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/ 3 January 2008

Bollywood beckons for England duo

England fast bowling duo Sajid Mahmood and Simon Jones are among several Test cricketers set for on-screen roles in a new Bollywood movie about cricket. Victory is a film that charts the story of a boy fulfilling his dream of playing for India. Shooting will start this month in Australia.

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/ 3 January 2008

Man City leapfrog Liverpool into fourth

Manchester City added to the pressure on the shoulders of Newcastle United manager Sam Allardyce with a 2-0 Premier League away win at St James’s Park on Wednesday that saw them leapfrog Liverpool into fourth place on the table. Defeat meant Newcastle had taken just one point from a possible 12.

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/ 3 January 2008

South Africa’s graveyard generation mourns

It is Saturday in Soweto and the Aids-ridden township is geared up for its foremost weekend activity: funerals. Traffic officials are dispatched en masse to the major streets where the sheer number of funeral processions would render chaos if one had to rely on traffic lights alone. ”Nowadays young people are dying like flies,” reflects 27-year-old Modise Selebogo.

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/ 3 January 2008

Rasool: Cape Town must bury its differences

The people of Cape Town should bury their differences and build bridges between communities in 2008, Western Cape Premier Ebrahim Rasool said on Wednesday. Addressing thousands who gathered to celebrate the minstrel carnival, Rasool said 2008 should be the year in which the Cape took greater strides in realising the vision of a ”home for all”.

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/ 3 January 2008

White House rivals hit finishing tape in Iowa

Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama and other White House hopefuls beseeched Iowans to vote to change America as they sought to land an early blow in Thursday’s crucial first 2008 nominating clash. Both Democratic and Republican races were too close to call, before more than 200 000 activists cast their judgements in the fabled Iowa caucuses.

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/ 3 January 2008

Oil hits record $100 a barrel

Oil prices vaulted to a record a barrel on Wednesday as violence in Nigeria, tight energy stockpiles and a weaker dollar triggered a surge of speculative buying, dealers said. Oil’s climb to the psychologically key triple-digit price helped send stocks tumbling on Wall Street and further darkened an already gloomy economic outlook in the United States.

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/ 3 January 2008

Sri Lanka on alert after announcing end to truce

Police and security forces went on alert across Sri Lanka on Thursday, hours after the government announced its withdrawal from a tattered ceasefire with Tamil Tiger rebels, security officials said. The already tight security in the capital was further strengthened one day after suspected rebels set off a roadside bomb that killed five and wounded 28.

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/ 3 January 2008

Musharraf calls UK for help on Bhutto probe

Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf called for help from British police in probing the murder of opposition leader Benazir Bhutto as he sought to dampen public anger on Thursday a week after her death. He said a Scotland Yard team would "immediately" come to help resolve doubts surrounding the circumstances of how she died.

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/ 3 January 2008

Kenyan opposition to defy government

Defeated Kenyan opposition presidential candidate Raila Odinga was set Thursday to press his claims of vote fraud at a rally declaring him "the people’s president" despite threats of arrest, as the toll from post-election violence climbed above 340. The government has banned the Nairobi protest rally, one week after the election, over fears of further violence.

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/ 3 January 2008

Inside the Bhutto clan

Six hours before she was executed, Mary, Queen of Scots wrote to her brother-in-law, Henry III of France: "As for my son, I commend him to you in so far as he deserves, for I cannot answer for him." The year was 1587. On December 30 last year a conclave of feudal potentates gathered in the home of the slain Benazir Bhutto to hear her last will and testament being read out and its contents subsequently announced to the world media.