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/ 1 December 2005
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Events marking World Aids Day were cancelled by royal decree on Thursday in Africa’s last absolute monarchy because they clashed with a traditional ceremony scheduled for the same day. The announcement shocked activists in a country where more than 38% of the one-million population are infected with HIV, the virus that causes Aids.
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/ 1 December 2005
Earthquake survivors in Pakistan said on Thursday they fear for their future as a bitter winter intensifies and their life in makeshift tent camps becomes more miserable with each passing day. Almost eight weeks after the devastating October 8 disaster, which killed more than 73 000 people, the fate of the 3,5-million others who were left homeless is far from secure.
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/ 1 December 2005
The Gabon Constitutional Court on Thursday declared the re-election of Omar Bongo Ondimba as President of the republic with 79,18% of the votes cast in last weekend’s election. Bongo (69) who has been in power since 1967, is Africa’s longest-ruling leader.
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/ 1 December 2005
Ethiopia has indicated its willingness to comply with a recent United Nations resolution demanding the country and neighbouring Eritrea reverse a worrisome military build-up on their tense border, a senior United Nations official said on Thursday.
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/ 1 December 2005
United Nations human rights chief Louise Arbour warned on Thursday that Nepal faced the threat of a full-scale armed conflict, and called on authorities to join a ceasefire with Maoist rebels and allow free assembly. The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights joined calls for Maoist rebels to extend a unilateral ceasefire which is due to end this week.
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/ 1 December 2005
On May 25 this year, Zimbabwe’s government began a massive campaign of forced evictions and demolitions. Six months later, says a damning Human Rights Watch report released on Thursday, the government has made no arrangements to provide even temporary shelter to the internally displaced. Thousands of people are now living in the open.
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/ 1 December 2005
Growth in internet access among the South African public has slowed to a crawl, with the dial-up market experiencing no growth in subscribers for the first time since the industry was launched in 1993. This is one of the findings of the World Wide Worx’s annual study of the South African internet access industry.
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/ 1 December 2005
It is unconstitutional to prevent gay people from enjoying the legal benefits of marriage, the Constitutional Court ruled on Thursday. It gave Parliament one year to rework laws allowing same-sex unions. If Parliament does not do this in one year, the Marriage Act will be rewritten to include the words ”or spouse” to allow these unions to take place.
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/ 1 December 2005
The Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu) began its 20th birthday celebrations in Durban on Thursday. The trade-union federation was formed at a colourful mass rally at Durban’s Kings Park Stadium in 1985, with Elijah Barayi its first president.
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/ 1 December 2005
A new shopping mall scheduled to open in Bangkok next year will feature a ”Gay Avenue” manned by retail outlets owned by gay people, news reports said on Thursday. ”Gay Avenue”, billed as the country’s first ”gay shopping zone”, will take up 2 400 square metres of retail space in the Tawana Centre Park.