A Turkish lawyer shouting: ”I am a soldier of Allah,” opened fire in the country’s top administrative court on Wednesday, killing one judge and injuring four others. Witnesses described how the gunman shouted, ”Allahu Akbar” (God is most great) as he fired a handgun in the court’s second chamber.
Amid an unprecedented amount of hype and hoopla for an opening movie at the Cannes film festival, it took the inimitable Ian McKellen to knock Dan Brown and his swollen bestseller down to size with a single word — ”codswallop”. The Cannes film festival has an ambiguous relationship with Hollywood, on the one hand championing auteur cinema and film-making as an art, on the other lapping up blockbuster glitz.
Mittal Steel is to formally launch on Thursday a takeover bid for European rival Arcelor that would create the undisputed world champion of steel groups.
When trading begins on the Belgian, French and Luxembourg stock exchanges, Arcelor shareholders will have a chance to exchange their equity for Mittal shares and cash via an offer that currently values Arcelor at €22-billion $28-billion.
China’s Three Gorges Dam across the Yangtze River, the world’s largest hydropower project, shows the nation at its most powerful, but also makes it vulnerable in entirely new ways. For the past nearly two decades, during design and construction of the dam, planners have engaged in a low-key effort to make sure it is protected from hostile forces.
Lemmer is pleased to report that the manne are no longer tittering prudishly over the South African Revenue Service web address as reported last week. However, in the interests of avoiding more scandalised uproar, Oom Krisjan has opted to remain tjoepstil about some other shockers, listed in the Independent’s ”Indipedia”.
Hugo Chávez, Venezuela’s socialist president, remembers ”with great affection” the day he went to see Queen Elizabeth II in 2001. ”There’s something I’ll never forget. When I got out of the car at the entrance to the palace, I spotted a coin lying on the ground and picked it up, and saw it had her face on one side. So I took the coin,” he says.
Late goals by Samuel Eto’o and substitute Juliano Belletti allowed Barcelona finally to overcome 10-man Arsenal 2-1 in a Champions League final of extraordinary drama at the Stade de France in Paris on Wednesday. Arsenal came close to pulling off what would have been one of the most unlikely triumphs in the tournament’s history.
Click on image for full-size view.
Cabinet has urged striking security guards and their employers to resolve their differences and end violent protests. Briefing the media after Cabinet’s meeting at Parliament on Wednesday, government communications head Joel Netshitenzhe said Cabinet once more condemned in the strongest terms the acts of violence by some demonstrators.
South Africa’s Cabinet made the claim on Wednesday to have the largest number of people on anti-retroviral treatment for HIV/Aids in the world. Government spokesperson Joel Netshitenzhe said the government would be ”scaling up its communication and social mobilisation” on the Aids fight.