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/ 25 January 2005
Indonesia on Tuesday moved to dispel charges that corrupt officials are siphoning off aid earmarked for tsunami-battered Aceh province, as south-east Asian nations seek to lure back foreign tourists scared off by the disaster. Indonesia’s health ministry, meanwhile, has significantly changed the way it tallies tsunami victims.
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/ 25 January 2005
Scores of Indian pilgrims, mainly women and children, were killed in a stampede at a temple in the western state of Maharashtra on Tuesday. Conservative estimates put the death toll between 25 and 40, with another 80 to 100 injured, witnesses and officials said. Witnesses said the stampede was triggered by a fire caused by a short circuit.
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/ 25 January 2005
A Roodepoort man, Marcus Mocke, has been sentenced in the Johannesburg Commercial Crimes Court to eight years in jail or a fine of R400 000 for dealing in pirated DVDs, the South African Federation against Copyright (Safact) said in a statement on Tuesday. Safact said it is the harshest sentence to date received for DVD piracy.
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/ 25 January 2005
The opposition Movement for Democratic Change is caught in a catch-22 situation in deciding whether to participate in Zimbabwe’s upcoming general elections, party leader Morgan Tsvangirai said in Johannesburg on Tuesday. ”We are damned if we do, and damned if we don’t,” he told participants in a seminar on opposition parties and democracy in Africa.
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/ 25 January 2005
Roger Federer sent out a chilling warning to his title rivals with a straight-sets demolition of Andre Agassi to charge into the semifinals of the Australian Open on Tuesday. The world number one stretched his unbeaten match streak to 26 as he put the four-times winner and eighth seed to the sword, 6-3, 6-4, 6-4 in one hour and 39 minutes.
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/ 25 January 2005
The Treatment Action Campaign has criticised the Catholic Bishops’ Conference in Southern Africa for saying the government should promote abstinence and not condoms in the fight against Aids because condoms are ”clearly not working”. ”It’s a sorry situation to find a person of such influence preaching such a message,” a TAC spokesperson said.
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/ 25 January 2005
The South African Democratic Teachers’ Union accused the Department of Education on Tuesday of taking the credit when pupils from disadvantaged schools do well, while downplaying the bad conditions under which they learn. Tuesday was the last day of the Access to Learning Material Conference in Parktown, Johannesburg.
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/ 25 January 2005
Fans of literary boy wizard Harry Potter have been beating a path to the tomb of a 19-year-old British soldier who is buried in a cemetery close to Tel Aviv, the <i>Maariv</i> daily reported. Corporal Harry Potter, a member of the Royal Worcestershire regiment, was killed 66 years ago during fighting in the West Bank town of Hebron.
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/ 25 January 2005
British police spent £10 000 (R111 000) to catch and prosecute a woman driver for eating an apple while behind the wheel, reports said on Tuesday. Sarah McCaffrey, a 23-year-old nursery nurse, was fined £60 (R660) on Monday and ordered to pay £100 (R1 100) in legal fees.
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/ 25 January 2005
A security guard was too far from where Nelson Chisale was being assaulted to save him, the Phalaborwa Circuit Court — trying three men accused of feeding Chisale to lions — heard on Tuesday. He also had no phone to call for help, Forget Tsaku Ndlovu testified.