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/ 27 January 2005
A Florida man paid $17Â 000 (R100Â 000) for a full-page newspaper ad imploring his wife to return, two weeks after she had left him. "Life without you is empty and meaningless. Please, please call me," Larry urged Marianne in the <i>Florida Times-Union</i> ad, which uses only the couple’s first names.
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/ 27 January 2005
A Florida judge issued his own version of a gag order when he had officers duct-tape the mouth of an angry murderer who had been hurling abuse at him, the <i>Saint Petersburg Times</i> reported on Wednesday. It took six prison officers clad in body armour and helmets to place the duct tape on the mouth of the defendant.
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/ 27 January 2005
Portugal’s national election commission on Wednesday called for a probe into the appearance of round red stickers on the noses of party leaders on election billboards. The large stickers, which resemble the bright noses worn by clowns, first appeared in Lisbon last week but became especially prominent over the weekend.
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/ 27 January 2005
South African producer prices for all commodities rose by 1,9% in the 12 months to the end of December, from a 2,5% increase for the 12 months to the end of November, Statistics South Africa said on Thursday. On the month, the producer price index (PPI) was down by 0,5% compared with November’s 0,2% monthly rise.
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/ 27 January 2005
"Some amongst us" (a presidential signature-phrase) who, with Archbishop Desmond Tutu, dashed for cover when police fired purple rain at protesters, and rubber bullets and tear gas at funerals and marches in the 1980s, will vouch that he was not a media creation. Some amongst us will know that his history cannot be rewritten to suit a party agenda.
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/ 26 January 2005
Just more than a month after an epic tsunami ravaged southern Asia, children and teachers in Indonesia’s worst-hit Aceh province on Wednesday made an emotional return to school, where thousands of desks of classmates and colleagues sat empty. "I don’t think he’s coming," whispered one boy when his best friend did not show up.
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/ 26 January 2005
China has ordered education authorities and schools across the country to ban beauty contests in schools, state media reported on Tuesday. "The ministry of education explicitly opposes holding beauty contests in primary and high schools," a ministry spokesperson was quoted as saying by Xinhua news agency.
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/ 26 January 2005
A Swedish man suffering from claustrophobia has been allowed to avoid jail time for perjury, prompting media speculation that his illness convinced the government to give him a pardon. The government refused to give a reason for pardoning Thomas Lundberg, who had been sentenced last year to four months behind bars for perjury.
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/ 26 January 2005
Japanese people who are too shy to work up the courage to say "I love you", or at least want a little surprise, have a new option: a bean plant that sprouts to read a special message. Japan’s second-largest toymaker will soon start marketing of the gift cans, which hold soil and the small plant bearing a message that sprouts up in about five days.
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/ 26 January 2005
A former Jewish grand rabbi, Mordechai Eliahu, has laid down the law on amateur operatics under the shower: you can hum but you can’t sing. "You will not sing in the shower," the former leader of Israel’s Sephardic Jews instructed a listener inquiring about Talmudic laws on an ultra-Orthodox religious radio programme.
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/ 26 January 2005
Coronation Fund Managers (Coronation) has secured third-party funding for its broad-based black economic empowerment (BEE) staff transaction with the Imvula Trust, the group announced on Wednesday. Arising from the transaction, the company is proposing a distribution of 25 cents per Coronation share to shareholders.
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/ 26 January 2005
South Africa’s CPIX inflation (headline inflation excluding mortgage costs) was up 4,3% year-on-year (y/y) for metro and other areas in December, compared with 4,6% y/y in November, Statistics South Africa said on Wednesday. CPIX was down 0,2% month-on-month (m/m) in December compared with a 0,6% m/m rise in November.
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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
The share price of Mutual & Federal, South Africa’s second-biggest short-term insurer, has climbed 10,4% or R2,35 in the first hour of trading on Tuesday after the company indicated late on Monday that its earnings for the six months ended December are likely to be much higher than those forecast in its last trading update in November.
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/ 25 January 2005
Minister of Finance Trevor Manuel is pushing to ensure that a sound plan to fund growth-creating investments in infrastructure and to open Western markets to African products doesn’t get lost in the bargaining process. But a crowded World Trade Organisation agenda, and a lack of effective enforcement, make the job even harder.
