SYDNEY, AUSTRALIA (BNO NEWS) — Australia had experienced its hottest decade on record due to global warming, the nation’s bureau of meteorology revealed on Tuesday.

The average temperature in Australia from 2000 to 2009 was 0.48 degrees Celsius above the 1961-1990 average, said the Australian Bureau of Meteorology in its annual climate statement.

The year 2009 will be remembered for “extreme bushfires, dust-storms, lingering rainfall deficiencies, areas of flooding and record-breaking heatwaves”, said bureau climatologist David Jones.

That year was Australia’s second warmest year on record, with the annual mean temperature 0.90 degrees Celsius above the 1961-1990 average, driven by three record-breaking heatwaves that caused Australia’s most deadly bushfires, which killed 173 people.

“To get one of them in a year would have been unusual. To get three is just really quite remarkable,” said Jones.

Outback Australia was warming more quickly than other parts of the country, with some inland areas warming at twice the rate of coastal regions.

As Australia warmed, with large tracts of the country battling a decade-long drought, the northern part of the country was becoming wetter. Floods now cover large parts of northern New South Wales state and thee tropical state of Queensland.

“Australia as a whole has been getting warmer for about 50-60 years and it’s actually been tending to get wetter,” said Jones. “You see this paradox — the country, particularly in the north, it’s getting wetter but is also warming up.”

Environment Minister Peter Garrett used the report to attack opposition politicians for blocking the government’s key climate policy, a carbon emissions trading scheme (ETS) aimed at reducing greenhouse gases causing global warming.

In a statement, Garrett claims that the report finds that the patterns of last year and the decade are consistent with global warming. According to Garret, passing ETS would be in the national interest and in the interest of the world.

“Australia is one of the hottest and driest inhabited places on earth and our environment and economy will be one of the hardest and fastest hit by climate change,” said Garrett.

The government has promised to introduce its ETS legislation to parliament in February, a move which may trigger an early election in 2010 if the legislation is again defeated.

The forecast for 2010 is set to be even hotter than before with temperatures likely to be between 0.5 and 1 degrees above average.