourne Newsroom

Australian humanitarian and military law expert Professor Tim McCormack has been appointed as Special Adviser on International Humanitarian Law to Prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo at the International Criminal Court in The Hague.

Professor John O'Toole discusses the purposes and the current progress of the National Curriculum.

Professor O'Toole is the Chair of Arts Education at the University of Melbourne, and lead author of the arts subject area of the National Curriculum.

As first round offers are sent out to students Deputy Vice-Chancellor Professor Sue Elliott says she is excited about the the number of offers the University of Melbourne has made through its Access program.

"The University of Melbourne is absolutely committed to attracting students with the best possible potential to achieve...This year we've increased the diversity of our intake of students, and 25% of our offers have gone to students who come in through the Access program, which recognises that there are inequalities in education."

Increased numbers of students applying for the University of Melbourne's Bachelor of Science shows that students believe science is important to the future of our society, according to the Dean of the Faculty, Professor Robert Saint.

"The dramatically increased demand for Science at the University of Melbourne tells us...that students are recognising the importance of science to the future of our society, and that they recognise the quality of science education and research going on at the University of Melbourne."

When it comes to precious commodities, it could be copper, not gold or oil, that stands out in the future, according to Dr Les Coleman.  

"Copper is interesting. It has been mined for the better part of ten thousand years, so we know copper very, very well, but the price keeps on going up."

"Generally if you know something very well you should be able to produce a lot of it quite cheaply and we don't seem to be able to do that, so it may be (a commodity) to look out for."

According to Dr Coleman we may be seeing the approach of 'peak copper.'

Leading Australian researchers have welcomed an announcement today by the Australian Government of $42M in funding for the development of a bionic eye capable of restoring vision to the blind.

Bionic Vision Australia is a consortium including the University of Melbourne, the University of New South Wales, the Bionic Ear Institute, Centre for Eye Research Australia and NICTA. The project is also supported by researchers from the Australian National University and the University of Western Sydney.

A significant shift in the ETS debate will result from this week's Federal Opposition leadership spill, says University of Melbourne's Dr Les Coleman
 
 "The major issue to come out of Abbott 's  leadership is the fact that all bets are off now. Where there was consensus before about the ETS as being a good way forward, I think it will go right back to basics now and that there will be a complete reassesment of it."

The Oceanic Viking asylum seeker issue has barely caused a ripple of interest in Indonesia, where all the eyes are focussed on the biggest government corruption scandal in years, says Professor Tim Lindsey.  "It’s a little bit like America's Watergate scandal."

Australia has a vital role to play in the region in campaigning against the death penalty, says Fr Peter Norden AO.  "I dont think it's enough for Australians to say it's not an issue in this country.  We are based in a region where many countries execute their citizens and we are host to many overseas students studying in Australia from these countries.

"We need to engage with those students while they are studying here to be more creative in their thinking, because they're going to be the leaders in those countries when they return."

Dr Pradeep Taneja says that while communism in China is dead 'practically', the 60th anniversary of the creation of the People's Republic of China is particularly significant.  "It comes about a year after China hosted the Beijing Olympics, so there's an added significance that China has demonstrated to the rest of the world that China is an important country and one that has achieved remarkable success in its economic development and modernisation."