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/ 14 December 2005
Tim Montgomery’s 100m world record was broken earlier this year. Now it’s been wiped completely from the books. The American sprinter was banned for two years on Tuesday in the Bay Area Laboratory Cooperative steroid scandal, and all his results, medals and prize money over the past five years were annulled.
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/ 14 December 2005
Polling began in Tanzania on Wednesday for parliamentary and presidential elections widely expected to extend the mandate of the ruling Revolutionary Party, which has already spent 44 years at the helm of the East African nation. Voting stations across the country opened at 7am local time.
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/ 14 December 2005
In a campaign dominated by personalities rather than sharp policy differences, Michelle Bachelet remains favourite to win Chile’s presidency next month and become the first professional female politician to lead a major Latin-American country. But in a land of machismo, male opponents are joining forces to thwart her ambitions.
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/ 14 December 2005
Nine people, including three British tourists, sustained horrific injuries when they were killed at a Ugandan gorilla reserve in 1999, according to testimony on Tuesday at the trial, in Kampala, of one of the accused. Jean-Paul Bizimana is one of the Rwandan rebels accused of hacking and bludgeoning to death the nine people.
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/ 14 December 2005
A former British military intelligence officer and an expert in psychological warfare has emerged as a crucial strategist in the Pentagon’s covert operation to pay Iraqi newspapers and journalists for publishing ”good news” stories about the coalition’s reconstruction efforts.
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/ 14 December 2005
The Paez Indians in south-western Colombia will launch Coca Sek this week, a fizzy drink based on coca leaves consumed for centuries by native Colombian peoples. The Paez, who live in the Calderas reserve, began their efforts to sanitise the use of the coca leaf, the main ingredient in cocaine, by selling crushed dried coca leaves for use as tea.
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/ 14 December 2005
CIA prisoners in Europe were apparently abducted and moved between countries illegally, possibly with the aid of national secret services who did not tell their governments, according to the first report by Dick Marty — a Swiss Senator investigating the allegations — on the so-called ”renditions” scandal.
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/ 14 December 2005
Aubrey Welken, a South African Secret Service agent imprisoned for a year in Zimbabwe, arrived at Johannesburg International airport on Tuesday. Speaking to the media, the middle-aged Welken, with shoulder-length grey hair, said: ”It was a tough time, but I am okay.”
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/ 14 December 2005
Minister of Minerals and Energy Lindiwe Hendricks is due to make an announcement on Wednesday following a meeting with the petroleum industry over fuel shortages. Addressing the National Assembly earlier on Tuesday, Hendricks said: ”Everybody knows the industry is to blame in this case.”
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/ 14 December 2005
Authorities in Equatorial Guinea plucked two South African air-crew members stranded in that country from the plane that was to return them to Johannesburg on Tuesday afternoon, their employer said. The two have been detained in the West African country’s capital, Malabo, since November 10 as pawns in a business dispute.