A Nigerian three-year-old boy has been released by his kidnappers one day after he was snatched on his way to school in the lawless Niger Delta, the boy’s father said on Friday. The kidnappers had demanded 10-million naira ( 600) for the child, relatives of the toddler said earlier.
The United Nations refugee agency warned on Friday of a humanitarian disaster looming in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), where more than 160Â 000 people have fled fighting and atrocities this year. Despite successful polls last year that chose Joseph Kabila as DRC’s first democratically elected president in more than 40 years, fears were growing of a return to war in North Kivu.
The Sudanese government has resumed bombing civilian targets in the war-ravaged western region of Darfur, the United States special envoy for Darfur said on Friday. ”After a halt in the bombing between the beginning of February and the end of April in 2007, the Sudanese government has resumed bombing in Darfur,” Andrew Natsios said.
A pedestrian was cut in half when a car, allegedly travelling over 200km/h, hit him on the N8 near Kimberley in the Northern Cape, paramedics said on Friday. ”One half of the body was found inside the car that hit him, and the other half was lying in the bushes some distance away,” said ER24 spokesperson Ben Johnson.
Springbok captain Johann Muller did well to keep his calm on Friday in the face of some fairly stinging questions from the New Zealand press, who are anticipating a big win against the Boks in the Tri-Nations on Saturday. Muller was asked first if he thought he would concede a point for every preceding Bok captain — 52.
Authorities in Zimbabwe announced the arrest of hundreds more retailers and executives as part of an ongoing price crackdown on Friday as it emerged the head of the central bank had warned against the blitz. Among the latest arrests were four police officers accused of looting from shops.
South African amputee sprinter Oscar Pistorius has been given the all-clear to compete with able-bodied athletes in the Rome leg of the IAAF Golden League Series on Friday, with a view to earning his ticket to next month’s World Athletics Championships in Osaka.
Several thousand Pakistani Islamists rallied on Friday to denounce the government for ordering an army crackdown on a radical mosque in the capital, Islamabad. Protests were held in several towns and cities across the country after Friday prayers but none was very big and there were no reports of trouble.
Danny Jordaan, CEO of the 2010 Soccer World Cup local organising committee, on Friday returned to his home town of Port Elizabeth to switch on the First National Bank (FNB) World Cup countdown clock. This demonstrates that things are really ”hotting up” in the friendly city as it prepares to host some of the games in three years’ time.
Police on Friday defended the redeployment of officers dealing with crimes against women and children, saying the new system was proving to be effective. ”Rape cases have decreased significantly in Mpumalanga, while the conviction rate has increased substantially,” said spokesperson Director Selby Bokaba.