Bali

Slow start as Bali re-opens to foreign tourists

As of Thursday, fully vaccinated travellers from 19 countries including China, India, and France can enter Bali. The UK is not on the list.

But visitors must first serve a five-day quarantine in a hotel.

Officials had closed the international airport in April last year to stop the coronavirus from spreading.

In July, Indonesia became the epicentre of Covid in Asia, but daily cases have since reduced significantly.

Now the tourism sector is hoping that some of the 6 million foreigners who visited the island in 2019, before the pandemic hit, will return.

Bali extends airport closure as eruptions cause lahars

Governor Made Pastika said the evacuation period for people living within 10km of the crater could easily last as long as a month.

Indonesia's disaster management agency said the evacuation had so far been orderly and without panic.

Mount Agung has been hurling clouds of white and dark grey ash about 3000m into the atmosphere since the weekend and lava is welling up in the crater, sometimes reflected as a reddish-yellow glow in the ash plumes.

Its explosions can be heard about 12km away.

Bali's main airport shuts as volcano alert rises

Indonesia's disaster mitigation agency said it had raised the alert to the highest level four on Bali's Mount Agung volcano and warned residents in an 8-10 km radius around the volcano to evacuate immediately.

Hundreds of New Zealanders have been stranded as Mt Agung volcano continues to spew ash and smoke high into the sky.

"Grey ash and occasional weak blasts can be heard 12 km (seven miles) from the peak. Flames were visible at night which indicates a potential eruption could happen anytime," Indonesia's disaster mitigation agency said in a statement.

Bali evacuees surge as volcano threat grows

Spewing steam and sending tremors through the area, the volcano's alert status was raised to the highest level last week.

Since then, tens of thousands of villagers have been urged to abandon their homes beneath the menacing volcano.

The national disaster management agency has housed evacuees in tents, school gyms, and government buildings in neighbouring villages.

While there are plentiful stocks of food, water, medicines, and other supplies, evacuees fear they are in for a long wait that could disrupt their livelihoods.

Bali statue of Hindu god Wisnu to be world's largest

Twenty-five years and around $100 million in the making, the enormous copper and brass sculpture is of the Hindu god Wisnu astride the mythical bird Garuda.

After years of planning, re-designs, cash shortages and stop-start construction, sculptor Nyoman Nuarta says the project should be finished next September.

And the final phase — the fitting of the sculpture's skin to the concrete and steel skeleton — is well underway.

The copper and brass claws of Garuda are finally gripping an enormous, purpose-built, concrete pedestal.

Australian teenager Jamie Murphy arrested in Bali over drug claim

Jamie Murphy, 18, was detained at the Sky Garden nightclub at Kuta beach in the early hours of Tuesday morning.

His lawyer claimed forensic tests proved a white powder, allegedly found on Mr Murphy, was not an illegal substance.

News Corp Australia reported police now believed the powder was paracetamol.

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