President Robert Mugabe castigated private charities, religious groups and other aid organisations on Tuesday for interfering in politics and said legislators will be asked to pass a law allowing authorities to close some groups and arrest officials. He said a new Bill to tighten controls on such organisations will be introduced soon.
<li><a class=’standardtextsmall’ href="http://www.mg.co.za/Content/pd.asp?ao=119007">Heard about Zimbabwe’s ‘revival’?</a>
Liberia’s security will remain precarious until concentrated efforts are made to disarm next-door Côte d’Ivoire, General Daniel Opande, the Kenyan military commander for the UN mission in the west African state, said. ”I can assure you that at the end of our mission in Liberia, we will have collected all the arms, but the country will remain at risk if in Ivory Coast the guns are still in the hands of the wrong people,” said Opande.
The International Whaling Commission (IWC) warned on Tuesday over the effects of an oil and gas project on the ”critically endangered” western grey whale. The IWC adopted a resolution that ”strongly recommends” that subsidiaries of Exxon, Royal Dutch Shell and BP halt seismic exploration activity.
Japan fails to get secret whaling vote
Protesting workers from petrol stations, car dealers and panel beaters warned their employers on Tuesday to prepare for a long battle in their campaign for better wages and allowances. The National Union of Metalworkers of South Africa marched to the offices of the Fuel Retailers Association and the Retail Motor Industry.
Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said on Tuesday he has set up a panel to find a permanent solution to floods that annually ravage the country’s east and north-east, as officials reported another 24 people killed. The death toll due to flooding caused by monsoon rains since mid-June in India has touched 217.
The Constitutional Court was concerned on Tuesday about the few facts in the case of 69 alleged mercenaries held in Zimbabwe and facing possible extradition to Equatorial Guinea where they might be executed. Chief Justice Arthur Chaskalson told counsel for the state Ismael Semenya that ”lots had happened” but few material facts had been placed before the court.
State has ‘no duty’ to help ‘mercenaries’
While the South African stock market comes under pressure and exporters bleat about the dire consequences of the rand’s strength, there is a flip side to the rand coin and many of the benefits of a robust rand are going unheeded, commentators say. On Monday the rand touched R5,88 per dollar — its best level since January 1999.
President Robert Mugabe on Tuesday declared that Zimbabwe was undergoing an economic ”revival” as he addressed the opening of the last session of Parliament before key elections next year. ”We have money to reap a good harvest … to ensure we meet our needs and food requirements. What enhances this … is the evident revival of our economy,” Mugabe told Parliament.
The state argued in the Constitutional Court on Tuesday that it has no duty to intervene in the case of 69 South Africans currently being held in Zimbabwe and facing extradition to Equatorial Guinea for an alleged coup plot. On Monday lawyers for the 69 argued the state indeed has such a duty.
‘Mercenaries’ in a ‘lion’s den’
Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat in an attempt to defuse an unprecedented challenge to his authority was holding more talks with his Prime Minister, Ahmed Qorei, on Tuesday in a bid to persuade him to retract his resignation. Street protests in Gaza forced Arafat to execute an embarrassing U-turn over his choice of security supremo.