The Peace and Security Council of the African Union (AU) will meet on Monday to discuss the deployment of an African peacekeeping force in the Darfur region of western Sudan. ”We expect to make a decision today [Monday]” whether to transform a 300-strong ceasefire observer mission in Darfur into a peacekeeping force, said Sam Ibok, AU’s director for peace and security department.
The government of the southern Indian state of Kerala has set up a committee to study its unusually high suicide rate — currently one every hour, it was reported on Monday. According to Kerala’s Chief Minister AK Anthony, about 19 774 people killed themselves in the last two years, taking the state’s suicide rate to 31,5 per 100 000 people.
Opposition Democratic Alliance leader Tony Leon said Women’s Day was often the most difficult of South Africa’s public holidays to celebrate because women were still not protected by the Constitution. Leon said that while South Africa had the most wonderful rights on paper, in practice women were not protected by these rights.
Mbeki pays tribute to SA women
Zambian President Levy Mwanawasa has warned white farmers who have resettled from neighbouring Zimbabwe that they will be thrown out if they use speech that is deemed to be racist, a state-run newspaper reported on Monday. Mwanawasa, who was touring the Mkushi farming bloc in central Zambia, advised them to quickly learn how to cohabit with Zambians working on their farms, it said.
Nigeria is being used by Britain as a conduit to bankroll Zimbabwe’s main opposition in a bid to unseat President Robert’s Mugabe’s government in next year’s legislative elections, a state-owned paper said on Sunday. The Sunday Mail reported that Nigeria had promised the Movement for Democratic Change at least 200-million Zimbabwe dollars.
Microsoft released a long-awaited security update for its Windows XP program on Friday, a response to the growing number of security shortcomings in the market-dominant computer operating system. The free upgrade won’t be available to everyone right away, however.
Six people have died after an anti-tank mine exploded in the southeastern Angolan province of Kuango Kubango, national radio reported late on Sunday. The explosion occurred on Friday evening when a vehicle carrying six people, including two newly appointed provincial officials, hit the explosive.
First National Bank, a division of FirstRand Bank Limited, has opened a portable branch in Tembisa, Ekurhuleni, for personal and business customers. The bank’s spokesperson Nono Bam said on Saturday that the branch provided all banking services. She said clients will have access to two tellers, two customer service consultants and two ATMs.
Opec is to invite producers from outside the cartel to talks next month on how to stablise sky-rocketing oil prices, the organisation’s President Purnomo Yusgiantoro said in Jakarta on Monday. The unusual move to throw open the Opec meeting in Vienna on September 14 to non-members comes just days after crude prices hit record highs, reaching ,77 a barrel in New York on Friday.
Laggards at work are costing economies billions of dollars a year, a multi-country study said on Saturday. In absolute terms, the United States incurs the biggest loss in wasted talent and management time, -billion dollars yearly, followed by the United Kingdom at -billion, according to the global firm SHL.