The JSE remained firmly in the red by noon on Thursday as subprime concerns continued to plague investors. At midday, the JSE all-share was off 3,26%. Resources lost 3,87%, the gold-mining index was 3,42% lower and the platinum-mining index fell 2,84%. Financials shed 3,26% and banks tumbled 4,10%, while industrials were down 2,56%.
Andriy Voronin scored two minutes before half-time, and five-time winners Liverpool won 1-0 at Toulouse on Wednesday to move a step closer to the lucrative group stage of the Champions League. Voronin fired a rising shot from 20m after collecting a headed pass from Peter Crouch.
Now that toy companies have issued recalls for millions of Chinese-made toys that are either tainted with lead or otherwise hazardous to children, they are scrambling to figure out what to do with them. Mattel, which on Tuesday recalled about 18-million toys worldwide, said it was working on a ”responsible approach”.
The Namibian government said on Wednesday it will continue culling seals after a meeting with animal rights activists failed to halt the mass killings. The government argues the seals consume 900 000 tonnes of fish a year, more than one-third of the fishing-industry catch.
Sanctions against former Liberian president Charles Taylor and his entourage are impairing his ability to defend himself against war-crimes charges, his lawyer said on Wednesday. The sanctions are having a ”chilling effect” as witnesses sympathetic to Taylor are afraid to come forward, said the lawyer.
Are you portly, male and a fan of rightwing dictators? And on the lookout for a second-hand suit? If so, there’s good news from Santiago. Items from Augusto Pinochet’s wardrobe have gone on sale at a tailor’s shop in the Chilean capital. To buy one, you need at least 980 (about (R14 600) and be a fan of the dictator.
More than 1 200 years ago, bloodthirsty Viking raiders descended on Ireland, pillaging monasteries and massacring the inhabitants. On Wednesday, one of their more mild-mannered descendants stepped ashore to apologise. The Danish culture minister was in Dublin to participate in celebrations marking the arrival of a replica Norse longboat.
The Bush administration is preparing to ramp up its confrontation with Iran by declaring part or all of the country’s Revolutionary Guard a ”global terrorist” organisation and targeting its extensive financial interests. The move is extremely provocative, given that the Revolutionary Guard Corps is an integral part of the state.
A strong typhoon off the Philippines’ mountainous north forced authorities to close schools in the capital for a second day on Thursday as disaster-response teams braced for possible floods and landslides. Typhoon Sepat was roaring over the Pacific Ocean with sustained winds of 185km/h and gusts of up to 220km/h.
New Delhi’s stray dogs lead a difficult life. But if it was up to one city councillor, they would find themselves in more hot water — soup, to be precise. Shipping the thousands of strays to Korea, where dog meat is widely consumed in soup, was one of the more outlandish ideas proposed at a city-council meeting to deal with the problem.