New figures released today show that one Indigenous Australian dies every 38 hours from an alcohol-related illness. The cause of death for more than half of those counted since 2000 was cirrhois of the liver or suicide and the average age of death from an alcohol-attributable cause was just 35. So what can be done about this? Well while the Federal Government is mainstreaming services to Indigenous Australians, to combat rates of addiction, Aboriginal run centers around the country are developing community based solutions that are working. But they need more funding. Professor Dennis Gray is the deputy director of the National Drug Research Institute at Curtin University and he conducted the study, outlined its findings and explained what needed to be done to reverse this trend. Director Andrew Amour outlined the programs provided by the Milliya Rumurra Aboriginal Corporation in Broome.

Glitzy ad campaigns and education incentives are not enough, it seems, to encourage young Australians to join the Army. And with the Australian Defence Force still struggling to meet its targets, two defence analysts say that recruiting Pacific Islanders into the armed forces, in exchange for citizenship, could be the solution. The men behind the controversial proposal are Professor Hugh White, from the Australian National University, and Doctor Anthony Bergin, Director of Research Programs at the Australian Strategic and Policy Institute. The proposal, Dr Bergin says, would simply be an extension of Australia's skilled-migration policy. But with a plan to include Islanders who would otherwise fail the Points test for migration to Australia, Anna Vidot asked Anthony Bergin what criteria potential recruits would have to satisfy in order to join the ADF.

An inquest into the death pf Brian Peters, one of the five journalists killed in Balibo in East Timor in 1975, is being held in Sydney, stirring up old debates about what actually happened 31 years ago and whether key aspects of the story were covered up by the Australian, British and Indonesian governments. Peters, along with Greg Shackleton, Gary Cunningham, Tony Stewart and Malcolm Rennie, travelled to the border town of Balibo in October 1975 to document the border raids on towns occurring by Indonesian special forces, in the lead up to invasion later that year. Then on October 16th they were killed and their bodies burnt in circumstances long contested. The official line has always been that the men were accidentally cross fire as Indonesian and Fretilin forces battled to control Balibo. So far, a number of East Timorese witnesses have appeared before the inquest, providing evidence contradicting the official findings of previous inquiries by the Australian government. One of the people who has long sought the truth of the matter is Maureen Tolfrey, sister of Brian Peters.

This week marks the start of Australia's largest ever Green Cities conference. On the agenda is green building, sustainable construction and green design masterclasses. In the last year or so, climate change awareness has increased drastically and the numbers attending Green Cities 2007 reflects that - they're up 300% on the last one, held in 2004. The Green Building Council of Australia's Susie Guthrie discussed what "green buildings" are.

The conflict between Israel and the Palestinians is one that continues to dominate our headlines. But one group is maintaining that we are not getting the full picture, due to the influence of powerful lobby groups that sometimes engage in intimidation and censorship of journalists to ensure their side of the story is given more prominence. US-based Jewish Voice For Peace argues that the influence of powerful pro-Israel lobby groups is having a negative impact in shaping debates around the conflict. And they’re so fed up with the situation that they have set up a blog called muzzlewatch, which aims to document and expose incidences of intimidation and censorship of stories critical of US-Israeli policy. And in the first month of their launch, they’ve had some wins. Cecilie Surasky from Jewish Voice for Peace about the new blog, starting with the phenomena of journalists not even doing stories on the issue, for fear of retaliation.