Anglo-Australian mining giant BHP Billiton said on Thursday it was forming a joint venture with Japanese steelmaker JFE steel that will underpin iron ore sales worth ,7-billion over the next 11 years. The joint venture partners will work together to develop and commercialise part of BHP Billiton’s Yandi mine in northwestern Australia.
An end to the illegal strikes at three of Botswana’s diamond mines was expected on Thursday, mining company Debswana said on Wednesday, but informal talks with the Botswana Mining Workers Union then snagged on the issue of the reinstatement of strikers who had been fired.
Iraqi police on Wednesday night abducted around 60 journalists in the city of Najaf, after bursting into the hotel where they have been covering the battle in the city for the Imam Ali shrine, and dragging them off at gunpoint. The police moved into the lobby of the Sea of Najaf hotel at 9.15pm on Wednesday night. As they fired shots into the air, they ordered all journalists to leave immediately.
In the colonnaded doorways of Rassul Street, several fighters of the Mehdi army had made their final stand. Their bodies lay in small groups — two here, two there, and five here. For three weeks militia loyal to the Shia cleric Moqtada al-Sadr have defied the extraordinary firepower of the United States military, hiding in the network of alleys surrounding Najaf’s Imam Ali shrine.
Police abduct journalists
The Sudanese government bowed to international pressure on Wednesday and agreed to allow more foreign troops in the stricken Darfur region. The team of 550 monitors and soldiers sent by the African Union may be expanded to a force of 2 000-3 000 soldiers. Hitherto Khartoum has resisted any enlargement of the force or its mandate.
UN pleads for more Sudan aid
Russian authorities struggled on Wednesday night to explain how two passenger aircraft had apparently blown up simultaneously in midair on Tuesday night, killing all 89 people on board. The owners of the two aircraft, aviation experts and relatives of the dead said the coincidence was too great for it not to be a terrorist act.
Mark Thatcher was on Wednesday night facing a legal battle to avoid a lengthy jail sentence after being arrested and charged in South Africa with helping to finance a failed attempt to overthrow the president of a tiny but oil-rich West African state. Police said they had ”credible evidence” that he was involved in backing a coup attempt in Equatorial Guinea.
Thatcher released on R2m bail
‘Thatcher met with coup plotter’
Wayward son of the Iron Lady
Even dogs of war shouldn’t have rats the size of cats running over them as they sleep; or be shackled in leg-irons; or be woken up at night for interrogation sessions conducted past the end of a rifle; or be denied access to their lawyers; or have their trial conducted in Spanish sans translation. That is the fate of eight South Africans and other nationals holed up in Black Beach prison
Mbulaeni Mulaudzi and Hezekiel Sepeng were whip-cracking sharp in their opening 800m rounds of the Athens Olympics at the Olympic Stadium on Wednesday night. Not so happy were pole-vaulter Okkert Brits, 110m hurdler Shaun Bownes and javelin-thrower Sunette Viljoen, who all failed to go through to their following rounds.
Special Report: Olympics 2004
Thierry Henry ensured Arsenal’s place in history when they broke Nottingham Forest’s 26-year-old record of 42 English league matches unbeaten by defeating Blackburn Rovers 3-0 at Highbury on Wednesday. Henry poked in Dennis Bergkamp’s 50th-minute cross and took the corner which Cesc Fabregas tucked in eight minutes later.