Tutu pays tribute to Mandela after visit

Nelson Mandela was visited by fellow peace laureate, archbishop Desmond Tutu (pic). Source: AAP

A DAY after turning 95, Nelson Mandela was visited by fellow peace laureate, archbishop Desmond Tutu, who praised him for continuing to inspire the world even from his sickbed.

"We have a special gift in a man who can unite not only South Africa but the world, even from his sickbed," Tutu told journalists on Friday outside a Pretoria hospital where the anti-apartheid icon is critically ill.

Tutu said he found Mandela asleep but managed to hold his hand.

"He inspired us to become a great country and the world to become compassionate," he said.

Tutu also read the messages of support posted by the public on the wall of the MediClinic Hospital.

Mandela celebrated his 95th birthday on Thursday, six weeks after he was admitted in hospital for treatment for a respiratory condition. The much-loved icon spent the day surrounded by his family in hospital and also received a visit from President Jacob Zuma and other prominent politicians.

Mandela's granddaughter Ndileka described him as "steady and improving."

His condition had in the last two weeks said to have been "precarious".

Mandela's birthday, which was in 2010 declared by the United Nations as the International Mandela Day, is dedicated to good causes.

People are urged to spend 67 minutes of their time doing charity work. The number symbolises the years Mandela spent in politics.

Mandela was rushed to hospital on June 8 with a recurring lung infection that had already put him in hospital three times in less than a year.

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Berlusconi allies guilty over prostitutes

A Milan court has found three of Silvio Berlusconi's associates guilty of procuring prostitutes. Source: AAP

A MILAN court has found three of Silvio Berlusconi's associates guilty of procuring prostitutes - including the then underage Ruby - for racy parties held at the former Italian premier's villas.

Failed showbusiness agent Lele Mora and television host Emilio Fede were sentenced on Friday to seven years each in jail, while showgirl-turned-politician Nicole Minetti was given five years behind bars.

Among the girls allegedly recruited by the trio for parties at billionaire Berlusconi's villas was Moroccan-born Karima El-Mahroug, a then 17-year-old exotic dancer nicknamed "Ruby the Heart Stealer".

Berlusconi was sentenced in a separate trial in June to seven years in jail for paying for sex with Ruby and abusing his power to hide the liaison - though the punishment was suspended on appeal.

The Milan court on Friday banned Moro and Fede for life from holding public office and working with minors, while Minetti was given a five-year ban on holding public office.

All three were ordered to pay court costs.

In his summing up speech in May, prosecutor Pietro Forno said the three had arranged "orgies" at Berlusconi's mansion and cited the tycoon's ex-wife Veronica Lario, who accused her then husband of consorting with "young virgins".

His colleague Antonio Sangermano said the three were like "tasters of fine wine" and had obtained financial advantages from Berlusconi because "they know all the secrets" of those nights.

"They carried out a sort of exam of the capacities of the young women and then injected them into the circuit of soirees," Sangermano said. Minetti was also an active participant and "performed sexual acts for money," he said.

All three denied the charges, insisting that while they may have invited girls to the premier's Milan villas, it was to attend nothing more than elegant dinner parties.

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Israel frees Palestinians as talks gesture

US Secretary of State John Kerry says Israeli and Palestinian negotiators will resume peace talks. Source: AAP

ISRAEL says it will release some Palestinian prisoners as a "gesture", as the two sides agreed to meet to pave the way for their first direct talks in three years.

The announcement came hours after US Secretary of State John Kerry told reporters in Amman late on Friday that Israeli and Palestinian negotiators had laid the groundwork to resume the frozen peace talks.

Kerry said that as a first step Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erakat and his Israeli counterpart Tzipi Livni would meet him in Washington "to begin initial talks within the next week or so".

The last round of direct talks broke down in 2010 over the issue of Israeli settlements in the West Bank and east Jerusalem. The issue of continued expansion of Jewish settlements remains one of the biggest stumbling blocks between the two sides.

