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/ 21 October 2004

Fidel Castro: ‘I remain in one piece’

President Fidel Castro, Cuba’s leader for more than 45 years, broke his left knee and his right arm in a fall, and urged the Caribbean country’s population of 11-million to stay calm, a government statement said on Thursday. TV cameras captured the incident on Wednesday when the leader stumbled as he was descending a flight of stairs.

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/ 6 October 2004

Paedophile teacher feels ‘like a piece of rubbish’

The horror and trauma of being in Pollsmoor Prison, awaiting trial, has left him feeling like a ”piece of human garbage”, convicted paedophile Wiliam John Creasey told the Wynberg Regional Court on Tuesday. After his tearful outbursts on Monday brought his trial to a halt, he assured defence attorney Van Zyl Loots that he was sufficiently recomposed to proceed with his testimony in mitigation of sentence.

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/ 23 September 2004

Liberian village picks up the pieces

With handpumps, latrines and the unimaginable luxury of electricity, the inhabitants of Cestos City in eastern Liberia are slowly rebuilding their ruined town under the shadow of epidemic illness. ”The war has destroyed everything we had,” said Emmet Kay, looking around him at the barren landscape that used to be a large village.

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/ 30 August 2004

Sudan — peace or pieces?

It is crucial to view current peace initiatives in the Sudan through the prism of its post-colonial history, which has been that of multiple and simultaneous political struggles and civil wars. The murder and mayhem in Darfur reveals many of the limitations of the agreement between the Sudanese Peoples Liberation Army and the government of Lieutenant General Umar al-Bashir.

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/ 14 April 2004

Will the IEC’s systems hack it?

<img src="http://www.mg.co.za/ContentImages/41909/10-X-Logo.gif" align=left>Ten years ago, voters and political parties were willing to turn a blind eye on the amateurish shambles the transitional Independent Electoral Commission (IEC) made of the technology it tried to use to gather and tally votes. The permanent IEC administering today’s election won’t enjoy the same forbearance if its systems fail.

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/ 7 April 2004

IEC gets Telkom on the line

The Independent Electoral Commission (IEC) has commissioned telecommunications giant Telkom to provide numerous voice and data services for the general election, Telkom chief sales and marketing officer Nombulelo Moholi, said on Wednesday — just a week before South Africans go to the polls.