ALAN FINLAY & Reuters, Johannesburg | Wednesday 11.20am. LOCAL markets slumped in early trade on Wednesday, as investors took a dim view of a US rates hike of 50 basis points, which boosted the Dow Jones overnight. Analysts say the hike may put pressure on the rand and result in an interest rates hike in […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Jolo | Wednesday 8.50am. GOVERNMENT negotiators are expected to arrive on the southern Philippines island of Jolo on Wednesday to resume talks with Moslem rebels holding 21 hostages, including two South Africans. Journalists who saw the hostages on Tuesday said ailing German housewife Renate Wallert, one of the captives, is very weak and […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Freetown | Wednesday 8.50am. NINETY-three exhausted Zambian and Kenyan UN peacekeepers, held hostage for two weeks in the bush by rebels in Sierra Leone, have flown back to the government-controlled capital of Freetown. Wearing a ragged array of uniforms and some shod in flip-flop sandals, they landed at Freetown’s Lungi airport on Tuesday […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, London | Wednesday 2.00pm. GOLD prices were seen extending losses after overnight falls sparked by the US interest rate rise of 50 basis points. ”The dollar strengthened on the back of higher interest rates, so producing-countries currencies weakened and are putting pressure on gold,” said one European trader said. In the short term, […]

ITALO-BELGIAN former journalist Georges Omar Ruggiu, 44, has pleaded guilty in a UN court in Arusha, Tanzania, to having used the airwaves to incite the 1994 genocide that claimed up to 800000 lives in Rwanda. Ruggiu is the only non-Rwandan to appear before the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda. He “admitted having directly and publicly […]

A VAST game reserve spanning Botswana and South Africa became Africa’s first official transfrontier park on Friday after the presidents of the two countries opened the conservation zone. President Thabo Mbeki and his Botswanan counterpart Festus Mogae inaugurated the Kgalagadi Transfrontier Park at a ceremony attended by about 500 people at the park’s southern Twee […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Harare | Tuesday 5.15pm. COMMONWEALTH chief Don McKinnon said free and fair elections in Zimbabwe are possible, after talks with President Robert Mugabe on Tuesday. “I believe it is possible to have a free election,” Secretary General McKinnon said after the hour-long meeting at Mugabe’s State House office in Harare. “There are concerns […]

ZIMBABWEAN leg-spinner Brian Murphy has had to cut short his final-year law studies to strengthen the depleted Zimbabwe bowling attack in the two-test series against England starting at Lord’s on Thursday. Murphy, 23, made his debut in the West Indies this year, and will play in the place of senior leg spinner Paul Strang, who […]

LEADERS from eastern and southern Africa meet in Mauritius on Wednesday to discuss ambitious plans for economic integration which are threatened by conflicts across the continent. Heads of state from members of the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa will hold a two-day summit to discuss plans to create a free trade zone from […]

THE US Agency for International Development pledged on Tuesday $250-million in development aid to South Africa for the next five years. The money will be used to stimulate job creation, strengthen the country’s justice system, improve access to health, education and housing for its people and fight the spread of HIV/Aids, the US embassy and […]