In Brief

PROBLEMS – German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s government came under attack yesterday from leaders in her own party as the conservatives fell to a record low in opinion polls amid public anger over rising taxes and stymied reform efforts.

The head of the leading opposition party, Free Democrat chairman Guido Westerwelle, predicted Merkel’s nine-month old grand coalition would collapse well before the next election set for 2009 because of bad blood between the two ruling parties. * TALKS – Somalia’s top interim leaders have agreed to end a rift threatening the fragile administration and will reshuffle the cabinet after Ethiopian-led crisis talks, an official said yesterday.Politicians had said the government was split between President Abdullahi Yusuf and parliamentary speaker Sharif Hassan Sheikh Adan against Prime Minister Ali Mohamed Gedi.They said the two opposed the prime minister’s move to postpone proposed talks with rival Islamists, who control the capital Mogadishu and a swathe of south Somalia.Forty senior officials have deserted the government, many of them citing Gedi’s reluctance to reach out to the Islamists.* DEATH – Typhoon Prapiroon has so far killed at least 55 people and left 17 others missing in south China’s Guangdong Province and neighboring Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region.The latest increase in the fatalities was from Guangxi, where typhoon Prapiroon has weakened into a tropical storm but kept its influence, with another seven deaths in typhoon-triggered disasters, according to the Guangxi regional department of civil affairs.* RESCUE – A stricken bulk carrier that had been taking on water arrived in Durban harbour yesterday, port control said.Water has been successfully pumped out of the carrier in heavy seas off KwaZulu-Natal and the vessel was no longer listing, officials said.Earlier a spokesman for the Maritime Rescue Coordinating Centre in Cape Town said the Shearwater had been sailing in moderate weather in a wind of 10 to 15 knots with the tug Pentow Service sailing alongside.Nampa-AFP-Reuters-AP-SAPA-wn* TALKS – Somalia’s top interim leaders have agreed to end a rift threatening the fragile administration and will reshuffle the cabinet after Ethiopian-led crisis talks, an official said yesterday.Politicians had said the government was split between President Abdullahi Yusuf and parliamentary speaker Sharif Hassan Sheikh Adan against Prime Minister Ali Mohamed Gedi.They said the two opposed the prime minister’s move to postpone proposed talks with rival Islamists, who control the capital Mogadishu and a swathe of south Somalia.Forty senior officials have deserted the government, many of them citing Gedi’s reluctance to reach out to the Islamists.* DEATH – Typhoon Prapiroon has so far killed at least 55 people and left 17 others missing in south China’s Guangdong Province and neighboring Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region.The latest increase in the fatalities was from Guangxi, where typhoon Prapiroon has weakened into a tropical storm but kept its influence, with another seven deaths in typhoon-triggered disasters, according to the Guangxi regional department of civil affairs.* RESCUE – A stricken bulk carrier that had been taking on water arrived in Durban harbour yesterday, port control said.Water has been successfully pumped out of the carrier in heavy seas off KwaZulu-Natal and the vessel was no longer listing, officials said.Earlier a spokesman for the Maritime Rescue Coordinating Centre in Cape Town said the Shearwater had been sailing in moderate weather in a wind of 10 to 15 knots with the tug Pentow Service sailing alongside.Nampa-AFP-Reuters-AP-SAPA-wn