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/ 29 October 2004
About 100 000 Iraqi civilians — half of them women and children — have died in Iraq since the invasion, mostly as a result of airstrikes by coalition forces, according to the first reliable study of the death toll from Iraqi and United States public health experts.
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/ 29 October 2004
Yasser Arafat flew to Paris on Friday morning for emergency medical treatment, leaving for the first time in more than two years the battered Ramallah compound in which Israel has confined him. Doctors from four Arab countries were on Thursday unable to pinpoint what had caused the serious deterioration in the health of the 75-year-old Palestinian leader, amid growing speculation he is suffering from leukaemia.
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/ 29 October 2004
The dam in question is brown and long, squeezed in as an affront by water nymphs between desiccated farmlands and the ruddy oven walls of the Cedarberg mountains to the east. Last weekend it was three-quarters full, but the sun-crushed bluegums on the waterline haven’t been dampened in years, and the grass, optimistically spreading across the mud flats, is already yellowing. But at least for now the dam has a domesticated air about it.
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/ 29 October 2004
<img src="http://www.mg.co.za/ContentImages/140506/shaik_icon_new.gif" align=left>Secret documents seized by the Scorpions during their investigation of the arms deal — revealed for the first time at the Schabir Shaik trial — give a remarkable insight into the intense lobbying that went on to secure contracts. Newly evident is the role played by President Thabo Mbeki — then deputy president and chair of the Cabinet committee that oversaw the arms acquisition process.
<li><a class=’standardtextsmall’ href="http://www.mg.co.za/Content/l3.asp?cg=BreakingNews-National&ao=124569">How Zuma ran up massive debts</a>
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/ 29 October 2004
The most alarming thing about the Schabir Shaik trial in Durban is that the revelations being made by various witnesses seem unsurprising. As each new narration unfolds we learn of chicanery, double-dealing, hustles, swindles, lies. And we do little more than shrug. If these things were even 10% true, we should be outraged.
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/ 29 October 2004
"The kidnapping of Margaret Hassan, the British-Iraqi aid worker, is shocking but not surprising. We have come to accept that the same thing might happen to any of our family or friends. In fact, it already has happened to my dearest friend Nada." Kidnapping and killing is a daily reality in Iraq, but the atrocities go unrecorded and the dead are unnamed in the West, argues Haifa Zangana.
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/ 29 October 2004
<img src="http://www.mg.co.za/ContentImages/140248/USA2.GIF" align=left>The United States presidential election is often described as 50 state elections. The right of states to make their own rules for the way they want to run elections — from ballot design to the requirements for registering as a voter — are honoured in this federal system. But more than half of Americans want to abandon the country’s outdated electoral college system.
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/ 29 October 2004
It’s supposed to be a period of serene, prayerful contemplation, a time to explore the depths of faith and to think of the poor. But for many of Kenya’s 10-million Muslims, the month of Ramadan this year has become a reflection on crime, HIV/Aids and the effects of the United States-sponsored war on terror on the followers of Islam around the globe.
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/ 29 October 2004
With the winner of Saturday’s election in Botswana a racing certainty, interest has focused on exactly how many of the 552 890 registered voters will turn out and who will be the strongest opposition. The battle in this landlocked, diamond-rich state will be the first test of the electoral code adopted by the Southern African Development Community nations at their summit in Mauritius in August this year.
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/ 29 October 2004
Springbok coach Jake White has kept faith with most of his winning Tri-nations team when he named the side for the first Grand Slam Test against Wales next Saturday. On Friday, White announced just three changes — two enforced due to injury — to the run-on side that did duty in the last Tri-Nations Test against Australia.
Markgraaff is Sarfu deputy president