On Saturday, Israeli Intelligence Minister Yuval Steinitz said his government would engage in the staged release of a "limited number" of prisoners, some of whom have been in Israeli jails for 30 years.

Steinitz provided no other details but said "there will definitely be a certain gesture here".

Kerry's announcement came after he spent four days consulting the Israeli and Palestinian leadership from his base in an Amman hotel and a late Friday helicopter dash to the Palestinian Authority in Ramallah.

Just minutes before boarding a plane to fly home, Kerry told reporters both sides had reached "an agreement that establishes a basis for resuming direct final status negotiations".

"This is a significant and welcome step forward," he added, having doggedly pushed the two sides to agree to resume talks in six intense trips to the region since becoming the top US diplomat in February.

But he warned that the issues separating the sides were "difficult" and "complicated".

A US State Department official said Kerry had wrenched a commitment from both sides "on the core elements that will allow direct talks to begin".

The Israelis and Palestinians remain far apart on final status issues including the borders of a future Palestinian state, the right of return of Palestinian refugees, and the fate of Jerusalem which both want as their capital.

Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas has also repeatedly called for a freeze to Israeli settlement building and a release of prisoners.

Analysts cautioned against reading too much into the latest developments.

Chico Menashe, diplomatic commentator for Israeli public radio, likened the situation to "a half-baked cake Kerry removed from the stove. Kerry convinced the Israelis and Palestinians it was edible, and both sides agreed to eat it."

Gal Berger, Palestinian affairs correspondent for Israel's public radio pointed to the fact that Yitzhak Molcho, the personal envoy of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, has already been holding talks with Erakat, which were still ongoing.

"Now Livni is being added, but it is still not a meeting at the level of the leaders (Netanyahu and Abbas)," he said.

Predictably, the Islamist Hamas movement which runs the Gaza Strip rejected a return to talks, its spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri saying Abbas had no legitimate right to negotiate on behalf of the Palestinian people.

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Sydney man's girlfriend a 'liar': inquest

SARAH Manning could "smell money" and was a "poisonous woman" who asked about her French boyfriend's will days after he died of a drug overdose, a court has heard.

David Monlun's business partner Raymond Harrison also described Ms Manning as a "compulsive liar and an actress" in a police statement he made weeks after the wealthy Frenchman died.

The inquest into Mr Monlun's death has previously heard Ms Manning and friend Jamie Philp were the last people to see Mr Monlun, who was found lying face down in his apartment near Sydney's Darling Harbour on May 30, 2011.

An autopsy listed mixed drug toxicity as the direct cause of death, with a lethal range of the drug GHB detected in his blood.

Speaking at the inquest on Thursday, Mr Harrison said Ms Manning had called him just days after his business associate had died, allegedly asking after the 40-year-old's will.

"She rang and said David had said to her on the event of his death that she should ring me and I would fix everything," he told Glebe Coroner's Court.

Mr Harrison who co-owned Mr Monlun's successful freight sales agency company Repworld said the French businessman "was happy again" when he first started seeing Ms Manning in the decade before his death.

But Mr Harrison said this changed over time.

In 2006 Mr Monlun was bashed and had his "hair cut out", reportedly by a friend of Ms Manning.

About four months later, Ms Manning's former partner Matthew Haar kidnapped Mr Monlun and forced him to take cocaine.

Two weeks later, Mr Haar and Ms Manning detained Mr Monlun and were both convicted over the incident.

In the statement given to police in June 2011 in which Mr Harrison said Ms Manning could "smell money" and was poisonous, he also said that after Mr Monlun's death, Ms Manning had called their business associate Nicholas Papaix.

"It was both the opinion of Nicholas and mine, Sarah was seeking an alibi regarding her involvement or contact with David and his death," Mr Harrison told police.

On the night of Mr Monlun's death, CCTV footage shows Ms Manning leaving the apartment at various times before coming back with Mr Philp - a long-term user of GHB.

