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Search "bama rush" on TikTok and this is what you get. Photo: TikTok Depending on the corners of TikTok you might inhabit, the curious American cultural phenomena of rush week might be filling your feed. (Not on TikTok? Proceed anyway. This is interesting). Rush week, and specifically rush week at the University of Alabama, is the pinnacle of over-the-top university life in the US that will leave many a New Zealander scratching their head. It's a massive drama that now plays out on social media where girls new to university vie for coveted invitations to a sorority, a house and organisation of female students that often provides a leg up in college social life and the career to follow. "The craziness is quite intense. You can feel down about yourself during rush week and rush week can s...

Prime Minister Christopher Luxon and his Australian counterpart Anthony Albanese have raised the issue that a cyberattack on one country could trigger a joint co-operation under trans-Tasman agreements. The discussion of cyber-warfare was one of the main issues raised by the two leaders at a joint press conference in Canberra on Friday. Luxon said the nature of modern warfare had changed, and while it would require a "pretty severe cyberattack" to trigger Article IV of the ANZUS Treaty, which recognises an "armed attack in the Pacific Area on any parties" would be dangerous to the others, it was now a factor that needed to be considered. Albanese said its military and signals defences were being tested by cyberattacks, which can now have "as great an impact as an attack from traditional me...

Prime Minister Christopher Luxon and Australian counterpart Anthony Albanese are facing questions after a meeting in Sydney. Luxon is in Australia, with security and defence front and centre, amid concerns over any potential New Zealand involvement in the AUKUS alliance. In a foreign policy speech in Sydney on Thursday, Luxon said New Zealand "must be a participant and a contributor - not an interested bystander" in international affairs. He has been in Canberra on Friday, for a meeting with Albanese. They will address the media together at 12.55pm (NZ time) before Luxon takes questions from the press. Last year, New Zealand and Australia celebrated 40 years of the Closer Economic Relations trade agreement, that allows people to live, work, trade and businesses to grow and invest more easi...

A photo taken on 6 February 2013 shows a crowd watching as a young mother accused of sorcery, is stripped naked, reportedly tortured with a branding iron, tied up, splashed with fuel and set alight on a pile of rubbish topped with car tyres, in Mount Hagen city in the Western Highlands of Papua New Guinea. Photo: AFP / Post Courier Papua New Guinea desperately needs stronger laws to protect innocents and deliver justice for victims of sorcery related violence, an advocate says. Activist Evelyn Kunda is currently in Aotearoa to shine a light on the horrors of sorcery related violence in her country. Those accused of sorcery in PNG are frequently beaten, tortured, and murdered, and anyone who manage to survive the attacks are banished from their communities. Kunda told RNZ Pacific authori...

Kiwi country music queen Tami Neilson is heading to Nashville to play the Grand Ole Opry. Only the elite in country music get to play and you have to be invited to perform. The Opry is the radio show that made country music famous and has been running for 98 years. It's launched the careers of Dolly Parton, Hank Williams, Patsy Cline, Loretta Lynn and Willie Nelson. It's 30 years since she attended the Opry with her family, she told RNZ's Nine to Noon. "I was 16 years old, I was living in Nashville with my family. We were playing shows there, and we were living in our motor home in a trailer park. I mean, does it get more country than that?" For country musicians the Opry is "our Carnegie Hall," she said. "I still have the ticket stub from when we attended. It's in my scrapbook from when I...