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THURSDAY, 19 FEBRUARY 2026, 23:16

World

Veteran dissident who refused exile released

Today at 22:15 PM, via BBC News

Mikola Statkevich, who spent more than five years in prison in his native Belarus, is now recovering from a stroke at home, his wife says.

Business

Not enough to save 134-year-old company in South Africa

Today at 17:00 PM, via BusinessTech

Despite the gazetted reforms aimed at strengthening the industry, they do not address the imports that contributed to the liquidation of a 134-year-old South African company.

Politics

Sona debate: Ramaphosa defends task teams and slow recovery

Today at 17:01 PM, via Mail & Guardian

MPs had criticised the president for establishing another task team to tackle the country’s water crisis after he set up a police special investigations task team to probe those implicated in corruption at the Madlanga commission

Sport

GB’s Atkin qualifies top for halfpipe final

Today at 22:47 PM, via BBC News

British freestyle skier Zoe Atkin qualifies top for Saturday’s halfpipe final as she looks to add the Winter Olympic title to her World Championship crown.

Education

Schools in England to get budget for children with special needs as part of Send overhaul

Today at 20:50 PM, via The Guardian

Children to get individual support directly from school instead of via council in attempt to curb spiralling costs

Children in England with special needs will receive individual support and therapy directly from their schools as part of the government’s overhaul of England’s special education provision.

Under the plans, mainstream schools will be given commissioning budgets to spend on...

Education

Nigeria: Khairun VC Receives Sarkin Sumaila On Courtesy Visit

Today at 20:14 PM, via AllAfrica

[Daily Trust] The Vice-Chancellor of Khalifa Isyaku Rabiu University, Kano (KHAIRUN), Prof. Abdulrashid Garba, on Monday received the Emir of Sumaila, Alhaji Bello Muhammad Dan Sumaila, on a courtesy visit to his office.

Entertainment

24 hours in pictures, 19 February 2026

Today at 18:30 PM, via The Citizen

Through the lens: The Citizen’s Picture Editors select the best news photographs from South Africa and around the world.

Science/Tech

Microsoft’s New 10,000-Year Data Storage Medium: Glass

Today at 22:45 PM, via Slashdot

Microsoft Research has published a paper in Nature detailing Project Silica, a working demonstration that uses femtosecond lasers to etch data into small slabs of glass at a density of over a Gigabit per cubic millimeter and a maximum capacity of 4.84 terabytes per slab. The slabs themselves are 12 cm by 12 cm and just 2 mm thick, and Microsoft’s accelerated aging experiments suggest the data...

Science/Tech

Europe’s Labor Laws Are Strangling Its Ability To Innovate, New Analysis Argues

Today at 22:05 PM, via Slashdot

A new essay in Works in Progress Magazine argues that Europe’s failure to produce a Tesla or a Waymo stems not from insufficient research spending or high taxes — problems California shares in abundance — but from labor laws that make it devastatingly expensive for companies to unwind failed bets. According to estimates, corporate restructuring costs the equivalent of 31 months of salary per...

Health

How Microbes Got Their Crawl

Yesterday at 18:00 PM, via New York Times

In the oceans and on land, scientists are discovering rare, transitional organisms that bridge the gap between Earth’s simplest cells and today’s complex ones.