After saying goodbye to the pair at around 3.20am, Mr Monlun can be seen to deteriorate, dropping a phone and being unsteady on his feet.

In a victim impact statement read to the court by Mr Monlun's mother Irene, she said much of her son's life had been a mystery to her.

Describing him as a "loveable joker" and a good son, she said, "David, as every human being, had his imperfections".

The inquest will delve into a number of matters, including telephone conversations about the nature of Mr Monlun's death.

It will also look into the circumstances in which an associate of Mr Monlun and Ms Manning - a Dr Christoph Lenzer - attended Mr Monlun's apartment during the evening he died and was later seen by police at Ms Manning's home.

The inquest before Deputy State Coroner Sharon Freund was adjourned to July next year.

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'Improving' Mandela marks 95th birthday

Nelson Mandela's daughter says her father has made a "dramatic" progress on the eve of his birthday. Source: AAP

NELSON Mandela is spending his 95th birthday in hospital but his health is "steadily improving", the South African presidency says, as people around the world honour his legacy with charitable acts.

With a wave of good deeds planned to mark Nelson Mandela Day, South Africans awoke on Thursday to word that their national hero was getting better six fraught weeks after he was admitted to hospital with a recurring lung infection.

"Madiba remains in hospital in Pretoria but his doctors have confirmed that his health is steadily improving," the presidency said in a statement, using Mandela's clan name.

Ndileka Mandela said her grandfather was now more responsive.

"He's using his eyes, nodding," she told AFP.

The news prompted joyful prayers of thanks outside the hospital which, for 41 days, has been the focal point of a national vigil.

"He is here with us today us. We didn't know that he will live to see this day," said Agnes Shilowane, a local university student.

"Tata (father) Mandela has once again proved that he is a fighter."

Nearby, school children read poems and left cards as nurses sang happy birthday to the former political prisoner who went on to become South Africa's first black president.

Birthday greetings and messages of support poured in from around the world - and even from astronauts on the International Space Station - to mark the anniversary, which many had feared Mandela would not live to see.

US President Barack Obama - who was unable to visit Mandela during a trip to South Africa last month - led tributes to the peace icon, calling on people to honour him through volunteer work.

"Our family was deeply moved by our visit to Madiba's former cell on Robben Island during our recent trip," Obama said in a statement.

"We will forever draw strength and inspiration from his extraordinary example of moral courage, kindness, and humility."

Other well-wishers included the Dalai Lama, former US president Bill Clinton and his wife Hillary, US actor Morgan Freeman and Mandela's former jailer FW de Klerk, who went on to share the Nobel Peace Prize with him.

"Mandela's place in South Africa's history is assured," former president De Klerk said in a statement.

"His legacy of courage, perseverance and magnanimity will continue to inspire us - and people throughout the world - for generations to come."

Across the country, biker gangs cleaned streets, volunteers painted schools and politicians spent 67 minutes on worthy projects - all to mark Mandela's 67 years of public service.

"Let us return Madiba's sacrifices and contributions through our own efforts to build a better society," President Jacob Zuma said.

Near Pretoria, Zuma himself will later try to channel Mandela's cross-community appeal by delivering government housing to poor whites.

Born on July 18, 1918, Mandela fought against white rule in South Africa as a young lawyer and was convicted of treason in 1964.

He spent the next 27 years in jail.

It was in part through his willingness to forgive his white jailers that Mandela made his indelible mark on history.

After negotiating an end to apartheid, he became South Africa's first black president, drawing a line under centuries of colonial and racist suppression.

He then led reconciliation in the deeply divided country.

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Qld premier cagey on COS' pay: opposition

Queensland Premier Campbell Newman hid the full pay of his chief of staff, the opposition says. Source: AAP

PREMIER Campbell Newman has tried to hide the full pay and perks of his chief of staff, the opposition says.

Labor Leader Annastacia Palaszczuk asked the premier to detail Ben Myers' salary package at Tuesday's budget estimates hearing.

