The United States threw its weight behind an expansion of the United Nations security council that would take in Japan as a permanent member Thursday but not the other prime contender from the developed world, Germany. The structure of the security council has not changed for more than three decades, since China joined the main victors of World War II as a permanent member.
A former Ku Klux Klan member on trial for the murder of three civil rights activists in 1964 was taken from a Mississippi court on a stretcher on Thursday after the judge ruled that evidence from a previous case could be used against him. His condition was stable, but the trial went into recess until today at the earliest, depending on his ability to attend.
Iran’s outgoing reformist president, Mohammad Khatami, warned on Thursday that the country’s presidential election was being undermined by orchestrated dirty tricks as voters prepared to choose his replacement. With the polls opening on Friday amid tight security, Khatami accused unnamed elements of ”disruption of gatherings and beatings”.
It’s a mystery why there are still seats available for the first Test against France. The match in Durban will, after all, show whether this season’s Springbok can bring home the Tri-Nations title. Should it come together for the boks, they will go into next week’s test sore and bruised but with the assurance they’ve passed the acid test.
The race for the 2012 Summer Games moves to Africa this week, with the five bid cities taking their campaign to Ghana in the last major Olympic gathering before next month’s IOC vote in Singapore. Each city will be given 10-15 minutes on Friday to make formal presentations to the body, which represents 53 countries.
A 74-year-old woman accidentally burned her life savings of 4Â 000 euros because she forgot that the money was hidden in an oven, the daily Jutarnji List reported on Friday. The woman, identified as Dusanka, started a fire to prepare a meal, but forgot that her money was in the oven.
Combative mining magnate Roger Kebble has taken on Bobby Godsell and AngloGold Ashanti as well as the Department of Water and Forestry over water pumping obligations in the Stilfontein basin. Kebble said he and his co-directors are willing to step down from control of the dormant mining company in favour of new appointees nominated by Godsell.
Police in central Zimbabwe have begun evicting people who settled on former white-owned farms without government permission as part of a countrywide ”clean-up” campaign. Hundreds of white farmers were evicted at the height of the controversial land reform programme when their farms were taken over by militant war veterans.
Johannesburg police arrested 203 people in a swoop on Hillbrow which started on Thursday afternoon and ended in the early hours of Friday. Inspector Kriban Naidoo said an ”enormous” number of people were arrested for drunken driving. ”It is no compensation that it was a holiday,” he said.
A place at the 2006 World Cup in Germany seemed a distant prospect for Angola less than two years ago after a disastrous start to their qualifying campaign. But the Palancas Negros face Nigeria in Kano on Saturday knowing a draw will keep them top of Group 4 and within sight of a first appearance at the quadrennial international football showcase.