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/ 11 January 2006
South Africa’s opposition Democratic Alliance (DA) has requested in a letter that President Thabo Mbeki take action over what it described as ”the possible abuse of state resources” by Deputy President Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka. It is estimated that a holiday — described by DA MP Gareth Morgan as ”a gravy plane holiday” — to the United Arab Emirates in December cost about  000.
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/ 11 January 2006
Gold was higher in choppy and highly liquid trade on Wednesday afternoon amid a firmer euro. At 2.46pm, gold was quoted at $544,20 a troy ounce, up $1/oz from its previous close. "It has been quite a choppy and volatile day. We’ve seen extremely high levels of liquidity," a Johannesburg-based trader said.
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/ 11 January 2006
Budapest firefighters had to remove a window and a large section of wall, and use a forklift to extract a grossly overweight woman from her home, MTI news agency reported. Firefighters spent five hours dismantling the home of the middle-aged woman, who weighs in at between 200kg and 300kg.
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/ 11 January 2006
Australian police said on Wednesday that they will counter an SMS service that tips off motorists about the location of random breath testing (RBT) patrol cars by constantly shifting their location. Road Spy provides subscribers with SMSs alerting them to the locations of RBT patrols as well as radar and speed-camera traps.
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/ 11 January 2006
The African Christian Democratic Party in the Free State on Wednesday urged the African National Congress and the South African National Civic Organisation (Sanco) in the province to sort out their differences. Sanco in the Free State on Tuesday said it would contest the forthcoming local government elections alone.
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/ 11 January 2006
A flood emergency might be declared at Standerton in Mpumalanga as more water flows into the already over-full Grootdraai Dam, authorities said on Wednesday. The South African Weather Service said more rain is expected on Wednesday and Thursday, especially over the Highveld and Mpumalanga.
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/ 11 January 2006
The European court of justice dismissed a challenge on Tuesday to European Union rules covering compensation for air travellers whose flights are overbooked, cancelled or delayed. Europe’s highest court rejected claims by the International Air Transport Association and the European Low Fares Airline Association that the regulations were unfair to their members and failed to protect consumers.
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/ 11 January 2006
Some of the world’s worst polluting nations launched a controversial conference with international business chiefs in Sydney on Wednesday to seek high-tech solutions to global warming. Ministers from the United States, China, India, Japan, South Korea and Australia were meeting with executives from major mining and energy companies including Exxon Mobil, Rio Tinto and Peabody Energy.
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/ 11 January 2006
Organisers of the Hansa Powerade Dusi are working long days and nights to ensure that they are ready for the 55th running of the event next week. ”Close on 2 000 paddlers have already entered and we expect more between now and the race,” said Cameron Mackenzie, chairperson of the organisers.
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/ 11 January 2006
The Mamelodi Sundowns management has accepted that results speak for themselves and appointed former Bafana Bafana captain Neil Tovey and Argentinian Miguel Gamondi as joint coaches until the end of the current Premier Soccer League season.