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Barca coach Xavi says Real Madrid ‘can beat any team’ ahead of Copa semi-final Clasico


Madrid (AFP) – Speaking ahead of Wednesday’s Copa del Rey semi-final, the managers of Read Madrid and Barcelona predict a closely fought Clasico. “The idea is not to go crazy” says Carlo Ancelotti, manager of a Real Madrid side that “can beat any team” according to Barcelona coach, Xavi. The Catalan side goes into the tie with a 1-0 advantage from the first leg, but Xavi warns that Madrid “are used to mounting comebacks.”

©AFP

Uruguay’s Tannat wine proves an unlikely hit at home and abroad


Montevideo (AFP) – More than 10,000 kilometers from France, its land of origin, a red grape with a reputation for harshness has proved popular in meat-loving Uruguay, putting the tiny South American country on the world’s wine map. Tannat was brought to Uruguay in the 1870s and has found its crowd, as enologist Eduardo Boido explains: “our gastronomy is based on meat…you eat meat and drink Tannat and it cleans the mouth.”

©AFP

Dutch train crash described as ‘really scary’ by residents near the scene


Voorschoten (Netherlands) (AFP) – With a double-decker passenger carriage lying in a meadow, and a second on its side next to the tracks, residents of Voorschoten in the Netherlands recount a train crash that has killed at least one and left dozens more injured, some seriously. “We heard a very loud bang” says Jaron Ooms, “it was really scary”. Rail operators say the high-speed passenger train, which was travelling from Leiden to The Hague, collided with a maintenance crane on the tracks.

©AFP

Credit Suisse chair ‘truly sorry’ for bank’s failure as shareholders left tearful


Zurich (AFP) – Credit Suisse chairman, Axel Lehmann, says he is “truly sorry” that the bank could not be saved. Speaking in front of angry and tearful shareholders, Credit Suisse chiefs fronted up at the bank’s annual general meeting, 16 days after its hastily-arranged takeover by larger Swiss rival UBS — a mega-merger in which the shareholders of both banks had no say at all. “I lost 10,000 Swiss francs” says one of those visibly upset outside the meeting in Zurich, “it’s many money for my family.”

©AFP

Colombian artist recycles tyres to make sculptures and raise pollution awareness


Cundinamarca (Colombia) (AFP) – One man’s trash is another man’s treasure. This is true for Colombian artist Edison Camacho, who recycles tyres and other discarded materials into sculptures which he then displays in The Tyre Museum in San Francisco de Sales, Cundinamarca, Colombia. “People think it’s no longer useful” he says, “but it still works, it’s still useful, it’s still alive.”

©AFP

King Charles III stamps go on sale in the UK


Wolverhampton (United Kingdom) (AFP) – The first new face in 70 years, as postage stamps featuring King Charles III are printed in a factory in Wolverhampton. The stamps go on sale in post offices across the UK today with Charles, who succeeds his mother, the late Queen Elizabeth II, set to be coronated in May.

©AFP

Huge fire engulfs market in Bangladeshi capital


Dhaka (AFP) – Hundreds of firefighters on Tuesday battle an immense blaze at a popular clothing market in the Bangladeshi capital, blanketing the city’s oldest neighbourhoods in black smoke.

©AFP

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