Rebels holding the north of Côte d’Ivoire say they are gearing up for an imminent return to hostilities in the divided and tense West African state following an attack last month on one of their positions. Humanitarian workers said, meanwhile, that a recent attack in the restive west has sent up to 15 000 people in the area fleeing.
The Gambia’s media is outraged by the promulgation of two new press laws it says were signed in secret by President Yahya Jammeh to muzzle freedom of expression as the country gears up for elections next year. Jammeh has approved the two laws, which were passed by Parliament in December, despite a storm of protest at home and abroad.
Services in public hospitals across Burundi continued to be paralysed as an indefinite strike by nurses entered its fifth day on Friday. The nurses are demanding better pay and working conditions. Although nurses have been reporting for duty at most hospitals, they have not been working as normal.
The Asian tsunami attracted more media attention in the first six weeks after it struck than the world’s top 10 ”forgotten” emergencies did over a whole year, according to a report from Reuters. Other emergencies — from the devastating wars in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Sudan to HIV/Aids — have been neglected by world’s media.
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A French arms-company executive told the Durban High Court on Friday it is usual to have high-level political contacts when trying to sell arms abroad. The executive is the first representative of the company to testify in the Schabir Shaik fraud and corruption trial.
The African National Congress will review the progress the country has made ”in the pursuit of the goal of the emancipation of women” at its national general council meeting in June, President Thabo Mbeki said on Friday. An immediate issue is parity of representation of women in the upcoming local government elections.
A dinner date Romeo wooed lonely Hong Kong women over the internet, then took them for expensive meals and fled, leaving them to pay the bills, a news report said Friday. The sly charmer took them out for lavish dinners, then asked to use their mobile phones to make a business call and fled shortly before the bill was due to arrive, The South China Morning Post reported.
Thai police revealed on Friday that they have been searching for 82 missing cobras from the Red Cross Snake Farm in the centre of Bangkok for the past three months. The cobras, used to extract venom to treat snake bites, started to disappear in January, this year, said Police Lieutenant Colonel Wichien Watchirasaenglert.
Hours before the judge in the Michael Jackson case was expected to rule on whether comedian Jay Leno can tell jokes at the singer’s expense, The Tonight Show host found a way to slip in a quip without opening his mouth. After arriving ”late” for the taping of Thursday’s show, Leno stepped out of a black limousine wearing SpongeBob SquarePants pyjamas.
Injuries to three of South Africa’s main bowlers caused headaches for South African skipper Graeme Smith after lunch on the first day of the second Castle Lager/MTN Test against Zimbabwe at Supersport Park on Friday, in a session that saw three wickets fall in three overs without any addition to the score. Zimbabwe went to tea on 189 for seven.