Hello Australia!! - A powerful storm plays havoc in Sydney - The US and Russia reach an agreement on a key sticking point on ending the Syrian Civil war  - Is the Paris climate deal already up in smoke? - And more in your CareerSpot World News Briefs:

A Tornado hit southern Sydney causing all sorts of problems including damage to the desalination plant in Kurnell, which has been declared a disaster area.  At least three people were injured as 200 kph winds tore through the area.  Other highlights include an apparent hole in the roof at Westfield Bondi Junction and general roof damage in the region, downed wires and branches, street flooding, and golf ball-sized hail.

Public schools will be open again in Los Angeles on Wednesday morning, after it was determined that an emailed threat to the school system was not credible.  And with some details leaking out, it's a wonder why that threat wasn't immediately determined to be a hoax, before officials of America's second largest school system abruptly closed every school in the system leaving 640,000 students locked out.  The phony "jihadi" threat contained tell-tale spelling errors, but even more hilariously it came from an email host called "Cockmail" - associated with the pornographic and gutter image board 8chan.  New York City's school system got a similar threat from the same source, and ignored it. 

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is promising "full reconciliation" with the country's indigenous communities, after the release of a report detailing decades of state-approved abuse.  From 1840 all the way to 1996, Canada separated 150,000 indigenous kids from their families and put them into horrific boarding schools - often run by Christian groups to break them of their links to their own languages and cultures.  The children were subjected to physical, sexual, and psychological abuse.  At least 4,000 children died in these schools, and were often dumped in unmarked graves.  PM Trudeau says Canada will fully enact the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.

Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos is hailing an agreement signed with the Marxist FARC rebels as an "important step" towards peace.  It provides for reparations and justice for victims of the country's five decade long civil war; offers an amnesty for all but the most serious crimes; and creates special tribunals for those accused of crimes in the context of the war.  "2016 will be the year that Colombia sees a new dawn," said President Santos.

US Secretary of State John Kerry and his Russian counterpart Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov say world powers will meet in New York City on Friday, to come up with a resolution on the Syrian peace process to be presented to the United Nations.  The text will likely endorse the principles agreed to in Vienna last month.  This comes after Mr. Kerry traveled to Russia to discuss Syria with President Vladimir Putin.  The US is now agreeing to Russia’s long-standing demand that President Bashar Assad’s future be determined by his own people, and not by outside powers.

A week after the Paris Climate Talks wrapped up with a deal to try to limit global warming to 2 degrees C above pre-industrial levels, Japan and South Korea are already pressing ahead up plans for coal-fired scores of new coal-fired power plants.  The East Asian neighnors are the region's most-developed economies, and plan to add at least 60 new coal-fired power plants over the next 10 years.  The Paris deal has no enforcement mechanism to make sure nations actually honor their promise to phase out coal and fossil fuels.