The position of United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan was undermined on Tuesday after an independent inquiry into the oil-for-food scandal heavily criticised his son Kojo Annan and a Swiss company. The committee of inquiry’s findings about his son left question marks about his stewardship of the UN.
Uganda, considered a beacon in Africa for its Aids-beating policies, is adopting sexual abstinence-only programmes financed by the United States that could undo all its successes, a report says on Wednesday. Human Rights Watch warns that the new policies leave young unmarried people and women married to unfaithful men at risk.
The human race is living beyond its means. A report backed by 1 360 scientists from 95 countries warns that the almost two-thirds of the natural machinery that supports life on Earth is being degraded by human pressure. The study contains what its authors call ”a stark warning” for the entire world.
Iraq’s political deadlock deepened on Tuesday when the Parliament failed to elect a speaker in a session marred by acrimony and farce, further delaying the formation of a government, two months after the election. Instead of a breakthrough, the Assembly’s second sitting ended in frustration, with deputies exchanging blame.
The desperate search for survivors of the latest natural disaster to strike Indonesia was under way on Tuesday night as the death toll rose to 430 confirmed dead, with more than 20 000 displaced on the island of Nias, where more than 80% of the buildings were destroyed or rendered uninhabitable.
When you are stuck knee-deep in a crocodile-infested bog — your way lit only by the twinkling of the Milky Way and the black night filled with a cacophony of croaking, singing, snoring and bonking toads — it is easy to be swamped by three paradoxical impulses: lust, loathing and learning. <i>Escape</i> explores the murky world of toads on a trip to northern KwaZulu-Natal.
Years ago, the comedian Alexei Sayle used to entertain his audience with wondrous tales about holidays in Albania. Then it seemed an almost exotically remote place, isolated from the world by the communist government of Enver Hoxha, living in a parallel universe far removed from the West. Albania remains one of Europe’s most exotic and remote places. Get there before Club Med.
<i>The Sunbird Illustrated Touring Atlas of Southern Africa</i> is a big-scale touring book that has heaps of fantastic information. The highlight is, of course, the stress on "illustrated" as the guide has detailed area maps, just right for the <i>rigting-bedondered</i> (directionally challenged). If you want to head out into distance, there are plenty of travel books to help you on your way.
<img src="http://www.mg.co.za/ContentImages/199502/Zim_icon.GIF" align=left>Leading European Union (EU) officials have warned that the general election in Zimbabwe will be a "sham". They have warned that election proceedings in the southern African country have so far failed to conform to accepted standards and have indicated that the EU will take swift action against Mugabe’s government after the polls.
"As you may or may not know, the world has been arbitrarily divided up into "zones" in which movies and DVDs are released. Each zone often has its own release dates, and on top of that, each local zone has a unique kind of "coding" done to all DVD players and media. Why? Very simply, it’s so that the entertainment industry can try to control what you see and when you see it." Ian Fraser investigates.