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/ 13 January 2005

Greens ready to block crater study

A study of the crater left by the meteorite which many believe caused the extinction of the dinosaurs 65-million years ago is being opposed by activists who fear it could prove fatal to marine life. The month-long study off the Yucatan peninsula in Mexico involves researchers from Cambridge University and Imperial College London, and United States and Mexican universities.

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/ 13 January 2005

Much more than a simple stomach bug

Doctors have removed parasites weighing a total of 3kg from the stomach of a young woman in central Turkey in what they have described as a rare case in medicine, Anatolia news agency reported on Wednesday. Surgeon Kemal Arslan said the size of the parasites varied between 5cm and 20cm.

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/ 13 January 2005

Bookshop ‘slavery’ leads to dismissal

An employee of British bookseller chain Waterstone’s has been fired for bringing the company into disrepute after he made entries on his weblog site identifying it in code as "Bastardstone’s" and accusing it of slavery. "I did not set out to attack the company in some systematic manner," Joe Gordon said.

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/ 13 January 2005

Hong Kong man hands out cash on the street

Hong Kong police are searching for a man who handed out HK$1 000 (R753) notes to passers-by on a busy street, a spokesperson said Thursday. The man, soberly dressed and in his forties, is known to have handed out at least HK$7 000 in the city’s crowded Mongkok district, but officers believe he gave over more.

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/ 13 January 2005

US gives up search for Saddam’s WMD

The United States investigators searching for Saddam Hussein’s alleged weapons of mass destruction have given up the hunt and left Iraq with an appeal to the Pentagon for the release of several Iraqi scientists still being questioned, it was reported on Wednesday. Charles Duelfer, who led the Iraq Survey Group, has returned to the US and will deliver a final report in the spring.

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/ 13 January 2005

US school in eye of creationist storm

The battle over attempts to introduce a version of creationism into the curriculum of United States schools has become focused on a small town in Pennsylvania. Biology teachers at a high school in Dover have rejected the instructions of local officials to read a statement in class on Thursday questioning the theory of evolution.

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/ 13 January 2005

Tribunal ‘ignoring Tutsi crimes’

The international tribunal for Rwanda was criticised on Wednesday for its failure to charge Tutsis suspected of killing Hutus in the 1994 genocide. Filip Reyntjens, a Belgian historian and expert witness on the genocide, said he would stop cooperating with the tribunal because no Tutsis from the Rwandan Patriotic Front rebel army had been indicted.

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/ 13 January 2005

Zuma again opposes trade barriers

South African Deputy President Jacob Zuma on Thursday reiterated the call for restrictive trade barriers to be removed and for the Doha development round on international trade to be finalised in time. He was speaking at the International Meeting on Small Island Developing States in Port Louis, Mauritius.

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/ 13 January 2005

Abbas ready to honour road map to peace

Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas said on Thursday that he is ready to honour the security commitments in an internationally backed peace plan, adding that he hopes to resume peace talks with Israel soon. Abbas, elected earlier this week, said he is eager to restart talks on the ”road map” peace plan, backed by the United States, European Union and the Russian Federation.