Malawi, Mozambique, Zambia sign pact on waterway project

A hostage crisis lasting nearly four hours in South Africa's capital city of Pretoria on Wednesday afternoon was solved after a gunman was arrested by police.

All eight hostages escaped unharmed, but a police officer was wounded as the hostage-taker opened fire inside the building of Pretoria News in central Pretoria, the South African Press Association (SAPA) reported.

Police brought the unidentified man, described as "very aggressive" and "suicidal," out of the building just after 7 p.m. (1700 GMT) and put him into a police van.

National police spokesman Dennis Adriao said neither the man, believed to be in his 30s, nor the eight hostages were injured.

The stand-off started at about 3:30 p.m. (1330 GMT) and ended with his arrest at about 7 p.m.. The hostages, all advertising staff of the newspaper, were released unharmed by 5 p.m. (1500 GMT).

Another woman, previously believed as the ninth hostage, hid by locking herself away in the building and later escaped unharmed.

The gun-waving man claimed he was an ex-policeman and had lost his job, Estie Dwyers, a hostage, told SAPA.

"We were sitting in out office when this man walked in. He pulled a gun and told us to lie down. He was very aggressive," she was quoted as saying.

"Waving a gun, he ordered us to lie down on the floor. 'Shut the f*** up,' he shouted all the time," she said.

Dwyers said she and a colleague started crying and held each other.

"He told us not to cry. Minutes later, he put the gun to his head, saying he was going to kill himself. He told us to get out and we just ran for our lives," she said.

Gomo Phiri, another hostage, said the man had complained about being sick and tired of crime. He entered the first floor of the newspaper's office around 3 p.m. and herded staff into a corner.

After releasing the hostages, the man moved from the first floor to the ground floor, where a police task force negotiated with him until they could get him out of the building. Recast: Malawi, Mozambique, Zambia sign pact on waterway project

LILONGWE, April 25 (Xinhua) -- Malawi, Mozambique and Zambia signed an agreement on Wednesday committing the three governments to jointly work towards development of the 6 billion U.S. dollars Shire-Zambezi waterway, which landlocked Malawi is championing as a viable transportation route to the Indian Ocean.

Malawi's Transport Minister Henry Mussa, his Mozambican counterpart Antonio Munguambe and the Zambian envoy to Malawi Joshua Mweemba signed the memorandum on behalf of the three governments at a ceremony held in the Malawian capital Lilongwe.

Signing of the memorandum commits the three governments to pool resources towards implementation of the waterway project whose execution would start soon with a comprehensive feasibility study that would look into the navigability of the waterway.

Malawi has come up with an ambitious initiative to transport its goods from the Indian Ocean through the Mozambican port of Chinde, located about 238 km from Malawi's inland port of Nsanje in the southern part of the country.

Malawi has already started construction work of the waterway canal in Nsanje.

The Malawian minister Mussa described the initiative as of immense economic importance to the three countries and others in southern Africa and the Great Lakes Region.

He said the Shire-Zambezi Waterway, once completed, would enable medium sea-going vessels to ply along the waterway and therefore drastically reduce transportation costs of imports and exports as it would provide direct and short waterway access to the Indian Ocean.

Malawi's current traditional ports are Beira and Nacala in Mozambique located about 800 km and 900 km away respectively, and the Tanzanian port of Dar es Salaam which is about 1,200 km away.

The Common Market of Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA) estimates that Malawi's transportation costs alone eat up about 60 percent of the value of the country's exports.

COMESA further states that Malawi spends a total of 250 million dollars annually on transport costs for imports and exports as indicated in the 2005 Malawi Transport Costs Study.

The economic bloc has already allocated 500,000 dollars towards the project's hydrographic study

On their part, the Mozambican minister and the Zambian envoy to Malawi both pledged their respective governments' support of the waterway project as the project was part of the two countries' efforts to find alternative routes for transportation of goods.

Source: Xinhua