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/ 8 November 2005
David Beckham will hope to bend the ball even further at next year’s World Cup finals in his new soccer boots. The Real Madrid and England midfielder took turns with other top players taking free kicks and playing soccer tennis at an Adidas boot launch. They also shot a ball against a wall to measure how fast it was moving.
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/ 8 November 2005
Sixty-four percent of South Africans have had unprotected sex without knowing their partner’s sexual history, according to the Durex Global Sex Survey. "When compared to last year’s results, this statistic is higher, which means that South Africans continue to take risks and put their lives in danger," said a statement.
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/ 8 November 2005
A lawyer working for Barzan Ibrahim al-Tikriti, one of the co-defendants of ousted president Saddam Hussein on trial over the massacre of Shia civilians from the town of Dujail, was shot and wounded by armed men in Baghdad on Tuesday, an interior ministry source said.
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/ 8 November 2005
President Hamid Karzai officially opened the most luxurious hotel in destitute Afghanistan on Tuesday, with the five-star Kabul Serena touted as a means to lure investors and dollar-spending tourists. The $36,5-million hotel, opposite the heavily fortified presidential palace, is an almost-total overhaul of the once-famous Kabul Hotel that was badly damaged in the 1992-1996 civil war.
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/ 8 November 2005
Christopher Dell, the United States ambassador to Zimbabwe, did not mince words. President Robert Mugabe’s government was guilty of gross mismanagement and corruption, Dell said in a speech last week. ”No wrongs are righted. The rule of law [is] in a shambles.”
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/ 8 November 2005
Science institutions in Africa must do more to ensure their research is put to practical use against agricultural, health and other problems, and governments must invest more in research if they want to develop, officials said. Mohamed Hassan, president of the Nairobi-based African Academy of Sciences, said such institutions too often do little more than bestow honours on their members.
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/ 8 November 2005
Thailand on Tuesday vowed to pursue its offensive against Islamic militants as two bombs rocked provincial government buildings in the country’s south following a night of deadly gun attacks. Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra told reporters he is happy with the government response to the latest unrest and vowed further crackdowns.
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/ 8 November 2005
The government is not specially selecting the land of Afrikaans South Africans for expropriation purposes, Deputy Minister of Agriculture and Land Affairs Dirk du Toit said on Tuesday. He was briefing the media following discussions between a government delegation led by President Thabo Mbeki and the Afrikaans Discussion Group.
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/ 8 November 2005
The decision by Myanmar’s military rulers to move the administrative capital to a secret mountain compound was as sudden as it was inexplicable, leaving observers wondering on Tuesday why the already reclusive junta is pushing itself deeper into isolation.
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/ 8 November 2005
”An awful lot” needs to be done before mid-December when financial closure is expected to be reached between stakeholders of the Gautrain project, local construction partner Murray & Roberts said on Tuesday. The executive director of the company, Arnold Miller, said there was nonetheless no reason to suppose that financial closure could not be reached.