Insurgents unleashed a pair of powerful car bombs near the symbol of United States authority in Iraq — the Green Zone, where the US embassy and key government offices are located — and hotels occupied by hundreds of foreigners. Two other explosions brought the day’s bombing toll to at least 24 dead and more than 100 wounded. The day’s violence also included assassinations of three Iraqis, and US attacks against targets in insurgent-held Fallujah.
Janet Leigh, who has died aged 77, appeared in about four dozen films in a Hollywood career that began in 1947. But the single role that ensured her a continuing place in movie history was that of Marion Crane, who meets her fate in the gleaming white of a motel bathroom in the extraordinary shower murder sequence of Alfred Hitchcock’s Psycho.
Rising world oil prices have given fresh impetus to an as yet fruitless 40-year search for the black gold on and near the Indian Ocean island of Madagascar, officials there said on Monday. ”Since the rise in the price per barrel, several foreign oil companies have signed exploration licences in Madagascar,” said Ignace Randrianasolo, head of fossil fuels at the Office of Mines and Strategic Industries.
President Thabo Mbeki has made a withering attack on commentators who argue that violent crime is out of control in South Africa, calling them white racists who want the country to fail. He said crime was falling but some journalists distorted reality by depicting black people as ”barbaric savages” who liked to rape and kill.
Israeli forces have demolished the homes of hundreds of Palestinians, bulldozed swaths of agricultural land and destroyed infrastructure in their bloodiest assault on the Gaza Strip in years. More than 70 people have died in Operation Days of Penitence, launched in northern Gaza six days ago after a Hamas rocket attack killed two Israeli children.
Two United States researchers on Monday shared the 357 839 Nobel prize for physiology or medicine for their discovery of the molecular machinery behind the scent of lilac in the spring, the bouquet of a vintage burgundy or the smell of napalm in the morning.
The week before last, Dr Anban Pillay made certain statements about pharmacists and pricing regulations ("Pills without frills"). The Department of Health is now in the unenviable position of having to deal with the aftermath of introducing a fee that, in the words of Judge Jeanette Traverso, appears to be a "thumbsuck". Lorraine Osman exercises her right to reply.
Throughout the developing world appropriate microfinance has helped address the poverty and vulnerability of millions of poor households in the informal sector. The United Nations has declared 2005 the Year of Microcredit. With a few exceptions, however, South Africa lacks the sort of poverty-oriented microfinance institutions common in Africa, Asia and Latin America. Why is this?
There’s modest growth in the broadsheets, but the really big circulation gains in local weekly newspapers are coming from the tabloids. Andy Davis unravels a segment that mirrors the international trends.
Barclays Bank’s potential purchase of a controlling stake in Absa puts into perspective parochial talk of ”big empowerment deals”. The R20-billion bandied about as the price is almost the total spent on black economic empowerment (BEE) deals in 2003. That a foreign bank wants to put such serious money into a South African operation supports the view that BEE does not necessarily deter foreign direct investment.