South Africa

HIV prevention is based on getting people to change their sexual habits - but this is a very difficult process as President Zuma has shown.

Although South Africa has almost a million HIV positive people on treatment, actuaries tell us that over 300,000 citizens are still being infected with the virus every year.

Two million 2010 FIFA World Cup tickets were sold in the first three sales phases, according to FIFA.

"We are content with the ticket sales results so far. We still have two more ticketing phases to sell out the event," said Horst Schmidt, Chairman of the FIFA World Cup Ticketing Sub-Committee.

AFTER a week of censure over his sexual indiscretions, President Jacob Zuma yesterday got the first public show of support from political ally the Congress of South African Trade Unions (Cosatu).

THE murky details of SA's multibillion-rand arms deal are unlikely ever to come to light after weapons maker BAE Systems last week cut a deal with UK and US officials to plead guilty and pay fines on some charges in exchange for the dropping of probes on others.

Southern African leaders have dismissed plans by Malagasy leader Andry Rajoelina to hold unilaterally-organized elections in March.

A summit of heads of state and government attending the inauguration of President Armando Guebuza of Mozambique, who was re-elected in October, called on Rajoelina to return to internationally-supervised talks aimed at restoring constitutional rule in Madagascar.

The rise to power of South Africa's first polygamous head of state in the modern era* is causing confusion in the media, and the office of President Jacob Zuma is now trying to set them straight.

President Jacob Zuma has used South Africa's Day of Reconciliation to denounce attacks on migrants from elsewhere in Africa who are living in the country.

"We are outraged by the reports of ill-treatment of foreign nationals in some parts of the country," Zuma told a celebration in Tshwane, the capital.

In what appears to be a repeat of the 1994 and 2002 editions of the FIFA World Cup, Nigeria last night was drawn alongside Argentina, South Korea and Greece in Group B for the global football fiesta to be hosted by South Africa next year.

The grouping means the Super Eagles will once again battle the Argentines following the 1994 and 2002 group stage fixtures.

President Jacob Zuma on Friday reiterated that no police officer has permission to shoot suspects in circumstances other than those provided for by law.

"The law does not give the police a licence to kill," the President said in a statement.