Mr Newman only tabled a document which says Mr Myers earns the salary of a "chief of executive 5.1", but gave no dollar figure.

The public service commission said on Thursday that Mr Myers earns $264,000 a year.

But Ms Palaszczuk believes Mr Myers could be on a package as high as $400,000 when you add a work car, superannuation and leave allowances.

"I now want the details of what that package is," she said.

"I hope this is not a cover up."

She said she'd write to the Speaker of the House to question if Mr Newman deliberately mislead the budget estimates hearings.

A spokesman for the premier said the opposition leader's claims are nonsense.

"This is just another example of a lazy opposition jumping the gun, making wild claims and not doing any real work," he said.

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Inquest reveals drug scene in NSW prisons

MAKESHIFT syringes made from cotton buds, prisoners "stoned" for days and drugs secreted inside inmates' bodies.

This was the drug scene inside NSW's Junee Correctional Centre when Anthony Van Rysewyk died from a heroin overdose in 2011, an inquest has found.

According to correctional officer Steve McMahon, drugs are a problem facing all prisons across the state.

Van Rysewyk was nearing the end of a minimum six years and three months sentence for robbery when he took two shots of heroin at the privately-run facility near Wagga Wagga on May 7, 2011.

In handing down her findings into the 28-year-old's death on Wednesday, Deputy State Coroner Sharon Freund said when Van Rysewyk was put into his cell that evening other minimum security inmates noticed he was slurring his words, was unsteady on his feet and had "pin eyes" - a clear symptom of heroin intoxication.

Correctional service officers reported noticing nothing.

The next morning he was found dead in his cell.

According to inmates who gave evidence at the inquest, legal and illegal drugs - including heroin, marijuana and speed - regularly flowed into the prison.

Inmates regurgitated prescription medications obtained from the centre's pharmacy, while visitors ferried drugs in.

One inmate told the inquest how he had seen a visitor retrieve a parcel "about the size of a golf ball" from her crotch and pass it to a prisoner.

The prisoner then allegedly tried to put it up his anus.

Syringes were constructed from miscellaneous items, including cotton ear-buds as plungers.

"Inmates would be stoned every weekend, every day or Sunday to Tuesday from drugs that were available weekly," Ms Freund said.

Mr McMahon, also the Public Service Association (PSA) chair of prison officers, said drugs were "certainly a problem" in all NSW correctional centres.

"Some prisoners say that they are as easily available in jail as what they are on the streets," he told AAP.

"I don't personally believe that they are that prevalent. (But) there is certainly still a high incidence of drug use in jail."

Mr McMahon said he has found prisoners dead in their cells a number of times over his 20-year career, and pointed to contact visits as the primary way of drugs coming into the centres, with people secreting items into all bodily crevices, including mouths.

He suggested increasing the use of sniffer dogs and improving officers' training to identify drug intoxication.

These were among two of the recommendations also made by Ms Freund.

At the time of Van Rysewyk's death, she said there were only two officers supervising up to 40 inmates at the visitor centre, meaning prisoners were sometimes left unattended for up to five minutes.

There were no CCTV cameras and the dog squad didn't patrol the centre during or after visits.

Improvements at the centre run by GEO Group Australia had been "nominal" since the 28-year-old's death, the court heard.

GEO Group said in a statement it had "already taken steps to address the areas outlined in the recommendations", including conducting a review of officers' training.

Corrective Services NSW (CSNSW) Commissioner Peter Severin said it took Van Rysewyk's death "very seriously" and would be looking at the coroner's recommendations.

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No manslaughter charges over Pike River

NO criminal charges will be laid by New Zealand police against individuals involved in the Pike River mine disaster, after an investigation concluded there was not enough evidence to prove manslaughter.

The families of the 29 men killed in the explosion at the Pike River mine on November 19, 2010 were informed of the outcome of the two-and-a-half year police investigation at a meeting in Greymouth on the South Island's west coast on Wednesday night.

