Hobson's Choice

Estimated number of Algerians who have died during the seven-year civil war:

70,000

Percentage of Algeria's population under 25:

75

Number of Thais living close to the Cambodian border killed or maimed by landmines in the last four years:

1,000

Amount US owes the United Nations:

$1bn

Combined worth of the 369 corporate mergers Goldman, Sachs & Company investment bank advised on last year:

$960bn

Interest rate in Zimbabwe:

55 per cent

Amount Bill Clinton owes in personal legal fees after Kenneth Starr's

investigation:

$9m

Amount Bill Clinton raised last year by direct mail towards his legal expenses: $4.6m

Amount Mike Tyson owes in tax:

$13m

Percentage of Los Angeles Police officers who live in predominantly white suburbs:

83

Number of guns inhabitants of Los Angeles County are now legally allowed

to buy per month:

1

Number of malfunctions in US government satellites caused, in a good

year, by space weather:

150

Number of pagers which were put out of action when the communications satellite Galaxy IV failed last May:

45 million

Chances that one of the known - and officially classified - forms of life is a species of beetle:

1 in 5

Length, in kilometres, of water-repellent skates humans would have to wear to emulate water striders, a type of insect living on the surface film of ponds: 18

Seconds in which Nyana Spier, a 17-month-old cheetah, ran the 100 metres, knocking over three seconds off the world record:

6.8

Percentage by which the UK population of turtle doves declined between 1971 and '95:

79

Number of people who pick 1,2,3,4,5,6 as their lottery numbers every week:

10,000

SOURCES: TIME(X2), ASIAN TIMES, THE VOICE, NEW YORKER, LONDON REVIEW OF BOOKS, PRECISION MARKETING(X2), THE VOICE, BBC, NEW REPUBLIC, NEW SCIENTIST(X2), NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC(X2), NEW SCIENTIST, FRONTIER.

Compiled by Will Hobson