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/ 15 September 2006

Castro’s health looms at summit of US foes

Cuban President Fidel Castro’s state of health loomed over a summit of non-aligned nations on Friday at which Iran and other prominent opponents of United States policy sought to forge a united front. State television showed Castro standing up briefly to greet friend and ally Hugo Chavez, the Venezuelan President, on Thursday.

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/ 15 September 2006

Zimbabwe unionists beaten by police

Lawyers representing detained trade union and opposition activists in Zimbabwe say their clients were viciously assaulted by police while in detention this week. Armed police swooped on the Zimbabwe Congress of Trade Unions (ZCTU) leadership on Wednesday as they prepared to march to present a petition to the finance minister

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/ 15 September 2006

Clooney warns UN of Darfur genocide

The Hollywood actor George Clooney on Thursday warned the United Nations Security Council that Darfur would become the scene of the ”first genocide of the 21st century” if peacekeepers were not sent to Sudan by the end of the month. ”After September 30, you won’t need the UN,” he told the council.

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/ 15 September 2006

Pressure mounts on Olmert to quit

Israel’s former military chief launched a devastating attack on the country’s leadership on Thursday, calling for the prime minister and the top general to quit over failings in the Lebanon war. In an interview in the Ha’aretz newspaper, Moshe Ya’alon rounded on the government for launching a costly ground invasion of Lebanon in the final days of the conflict.

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/ 15 September 2006

Miserable existence

On October 14 John Perlman, über host of SAfm’s breakfast session, dealt with teen suicide in his item <i>The After Eight Debate</i>. It was depressing enough to drive an adult to harsh measures, writes Matthew Krouse.

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/ 15 September 2006

Letter from Croatia

Croatia is this year’s setting for the annual meetings of the International Net-work for Cultural Policy (INCP), a grouping of about 58 cultural ministers from around the world, and its complementary NGO network, the International Network for Cultural Diversity (INCD). Mike van Graan reports.

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/ 15 September 2006

A tale of Pinotage

Since the 1960s Pinotage has had its ups and downs but is currently on the ascent, being more widely planted now than its Cinsaut sire, once the most planted red grape variety in the Cape. Pinotage’s popularity is not simply due to its status as an ethnic curiosity. Pinotage, a homegrown wine, finds its place in the sun, writes Gad Kaplan.

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/ 15 September 2006

A nostalgia for truth

John Kani is not responsible for my nostalgia. Eighteen years spent outside South Africa have honed it to a sharp edge. There is no easy going back … not now, not even now. But return I have to the Market Theatre and I wait restlessly in the half-light that illuminates the set of Kani’s <i>Nothing but the Truth</i>, writes Louise Bethlehem.

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/ 15 September 2006

Rocking in Potch

Fridays in Potchefstroom are usually mundane affairs. The sleepy town, only 150km from Johannesburg, snores away as many of the students from the local university leave to party elsewhere on the weekend. But Aardklop Fridays are different. Yolandi Groenewald looks back at this year’s Aardklop arts festival.