Europe’s southern fringe is still the home of machismo, with Portuguese men being the least likely to do any housework, according to a study. At the top of the household layabouts’ ranking, 61% of Portuguese men, 57% of Greek men and 47% of Spanish men told researchers they rarely, or never, used an iron or wielded a dustpan and brush.
Road accidents claim more lives in the world’s poorest countries than malaria or tuberculosis, say campaigners urging governments to treat fatal crashes as a global disease. The Commission for Road Safety, chaired by the former Nato chief Lord Robertson, will on Thursday call on the G8 countries to support a -million 10-year plan to tackle the 1,2-million deaths and 50-million injuries on the roads every year.
A suspect in an alleged plot to bomb Canadian buildings had applied to a flying school and considered using a plane for an attack, according to court documents revealed by Canadian radio. But the suspect, Amin Mohamed Durani (19) did not attend the flying lessons, fearing that he would draw attention to himself.
The Western Cape department of local government office in Cape Town had its water and electricity cut off on Thursday over an unpaid bill of almost R750Â 000. City of Cape Town workers cut off the water to the department’s city centre building at 1.12pm and the electricity shortly after that.
Two United States astronomers have discovered huge quantities of carbon gas mixed with a cloud of dust surrounding a young, yellow star that could resemble our own solar system at its inception, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (Nasa) said.
Democratic Alliance leader Tony Leon has scoffed at suggestions that the party’s newly-elected Tafelsig ward councillor Sheval Arendse be suspended. Briefing the media at Parliament after Wednesday’s by-election, Leon said he was unaware of any charges against Arendse.
![]()
A smiling Wayne Rooney resumed training at England’s base camp in southern Germany on Thursday, giving the side a huge boost ahead of their World Cup campaign. The 20-year-old striker was put through his paces with his teammates and showed no ill effects in his first run-out since jetting being given the green light to play in the World Cup.
Public clinics and hospitals in the Zimbabwean capital, Harare, are running out of desperately needed drugs to treat tuberculosis as a worsening hard-currency shortage hits state health facilities, it was reported on Thursday. Overcrowding and poor hygiene have seen increasing cases of TB surfacing in Harare.
Diamond giant De Beers on Thursday unveiled plans to mine diamonds off South Africa’s West Coast, saying output could touch 240 000 carats annually once the programme was up and running next year. De Beers said that it was equipping a ship with an underwater crawling mining device.
Al-Qaeda’s chief in Iraq Abu Musab al-Zarqawi has been killed in an air strike, United States and Iraqi officials announced on Thursday, hailing a major blow against the network’s bid to destabilise the country. The US military said al-Zarqawi was killed in an air strike on a safe house north of Baghdad where he was holding a meeting with fellow militants.