The German government has agreed to take a 25-percent share in Commerzbank. The move signals the first time the government has taken a stake in a major private bank and comes as Commerzbank is set to buy Dresdner Bank.

Commerzbank, Germany's second largest bank, is to be recapitalized again as the state takes a 25-percent-plus-one-share stake in return for 10 billion euros ($13.6 billion) in fresh funds. 

 

The capital comes on top of the 8.2 billion euros that SoFFin, the state rescue fund for the banking sector, already granted Commerzbank in November. SoFFin will pay 6.0 euros per share.

 

According to a statement from Commerzbank, the German government "is clarifying all further details with the EU Commission."

 

Analysts say Commerzbank requires the additional cash as it moves to acquire another struggling bank, Dresdner Bank, from insurance giant Allianz at the end of January.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Nicholas Sarkozy have warned the US not to block attempts to build an international financial regulator, calling for a new economic body similar to the UN's Security Council.

"I've always in my political life been a supporter of a close alliance with the United States but let's be clear: in the 21st century, a single nation can no longer say what we must do or what we must think," said Mr Sarkozy at an international symposium in Paris on Thursday (8 January), shortly before US president-elect Barack Obama enters office.

Mr Sarkozy and Ms Merkel say capitalism needs new global oversight

The French leader had originally called the Paris meeting - "New World, New Capitalism" - a global "summit," but limited his ambitions after few international leaders deigned to attend.

"We'll take our decisions on 2 April in London," he went on, referring to an upcoming meeting of the G20. "Perhaps the United States will join us in this change."

EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS - The Czech EU presidency is to begin the complicated task of providing the legal guarantees for the political concessions that Ireland has received on the rejected Lisbon Treaty.

Work will soon begin between Irish lawyers, the legal services of the Council (representing member states) and the European Commission, to firm up EU promises to that the treaty will not affect Irish neutrality, abortion or tax laws.

The Lisbon treaty was signed in 2007, but ratification is proving harder

Europe ministers meeting in Prague on Thursday (8 January) had a brief discussion on how to proceed with the pending EU charter, which Ireland rejected in a referendum last June.

Irish Europe minister Dick Roche used the gathering to stress the importance of putting the concessions in legally watertight language.

He also told counterparts that reflections about when to hold a referendum on the treaty - an issue of burning interest to other member states - were well advanced, an EU diplomat said.

EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS - The area surrounding the Atomium, an atom-shaped structure seen on every Brussels postcard, might become a location for some of the European Commission's buildings, according to a draft project developed by the city of Brussels and seen by EUobserver.

The draft, entitled "Application file for the Heysel plain to host a new European quarter," dates back to 15 September 2008.

The European Commission's next location could have a view of the Atomium.

Placed right next to the Atomium, the Heysel area lies four kilometres north from the centre of the Belgian capital and the European quarter where the commission currently sits.

"By establishing itself in Heysel, the EU would affirm its imprint on the capital city and would extend its zone of influence outside the Leopold quarter," the draft paper argues.

Police in Athens have clashed with protesters in a resumption of the violence that flared after last month's killing of a teenager by police.

Hooded youths broke away from a student march against education reforms and threw stones and flares at riot police, who fired tear gas and flash grenades.

The centre-right Greek government has pledged to crack down on the rioting.

French Justice Minister Rachida Dati has come under fire from women's groups for returning to work just five days after giving birth.

Ms Dati attended a cabinet meeting on Wednesday, hours after leaving a Paris clinic with her new daughter, Zohra.

Activists said the move set a bad example for women, and put pressure on new mothers to return to work quickly.

Ms Dati, who gave birth by Caesarean on 2 January, told reporters she felt fine on her first day back at work.

"This is scandalous," Maya Sturduts from the National Collective for the Rights of Women told AFP news agency.

"Employers can now use this to put pressure on women," she said, especially during the current economic crisis when many companies are looking to reduce the number of staff.

Tony Blair for president of Europe? Interview suggests he wants the job | Politics | guardian.co.uk

Former PM was given four opportunities to dismiss the idea in an FT interview, but did not once do so

As well as giving an interesting speech at the New World, New Capitalism conference in Paris yesterday, a, Tony Blair found time to give a video interview to the editor of the Financial Times, Lionel Barber.

