Tuesday June 14, 2011

From Creamer Media in Johannesburg, I’m Jessica Hannah

Making headlines:

Southern African leaders urged Zimbabwe's political rivals to move faster on settling their differences to enable elections to be held. The SADC said President Robert Mugabe's Zanu-PF party and the rival MDC should work harder to create an environment for free and fair elections, as provided for under a Global Political Agreement (GPA) they signed in 2008. The SADC called on the troika working towards fuller implementation of the GPA in Zimbabwe – South Africa, Zambia and Mozambique – to appoint a team to enforce the power-sharing agreement in the-lead up to the elections.

The world is off course in fighting climate change and governments need to boost green energies to build new momentum, the head of the UN panel of climate scientists said. Rajendra Pachauri said governments would face ever higher costs to slow global warming after new data showed greenhouse-gas emissions rose to new highs in 2010. Pachauri, an Indian citizen, said the outlook was not all gloom if governments designed policies to promote cleaner energies such as wind, solar, geothermal and hydropower.

South Korea aims to increase bilateral trade flows with South Africa from about $4-billion a year at present, to $10-billion a year within five years, said Korea Trade-Investment Promotion Agency regional director-general for Africa Byung-Sam Kim. According to 2010 South African Revenue Service trade data, South Korea was South Africa’s fourteenth largest trading partner, with imports increasing by 32% on the prior year, and totalling some R12.7-billion.  These imports consisted largely of vehicles, electrical machinery, plastic, iron and steel products and chemical products.

Also making headlines:
The Libyan government has promised to implement proposals laid out by African countries to end the stalemate in the North African country, as well as draft a constitution and press law.
Madagascar will reject a call from Southern African leaders to allow all political exiles, including former President Marc Ravalomanana, to return home to end a crisis, a government source said.
And, consolidating Africa into larger markets would help the continent take full advantage of trade opportunities between emerging economies, said the World Bank VP for Africa Obiageli Ezekwesili.

That’s a roundup of news making headlines today.