Oil prices slipped more than a barrel on Monday as traders worried that the flagging United States economy would cause oil demand to soften. Oil’s sharp decline started last week. Crude futures started plunging after the US Federal Reserve-backed sale of Bear Stearns to JPMorgan Chase created fears of deeper economic problems.
Pakistan’s Parliament prepared on Monday to elect a new prime minister as the coalition government appeared set for a confrontation with key United States ally President Pervez Musharraf. Yousuf Raza Gilani, the candidate nominated by the party of slain opposition leader Benazir Bhutto, is a virtual certainty to win.
Rebels in northern Mali are holding about 30 soldiers hostage following an attack last week, military officials said on Sunday. Ethnic Tuareg rebels raided a military convoy in the desert Kidal region last week, taking several dozen troops hostage, a military official said on condition of anonymity because he was not an authorised spokesperson.
At least five people, including a child, were killed on Sunday in a new wave of violence in the Somali capital, Mogadishu, witnesses said. ”I saw armed men opening fire at policemen at Debka interception. Three policemen and a doctor who worked in a clinic nearby were killed,” witness Farah Hasan Sahal said in southern Mogadishu.
Police in the north-west Nigerian state of Kebbi, home to the Argungu fishing festival, have released on bail this year’s champion, arrested last week for allegedly smuggling his winning monster catch already dead into the river, a police chief said on Sunday. The fishing champion was arrested on Friday.
President Robert Mugabe on Sunday vowed that his main political rival would never rule Zimbabwe, as the opposition raised concerns that the governing party would rig the March 29 ballot. Meanwhile, opposition Movement for Democratic Change leader Morgan Tsvangirai drew the biggest crowd so far in the election campaign.
The elegant, tapering signature of the Eiffel Tower is to be reshaped, altering the skyline of Paris, in time for the structure’s 120th anniversary next year, the Société d’exploitation de la Tour Eiffel has just announced. Serero Architects of Paris has won the competition to redesign the structure’s public viewing platform and reception areas.
The Zimbabwean government has banned e.tv from covering next Saturday’s general elections, state media said on Sunday. The Sunday Mail said that e.tv, South Africa’s only commercial terrestrial station, had not been accredited for the joint parliamentary and presidential polls.
Drug-resistant tuberculosis (TB) patients have again staged a mass breakout from Port Elizabeth’s TB hospital. The Eastern Cape health department’s Sizwe Kupelo said on Sunday the department was looking for 21 patients from a group of 33 who had forced their way out of Jose Pearson Hospital on Thursday.
The Western Cape’s Koeberg nuclear power station is firing on all cylinders again, the South African Broadcasting Corporation reported on Monday. Eskom spokesperson Andrew Etzinger said one of the Koeberg units, which had been taken offline for maintenance, was recommissioned over the Easter weekend.