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Asia is buzzing with World Cup fever and nowhere more than in pubs and clubs, which are poised for a bonanza from hordes of football fans watching the games, drink in hand, on big screen TVs. The excitement has not escaped staid Singapore, where nightlife venues in the tiny island-state are extending opening hours and ramping up promotions.
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England coach Sven-Goran Eriksson fears his World Cup squad will be distracted over the media obsession with Wayne Rooney’s broken foot. Eriksson is still confident the Manchester United striker will play some part in the World Cup, but he has requested his next CT scan be brought forward seven days to June 7.
An early morning traffic accident in Kabul involving a United States military vehicle rapidly degenerated on Monday into the worst upheaval in the Afghan capital since the fall of the Taliban, as angry protesters burned vehicles and buildings, ransacked shops and aid agencies and hurled rocks and invective at American soldiers.
Townsville Golf Club president Terry Walsh thought golfers reporting crocodiles on the course were hallucinating — until he saw them himself. "For the last two years, the people I play golf with have been saying there were crocs on the course and I thought they were on drugs," Walsh told the Australian Associated Press in the tropical northern city.
The World Health Organisation on Tuesday accused the global tobacco industry of continuing to use misleading labels to lure millions of people, including children, to take up smoking. On the eve of World No Tobacco Day, WHO said it would focus on the "tobacco industry’s lies" and the great variety of deadly tobacco products.
Daewoo Group founder Kim Woo-Choong was sentenced to 10 years in prison on Tuesday for fraud and embezzlement relating to the collapse of the firm under heavy debts. The Seoul Central District Court said Kim, aged 69 and in poor health, was also ordered to repay 21,4-trillion won ($22,5-billion dollars) in restitution, along with a fine of 10-million won.
A group of South African game developers is planning the development of an open-source adventure role-playing game that the developers hope will reinvigorate South Africa’s game-development industry. The game is likely to have an African folklore and mythology theme.
China’s will next month increase down-payments on home loans and broaden the capital gains tax, moves analysts said on Tuesday should help cool the overheated real estate sector in the short term. The down-payment on homes above 90 square metres would be raised to 30% from 20%, as authorities target the high-end of the property market.
Deputy President Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka told Western newspaper editors on Monday to stop generalising about Africa and concentrate more on the continent’s success stories. Issues of real concern, such as Western poaching of Africa’s best and brightest talent, were being overlooked as the world’s media focused on wars and poverty, she told the annual world congress of the International Press Institute.
Former southern Sudanese rebels wound up landmark talks with the ruling party in Khartoum on Monday, vowing to work as partners but failing to reach agreement on a disputed oil-rich province. First Vice-President Salva Kiir, who heads the SPLM, and former arch-foe President Omar al-Beshir told journalists that they would work together to bring stability to the violence-wracked nation.