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/ 19 October 2007
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As a wax model of English rugby star Jonny Wilkinson joined the statue of national hero Horatio Nelson in London’s Trafalgar Square, attention in both England and South Africa was on Friday focused on the looming Rugby World Cup final between the two nations.
It may never be known if Princess Diana was pregnant when she died with her lover, Dodi al-Fayed, in a high-speed Paris car crash, the inquest into their deaths was told on Wednesday. Dodi’s father, Harrods luxury storeowner Mohamed al-Fayed, says the couple were killed in 1997 by Britain’s security services on the orders of Queen Elizabeth’s husband, Diana’s former father-in-law.
An inquest into the death of Princess Diana finally opened on Tuesday, 10 years after she and Dodi al-Fayed were killed in a Paris car crash, with her lover’s father still convinced the two were victims of an establishment plot. Mohamed al-Fayed, owner of London’s luxury Harrods store, fought a long legal battle to have the inquest heard by a judge and jury.
Archbishop of York John Sentamu warned Anglican conservatives on Monday that boycotting a church summit next year means they will effectively expel themselves from the worldwide communion. United States liberals, who sparked the row in the first place by ordaining an openly gay bishop, have locked horns with conservatives from Africa and Asia.
The BBC suspended some senior editors on Thursday after the public broadcaster unearthed a string of fake phone-in competitions that tarnished its reputation and torpedoed the trust of viewers. It is the biggest crisis faced by the BBC since it locked horns with the British government over its coverage of Iraq.
The publisher who first signed up JK Rowling believes he may have found another Harry Potter — but this time it is a boy archaeologist. In an industry that revels in hype and is always on the lookout for the next blockbuster, two unknown authors have amassed advances of over £500 000.
JK Rowling, who became the world’s first billion dollar author on the back of Harry Potter’s success, has given the go-ahead for the creation of a Florida theme park dedicated to the schoolboy wizard. ”The plans I have seen look incredibly exciting and I don’t think fans of the books or films will be disappointed,” Rowling said.
The Simplified Spelling Society (SSS) is celebrating its 99th birthday by launching a new campaign to make it easier to read and write English. It may be the world’s most universal language, but linguistic experts say it has failed to adapt for the past 500 years and now half the globe’s English speakers have difficulty spelling.
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/ 27 February 2007
People think the Anglican church is obsessed with sex in a battle over homosexuality that ”very few really want to be fighting”, Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams said on Monday. The Anglican communion, a loose federation of 38 national churches, has been split between a liberal minority and a conservative majority.
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/ 1 February 2007
Anti-Semitic attacks reached record levels in Britain last year and peaked during the conflict in Lebanon, a study showed on Thursday. Race-hate incidents — ranging from death threats to physical assault — rose by more than 30% to almost 600. ”These are the worst figures we have had in the 23 years since we have been monitoring it,” said Mark Gardner of the Community Security Trust.