On the advice of Patrick Hennessy at Three Line Whip, I've just been watching it. And my conclusion is that Blair is still very, very interested in becoming president of Europe.

He didn't exactly put it like that, of course. But he was given four opportunities to dismiss the idea of being a candidate, and not once did he try to do so.

I got the impression that he wants the job quite keenly: watch for yourself and make your own mind up. The issue comes up right at the end, after the questions on Gaza. Here is a transcript of the key exchange.

The European Union says gas supplies to Europe could restart soon, even though the deal it has brokered between Moscow and Kyiv has been stalled by complaints from both sides.

The latest row erupted just as the first members of an EU monitoring mission arrived in Kyiv, with more expected within 24 hours. Russia wants the monitors in place to track the flow of gas through Ukrainian pipelines and ensure supplies are not stolen -- a charge Kyiv denies.

Russian and Ukrainian officials on Friday said they supported the EU observer plan, but both noted Kyiv and Moscow still have not agreed on gas pricing and terms between the two countries -- the issue leading to the cut-off.

 

Briefing Russian President Dmitry Medvedev on Friday, Gazprom chief Alexei Miller said there had been "no progress" on the price Kyiv should pay for gas and charge for transit tariffs in 2009.

Hundreds of thousands of people were left without heating in the Balkans and some businesses had to cut production or close on Thursday (8 January), with resumption of gas flows impossible before next week.

In the Balkans - the European region the hardest hit by the gas crisis - many countries rely almost entirely on Russian gas, which stopped flowing completely on Wednesday.

Europe's cold spell continues to claim lives throughout the continent

Many schools have closed as result of the cold and several factories had to stop production, notably in Bulgaria, Macedonia and Bosnia, as temperatures fell well below zero.

In Bosnia, some 100,000 households are without central heating and there is panic buying of electric heaters in the capital Sarajevo. Some travelled to other cities to buy heaters, having exhausted reserves in Sarajevo's shops.

Around 65,000 households were without central heating in Bulgaria as heating plants changed over to crude oil. Public transport in the capital Sofia also switched off heating, while some hospitals delayed operations.

EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS - With EU experts heading to Russia and Ukraine on Friday in a bid to restart gas flows, one EU company has launched the first legal salvo - against Ukraine - to get its money back.

Vienna-based law firm Wolf Theiss on Thursday evening (8 January) filed a complaint at the EU court in Luxembourg on behalf of Hungarian gas provider Emfesz against Ukraine state owned gas transit company Naftogaz.

So far 18 EU states from France to Greece affected by the gas crisis (Photo: Naftogaz of Ukraine)

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The legal complaint is based on a 1994 EU regulation to help European firms enforce rights under international pacts, especially World Trade Organisation (WTO) rules. Ukraine joined the WTO in May last year.

Emfesz also filed a second lawsuit against Naftogaz in a Budapest court, in what could signal the start of a domino effect of legal challenges to recoup lost income by EU companies.

MOSCOW/KIEV (Reuters) - The European Union sought to finalize details on Friday of a gas monitoring deal to allow the resumption of gas supplies to Europe via Ukraine, which have been cut off for days over a pricing row.

But Ukraine made clear the continued political rancor underlying the dispute, which has closed some factories in eastern Europe and raised fears in the EU over future reliance on Russian gas deliveries.

"Those statements that have in recent days been heard from the mouth of the Russian leadership -- they are incorrect, they humiliate Ukraine," President Viktor Yushchenko told a news briefing, apparently referring to accusations by Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin of high-level corruption and disarray in Kiev.

There are hopes that gas flows through Ukraine may soon be restored after the first EU monitors arrived to start checking pipelines from Russia.

Hundreds of thousands of homes in Europe remain without heating amid plunging temperatures, following a row over gas between Russia and Ukraine.

But Russia says shipments will resume when Russian, Ukrainian and EU monitors start work, possibly later in the day.

It may still take several days for gas to reach some areas, however.

