OWN CORRESPONDENT, New York | Monday SOUTH African gold producer Anglogold is to boycott this week’s Bank of England gold auction, which it says is likely to receive an “unenthusiastic” response from the marketplace. Echoing the sentiment of many other gold market industry players, AngloGold marketing executive director Kelvin Williams described the auction format as […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Pietermaritzburg | Monday GOVERNMENT is racing to quell fears over the potential economic implications for South Africa of an outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease on a pig farm in the KwaZulu-Natal midlands, but warns that the country could face disaster if the disease is not contained. Strict emergency measures have been put in place […]

THE trial of six Bulgarians, who face the death penalty if found guilty of deliberately infecting nearly 400 Libyan children with AIDS, has been postponed again – the fifth postponement since it opened in February. The six Bulgarians, five nurses and a doctor, as well as a Palestinian doctor, stand accused of “triggering an AIDS […]

A TOGOLESE employee of the UN refugee agency has been killed in a rebel attack on the south-eastern Guinean town of Macenta, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in Geneva said. UN staff discovered the body of their colleague, who had apparently been killed by his attackers as they retreated. An Ivorian UN employee […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Johannesburg | Monday WORKERS at the Anglo American Platinum Corporation (Amplats), the world’s largest producer of the precious metal, are set to strike from this evening after failed wage negotiations. The National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) is to advise employees at the company to strike if their demands for a 10% wage increase […]

KHANYISILE MAEPA, Mbabane | Monday THE shift by SABC television from analogue to digital broadcasting has left thousands of Swazis cut off from their favorite channels – and reinforced calls for media diversity in the tiny kingdom. The South African broadcaster switched off its SABC 3 analogue service on September 11, and will cut off […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT and AFP, Cairo | Monday AFRICAN nations need to push for closer trade links if they want to call the shots at World Trade Organisation (WTO) negotiations, an international trade official said ahead of a meeting of African trade ministers. Chungu Mwila, an official with the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa, […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Cape Town | Monday DEFENCE Minister Mosiuoa Lekota and defence force chief General Siphiwe Nyanda have confirmed that the government is considering reintroducing some form of conscription. Speaking at a briefing for media and diplomats at Parliament, they said current members of the South African National Defence Force were not “getting any younger”, […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Johannesburg | Monday AS South Africa’s roads continue to crumble, the National Roads Agency is to investigate the building of 18 new toll routes which could see up to 3500km of roads fall under private management in the next five years. According to a report in the Business Day newspaper, the road network […]

WORK has started on a $10m project to clear earth blocking the flow of the River Nile, using machinery supplied by the Egyptian government. Workers started removing the mass of earth blocking the middle of the river’s main stream, said an Egyptian irrigation mission official. The Nile is the main source of water for agriculture […]