Police say there is not enough evidence to link any individuals to specific events leading to the explosion and therefore manslaughter charges had to be ruled out.

Detective Superintendent Peter Read said he knew the families of the victims would be disappointed with the outcome.

"This has been a very difficult decision and not one taken lightly," he said.

He said the investigation had been one of the most complex ever undertaken by New Zealand police, involving interviews with 284 people and 34 million pages of documentation.

Police said there was enough evidence to charge individuals with criminal nuisance, but given the ongoing investigations by Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment(MBIE), those charges would raise double jeopardy issues.

Any penalties arising from police charges would be unlikely to supersede those imposed under MBIE prosecutions, police said.

Police are not ruling out reopening the investigation should access to the mine be gained in the future.

Access would allow a scene examination.

"However, I stress there is no certainty that this would produce any new relevant information," Det Sup Read said.

"Even if new information was identified, there is no guarantee that it would lead to a future prosecution."

Earlier in July, Pike River Coal was ordered to pay $NZ110,000 ($A94,840) to each of the families of the 29 victims killed in the explosion.

The company was also fined $NZ760,000 for nine health and safety charges.

Last month, a judge ruled former Pike River Coal boss Peter Whittall could be tried in Wellington, rather than in Greymouth, on 12 health and safety breaches.

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21 Indian children dead from school meal

Eight children died and 80 were hospitalised after eating lunch served at their school in India. Source: AAP

TWENTY-ONE children have died after eating a free lunch feared to contain poisonous chemicals at a school in eastern India, as angry protests erupted over the tragedy.

Thirty more children remain ill in hospital after consuming lunch cooked at a village primary school in the impoverished state of Bihar, state education minister P K Shahi said.

"The death toll has risen to 21," local government official Amarjeet Sinha told reporters, as suspicion focused on the possible presence of insecticide in the food.

There were emotional scenes as children, their limbs dangling and heads lolling to one side, were brought to a hospital in the Bihar city of Chhapra.

Other children, lying listless on stretchers, were placed on intravenous drips amid chaotic scenes at the hospital. Outside, inconsolable relatives wept.

"My children had gone to school to study. They came back home crying, and said it hurts," one distraught father told the NDTV network.

"I took them into my arms, but they kept crying, saying their stomach hurt very badly."

Running to the school to find out what had happened, the father said he saw "many bodies of children lying on the ground".

Bihar education minister P K Shahi said the midday meal "appears to be poisonous".

The children, all aged under 10, were buried near the school in the village of Masrakh on Wednesday morning as angry residents armed with poles and sticks took to the streets of Chhapra.

The mob smashed windows of police buses and other vehicles and turned over a police booth in Chhapra, the main city of Saran district where the school is located.

"Hundreds of angry people staged a protest in Saran since late Tuesday night, demanding stern action against government officials responsible for this shocking incident," said district government official S K Mall.

A preliminary investigation has shown the meal may have contained traces of phosphate from insecticide in the vegetables, Sinha from the local government told AFP.

He said doctors were treating victims with atropine, which is effective against organophosphate poisoning.

Media reports quoted villagers as saying the use of contaminated, foul-smelling mustard oil for cooking at the school could also have caused the deaths.

"Investigators are examining midday meal samples and samples of victims' vomit. Only the final report of inquiry will reveal the real cause," Sinha said.

State chief minister Nitish Kumar has announced compensation of 200,000 rupees ($A3670) for bereaved families.

Free lunches are offered to impoverished students in state-run schools as part of government welfare measures in many of India's 29 states.

Bihar is one of the country's poorest and most densely-populated states.

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Aust woman hurt in Pamplona bull run

A 23-YEAR-OLD Australian woman is among five people injured when they were gored by bulls on the final day of the Pamplona fiesta in Spain.

The festival ran for nine days and landed a total of 50 daredevils in hospital.

Nearly half of those were seriously hurt on Saturday when the run in the northern Spanish town resulted in a bloody human pile-up that got trampled by the half-tonne bulls, sending 23 revellers to hospital.

