Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, who has been in a coma for the last three months, was to undergo surgery on Tuesday to restore part of his skull which had been removed by surgeons. Ron Krumer, a spokesperson for Jerusalem’s Hadassah hospital, said the 78-year-old remains ”serious but stable”.
Tom DeLay rose from humble beginnings as the owner of a Texas pest control business to become known as ”The Hammer” — one of the most successful and feared politicians in the United States. DeLay rose to become the Republican leader in the House of Representatives and a key powerbroker in any decision in the US Congress, until a Texas prosecutor threw a spanner into the political works.
Athens Paralympics gold medallist Oscar Pistorius and Commonwealth Games stars Hilton Langenhoven and David Roos were among a host of disabled sport stars banking on success as the 2006 Nedbank South African Sport Association for the Physically Disabled Games opened in Bloemfontein on Monday.
With South Africa’s Commonwealth Games triple gold medallist Roland Schoeman out of action with flu, all eyes will be on the country’s two-time World Cup champion Ryk Neethling as the World Short-Course Championships kick off at the impressive Qi Zhong Stadium in Shanghai on Wednesday.
South African-listed food and pharmaceuticals group Tiger Brands has entered into an agreement to acquire Bromor Foods from Cadbury Schweppes for R1,16-billion, it said on Tuesday. Bromor is a non-carbonated soft-drink company and has a turnover of around R850-million per year.
Prisoners in some of Zimbabwe’s jails have to stay naked because of a shortage of uniforms that highlights deteriorating conditions.
On the back of dire poverty and legal shortcomings a new mafia is prospering in Egypt and turning the country into the regional hub for the human organs trade. There are no official statistics but in a country where social inequality is high and a quarter of the population is believed to live under the poverty line, more and more destitute Egyptians are falling prey to the phenomenon.
The French Open will offer equal prize money to the men’s and women’s champions for the first time. Each champion will receive â,¬940 000 (,13-million), the French Tennis Federation said on Monday. ”We’re following the evolution of tennis in general a little bit,” said Stephane Simean, the federation official in charge of setting the prizes.
The long-time chairperson of Australia’s national cricket selectors, Trevor Hohns, announced his resignation on Tuesday after coming under increasing criticism over a series of controversial team choices. Cricket Australia said Hohns was quitting after a decade as chairperson of the selectors’ panel to devote more time to his business interests.
The big winners at the Nasdaq-100 Open were Svetlana Kuznetsova, Roger Federer and video replay. Former United States Open champion Kuznetsova earned her first title in 18 months, while Federer won the men’s final for the second year in a row and remained unbeaten in the United States since August 2004.