Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd on Sunday named September 7 as election day, hoping to complete a stunning political comeback by keeping his center-left Labor Party in power three years after it ousted him.

Kicking off an election campaign set to focus on the economy and a decision to send asylum-seekers to Papua New Guinea and Nauru, Rudd met Governor General Quentin Bryce in Canberra to pave the way for the polls.

Australia plans to slap a levy on bank deposits to help boost its coffers with the money raised used to protect savings against a bank collapse, sparking criticism Friday from the industry.

It was widely reported that a 0.05 percent tax on deposits up to Aus$250,000 (U.S.$223,255) will be collected from 2016, raising a forecast Aus$733 million in its first 18 months.

The first asylum-seekers to be sent to Papua New Guinea under Australia's hardline new boatpeople policy arrived Thursday, with the government declaring people-smugglers no longer have a product to sell.

Their arrival formally brought into effect an arrangement agreed on July 19 under which those who turn up in Australia on unauthorized boats will be sent to PNG for processing and resettled there -- even if judged to be genuine refugees.

Organised crime is so big globally that were it a country, it would be part of the G20 group of major economies, the Australian government said Tuesday.

Releasing the Australian Crime Commission's biennial report on the issue, Home Affairs Minister Jason Clare said organised crime had boomed and grown more complex with the advent of the Internet.

Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd has made a surprise visit to troops serving in Afghanistan, telling them that it was time they came home.

Rudd, who the Labor Party reinstalled as leader four weeks ago ahead of this year's election, made the trip Saturday with his wife Therese Rein to troops in southern Uruzgan province.

A 6.2-magnitude quake hit off the South Pacific island of Vanuatu on Friday, the U.S. Geological Survey said, but it was not expected to generate a tsunami.

The US Geological Survey said the tremor at 0707 GMT was 135 kilometers (84 miles) deep and some 48 kilometers northeast of Luganville, and more than 270 kilometers from the capital Port Vila.

Australian doctors Friday called for the smacking of children by parents to be made illegal, saying it was too easy to blur the line between reasonable discipline and abuse.

The Royal Australasian College of Physicians said Australian laws needed to be changed to make all forms of corporal punishment illegal "so the law protects children from assault to the same extent that it does all people".

The United Nations on Friday said it was "troubled" by Australia's decision to send asylum-seekers arriving by boat to Papua New Guinea given conditions there failed to adequately protect refugees.

In it's first assessment of the hardline policy announced a week ago by Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees said it was concerned greater numbers of asylum-seekers could be sent to the poor and developing nation.

Australia's tropical Northern Territory presented an unusual gift to Britain's new royal baby, Prince George, on Thursday -- a crocodile hatched on the day his conception was announced.

The tiny reptile, named George after its recipient, was unveiled by Adam Giles, chief minister of the outback province, who described it as a "unique gift".

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange Thursday officially launched his political party to contest Australian elections this year, saying a victory for this candidates would be akin to planting the country's "best investigative journalists" in the Senate.

Assange, the Australian founder of the whistleblowing website, said the WikiLeaks Party would field seven candidates for upper house Senate seats in the states of New South Wales, Victoria and Western Australia.