The Czech EU presidency urged Israel and Hamas to avoid a further escalation of the violence in the Gaza Strip Friday, saying it was "deeply concerned" at the situation and urged the two sides to embrace a UN truce deal.

"The Presidency is deeply concerned over the continuing Israeli military action in Gaza and the continuation of indiscriminate rocket attacks on Israel," the EU presidency said in a statement.

 

"We call on all parties to restrain from acts that further escalate an already tense situation," it added.

 

The EU presidency called on all parties to fully implement a truce order from the UN Security Council.

 

A defiant Israel pounded Gaza with bombs and shells Friday, vowing to pursue its war on Hamas despite the UN decision, amid warnings the population was running out of food.

 

The European Commission meanwhile condemned "in the strongest terms" the attacks on UN humanitarian convoys and personnel in Gaza.

 

Both Israel and the militant Palestinian group Hamas have dismissed a UN Security Council resolution that calls for an immediate ceasefire in the Gaza Strip. Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said the resolution was unworkable noting that Palestinians had fired more rockets at Israel on Friday. As Israel's security cabinet decided to continue its military campaign, warplanes bombed the outskirts of Gaza City, killing seven Palestinians

The Israeli military may have committed war crimes in Gaza, the UN's most senior human rights official said tonight, as Israeli troops pressed on with their increasingly deadly offensive in defiance of a UN security council resolution demanding a ceasefire.

Navi Pillay, the UN high commissioner for human rights, singled out the killing this week of up to 30 Palestinians in Zeitoun, south-east of Gaza City, when Israel shelled a house where its troops had told about 110 civilians to take shelter.

Pillay, a former international criminal court judge from South Africa, told the BBC the incident "appears to have all the elements of war crimes". She called for "credible, independent and transparent" investigations into possible violations of humanitarian law.

The incoming Obama administration is prepared to abandon George Bush's ­doctrine of isolating Hamas by establishing a channel to the Islamist organisation, sources close to the transition team say.

The move to open contacts with Hamas, which could be initiated through the US intelligence services, would represent a definitive break with the Bush ­presidency's ostracising of the group. The state department has designated Hamas a terrorist organisation, and in 2006 ­Congress passed a law banning US financial aid to the group.

GAZA (Reuters) - Israel rejected a U.N. resolution calling for a ceasefire in the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip on Friday and warplanes and tanks pounded the Palestinian enclave.

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert dismissed Thursday's binding Security Council resolution demanding an "immediate and durable" ceasefire in the two-week-old war as "unworkable."

Israel said Hamas fighters had fired at least 30 rockets into its territory on Friday. No casualties were reported.

Medics in Gaza said the Palestinian death toll had risen to 784. Ten Israeli soldiers have been killed, as well as three civilians hit by Hamas cross-border rocket fire.

Hamas officials in Gaza say they are weighing the U.N. resolution, but have voiced irritation they were not consulted.

ROME, Jan 9 (Reuters) - At least 80 percent of people in Gaza need urgent food assistance and Israel must make access to the area easier for humanitarian aid to be delivered, the head of the United Nations' food relief agency said on Friday.

The World Food Programme (WFP) said it was becoming increasingly difficult to find food in Gaza, with little available in markets, bakeries running out of wheat flour, flour mills running out of grain and many people too frightened to leave their homes.

The removal of Coca-Cola from thousands of restaurants in Malaysia in protest at US support for Israel will hurt the local economy, the company has said.

The drinks company was responding to boycotts of US-made goods called by Muslim groups in Malaysia.

Malaysia has called at the United Nations for action to stop the Israeli offensive in Gaza.

Former leader Mahathir Mohamad has also called for a global boycott of the US dollar and US products.

LONDON (Reuters) - The U.S. is seeking to hire a merchant ship to deliver hundreds of tons of arms to Israel from Greece later this month, tender documents seen by Reuters show.

The U.S. Navy's Military Sealift Command (MSC) said the ship was to carry 325 standard 20-foot containers of what is listed as "ammunition" on two separate journeys from the Greek port of Astakos to the Israeli port of Ashdod in mid-to-late January.

A "hazardous material" designation on the manifest mentions explosive substances and detonators, but no other details were given.

