News Roundup: April 2005

A HIGH-LEVEL COMMITTEE of representatives from various international bodies, including the UN, OPEC, the Vatican and major aid organisations, is still locked in discussion in Geneva on the question of whether it is too soon for dead pope jokes. A statement is expected soon. The world's media are gathered outside the meeting room in anticipation, except the Daily Telegraph, which took a wrong turn at the top of the stairs and is waiting in anticipation outside the broom cupboard. It is not clear when the broom cupboard's statement is expected. * * * TONY BLAIR HAS called a general election on 5 May, to the surprise of no-one. However, the announcement was closely followed by a press release from Downing Street thanking the British people for their support in Labour's landslide victory. Upon closer examination the election was found to have been called for 5 May 2004, and won by Labour 1-0. The winning vote is believed to have been that of a dock worker in Leicester. Coincidentally, the England football team lost by the same margin today to a European country so small its government does not even formally recognise itself. * * * OH YEAH, AND the Pope died. * * * THE KYRGYZ ELECTION result has been overturned by all eighty-four parties simultaneously, leaving the Presidency in the hands of a small tree on the Chinese border. The tree has so far issued no comment on its surprise victory. It has, however, issued a decree providing diplomatic immunity for three goats and a nearby shrub. * * * PRINCE RAINIER'S DEATH has prompted his three children to open a string of new Monacos (Monaci?) across Europe and the Middle East. Preliminary reports suggest that the Principality has thereby acquired a land area approaching the size of Mexico. Political leaders have so far declined to comment, although the Austrian Minister for Shifty-Looking Foreign Types is said to be "miffed". International initiatives to remove the extra Monaci (Monacoes?) through diplomatic means have been greeted with caution by the Monagasque élite. Prince Albert, who assumed his father's duties some days ago, commented, "It is a question of 'should I stay or should I Mona-go?' Hee, hee, hee." * * * A MAJOR CAMPAIGN co-led by Oxfam and Christian Aid is close to raising its target of £14 million, which will be used to punish Prince Albert of Monaco for abuses of humour. Any extra funds will go towards beer. * * * EDUCATIONAL STANDARDS IN Britain were labelled "severely lacking" by backbench MPs. Recent studies criticised the decision to stop teachers from using words of more than one syllable, and noted that children of 11 years old are now actually 35% less intelligent than at birth. Schools Minister Stephen Twigg defended the education system under New Labour, pointing out that the average foetus performs better now at standardised testing than under the Thatcher government, and also that he, Stephen Twigg, had a watch that cost more than our, the media's, houses, so there. * * * IN OTHER NEWS, the Pope's dead.

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