The Congress of South African Trade Unions slammed media reports on Friday, which said the federation had turned on rape accused Jacob Zuma. ”Cosatu has not made a ‘dramatic change of tone’, or ‘turned on’ the deputy president of the African National Congress, as alleged in the article,” said secretary general Zwelinzima Vavi.
Liberian President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf said on Friday that Monrovia had no intention, nor is it required, to pay the legal fees of indicted war crimes suspect Charles Taylor. The former Liberian leader is standing trial at the United Nations-backed war crimes court in Sierra Leone on 11 counts of war crimes and crimes against humanity for his role in the decade-long Sierra Leone conflict.
Darryl Accone takes a look at the recently published, <i>African Road: New writing from southern africa 2006</i>.
World number-five gold miner Harmony Gold is taking a fresh look at its business model in the light of the prevailing bull market in gold, which is creating a new generation of investors who are keen to invest in bullion, Harmony Gold CEO Bernard Swanepoel said on Friday.
About 100 women who had protested massive increases in school fees were being held by police on Friday, police and organisers of the protest said. The protesters were arrested in the second city of Bulawayo where they marched eight blocks to government education offices on Thursday to demand the lowering of school fees.
Newly installed Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert set his sights on Friday on a visit to Washington to win United States support for his plan to redraw Israel’s borders and leave parts of the West Bank. Olmert, whose four-party coalition was sworn in on Thursday, will leave for the US on May 21, making his first overseas trip as prime minister.
South Africa committed R20-million to the African World Heritage Fund at its launch on Friday. Minister of Arts and Culture Pallo Jordan hosted the launch at the Cradle of Humankind heritage site, outside Johannesburg. Jordan said the conservation and preservation of heritage can be used to address the development agenda.
The transformation of the South African Broadcasting Corporation from an apartheid government mouthpiece to a non-partisan public broadcaster demonstrates the government’s resolve to encourage media freedom and diversity in South Africa, the African National Congress said on Friday.
Cheese is a serious business in France. General de Gaulle once famously remarked that it is impossible to govern a country that produces 246 different varieties of the stuff. If any product symbolises the visceral attachment so many French people have to their terroir, it is cheese.
With the George W Bush’s approval rating down to 33% in some polls, his lowest ever, an overt message from a musician of Neil Young’s stature could find a large audience, reports Oliver Burkeman in New York.