OWN CORRESPONDENT, Johannesburg | Monday 12.30pm. AFRICAN runners swept the board at the Chicago Marathon on Sunday, taking the top three palces in both the men’s and women’s races. Kenyan Ondoro Osoro, running in his first marathon ever, blitzed through the field to finish in two hours, six minutes and 54 seconds, the third-fastest marathon […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Arusha | Monday 8.30pm. THE subject of economic sanctions against Burundi will not be discussed at talks aimed at ending the civil war in the country, organisers said on Monday. The talks, due to start on Monday, have been postponed to Tuesday. “Sanctions are not on the agenda,” General Hashim Mbita of the […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Freetown | Monday 11.30pm. A MILITARY court in Sierra leone has condemned 34 officers to death by firing squad for crimes linked to the coup that toppled the elected government last year. The 34 were found guilty of treason, murder and other crimes committed by the junta, which held power for 10 months […]

FRANCIS XOAGUB, Namibia | Monday 9.30pm. THE Namibian Defence Force on Monday dismissed weekend reports that a consignment of artillery from South Africa destined for its Grootfontein army base is actually in transit to the Democratic Republic of Congo. A Namibian weekly newspaper reported on Saturday that TransNamib trucks hauling lowbeds with G-2 artillery pieces […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Johannesburg | Monday 4.30pm. WHETHER South African Davis Cup captain Danie Visser will continue to head the team remains undecided after Sunday’s crisis meeting between senior SA tennis officials. Two weeks ago, South Africa suffered a major loss in Prague, threatening Visser’s contract. Sources, however, believe that SA tennis leadership is as much […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Johannesburg | Monday 9.30pm. THE Cape Town businessman Vito Palazzolo has been named by the United States Federal Bureau of Investigation as being a senior member of the Sicilian mafia group Cosa Nostra. Palazzolo entered South Africa illegally in the 1980s and was given South African citizenship in 1995 in spite of appearing […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Johannesburg | Monday 8.45pm. A CAR-HIJACKER, convicted of shooting a man dead and seriously injured his female companion in a hijacking in 1983, applied for amnesty on Monday on the grounds that he had been acting with political motive. Saint Mkhululi Manyamalala, 30, told the Truth and Reconciliation Commission that he had needed […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Lagos | Monday 9.30pm. THE Anglo-Dutch oil group Shell has evacuated staff from the most volatile parts of the Niger Delta after a previously unknown group threatened the safety of foreign oil workers, Shell officials said on Monday. Armed youths last week seized 15 flow-stations belonging to the oil giant, which is the […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, N’djamena | Sunday 9.00pm. The Sudanese government has meanwhile announced that it wants a ceasefire with southern rebels. However it stopped short of agreeing to a truce declared by the rebels a few days ago. The SPLA said on Thursday that it will extend by another three months a cease-fire set to end […]

OWN CORRESPONDENT, Maseru | Sunday 9.00pm. A MAN was beaten to death and four more seriously injured by an enraged crowd at a Lesotho Congress for Democracy rally on Sunday. The rally in Maseru, attended by around 5000 people, had already been scattered by an earlier shooting in which one person was injured. Several people […]