Striking security guards — members of the South African Transport and Allied Workers’ Union (Satawu) — were forced to call off their march to Sandton on Thursday. Their leaders told them to disperse after police fired stun grenades at them in central Johannesburg, injuring guards in the process.
Washington has been playing with fire in Somalia, where its support for a warlord alliance has ended up boosting Islamic militias, which now hold the capital Mogadishu, analysts say. Somalia has been torn by four months of fighting between the Islamists and an alliance of warlords, who largely controlled the lawless state for 15 years.
Egypt’s opposition Muslim Brotherhood movement on Thursday criticised Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas for his decision to hold a referendum on a proposal which calls for recognition of Israel. ”The effort to circumvent legitimate routes by imposing a document presented by certain detainees will only serve the Zionist enemy,” the group’s supreme guide Mohammed Mehdi Akef said.
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England striker Wayne Rooney was cleared by doctors on Thursday to play in the World Cup. His first World Cup appearance could come on Thursday afternoon, when England play Trinidad and Tobago. However, England coach Sven-Goran Eriksson said he would only use Rooney as a substitute.
The move by the United States to sign free-trade agreements with the Andean countries of Peru, Colombia and Ecuador will harm thousands of small farmers, Oxfam has warned. The agreements will block access to affordable medicines and favour foreign investors, says Oxfam in a new report.
The Serbian government said on Thursday it recognised the independence of Montenegro, after the tiny Balkan state voted last month in an historic referendum to break away from Belgrade. The Serbian Parliament decided 10 days ago to proclaim independence after the referendum in Montenegro, its last remaining ally from the former Yugoslavia.
Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said on Thursday his country would not bow to pressure over its nuclear programme, implicitly rejecting international calls to suspend enrichment. ”The Islamic Republic of Iran will not bend to these pressures,” he said, referring to proposals drawn up to defuse the nuclear crisis.
Researchers are developing two prototype tests to detect fake anti-malarial tablets in just five seconds. A team of researchers from Asia, Africa and Europe has found that up to half of the anti-malarial pills in South-East Asia could contain no active ingredient at all, with some made of starch or chalk.
South Africa’s youth helped win the liberation struggle, but this generation is now hugely challenged by poverty, lack of education and HIV/Aids, trade-union federation the Congress of South African Trade Unions said on the eve of Youth Day. Friday is the 30th anniversary of the widespread youth protests, which began on June 16 1976.
Tradition, the world’s third-largest interdealer broker, is entering the fray in the South African marketplace. It says South Africa offers real potential for their business, but also feels it is unfair that the country suffers under the weight of its emerging-market status.