"Shipping 3,000-odd tons of ammunition in one go is a lot," one broker said, on condition of anonymity.

"This (kind of request) is pretty rare and we haven't seen much of it quoted in the market over the years," he added.

The U.S. Defense Department, contacted by Reuters on Friday in Washington, had no immediate comment.

Haaretz:

The United Nations is claiming Israeli military officers have admitted there was no Palestinian gunfire emanating from inside an UNRWA school in Gaza which was shelled by an IDF tank.

They're also doing exactly what they accuse others of doing:

He noted that all the footage released by the IDF of militants firing from inside the school was from 2007 and not from the incident itself.

"There are no up-to-date photos," Gunness said. "In 2007, we abandoned the site and only then did the militants take it over."

There's a big protest demonstration that has just left Place de la République, heading down to Bastille and finishing at Place de la Nation at about 7:00pm.

This morning, police were busy on the Place removing anything that looked like it could be used as a projectile. A friend came back to his bike just in time to avoid them cutting through his chain and taking everything away. A lot of shops near the Place said that they were going to close (despite this being the first weekend of the January sales).

Liberation reports that 3800 police have been deployed to maintain order. About an hour ago I saw my first ever water cannon, driving up my street. Not sure if I want to venture out to find out what's happening.

Recent violence in Mitrovica could spread across the newly independent state of Kosovo, the commander of French peacekeepers in NATO, General Michel Yakovleff, warned on Friday.

For over a week now, the ethnically divided city of Mitrovica has seen violent incidents with people injured and cars and shops set alight. Tensions between Kosovo's ethnic Albanian majority and Serb minority have been running high since the region declared independence from Serbia nearly a year ago.

"This is urban violence," said Yakovleff. "But it has political implications, meaning that it can mobilize people. That can lead to major conflict."

 

Yakovleff said his soldiers are prepared to put down any violence in the northern sector of Kosovo.

 

"Be aware of the strong determination of KFOR to respond, even brutally if necessary, to all forms of violence," he said.

Illinois lawmakers today voted unanimously to impeach the scandal-ridden governor Rod Blagojevich, who is alleged to have tried to sell Barack Obama's vacant Senate seat.

The Illinois House of Representatives voted 114 to one to start the impeachment process next week.

The process involves the state senate basically conducting a trial, which could take about three weeks.

"It's our duty to clean up the mess and stop the freak show that's become Illinois government," said Jack Franks, one of the Democrats who voted for impeachment.

A spokesman for Blagojevich insisted he will not resign. Some lawmakers had expressed hope that, faced with impeachment, he might opt to leave voluntarily.

The Saudi supertanker seized by Somali pirates in the world's biggest ever hijacking has been freed following a reported ransom payment of $3m. Last night the US navy released a photo showing a small package apparently containing the ransom parachuting to the deck of the Sirius Star from a small aircraft.

The Sirius Star, which was carrying 2m barrels of oil when it was captured on November 15, sailed from the pirate lair of Harardheere on Somalia's eastern coast today.

Two Britons - chief engineer Peter French, from County Durham, and second officer James Grady, from Renfrewshire - are among the crew of 25 who were all reported to be unharmed.

More than half a million jobs were lost in the US last month, taking the unemployment rate to its highest in 16 years.

Job losses over the whole of last year totalled 2.6 million, the biggest annual loss since 1945 when 2.75m jobs were shed, the US labour department said.

The bulk of the year's job losses came in the last four months when 1.9m people were laid off. In December alone, US employers cut 524,000 jobs. The original numbers for October and November were also revised higher.

Analysts said that companies had been cutting staff in anticipation of a very difficult year.

"These figures suggest that businesses have been focusing on clearing the decks to match their workforce to the economic conditions we will see in 2009," said John Silvia of Wachovia.

The unemployment rate hit 7.2% last month, up on 6.8% in November and the highest since January 1993.

South Korea's central bank has slashed interest rates by half a percentage point to a record low of 2.5%, in the latest attempt to fend off recession.

The bank warned that economic activity was "slackening at a rapid pace".

President Lee Myung-bak has warned that the country's target of 3% growth in 2008 could prove unattainable.

