Freetown | Tuesday INTERNATIONAL plastic surgeons will from next month start operating on 130 former child combatants who were branded by Sierra Leone’s Revolutionary United Front (RUF) rebel group, an NGO said on Tuesday. Rabih Torbay, director of the US-based International Medical Corps (IMC), said the initiative was aimed at helping the former child fighters […]
Emmanuel Goujon, Bouake | Tuesday A SPECIALLY developed hybrid rice for Africa, the result of 10 years of research and a fusion of a local and an Asian strain, has spawned hopes of improving the continent’s food security. Nerica, an acronym for New Rice for Africa, has been developed by the West Africa Rice Development […]
MALAWI will issue licenses to 20 hunters to kill 200 menacing but endangered Nile crocodiles in the southern African nation’s lakes and rivers, environmental authorities said on Monday. Each license will cost 1.50 US dollars, and will allow an individual hunter to kill 10 of the endangered reptiles in specially selected hunting grounds, said Roy […]
THE editor-in-chief of the pro-government Avenir newspaper in Kinshasa was arrested last week by security services and has been held in a dark cell for five days, the daily said on Monday. The Avenir said Joachim Diana Gikupa has been held by the National Intelligence Agency (ANR) for articles he has written. The newspaper, which […]
It’s a typical starlet’s career. She starts out in video, one cult success leading to a number of sequels. Then the media get hold of her – Time magazine, Newsweek. Pretty soon there’s a string of lookalikes, websites with supposed ‘nudie pictures’, soft drink commercials, and now the biopic. Only this starlet doesn’t really exist.
Johannesburg | Monday SA President Thabo Mbeki is under pressure to resolve a public spat between two senior members of his ruling African National Congress (ANC) over a multi-million dollar pay package awarded to former airline boss Coleman Andrews. Mbeki’s intervention is expected in the week-old dispute over the $28-million paid to Andrews, credited with […]
FOREIGN oil firms working in southern Sudan are “legitimate targets” for attack, John Garang, the leader of the rebel Sudan People’s Liberation Army (SPLA), said in an interview published on Sunday. “We hold the (Sudanese) government responsible for losses that could be suffered by workers and companies operating in the oil fields,” Garang told Al-Hayat […]
Evelyn Leopold, United Nations | Monday A WEEK before a major U.N. Aids conference, delegates are still embroiled on what to say about sex — among prostitutes, homosexuals and outside of marriage in general, according to a frank document on combating the killer disease. The negotiations, says Iranian Ambassador Bagher Asadi, should not turn into […]
“MISS Nigeria” has been stripped of her crown for lying about her age and academic qualifications, the newspaper group that sponsored this year’s pageant announced on Saturday. The Daily Times of Nigeria said that Valerie Ama Peterside was dethroned “over irregularities discovered with regard to her age and academic qualifications.” She was not born in […]
MALAWI President Bakili Muluzi said on Saturday his government would spend 40-million kwacha ($533,000) to build a high-tech tomb for the late dictator Kamuzu Banda. “I don’t want a cheap tomb. I will fire the committee looking into this construction if it does shoddy work,” Muluzi said as he laid a wreath at Banda’s grave […]
TWO university professors have written an open letter to new Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi to demand the long-delayed return of the Axum Obelisk, which was looted by the army of Italian dictator Benito Mussolini in 1937. “We feel the time has come, under your Excellency’s leadership, to redeem Italy’s reputation by honouring treaty obligations […]
CALM was restored to Cairo’s streets on Monday after six policemen were hurt in clashes with thousands of Christians protesting against a graphic news story of a monk’s alleged sexual relations with a married woman. Between 3,000 and 4,000 Coptic Christians had gathered at the main cathedral in Cairo late on Sunday, with many clashing […]
United Nations | Saturday THE World Food Programme (WFP) has again suspended cargo flights to Angola after a missile exploded near two of its planes on Friday, the United Nations said. The incident occurred at noon local time near Kuito, in the highlands of central Angola, 570 kilometres southeast of the capital, Luanda, representative Manoel […]
A Ghanaian ship has been prevented from docking in Benin’s main port Cotonou since June 7, stranding 170 passengers on the vessel in Benin’s territorial waters, the harbour master’s office said on Friday. “The ship, called Alnar, is currently in Benin’s territorial waters with 170 passengers on board,” adding that “for the moment, this ship […]
MATTHEW BURBIDGE, Johannesburg | Sunday THE Sunday Times is leading with an analysis on the machinations behind the employment of Coleman Andrews at SAA, that says President Thabo Mbeki backed the huge salary for the former CEO. The paper’s sports section examines how the French rugby team turned the form book upside down and thumped […]
THE United States on Thursday slammed new restrictions on foreign journalists imposed this week by the government of Zimbabwe, saying the rule was “particularly troubling.” State department representative Philip Reeker said it appeared the government of Zimbabwe ?wants very much to limit media reporting on what goes on inside Zimbabwe,” On Wednesday Zimbabwean President Robert […]