As on each of the last eight mornings, a firework set off Sunday's mad dash through Pamplona's cobbled streets of six bulls and six steers as well as hundreds of thrill-seekers, many dressed in traditional white with a red neckerchief.

The animals will be killed by matadors in the final bullfight of the nine-day San Fermin festival.

The early morning bull runs are the highlight of the fiesta, which was immortalised in Ernest Hemingway's classic 1926 novel The Sun Also Rises and now draws hundreds of thousands of tourists each year.

The regional government said five runners were hospitalised on Sunday including the young Australian woman with a gore wound.

During Friday's run, bulls gored three men including a 20-year-old American.

Each year, hundreds of people are treated by medics and the Red Cross at the scene for cuts and scrapes without being hospitalised.

Fifteen people have been killed in the bull runs since records began in 1911. The most recent death was four years ago when a bull gored a 27-year-old Spaniard in the neck, heart and lungs.

The Associated Press reports that the Australian woman was struck in the chest by a massive Miura bull as she clung to wooden barriers outside the bull ring entrance. Other runners got tossed by the bulls or fell as they ran.

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Vic can't afford paramedic pay claim: govt

PARAMEDICS' wage claims, totalling $1.3 billion over four years, would have a significant impact on Victoria's budget, Health Minister David Davis says.

But the paramedics' union disputes the $1.3 billion figure quoted by Mr Davis, calling on him to provide the full detail of the costings for scrutiny.

Mr Davis told reporters on Sunday the 30 per cent salary increase sought by paramedics totalled $1.3 billion over four years, and would lead to less money for ambulances and ambulance stations.

He said the wage claim was significant and not well thought out.

"These are tough times. It's not easy for governments to fund significant new expenditures," Mr Davis said.

But Ambulance Association Australia state secretary Steve McGhie said the figures were "highly inflated".

"There figures are nowhere near right and if he thinks they are let him provide the full detail so they can be scrutinised."

Mr Davis said paramedics are well remunerated, with the most common category of paramedic earning an average $93,000 a year, including overtime.

However, Mr McGhie said a six-year paramedic who worked shift penalties - which all were expected to do - would earn $71,000.

"To earn $93,000 means they have to work $22,000 of overtime per year on average.

"If there were paramedics earning that - and if they didn't do it - then the ambulance service couldn't put paramedics on ambulances."

Mr Davis again called on the union to enter voluntary conciliation with Ambulance Victoria through independent umpire Fair Work Australia, saying it would lead to a fair wage deal.

But Mr McGhie said the union would attend conciliation until Ambulance Victoria responds to its paper detailing the productivity paramedics have delivered over the past three years.

The government has offered paramedics a 2.5 per cent annual pay rise, with any further increases offset by productivity gains.

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Egypt prosecutors quiz Morsi

INVESTIGATORS have begun questioning Egypt's ousted president Mohamed Morsi and members of his Muslim Brotherhood over their involvement in a 2011 prison break, judicial sources say.

The inquiry follows allegations that Morsi and senior Brotherhood members escaped from Wadi Natrun prison during the uprising that ended former president Hosni Mubarak's three-decade rule.

Investigators are examining whether foreign groups such as Palestinian Hamas and Lebanese Hezbollah were involved in the jailbreak.

State Security prosecution service investigators interviewed Morsi at an undisclosed location, the judicial sources told AFP.

It came hours after the public prosecutor received complaints against Morsi and other Brotherhood leaders, accusing them of spying, inciting violence and damaging the economy.

Morsi, who was overthrown by Egypt's powerful army on July 3, is being held in a "safe place", interim leaders have said.

His supporters accuse the military of violating democratic principles by removing an elected leader from office, and have vowed to keep fighting for his reinstatement.

The interim authorities are working to an army-drafted roadmap, and Prime Minister Hazem al-Beblawi is closer to forming a cabinet.

Parliamentary and presidential elections are expected next year.

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