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/ 11 February 2005
More than 400 people are still missing in a remote area of south-western Pakistan after heavy rains caused a large dam to burst, sweeping villagers into the Arabian Sea, a provincial official said on Friday. At least 35 people have been confirmed dead, and more than 1Â 200 villagers have been pulled alive from the waters.
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/ 11 February 2005
The United Nations Security Council has started working on a resolution to establish a peacekeeping operation in Sudan to support the peace process, said the Council’s President, Ambassador Joel Adechi of Benin. The council discussed the implementation of the Sudanese peace agreement and a number of issues related to the western Sudanese region of Darfur.
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/ 11 February 2005
A large cache of weapons and ammunition was found by the police’s national intervention unit in Mqanduli, Transkei on Thursday. Police spokesperson Superintendent Sipho Sizani said the bust followed information about a 34-year-old ex-soldier, who was training people to use firearms.
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/ 11 February 2005
President Robert Mugabe’s government has earmarked 12-billion Zimbabwe dollars to buy food aid for needy Zimbabweans who are going to the polls next month, the state-run daily The Herald said on Friday. About 1,5-million Zimbabweans are in need of food aid ahead of the next main harvest due in April.
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/ 11 February 2005
The Pretoria High Court dismissed an appeal on Friday by Winnie Madikizela-Mandela and broker Addy Moolman against their fraud convictions. Moolman sought leave to approach the Supreme Court of Appeal in Bloemfontein to challenge his 58 fraud convictions and four-year prison sentence, and Madikizela-Mandela wanted to appeal her suspended sentence on 43 counts.
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/ 11 February 2005
The Competition Commission recommended conditional approval on Friday of the merger between mining groups Harmony and Gold Fields. Due to the hostile nature of the proposed takeover, the commission found it difficult to assess the effect of a merger on jobs, and therefore attached the retrenchment conditions to its approval.
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/ 11 February 2005
Peace is possible in Colombia despite its four decades of civil war, Archbishop Desmond Tutu said on Thursday, pointing to harmony achieved in South Africa after decades of racial strife under apartheid. The Nobel Peace Prize laureate gave the optimistic outlook during a speech at a peace symposium in the south-western city of Cali.
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/ 11 February 2005
Stung by intense criticism over new corruption allegations, Kenyan President Mwai Kibaki on Thursday ordered anti-graft officials to examine a cancelled suspect passport deal with a French firm. Faced with mounting concerns over his government’s commitment to fighting corruption, Kibaki has forwarded the contract to an anti-graft panel.
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/ 11 February 2005
The increasingly bitter debate over the presidential succession has taken a new twist, with the African National Congress Youth League suggesting Thabo Mbeki should quit as ANC leader when he leaves the presidency. Youth league president Fikile Mbalula told the M&G any proposal to separate the party presidency from that of the country was divisive and a distortion of ANC history.
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/ 11 February 2005
Yet another Free State township erupted in protest on Thursday, with residents trying to block the N1 to Bloemfontein to highlight unhappiness with service delivery. Mmamahabane, near Ventersburg, was the second township in two days to be engulfed in unrest in the beleaguered province. The residents demanded that the ANC and the provincial government address their grievances over councillors.