Johannesburg | Sunday SOUTH Africa celebrated Youth Day on Saturday with President Thabo Mbeki honouring the memory of an apartheid-era youth hero and urging the country’s youth to face new challenges with the same zeal. Addressing a national Youth Day celebration at the Orlando Stadium in Johannesburg’s Soweto township, Mbeki identified the new challenges as […]
A BRITISH court on Friday jailed two Nigerian nationals convicted of selling banned African delicacies such as monkey and anteater meat from a shop in south London. The judge said the illegal trade was causing the extinction of protected species and that the meat could have been a cause of the foot-and-mouth disease outbreak which […]
Kigali | Saturday CLOSE on 730 members of an extremist Hutu militia have been killed since May 1 after infiltrating Rwanda from the neighbouring Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), an army representative claimed here. Another 250 extremists have been captured, according to representative Colonel Jean-Bosco Kazura. Those captured — members of Rwanda’s disbanded Hutu-dominated army […]
CARS, furniture and garden equipment from the Swiss villa of the late dictator Mobutu Sese Seko of Zaire were auctioned off in Savigny for 58,700 euros, the ATS news agency reported on Wednesday. The item considered the auction’s main prize was Mobutu’s bed, which went for 5,160 euros ($4,460). A small garden tractor went for […]
UNITED Nations troops and military observers will help vaccinate some 12 million children against polio in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) at the beginning of July, the DRC government and the UN announced Wednesday. “Certain children have found themselves in troubled areas,” mostly in the eastern half of the former Zaire which is under […]
POLICE clashed violently with protesters during a massive ethnic Berber-led march in Algiers on Thursday which left two journalists dead and 168 people injured and fuelled anger against the government of President Abdelaziz Bouteflika. Hundreds of thousands of people joined the protest, which some observers said was the biggest in recent history. Some put the […]
SOUTH Africa will ratify the 1997 Kyoto Protocol, aimed at curbing greenhouse gas emissions blamed for global climate change, a government representative said on Wednesday. The government will also ratify the amendments to the Montreal Protocol on ozone depletion, Joel Netshitenze said after a cabinet meeting. Last month, the SA government called President George W. […]
SOUTH African President Thabo Mbeki said on the last full day of his official visit to Britain on Thursday that “a lot of things have gone wrong” in Zimbabwe. He made the comments after meeting British Prime Minister Tony Blair in Downing Street where the two men issued a joint statement saying they wanted to […]
STEFAANS BRUMMER, Cape Town | Friday THE Nelson Mandela Childrens Fund has found itself in bed with a business linked to Mafia don Vito Palazzolo – but the fund protests that it is an unwilling partner and says it has asked for an audit of moneys collected in its name. Sicilian-born Palazzolo was arrested in […]
LESOTHO and South Africa created a joint 8_000-square-kilometre conservation area on Monday over mountains straddling the border. The Maluti-Drakensberg Transfrontier Conservation Area will incorporate Lesotho’s Sehlaba-Thebe (Plateau of the Shield) national park in the southeast of the small kingdom and several South African reserves in KwaZulu-Natal province. The area created will stretch from the Golden […]
Bangui | Saturday SUMMARY executions are being carried out daily in the Central African Republic following a failed coup bid, sowing terror among members of the Yakoma ethnic group who are being targeted, witnesses claimed. The authorities condemn the killings and claim not to have a hand in them. They blame renegade security force members […]
BARRY STREEK, GLENDA DANIELS and DAVID MACFARLANE, Johannesburg | Friday COLEMAN Andrews offered to resign eight months ago as CEO of South African Airways (SAA), because he was frustrated with government and Transnet interference in the running of the airline – but he was persuaded to stay on for longer by former Transnet managing director […]
THIRTEEN members of the rebel Forces for the Defence of Democracy (FDD) were killed after infiltrating Burundi from neighbouring Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), an army source said on Friday. The Hutu rebels had crossed the border and were on the outskirts of the town of Kabezi, just south of the capital Bujumbura, when they […]
Ufrieda Ho The Nan Hua Temple in Bronkhorstspruit rises like a displaced pagoda in the middle of fields of sun-bleached highveld grass. For the new abbess of the Buddhist temple, these contrasts and contradictions are opportunities to fire up the great melting pot of modern culture. Venerable Man Ya (47), who joined the temple at […]
Belinda Anderson Mediswitch began in the Usko stable, now Bytes Technology, and although its founders were excited about the prospects of the business, it never broke even under the old management. But having moved aggressively, it now more than dominates its space, and recently teamed up with one of its big competitors PQ Africa’s QEDI. […]
Ntuthuko Maphumulo soccer The type of South African soccer that has entertained township fans for many years has been called diski. It’s based on short-passing, flair, passion and a love of the game and it’s known as samba football in Brazil. MTN last year launched a six-a-side version of the people’s game and named it […]