GRAVE robbers have dug up the bones of a former deputy minister of the apartheid regime to create a powerful “cure” for Aids, the Sunday Times newspaper reported. “All that is left of Hannes Rall, a deputy minister of transport in the apartheid government, are a few bones in a plastic bag at a police […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Maputo | Monday NEARLY 100_ 000 Mozambican families in areas affected by the devastating floods earlier this year will get a new lease of life when the country’s agricultural authorities start handing out seed kits for the coming planting season. Already dozens of trucks loaded with seeds imported from neighbouring South Africa and […]

A COUPLE have been publicly flogged in Nigeria’s northwestern Zamfara state for failing to prove their allegations that the Islamic head of the village had sex with their daughter, a court official said. Haruna Dutsi and his wife, Aishat, were given 80 strokes of the cane each in a public spectacle in the village of […]

BLOODY attacks attributed to armed Islamic militants in Algeria multiplied last week, with local media reporting nearly 40 killings, as fears of a resurgence in violence haunted the country. Most of the attacks took place in the Mitidja region, the fertile agricultural plain near the capital and former stronghold of the Armed Islamic Group (GIA). […]

DAVID MAGERIA, Nairobi | Saturday NINE out of the 20 members of the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa(COMESA) have promised to join a regional free trade area when it is launched at the end of next month, say officials. COMESA’s Secretary General Erastus Mwencha said the FTA programme was ”firmly on course” and […]

JEREMY LOVELL AND OWN CORRESPONDENT, Cape Town | Friday SOUTH Africa will not be stampeded into selling off its state-owned firms, which together account for 14% of gross domestic product, and will try to get the best prices for telecommunications utility Telkom, power utility Eskom, transport utility Transnet and arms maker Denel while trying to […]

THOUSANDS of Kenyans have joined a service of prayer for a US missionary found murdered a month ago. Headed by Roman Catholic clergy and singing hymns, they walked in procession for 8km from Naivasha, 80km northwest of Nairobi, to the isolated spot where Father John Kaiser’s body was found. Several members of parliament were among […]

AFP, Harare | Friday FOUR white farmers have been arrested on charges of “inciting violence” for allegedly convincing their black labourers to evict squatters from several farms south of Harare, the government daily reported. “The police will not tolerate any unlawful actions or disruptions of public order, such as new farm occupations,” The Herald quoted […]

AN Egyptian worker stabbed his employer to death, then ate his flesh and drank his blood in an old Cairo mosque after he was fired from his job renovating the holy site, police said. The 28-year-old worker was enraged at his 56-year-old employer for firing him after only a day’s work at Al-Kordi mosque and […]

FIRE has forced the plane of Togolese President Gnassingbe Eyadema to make an emergency landing at Niamey airport before being engulfed in flames, aviation authorities here said. Eyadema was not onboard, nor was any other Togolese dignitary. Ten people, including eight crew, were onboard, and two people were slightly injured in the incident. The aircraft […]