The trafficking of human beings is a problem in every African country, says the United Nations Children's Fund (Unicef).

Children are the biggest victims in what is a very complex phenomenon. They are forced into slavery, recruited as child soldiers or sold into prostitution.

Children are twice as likely to be trafficked as women.

89% of the countries had trafficking to and from neighbouring countries, but 34% also had a human trade to Europe.

There are no reliable figures for just how many people are trafficked in Africa, but it is likely to run into the millions. 

 

 

Fri Apr 23,11:20 AM ET

LONDON (Reuters) - Vets cut open a German Shepherd dog to find she had scoffed no fewer than 28 golf balls.

Eighteen-month old Libby had been coughing blood after weeks of fetching golf balls at the northern England course where owner Mike Wardrop works as a bar manager.

Wardrop told Reuters on Friday he hadn't realized the dog had a secret appetite for the dimpled balls she found at Didsbury Golf Club in Manchester.

"When I take her for a walk every day she is prone to finding golf balls," Wardrop said. "She can fit five in her mouth."

Libby is now recovering from the operation to remove the balls, with 30 stitches across her belly.

"I've had to buy her two footballs," said Wardrop. "She can't swallow them."

 

 

Florida Pain Patient Sentenced to 25 Years 4/23/04

A wheelchair-bound Richard Paey was sentenced to 25 years in prison by a Florida judge on April 16. Paey, who was convicted of forging prescriptions for pills to ease chronic, severe back pain dating from failed surgeries after an auto accident in 1985, was sentenced under Florida law as a drug dealer -- though even prosecutors conceded there is no evidence he did anything other than consume the medicine himself

Florida police and DEA agents who followed him for months described him wheeling himself into one pharmacy after another and leaving clutching his bags of pain pills. Prosecutors tried him as a drug trafficker three times before they could win a conviction.

"He's got no one to blame but Richard Paey," Assistant State Attorney Mike Halkitis told the St. Petersburg Times after sentencing. "Even if he possessed one pill illegally, it's a crime."

 

 

SARS returns to China

17:49 22 April 04

NewScientist.com news service

 

 

 

Months after it seemed to have died out, SARS has returned to China. Beijing authorities reported on Thursday that a woman who has already been in intensive care for eight days in Beijing has the disease.

And Hong Kong authorities say Chinese health officials have informed them of a second case in the more southerly province of Anhui. Five people who were in close contact with the case in Beijing have developed fevers, and 171 more people who contacted the patient have been isolated.

 

 

76 YEARS AGO TODAY

Apr 24 1928

The Supreme Court of Canada declares that though women are indeed legal "persons," they are nevertheless ineligible to serve in the Canadian Senate.

The Court agreed that the term "person" applies equally to humans of both genders, but the British North America Act referred specifically to "fit and qualified persons" -- necessarily excluding unfit and unqualified people (aka females).

In many matters, women were still considered to be 'persons only in terms of pains and penalties, and not rights and privileges' as defined by British Common Law.

http://www.famous5.org/famous5/history.html  

Teacher accused of ordering student thrown from window

 The students were in class when the teacher took a photograph of some of the students. When the girl asked why the teacher had taken her picture, the teacher allegedly responded with a disparaging remark about the girl's appearance.

The girl became upset and began to use profanity and hit the office assist button on the classroom wall, the incident report said. The teacher then allegedly told two 14-year-old boys to pick up the girl and throw her out the window.

 

 

From sillifish

 

 

                 

Priest allegedly tricked men into sexual ritual

A molestation charge against a Wyoming priest has brought forth allegations of a bizarre bondage ritual performed on men two decades ago in the basement of a small-town church.

Several men have told investigators they allowed themselves to be stripped, blindfolded, suspended upside-down, whipped, and bound about the genitals while praying for penance.

 The priest's attorney, Dallas Laird, said Jablonowski likened the rituals to initiation rites in fraternities or the Marine Corps and suggested the men's memories of the incident may have gotten hazy with time.

 

 

Rhino gets amorous with car

Thursday, April 22, 2004

LONDON, England (Reuters) -- Sharka, a two-ton white rhino, got amorous with Dave Alsop's car when he stopped with three friends to take pictures at the West Midland Safari Park.

The 12-year-old rhino tried to mount the Renault Laguna from the side, denting the doors and ripping off the wing mirrors before Dave drove away with a puffing Sharka in pursuit.

"He was a big boy and obviously aroused," Alsop told the Sun newspaper.

"He sidled up against us. The next thing I know he's banging away at the car and it's rocking like hell."

A spokeswoman for the park said Sharka was a hit with the female rhinos. "He's got a bit of a reputation this lad."

 

 

Edited From ABCNEWS-

Pat Tillman, a 27-year-old former NFL player who swapped a glamorous football career to enlist in the U.S. Army, has been killed in direct action during a firefight in Afghanistan.  

A former member of the Arizona Cardinals, Tillman, along with his brother Kevin, enrolled with the U.S. Army Rangers after the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks. 

Tillman, an unrestricted free agent, spurned a $9 million, five-year offer sheet from the St. Louis Rams in 2001 to join the Army.

The 5-foot-11, 200-pound Tillman was an exceptional student with a 3.84 grade point average through college and graduated summa cum laude with a degree in marketing.

From SororityGirl