The latest victim of the downturn is the country's fifth biggest carmaker, Ssangyong Motor, which said on Friday it had applied for court receivership.

Colektivo

It's still lending though, and that being so it is likely to fall fall of the Canadian banking/deposit-taking regime unless they make their peace with the regualators first (at huge cost in time and legal fees etc etc).

My approach would be similar "Pooling" but instead of lending to use a quasi Equity revenue-sharing approach through "unitising" gross revenues (if there are any).

Quite recently Prosper.com - the online Peer to Peer "social" lending operation - was obliged by the US SEC to

Cease and Desist

Modern conservatives engage in one of man's oldest exercises in moral philosophy: the search for a superior moral justification for selfishness.Galbraith

The first British baby genetically screened before conception to be free of a breast cancer gene has been born, doctors said today.

The baby girl grew from an embryo screened to ensure it did not contain the faulty BRCA1 gene, which would have meant she had a 50-85% of developing breast cancer.

A spokeswoman for University College London hospital said the mother and daughter were doing "very well", adding that the family did not wish to reveal when the little girl was born.

Paul Serhal, the medical director of the assisted conception unit at the hospital, said: "This little girl will not face the spectre of developing this genetic form of breast cancer or ovarian cancer in her adult life.

"The parents will have been spared the risk of inflicting this disease on their daughter.

As well as giving an interesting speech at the New World, New Capitalism conference in Paris yesterday, a, Tony Blair found time to give a video interview to the editor of the Financial Times, Lionel Barber.

On the advice of Patrick Hennessy at Three Line Whip, I've just been watching it. And my conclusion is that Blair is still very, very interested in becoming president of Europe.

He didn't exactly put it like that, of course. But he was given four opportunities to dismiss the idea of being a candidate, and not once did he try to do so.

I got the impression that he wants the job quite keenly: watch for yourself and make your own mind up. The issue comes up right at the end, after the questions on Gaza. Here is a transcript of the key exchange.

The scrap trader was immovable, despite Wu Wenxiu's pleas. She would pay one yuan - roughly 10p - for a kilogram of plastic. Around the corner in Shi Yuhai's yard, the offer was no better. Wu shrugged his shoulders and began to heave bags from his tricycle on to the scales. "One kuai [yuan] here, one kuai there - everywhere's the same these days. This industry has broken down," he grumbled.

Wu is one of 160,000 collectors in Beijing who make a living from the detritus of urban life - plastic sheeting, office printouts, bottles, radiators and scraps of cardboard. Recycling has become a global industry and China is the largest importer of the world's waste materials, taking in as much as a third of Britain's recyclables for example. Then came the slump, decimating the Chinese recycling industry and leaving Britain, the US and others grappling with growing volumes of recycled waste and nowhere to send it.

Half of the world's population could face severe food shortages by the end of the century as rising temperatures take their toll on farmers' crops, scientists have warned.

Harvests of staple food crops such as rice and maize could fall by between 20% and 40% as a result of higher temperatures during the growing season in the tropics and subtropics. Warmer temperatures in the region are also expected to increase the risk of drought, cutting crop losses further, according to a new study.

The worst of the food shortages are expected to hit the poor, densely inhabited regions of the equatorial belt, where demand for food is already soaring because of a rapid growth in population.

A study in the US journal Science found there was a 90% chance that by the end of the century, the coolest temperatures in the tropics during the crop growing season would exceed the hottest temperatures recorded between 1900 and 2006.

Zimbabwean soldiers are being given elephant meat for their rations, a wildlife campaigner has told the BBC.

Jonny Rodrigues from the Zimbabwe Conservation Task Force said that several soldiers had complained to him that was the only meat they were given.

Zimbabwe is believed to have some 100,000 elephants - more than its parks can sustainably hold and its economy is in freefall.

An American surgeon is demanding that his estranged wife returns a kidney he donated to her or pays him $1.5m in compensation.

Dr Richard Batista has gone public with the demand saying he is fed up with how long it is taking for his divorce to be finalised.

Rare footage of one of the world's most strange and elusive mammals has been captured by scientists.

Large, and with a long, thin snout, the Hispaniolan solenodon resembles an overgrown shrew; it can inject passing prey with a venom-loaded bite.

