Your afternoon Briefing

Good afternoon, readers. Here’s what made news this Monday.

Good afternoon, readers. Here’s what made news this Monday.

Australian Greens Senator Sarah Hanson-Young speaks during a press conference at Parliament House in Canberra, Wednesday, June 21, 2017. (AAP Image/Lukas Coch) NO ARCHIVING

‘If you’re white, you don’t count’

Liberal frontbencher Michael Sukkar has labelled Greens senator Sarah Hanson-Young’s comments “disgusting”, after she condemned Peter Dutton’s calls for persecuted South African farmers to have claims for humanitarian visas in Australia fast-tracked.

Mr Dutton last week argued for the fast-tracking of humanitarian visas for white South African farmers, sparking a furious response from the South African government.

“I’m to be honest quite shocked that anyone says, or basically intimates, that if you’re persecuted and you’re white, you don’t count,” Mr Sukkar told Sky News.

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18/03/2018: Phil & Maree Beasley standing in the burnt out remains of their home in Terang, South West Victoria, after a bushfire swept through the area. Stuart McEvoy for The Australian.

‘Climate change to blame’

Meanwhile, the Greens have blamed government inaction in climate change for a spate of natural disasters which have ravaged the nation.

Cyclone Marcus has swept across the Northern Territory, bringing down power lines and hundreds of trees in what’s being described as the biggest storm to hit the Top End in 30 years.

In Tathra on the NSW South Coast, at least 70 properties have been destroyed in four blazes started by lightning strikes.

In an anti-coal speech in the Senate today, Richard Di Natale said the government had been doing “everything it can to slow this country’s transition to renewable energy”.

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Teen Vogue images of Yassmin Abdel-Magied. Source: Supplied

Yassmin wins free speech award

Outspoken activist Yassmin Abdel-Magied has won a prestigious prize for free speech.

Human rights group Liberty Victoria has announced that Ms Abdel-Magied had been awarded the 2018 Young Voltaire Award for being a “role model” to young women, Muslims and migrants.

16/3/18 ABC presenter Patricia Karvelas at ABC studios in Southbank. Aaron Francis/The Australian

‘Biggest crock I’ve ever seen’

Need a podcast for your commute home? Look no further.

In this week’s episode of Behind The Media, RN Drive host Patricia Karvelas reflects on the reality of working for the ABC, the greatest threat to journalism and becoming an orphan at eight.

Listen here.

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Where the debris could fall.

Space station in death spiral

The eight-tonne Chinese space station Tiangong-1 is likely to smash back down into Earth some time between March 29 and April 9.

But where will it land?

Without knowing when the station will fall, it is impossible to say where those pieces might land, though the characteristics of the station’s orbit mean it will be ­between latitudes 43° north (that of northern Spain) and 43° south (which passes by Tasmania).