London’s version of the Lord of the Rings musical, touted as the most expensive show ever staged, has divided critics whose reviews on Wednesday both praised and panned the production. The Lord of the Rings closed early in Toronto, where it was launched in 2006, after opening to mixed reviews.
The Johannesburg Metro Police Department wants to raise the payment levels of traffic fines from an average of 33% to 60% within the next few years, media reports said on Wednesday. Measures include establishing a special squad to trace the top 100 offenders.
In what could be seen as the government’s final move to have the public-service wage dispute solved through talks, it gave unions a deadline of 6pm on Wednesday to accept its revised ”settlement offer”. The settlement salary package includes a 7,5% wage increase.
In the spacious, top-floor office of Gaza’s former police chief, the television was tuned to al-Aqsa TV, the Hamas channel, and at lunchtime half a dozen well-armed, bearded Hamas commanders rose in unison and knelt in prayer. On the streets there were no policemen to be seen.
United States and Iraqi forces killed at least 30 al-Qaeda militants and found numerous weapons during the first day of an offensive against the Sunni Islamist group north of Baghdad, the US military said on Wednesday. The military said a missile strike destroyed a weapons cache inside a known al-Qaeda safe house.
Records from the trial of Nelson Mandela, a medieval French tapestry, a millennium-old Iranian epic and the Hollywood movie The Wizard of Oz are among 38 new items on a Unesco cultural heritage list, the body said on Tuesday.
United States soldiers and airmen fighting in Iraq are to receive a new weapon in their arsenal: a pack of playing cards to help them identify ancient ruins before creating new ones. The Pentagon’s move, is part of a belated scheme to prevent further war damage to the country’s 11 000 archaeological sites.
China has overtaken the United States as the biggest producer of carbon dioxide, a development that will increase anxiety about its role in driving man-made global warming and will add to pressure on the world’s politicians to reach an agreement on climate change that includes the Chinese economy.
Mounting tensions between the South African Democratic Teachers’ Union (Sadtu) and the National Teachers’ Union (Natu) in KwaZulu-Natal have been blamed for the recent kidnapping and murder of two teachers in the province. The presidents of both Sadtu and Natu have undertaken to hold a summit involving both unions following the deaths of Philile Mthenjane, the deputy-principal of Hlokohloko Primary School in Jozini near Empangeni, and Phindile Ntuli, a department head.
Interactive whiteboards result in improved test scores, particularly in English, maths and science. This is according to a new report on the impact of information and communication technology (ICT) on learner achievement. The report, by European Schoolnet, examined the results of 17 studies on ICT produced in the United Kingdom and other European countries between 2002 and 2006.