West African officials called on Tuesday for a convention to elect a leader for Liberia’s main rebel group, aiming to quell rising dissent within their ranks that could destabilise the nascent peace in the war-torn state. A leadership crisis within the rebel group has hamstrung efforts to extend the Liberian central government into its territory.
Two South Africans in Pakistani custody have told interrogators they had planned to attack tourist sites in Johannesburg, a security official alleged on Tuesday. ”They had hatched a plot to carry out terrorist attacks on Johannesburg’s main tourist sites,” said the official, who is familiar with the interrogation.
The man who pleaded guilty to murdering a Tshwane Technical University professor was on Tuesday sentenced to 55 years’ imprisonment by the Pretoria High Court. Professor William Papo and two other people were found dead in Papo’s house in Doornpoort, Pretoria, in January last year.
Public Protector Lawrence Mushwana has tabled a report in Parliament blaming the PetroSA refinery for a R473-million loss during a shutdown in July 2003. Mushwana’s report clears Minerals and Energy Affairs Minister Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka of any misconduct over a controversial labour and maintenance contract that was awarded by the PetroSA refinery last year.
Neither a 200 basis-point hike in interest rates nor the rand weakening to R8 per dollar will affect South African clothing retailer Edgars Consolidated Stores Limited’s (Edcon) growth, Tessa Christelis, executive manager of investor relations at Edcon, told reporters on Tuesday.
An estimated 400 000 foetuses have been legally aborted between 1997 and 2004, a Christian advocacy group told Parliament’s health portfolio committee on Tuesday. Representatives of the groups were speaking during public hearings on the Choice of Termination of Pregnancy Amendment Bill.
Much of the intelligence that prompted United States authorities to raise alerts around major financial institutions indicated that al-Qaeda studied the sites as potential targets before the September 11, 2001 attacks, The Washington Post said on Tuesday.
We are a nation in danger
South Africa will host a new round of talks on Burundi to finalise a agreement on power-sharing and on holding elections, South African Deputy President Jacob Zuma said on Tuesday. The two days of talks beginning on Wednesday will be attended by all the parties in Burundi except for the Forces for the Defence of Democracy group.
A 34-year-old man appeared in the Johannesburg Magistrate’s Court on Tuesday in connection with the killing of three people during a road-rage incident at the weekend, Johannesburg police said. Three people were killed and another one wounded in the incident at Unigray on Saturday night.
The queen likes simple unspiced food and abhors waste to the extent of warming up leftovers, according to a BBC documentary to be broadcast next week. Celebrity chef Gary Rhodes spills the beans on life backstairs at Buckingham Palace, revealing details such as the ”traffic lights” on the corridors that turn to red when a royal approaches so that junior footmen can disappear into a handy closet.