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/ 29 January 2008
Following the bread price-fixing scandal at the end of last year and the further recent increases by the large bread producers, there have been several calls for government to intervene in the market for bread. The argument against government intervention is that it distorts the market allocation of goods and services. When a good is in short supply, buyers bid up the price.
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/ 29 January 2008
Less than a year after France’s decimated bee populations showed signs of recovery, beekeepers here are once again in a panic as their income-generating worker drones are disappearing by the tens of millions. The banning in 2005 of two potent pesticides used on sunflower and corn crops, suspected of killing off the bees, appeared to have stemmed the massive die-offs.
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/ 29 January 2008
United States soldiers are lampooned, police officers are shown as buffoons and Shi’ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr is irreverently cheered by penguins … Iraqis are turning more and more to YouTube to express their dark-edged humour. The main butt of send-ups posted by Iraqis on the popular internet video site is, as one might expect, the US military.
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/ 29 January 2008
An Egyptian court granted Baháí’s the right to obtain government identity papers on Tuesday, so long as they omit their faith, in an important ruling for members of unrecognised religions. Sources said the court had ruled that Egyptian Bahá’í Raouf Hindy could obtain identity documents for his teenage twins by putting a dash in the religion line.
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/ 29 January 2008
”I don’t think there is a conflict with regards to my position as the secretary general of the ANC and SACP chairperson. Moses Kotane served as treasurer general of the ANC while he was also secretary general for the SACP for many years”, ANC secretary general Gwede Mantashe tells the Mail & Guardian.
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/ 28 January 2008
Double-amputee sprinter Oscar Pistorius has virtually given up his fight to compete at the Beijing Olympics and is focusing his efforts on running at the 2012 London Games. The International Association of Athletics Federations ruled on January 14 that the South African was ineligible to compete at the Olympics.
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/ 28 January 2008
President Thabo Mbeki has taken opposition leader Helen Zille into his confidence on the case of police National Commissioner Jackie Selebi and on other contentious issues, she said on Monday. She met Mbeki at the Union Buildings in Pretoria for talks that lasted for longer than two hours.
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/ 28 January 2008
Congolese Tutsi rebels and Mai Mai militia clashed on Monday in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), breaking a ceasefire signed last week aimed at ending a long-running conflict, the two factions said. Tutsi fighters loyal to renegade General Laurent Nkunda and Pareco Mai Mai militia blamed each other for the fighting.
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/ 28 January 2008
Heavily armed militants took about 300 children hostage at a school in Pakistan on Monday but freed them after tense negotiations with tribal elders, the Interior Ministry said. Rebels armed with rocket launchers holed up at the school in the North West Frontier Province after a failed attempt to abduct a local official.