Iran’s northern and western regions were jolted by a ”relatively strong” earthquake on Friday, state television said, sending many people in Tehran scurrying into the streets. The quake struck at 5.10pm local time, the report said, without giving its magnitude or epicentre. There were no immediate reports of casualties or damage.
Seven pharmacy and health-care groups launched a joint court challenge against controversial new medicine regulations in the Cape High Court on Friday, their legal firm confirmed. This brings to at least nine the number of legal challenges against the Medicines and Related Substance Act, which came into force on May 2.
Iranian demonstrators clashed violently with security forces on Friday as they again tried to storm the British embassy in Tehran, an AFP reporter witnessed. Riot police made several baton charges to push back a crowd of more than 300 protesters trying to push its way towards the main gate of the embassy compound.
Jane Campion has made an incredibly sexy movie, and she knows it. In the Cut is being hailed as her finest work since The Piano. She tells Libby Brooks about the delights of working with Jennifer Jason Leigh’s stomach — and why she had to hire a gigolo.
How many of the lottery’s Arts, Culture and National Heritage Distribution Agency (ACNHDA) members does it take to change a light bulb? We don’t know. They can’t get a quorum to decide. How long does it take them to decide to change the light bulb? A year, if you’re lucky, laments Mike van Graan.
Namibia’s white farmers are hopeful of a negotiated solution to a crisis over land reform despite recent moves by the government to expropriate farms and hand them over to blacks. The government in the middle of May served notices on 15 white farmers giving them 14 days to offer their land for sale to the state.
Sporadic shooting resumed on Friday morning in the east Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) town of Bukavu, where at least 10 people were killed over the previous two days in clashes between rival army units. The gunfire and mortar explosions were less frequent on Friday than earlier in the week, according to an AFP journalist there.
The United Nations-backed war crimes court for Sierra Leone, which was due to rule on Friday on whether former Liberian president Charles Taylor will stand trial on charges he aided rebels in their decade-long war in the West African state, has delayed its decision, a court spokesperson said.
Hundreds of unarmed army reservists who had barricaded Madagascar’s Parliament on Friday morning saying they had taken lawmakers hostage over a pay dispute left the area early in the afternoon, an AFP journalist at the scene reported. The leader of the reservists called on the demonstrators to disperse at about 2pm.
The rise of ”modern individualism” had helped destroy the family values that were the foundation of society, Deputy President Jacob Zuma said in Cape Town on Friday. He was addressing the annual ceremonial opening of the National House of Traditional Leaders.