Uluru

Google has removed images from its Street View that allowed users to virtually walk on Australia's Uluru, a sacred Aboriginal site closed to tourists since last year, the company said Friday.

Hundreds of tourists flocked to Uluru Friday for one last chance to climb the sacred site ahead of a ban, despite heavy winds preventing early attempts to scale the giant red monolith.

There are about 700,000 Aborigines in a population of 23 million in Australia, but they suffer disproportionately high rates of suicide, alcohol abuse, domestic violence and imprisonment. Constitutional recognition of Aborigines is a complex issue in a country which previously administered its indigenous people under flora and fauna laws.

Britain's Prince William visited Australia's Uluru on Tuesday, taking his wife Kate to the spectacular red monolith and evoking the visit by his parents Prince Charles and Diana in 1983.

Google has removed images from its Street View that allowed users to virtually walk on Australia's Uluru, a sacred Aboriginal site closed to tourists since last year, the company said Friday.

Hundreds of tourists flocked to Uluru Friday for one last chance to climb the sacred site ahead of a ban, despite heavy winds preventing early attempts to scale the giant red monolith.

There are about 700,000 Aborigines in a population of 23 million in Australia, but they suffer disproportionately high rates of suicide, alcohol abuse, domestic violence and imprisonment. Constitutional recognition of Aborigines is a complex issue in a country which previously administered its indigenous people under flora and fauna laws.

Britain's Prince William visited Australia's Uluru on Tuesday, taking his wife Kate to the spectacular red monolith and evoking the visit by his parents Prince Charles and Diana in 1983.