Little is known about the creature, which is found in the Caribbean, but it is under threat from deforestation, hunting and introduced species.

Researchers say conservation efforts are now needed.

The mammal was filmed in the summer of 2008 during a month-long expedition to the Dominican Republic - one of only two countries where this nocturnal, insect-eating animal (Solenodon paradoxus) can be found (the other is Haiti).

A nine-year-old girl, allegedly kidnapped by her grandmother, has been found using a mobile phone signal and Google Street View.

A police officer and a firefighter in Athol, Massachusetts, joined forces after authorities were alerted that Natalie Maltais had been taken.

Officers used GPS in the girl's mobile phone to find her approximate location.

They fed the co-ordinates into Google Street View, pinpointing a hotel where the child was subsequently found.

US President-elect Barack Obama is to appear on the cover of a special edition of a Spider-Man comic.

A six-page story, with the superhero saving the day when an imposter tries to take Mr Obama's place as president, will hit shelves next Wednesday.

Marvel Comics editor Joe Quesada said the idea for edition came after Mr Obama admitted he was a Spider-Man fan.

"How great is that? The commander-in-chief to be is actually a nerd-in-chief," Mr Quesada said.

Mr Obama's fan status was revealed by his campaign team, who released 10 little-known facts about the Democrat.

"Right at the top of that list was he collected Spider-Man comics," Mr Quesada said.

By HOLLAND COTTER Published: January 8, 2009

In the 17th century the Netherlands was the most prosperous country in Europe. Then at midpoint of the century, partly because of a draining war, the bubble burst. The Dutch art market, at its zenith, collapsed. People thought, "Oh, it's just a phase." It wasn't. The golden age of Dutch art was over.

Rembrandt was hit especially hard. A decade earlier he had been a star, with a client waiting list a mile long. Amsterdam, like New York today, was a town of culture-craving burghers who had to have -- had to have -- a Rembrandt in their homes. So he turned himself into an art machine, piled on assistants to finish off work, and became very rich.

A rice planting robot developed by the National Agriculture and Food Research Organization in Japan is the grand prize winner of the Japanese Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry 2008 Robot Awards. There were some other hardware awards, but the only other really interesting winner was (I'm pretty sure) this little guy. Anyway, the ricebot is the first one in the world to be completely automated, using GPS and gyros to figure out its position in the field and keep the rice planted in nice, tidy lines.

The Conservatives today expelled a leading young activist from the party after he boasted about dressing up as the missing five-year-old Madeleine McCann at a new year party.

Caroline Spelman, the Tory party chair, expelled Matthew Lewis after it emerged that he had discussed plans to wear a blonde wig, "pink pyjamas, a teddy bear and a vial of fake blood" to the event on his Facebook page.

Other figures from the organisation left messages on the Facebook paghe, with one responding: "Is this a cunning (Baldrick style) plan to obtain the reward money?"

Spelman described the behaviour of Lewis, a member of the party's Conservative Future youth wing, as "completely unacceptable".

"This offensive behaviour is not only shocking but intolerable and completely unacceptable," she said. "There is no place for this sort of person in the party."

Electro-pop singer Little Boots has come top of the BBC's Sound of 2009 list, which aims to highlight the best new music talent for the new year.

Little Boots is 24-year-old singer and keyboard player Victoria Hesketh from Blackpool, whose influences include David Bowie, Gary Numan and Kate Bush.

The Sound of 2009 list is based on tips from 134 leading UK tastemakers, who named their favourite three new acts.

Last year, Adele came top, followed by Duffy, The Ting Tings and Glasvegas.

The six acts hoping to represent the UK in the Eurovision Song Contest are facing their biggest test yet.

Under the glaring lights of the BBC's main studio at Television Centre in London, the singers are tackling rehearsals for the first live show on Saturday night.

The floor is crawling with production staff, the set is lit with the colours of the Union Jack, and the band strikes up with Abba's Eurovision classic Waterloo.

The acts run through their group performance of the song with great success, the opener for Your Country Needs You.

They may be just getting to grips with working on television, but for one act, the dream will come to an end on Saturday.