Police clashed with anti-United States demonstrators in two Afghan towns on Thursday, killing at least three people, as protests spread across the country over the reported abuse of the Qur’an at the US jail in Guantánamo Bay. Two people were killed during demonstrations in Khagyani, a town near the eastern city of Jalalabad, where four people died on Wednesday.
Campaigning in Ethiopia’s parliamentary elections officially ended on Friday ahead of a weekend vote that will be a critical test of freedom and democracy in one of the United States’s closest allies in Africa. The balloting marks the end of a race that has tested the tolerance of regime that has ruled the Horn of Africa nation since 1991.
Billionaire businessman Mark Shuttleworth has offered to pay for the costs of satirical T-shirt-maker Laugh It Off’s Constitutional Court action, founder Justin Nurse told the Cape Town Press Club on Thursday. Nurse told his audience that he is ”flat broke” after several projects of his company were derailed.
Pope Benedict XVI on Friday launched the process to beatify his predecessor, John Paul II, heeding widespread calls to shorten the procedure toward sainthood drastically. The rules of the Roman Catholic Church dictate that normally five years must pass after a person’s death before the issue of sainthood is raised.
NOT THE MOVIE OF THE WEEK: Despite its good intentions, U-Carmen eKhayelitsha vulgarises and misrepresents our sexuality as black women, writes Khubu Meth.
Microsoft took the wraps off its next generation Xbox 360 games console on Friday — and took the gloves off in the latest round of an fight to dominate the -billion market. In a star-studded launch that was scheduled to be broadcast early on Friday on MTV America and presented by the Lord of the Rings star Elijah Wood, the firm paraded a product it says will ”kick the backsides” of its rivals.
Microsoft is rolling out a test version of an all-in-one subscription service that will give computer users automated security updates, back up their files and run tune-ups to make their machines speedier. The Redmond-based software company is distributing Windows OneCare to its 60 000 employees this week.
Seven years after his death, Malawi’s government has started building a 000 (R3,7-million) mausoleum for its former president Kamuzu Banda, who led the poor Southern African country to independence and later proclaimed himself ”president for life”.
A 70-year-old woman fell nine floors from her Florida apartment balcony, but miraculously had her fall cushioned by an awning and suffered just a bruised shoulder and light injuries, United States media reported on Thursday. The free fall occurred on Wednesday after she reportedly experienced a dizzy spell.
One million yen ( 360) may seem a fortune for a bottle of liquor, but a Japanese seller said on Friday its premium whisky distilled over half a century has been such a hit it stopped accepting orders within a day. Suntory announced the sale of the liquor, Yamazaki 50 Years, billed as ”a jewel of single-malt whisky”, on its website on Wednesday afternoon for 50 bottles only.