Large crowds have turned out for the pre-dawn start to the Boxing Day sales. Hundreds of people lined up, waiting for the major department stores to open. Retail's predicting shoppers will spend over 15 billion dollars more than the next couple of weeks.

 

At least 34 people have died in two bomb attacks targeting Christians in the Iraqi capital Baghdad. A bomb exploded as worshipers were leaving a Christmas service at a Church in the south of the city. Earlier, a bomb ripped through a crowded market in a nearby Christian area.

 

Egypt's interim government has declared the Muslim Brotherhood a terrorist group. The Brotherhood is being blamed for a bomb blast at a police headquaters earlier this week that killed 15 people. The group had already been outlawed in the wake of the protests over the ousting of the former president Mohammed Morsi. 

 

And Australia has withdrawn funding for a 38-million program that supplies medicine to health centres in Papua New Guinea. Authorities are concerned that poor-quality drugs are being supplied from China, putting people's lives at risks from TB and malaria.