The arrest of suspected rightists in connection with the brutal beating of an Ethiopian-born German citizen is fuelling fears that neo-Nazi violence could overshadow the football World Cup being held in Germany. Germany’s federal prosecutor said the attack, which left the 37-year-old father of two in a coma, had probably been carried out due to ”hatred towards foreigners”.
A crack in a dyke on a swollen river in south-eastern Hungary has forced 4 500 people to evacuate their homes, Tibor Dobson, spokesperson for the national disaster prevention agency, said on Friday. The evacuations were taking place in the towns of Csepa, Szeleveny and Tiszasas in Jasz-Nagykun-Szolnok county, along the river Koros.
The United States will provide an additional -million in humanitarian aid to Ethiopia to alleviate the effects of prolonged drought in the Horn of Africa country. Michael Hess, assistant administrator of the US Agency for International Development (USAID), said on Thursday that the additional funding included -million in food aid and ,3-million in non-food aid.
Police opened fire with rubber bullets on protesters against municipal boundary changes who had broken away from a dispersing crowd at the Union Buildings in Pretoria on Friday. Earlier, about five or six small groups, from a few hundred protesters, set patches of the Union Buildings’ lawns alight.
South Africans will not be getting access to explicit pornographic television channels soon if a Pretoria High Court judge has his way. Judge Ben du Plessis on Friday turned down an application by a Pretoria company, OtherChoice, to legalise the distribution of its smart cards, which give access to pornographic programmes.
Romania has ruptured a dyke on the River Danube to save homes elsewhere from floods and launched a 24-hour watch on the bulging embankments during Orthodox Easter as the swollen Danube menaced scores of villages and towns across south-eastern Europe.
South Africa’s Stormers scored three tries in three minutes in the second half on Friday to beat the Queensland Reds 24-20 in a Super 14 rugby match. Rodney Blake and Drew Mitchell scored first-half tries as the Reds led 13-3 at half-time, but the Stormers’ second-half burst of 21 points put the visitors ahead for good.
A white South African family’s nine-year bid for political asylum in the United States, on bizarre grounds of racial persecution, was dealt a further setback this week by the United States Supreme Court. David and Michelle Thomas and their two sons fled Durban and settled in southern California in 1997.
As few as 2,5% of road accident deaths in South Africa result in culpable homicide prosecutions, a senior state official has indicated. This suggests that no more than half a dozen motorists will face the music in connection with 173 road deaths over the Easter weekend.
Uncertainty continues to shroud the motives of the killers of actor Brett Goldin and designer Richard Bloom — but experts doubt that it was part of a straightforward robbery. They point to the ritualistic aspect of the killings — both men were found lying face down, almost naked, with bullet wounds to the back of the head.