A tolling bell and 332 white balloons — one for each victim — will commemorate on Friday the second anniversary of the school hostage massacre in Beslan, where the mental and political scars of the tragedy remain raw.
Rain wrecked the second day of the US Open on Tuesday with only an hour of play possible all day. A three-and-a-half hour delay kept players off court to start with as heavy showers swept through the New York area and when they did begin hitting balls, it was women’s top seed Amelie Mauresmo who got the action under way.
Time is running out to reach an agreement on Tibet’s future which, if not sorted out by 2008, could become a blemish on the Beijing Olympics, a French parliamentary delegation said on Wednesday. The Dalai Lama, accused by Beijing of being a separatist, has lived in exile in the Indian hill station of Dharamsala since fleeing Tibet in 1959 after a failed uprising against Chinese Communist rule.
The United States and Britain plan to push for a vote on a United Nations resolution sending peacekeeping troops to Darfur, despite a fresh rejection by Sudan on Tuesday of any deployment of UN troops there. The US and British sponsored resolution would authorise the deployment of 20 000 UN troops and police in Darfur to take over from about 7 000 African Union troops.
South Africa’s daily unleaded petrol price over-recovery surged to 75,605 cents per litre (c/l) on August 29 from 54,917 c/l on August 28 and only 21,136 c/l on August 9. An over-recovery means that the basic petrol price based on the daily product price and exchange rate is less than the basic fuel price used in the calculation of the monthly retail petrol price.
The increase in South Africa’s consumer price index excluding mortgage rate changes (CPIX) for metro and other areas, used by the South African Reserve Bank (SARB) for its inflation target, was up 4,9% year-on-year in July after a 4,8% year-on-year increase in June, Statistics South Africa said on Wednesday.
New Zealand will offer permanent residence to Zimbabweans in the country who are HIV-positive, making an exception to its policy of barring infected applicants, Health Minister Pete Hodgson said on Wednesday. About 1 300 Zimbabweans have entered New Zealand as a result of the political and economic crisis in Zimbabwe under a special immigration category.
Some parts are used as decorative bangles in certain countries and, at times, it is derisively referred to as a ”fish bag”, but usage of the female condom seems to be rising in South Africa, its second-largest market in the world. The female condom has been around for nearly a decade, and in South Africa it is a focal point of the government’s HIV/Aids programme.
Finding a date for the school prom is often a daunting business for high school students worldwide. Not so for Jordan Avramides from Sydney, Australia. At his formal end-of-year dance, sixteen-year-old Avramides will be walking in with the undisputed belle of the ball on his arm — Miss Universe Australia 2006, Erin McNaught.
A brothel in Australia’s biggest city, Sydney, is tapping into discontent over high petrol prices by offering clients a discount of about 15% a litre, a report said on Wednesday. Madam Kerry’s brothel said that like many other Australian businesses, the sex industry has been hit by a slump triggered by soaring world oil prices and the rise in prices at the pump.