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/ 25 January 2005
This week’s column is mostly in a "back to work and school" random weirdness and fun mode. Well, that is apart from this opening cluster of serious sites. First we freak you out and depress you, then we hit you with the stupid, cool and silly stuff, so that you can relax. It’s a time-honoured media tactic.
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/ 24 January 2005
A British man with a sexual fetish for tie-on surgical masks was jailed on Thursday for telephoning hospitals and dental surgeries around the country to ask for supplies to be sent to him. The judge called Norman Hutchins "manipulative and deceptive" and a "menace to anyone involved in medical or dental institutions".
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/ 24 January 2005
The world’s leaders are breaking their solemn promises to tackle global problems from poverty and peace to environmental protection, a new report issued on Monday by the World Economic Forum indicates. The report by the forum’s Global Governance Initiative assesses the efforts of the world’s governments and corporations over the past year.
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/ 24 January 2005
The murdered German fashion designer Rudolph Moshammer has left his luxurious home to his beloved Yorkshire terrier Daisy, the mass market <i>Bild</i> newspaper reported on Friday. Moshammer’s former chauffeur, identified only as Andreas K (44), will move in with the dog.
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/ 24 January 2005
A mystery bug has paralysed remote-control devices for opening car doors, garages and gates in a district of the town of Aosta in northern Italy, an environmental protection agency said on Friday. The agency, Arpa, admitted it has as yet no idea what the problem is.
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/ 24 January 2005
The Roman Catholic Church in Italy has described as "blasphemy" an advertising campaign in Saturday’s daily newspapers using the image of the Virgin Mary holding the steering wheel of a car. The advertisement shows a minature statue of the Virgin Mary on the dashboard of a car holding a miniature wheel.
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/ 24 January 2005
A 48-year-old Frenchman who went missing last month has been found emaciated but alive in an underground cave system where he spent 35 days in pitch blackness eating nothing but wood and clay, police said on Sunday. "It was truly terrible fumbling around with nothing to eat," Jean-Luc Josuat-Verges said.
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/ 24 January 2005
Retail group Edcon announced on Monday that it is to acquire clothing chain Topic(s) at a discount to net asset value by using cash resources. Pending approval from the Competition Authorities, and a due diligence investigation, the transaction will be effective from May 29 2005.
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/ 23 January 2005
An international team of doctors is set to launch a desperate, last-ditch bid to save Africa from polio, a scourge once believed to have been defeated but which has recently returned to haunt the continent. Scientists say the attempt is a make-or-break effort to eradicate this crippling, sometimes fatal illness.
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/ 23 January 2005
The project of rebuilding District Six floundered as a result of lack of funds, but late last year the clouds parted, when a bank agreed to lend financial muscle to the rebuilding. A scheme to sell bonds secured against the value of the new homes is now expected to resurrect the project.
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/ 22 January 2005
The biggest influx of illegal immigrants to Australia last year came not from Asia or the Middle East but from Britain and the US, according to a government report. More than 10 000 British and American visitors outstayed their welcome by June 30 last year, about a fifth of all foreigners on expired visas.
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/ 21 January 2005
This week, the Police and Prisons Civil Rights Union (Popcru) vowed to intensify its protests with marches in Gauteng and Bloemfontein. The union has threatened a countrywide strike if its demands are not met. The union says the prisons need at least 9 000 more warders to guard the growing prison population.
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/ 21 January 2005
Overseas development assistance or aid flows to Africa are not matching the progress that African countries have made in terms of governance over the past three years, Gobind Nankani, the World Bank’s regional vice-president for Africa, told a media briefing in Johannesburg on Friday.
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/ 21 January 2005
Canadian mining group Anooraq Resources on Friday announced that drilling has recommenced at the Boikgantsho joint venture properties, located on the northern limb of the Bushveld complex. Boikgantsho is a joint venture between Anooraq and Anglo Platinum.
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/ 21 January 2005
A senior Eritrean military official has dismissed guarantees that Ethiopian troop movements near their common border were purely defensive, according to the United Nations. Eritrean Colonel Zecarias Ogbagaber said he believed the troop deployment was "provocative".
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/ 21 January 2005
New hopes for 2005: "freedom of expression will be respected, that representative structures of artists will be viewed as expressions of democracy rather than as threats, and for consultation and transparency to be resurrected", writes Mike van Graan.