Less than three months after opening for business, Absa Islamic Banking announced on Tuesday that it will offer two more products to its Sharia-compliant offering. These are a cheque and savings account. And, as is the case with all other Absa Islamic Banking products, the new additions meet the conditions laid down by Islamic law.
A group of about 800 protesting former miners from the Eastern Cape who were evicted from the Tshwane city hall on Monday were being cared for by residents on Tuesday. ”The group has been separated into two smaller groups of about 300 and 500 each and they are staying in open halls in blocks of flats in the Pretoria CBD,” said Willie Fuledi, spokesperson for the Ex-Mineworkers’ Union of SA.
South African athlete Ernst van Dyk was named Laureus World Sportsperson of the Year with a Disability in Barcelona, Spain, on Monday. Swiss tennis superstar Roger Federer was named World Sportsman of the Year for the second straight year, with the women’s honour going to Croatian skier Janica Kostelic.
Sudan’s Islamist opposition leader Hassan al-Turabi on Tuesday criticised the Darfur peace agreement signed earlier this month as partial and incomplete, a senior official from his party told Agence France-Presse. The Popular Congress Party head met with United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan’s top envoy in Sudan, Jan Pronk.
English clubs are threatening to scuttle England’s new rugby Test with the All Blacks in November because they say they’re not obliged to make their players available. England’s Rugby Football Union confirmed the November 5 Test on Monday along with live TV and ticket packages to help christen the new £100-million (-million) South Stand at Twickenham.
Africa saw a reduction in conflicts last year but gross human rights violations including killings and rape continued in volatile areas, Amnesty International said its annual report. ”The signing of several peace agreements in 2005 resulted in a decline in armed conflict across the region,” the London-based body’s 2006 International Report said.
Blackouts hit parts of the Western Cape on Monday night as Eskom was unable to provide sufficient electricity to meet demand, the Cape Times reported. Its website said on Tuesday the blackouts came after Koeberg’s Unit Two generator was shut down to be refueled and for standard safety upgrades.
The serial killer known as the Son of Sam, whose murder spree brought terror to 1970s New York, is suing his former lawyer under the very law that was introduced to stop him from profiting from his crimes. New York and many other US states introduced ”Son of Sam” laws in response to rumours that David Berkowitz was being offered vast sums of money to write a book.
United States President George Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair are to discuss in Washington this week a programme of troop withdrawals from Iraq that will be much faster and more ambitious than originally planned. Britain is to begin with a handover to Iraqi security forces in Muthanna province in July and the Americans will follow suit in Najaf, the Shia holy city.
Travelling across the Siberian steppe in a manner reserved for reclusive world leaders like North Korea’s Kim Jong-il, or sages like Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, the Brazilian novelist Paulo Coelho is getting a rapturous reception in his specially converted train.