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/ 16 November 2006
"Jagshemash!!!" Kazakhstan is belatedly turning the joke on Borat, using the blundering fictional reporter as an unlikely prop to "make benefit" its tourism industry. Embracing the maxim "if you can’t beat them, join them", a Kazakhstan-based tour company has pounced on Borat’s conquest of Hollywood to lure Americans keen to find out what the country is really like.
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/ 8 November 2006
United States Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld resigned on Wednesday, paying the price for the Democrat surge to power in Congress driven by a wave of public anger over the Iraq war. President George Bush announced the veteran power broker’s departure, sending shockwaves though Washington.
The Bush administration has refused to abandon military tribunals for Guantánamo Bay inmates despite the United States Supreme Court ruling the ”war on terror” trials illegal, which leading newspapers called a victory for law. The court ruled on Thursday that President George Bush had no authority to order such tribunals.
If sport is a metaphor for life, then the passion and pain of the struggling West Indies cricket team is an apt reflection of the region that will welcome the 2007 ICC World Cup. Long gone are glory days when the islands in the sun churned out terrorising fast bowlers like the late Malcolm Marshall and master blasters like Viv Richards.
Visions dawned on Monday of a new golden age of philanthropy with Bill Gates atop a mammoth $60-billion charity machine, with a global punch to rival world aid bodies and even governments. Investment guru Warren Buffett’s $31-billion donation to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation will double the size of Gates’ fund and make it by far the world’s largest charitable foundation.
A United States jury rejected the death penalty for al-Qaeda conspirator Zacarias Moussaoui and ruled he should be jailed for life without parole for his role in the September 11 attacks conspiracy. True to his stormy and unpredictable character, Moussaoui shouted ”America you lost … I won”, as he was led from the court.
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/ 8 December 2005
They are the addicts who slake their craving in public, snatch a fix in boring business meetings, on the subway, or even risk a hit during rows with their spouses. But Americans hooked on the BlackBerry hand-held computer, dubbed by wags as the ”CrackBerry” for the hold it has on users, may soon be tasting cold turkey, if a patent dispute forces its maker to turn off the service.
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/ 6 December 2005
China is challenging United States interests and values in Africa, shielding ”rogue states,” harming the environment and thwarting anti-corruption drives, according to a new independent survey of US policy on the continent. Beijing and the United States are on opposite sides in a new struggle for influence and resources in the new ”playing field” of Africa, said the survey.
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/ 22 November 2005
United States media organisations are now skewering President George Bush over his case for ousting Saddam Hussein, but few questioned the pro-war juggernaut in the run-up to battle. Now, with the White House’s once-feared public-relations machine misfiring, Bush’s approval ratings plumbing their lowest depths, many commentators and journalists are piling on.
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/ 19 October 2005
Washington’s power-broking elite is shaken and stirred, and revolt is brewing over the Dom Perignon and canapés at the latest threat to the United States capital’s everyday life. What can have so vexed the cocktail party set? A new al-Qaeda terror threat? Quagmire in Iraq?