The crash of an Airbus A320 carrying 113 people off Russia’s Black Sea coast on Wednesday was mostly likely a result of poor weather conditions, Russian and Armenian officials said. The crash occurred as the aircraft made a second landing attempt at Sochi’s Adler airport after rain had severely reduced visibility.
United States President George Bush told Sudan’s president in ”very clear” terms that his government must redouble efforts to make a deal with rebels at peace talks, the White House said on Tuesday. In a phone call on Monday with President Omar al-Beshir, Bush urged the Sudanese leader to send his vice-president back to the peace talks in Abuja, Nigeria.
Zimbabwe has failed to learn from its past history of segregation, subjugation, and repression of dissenting and alternative voices with regard to media freedom, the Media Alliance of Zimbabwe said on Wednesday, World Press Freedom Day, as it called for the creation of an independent media council in the country.
Some of the boldest criticism of the government came from black intellectuals sympathetic to the ruling party, Democratic Alliance leader Tony Leon said on Tuesday. Speaking to commemorate the public service and parliamentary career of Helen Suzman, he said on the other hand watchdog institutions, including universities and the business community were no longer outspoken.
Described by the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists as one of the world’s worst jailers of journalists, Eritrea has at least 13 reporters in prison. Little has been heard of the journalists. The charges against them apparently include avoiding the military draft and threatening national security.
Standing in Magdeburg’s maternity clinic, Hubertus Schulz contemplated his empty delivery suite. In one corner, a fluffy stork with a red beak adorned a baby-less incubator. ”I’d like to have a bit more to do, to be honest,” Dr Schulz, the clinic’s chief doctor, said. ”I’ve been working here for 25 years. We used to be full of babies. Now this is rarely the case.”
Enron’s founder, Kenneth Lay, on Tuesday ended six days of trial evidence claiming he had done all he could to avoid the company’s collapse, an event he described as the ”most painful thing” in his life. In the last of a series of bruising exchanges the federal prosecutor, John Hueston, attacked Lay’s refusal during his evidence to accept the blame for what had happened to the company.
About 101 suspects accused of involvement in deadly riots in East Timor last week are being detained after 25 more arrests were made, the foreign ministry said on Tuesday. Thirteen of those held were among nearly 600 soldiers, or a third of the tiny nation’s armed forces, who deserted the army in February complaining of discrimination.
A rash of cases of Malaysian women being tricked into having sex with fraudulent "healers" has prompted a warning from authorities for women to beware of smooth-talking con men. In the latest case, a 41-year-old woman was tricked into having sex dozens of times with a medium who claimed to be the "Ninth Emperor of the Kingdom of God".
Bolivia defended on Tuesday the government’s seizure of its vast natural gas industry after the move triggered deep concerns among major foreign investors. Brazil, a huge consumer of Bolivian gas, and Spain expressed worry, while the United States said it was keeping an eye on the situation, one day after leftist Bolivian President Evo Morales gave foreign gas and oil investors 180 days to renegotiate their contracts.