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/ 31 January 2005

Zimbabwe denies that it’s facing famine

The government on Monday denied Zimbabwe faces a hunger crisis and accused a United States-funded famine early warning unit of exaggerating food shortages to cause panic. The Famine Early Warning Systems Network said 5,8-million people in the country of 12,5-million will need food aid to avert starvation before the next harvests in April.

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/ 31 January 2005

Record number of airport weddings in Sweden

The number of weddings performed at Stockholm’s Arlanda airport increased by more than 30% last year compared with 2003, an airport spokesperson said on Monday. ”It’s mostly couples on their way to their honeymoon that take the opportunity to exchange rings at the airport,” spokesperson Niclas Haerenstam said.

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/ 31 January 2005

New cellphones are all shook up

Tired of pushing all those buttons on your cellphone? Japanese handsets slated to hit stores next month are designed to solve that problem: they respond to shakes, tilts and jiggles. The cellphones come equipped with a tiny motion-control sensor, a computer chip that recognises and responds to movement.

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/ 31 January 2005

Govt officially supports Rugby World Cup bid

The government has officially given SA Rugby its support for the union’s bid for the 2011 World Cup tournament. Beeld newspaper reported on Monday that Minister of Sport and Recreation Makhenkesi Stofile has handed an official letter, in which the government’s support is stated, to bid committee chairperson Francois Pienaar.

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/ 31 January 2005

Global tourism rebounds in 2004

Global tourism arrivals enjoyed a huge rebound of 10% in 2004 after prolonged stagnation, the World Tourism Organisation said in its winter barometer report released on Monday. The WTO’s chief of market intelligence, Augusto Huescar, unveiled the report at talks on the Thai island of Phuket about reviving tourism following the December 26 tsunami.

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/ 31 January 2005

Tough road ahead for US in Iraq

While basking in the apparent success of Iraq’s national elections, the United States still faces some tough hurdles in fashioning an exit strategy from the country it invaded nearly two years ago. US President George Bush has made it clear Iraq has a long and bloody road ahead of it.

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/ 31 January 2005

Peres catches 40 winks at Cabinet meeting

Israel’s usually indefatigable Deputy Prime Shimon Peres dozed off for a full 15 minutes during the weekly Cabinet meeting, some of his less than discreet colleagues said on Monday. ”His eyes were well and truly closed and he went to sleep for a quarter of an hour,” one minister told the Yediot Aharonot daily on condition of anonymity.