The familiar bearded face gazes out from a billboard over a sunlit old Havana beside the reassuring slogan ”Vamos bien”. Close by, another poster wishes the world’s longest-serving leader a happy birthday and calls for ”another 80” years. Now, however, for the first time since he led his rebel army into Havana in 1959, the man who epitomises Cuba has stepped down, albeit temporarily.
Rape charges against a Durban Roman Catholic priest have been withdrawn on humanitarian grounds, media reports said on Wednesday. His doctor told the Durban Regional Court on Tuesday that the 75-year-old cleric was very ill, suffered from dementia and could not appear, let alone defend himself against the charges.
A couple who made a living performing unlicensed liposuctions in the basement of a family home in Massachusetts may face charges of manslaughter or murder after a woman died during a procedure. Luiz Carlos Ribeiro and Ana Maria Miranda Ribeiro, both 49-year-old Brazilian citizens, have been charged with practising medicine without a licence.
A raft of measures announced by the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe this week will not resolve the country’s six-year economic crisis and at best could only restore a modicum of viability to exporters such as gold miners, analysts have told independent news service <i>ZimOnline</i>.
Israeli commandos snatched at least three suspected Hezbollah members from the ancient city of Baalbek, deep inside Lebanon, on Wednesday in a raid backed by air strikes that killed at least 12 civilians. But Hezbollah denied they belonged to the group.
Relations between Springbok rugby coach Jake White and the South African Rugby Union (Saru) had worsened over issues of team selection and transformation, media reports said on Wednesday. It emerged on Monday that White had sent a letter to Saru, asking it to clarify its transformation objectives.
Writer and Nobel Prize-winner JM Coetzee has been extolling the advantages of becoming an Australian citizen, media reports said on Wednesday. Coetzee has become a prime figure in an Australian government advertising campaign aimed at immigrants who live in the country but had not taken out citizenship.
Police and public health officials in southern China have clubbed, hanged or electrocuted almost 50 000 dogs in a week-long crackdown on rabies, local media reported on Tuesday. Squads in Mouding, Yunnan province, grabbed pets from their owners while they were out for walks and beat them to death on the spot.
Rian van Heerden sees his virulently opinionated show <i>Onbesny</i> as a form of therapy, writes Anton Krueger.
Brenton Maart focuses on the minute detail in new art.