Six South Africans are reported to have been among those who died when a leisure boat sank off the coast of Bahrain, a Department of Foreign Affairs official said on Friday. Initial reports indicated that 13 South African were among the 150 passengers on board, said spokesperson Ronnie Mamoepa.
Scientists at an IBM research centre in Silicon Valley have created a magnetism-manipulating tool suited to building molecular computers, the company revealed on Thursday. The development was touted as a step toward making computers based on the spin of electrons and atoms.
A Malaysian executive was killed when his head was struck by a helicopter’s whirling rotor blades in the northern Penang state. Joseph Chan Sum Foo (45), general manager of a construction company, was struck on Thursday after he helped five school children onto the helicopter, which was used in an event to promote his company’s latest property development site.
A Palestinian suicide bomber killed three Israelis on Thursday night in the first such attack in the West Bank this year. The bombing, which destroyed a car at the entrance to the Jewish settlement of Kedumim, comes at a sensitive time, as negotiations to form a new coalition government are under way in Israel.
At least 38 people were killed when a powerful earthquake struck western Iran before dawn on Friday, wiping out villages and sending panicked residents fleeing from their homes. Another 700 people were also injured in the quake, which hit the province of Lorestan near the border with Iraq with a force of six on the Richter scale, officials said.
Butana Khompela, the chairperson of the African National Congress study group on sports and recreation, said this week: ”No political argument can be made as to why the south-east Cape should not be awarded an opportunity to participate in the Super 14 competition.”
At least 48 people died when a leisure boat with at least 150 passengers on board sank off the coast of Bahrain late on Thursday as the coast guard and the United States Navy worked frantically to rescue survivors. There were 10 South Africans on board. ”The number of survivors is 63, of which 12 were wounded, and the number of bodies that we have pulled out so far is 48,” said Colonel Yussef al-Ghatim.
"When I told colleagues that, if I were ever charged with rape, I would love to have Jacob Zuma’s advocate, Kemp J Kemp, as my lawyer, I was met with derisory comments. I want to believe that my colleagues think of me as upright enough never to have to defend myself against such a heinous crime," writes Fikile-Ntsikelelo Moya.
A Japanese burglar who thought he was lucky to find an unlocked door on Friday was shocked to be arrested by 20 massive sumo wrestlers who were staying at the building. Konoshin Kawabata (48) was rummaging inside a room in Osaka in the early hours when he was suddenly confronted by wrestler Dewanosato, who stands 180cm tall and weighs 131kg.
On March 25, three organisations representing the rights of women, particularly those affected by gender-based violence, applied to the high court to intervene urgently in the criminal trial of the State v Jacob Zuma. The three organisations applied to be admitted as amici curiae, or friends of the court.