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/ 13 December 2004
Germany is to cancel a 67-million-euro (,68-million) debt owed by following an agreement signed in Addis Ababa on Monday between Ethiopian Minister of State for Finance and economic Planning Mulu Ketsela and German Federal Minister of State Kerstin Muller.
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/ 13 December 2004
Japanese men who want to rest their weary heads this Christmas season are finding comfort in the lap of a woman — made of foam. The torso-less ”lap pillow” stands upright like a small cushion and resembles a woman’s legs in a miniskirt. ”Single men find this soothing,” said Mitsuo Takahashi of the seven-employee manufacturer Trane KK.
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/ 13 December 2004
A suicide car bomber killed at least 13 people in Baghdad on Monday, as Iraq’s interim president cited the decision to disband Saddam’s army and key ministries as a contributing factor to the violence over the last 18 months. The explosion took place at the entrance to the Green Zone, the vast fortified complex that houses in the interim Iraqi government and the British and US embassies.
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/ 13 December 2004
The White House was on Sunday scrambling to find a new candidate for the high-profile post of homeland security chief after its original choice was forced to stand down for hiring a nanny who was an illegal immigrant. The bungled nomination of Bernard Kerik, a former New York police commissioner, was a setback to White House hopes of swiftly assembling a Cabinet for Bush’s second term.
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/ 13 December 2004
About 70 000 football fans were forced to evacuate Real Madrid’s Santiago Bernabéu stadium on Sunday night when the police stopped a league game because of a bomb threat purporting to come from the Basque separatist group Eta. David Beckham, Michael Owen and Real Madrid’s other players were called off the pitch three minutes before the end of the match against Real Sociedad.
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/ 13 December 2004
More than 50 senior figures from Saddam Hussein’s former regime have begun a hunger strike in their United States military jail in Baghdad, according to an Iraqi lawyer. The group includes Tariq Aziz, the former deputy prime minister, and Taha Yassin Ramadan, a former vice president, according to the lawyer, Badie Arief Izzat.
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/ 13 December 2004
Debtor delinquency, the need for notarial bonds and the number of judgements have all declined over the past 12 months. This is according to the latest KreditInform barometer, based on a survey of more than 100 major corporations, with the majority from the manufacturing, wholesale and retail, mining and agricultural sectors.
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/ 13 December 2004
Minister of Arts and Culture Pallo Jordan has dissolved the board of the National Arts Council (NAC) with effect from December 14, he announced on Monday. He said the NAC as presently constituted has lost the confidence of the arts community and is not in a position to carry out the responsibilities assigned to it.
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/ 13 December 2004
Three men scaled the wall outside Winnie Madikizela-Mandela’s house in Orlando West in Soweto shortly after midnight on Saturday and, threatening to kill the security guard who caught them, demanded to see her, said police. Madikizela-Mandela, the ex-wife of former president Nelson Mandela, was sleeping in the house at the time.
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/ 13 December 2004
The Democratic Alliance has released its ”report card” assessing the performance of Cabinet ministers since they assumed office after the April elections, saying the overall record has been passable but lacklustre. The best performer was Finance Minister Trevor Manuel, who scored 8/10, while the worst performer was Health Minister Manto Tshabalala-Msimang, who scored 1/10, said DA leader Tony Leon.