Rachid Nekkaz, 38, a real-estate businessman based in Paris, travelled to Belgium on Wednesday to pay 100 euros for two women fined in the first case in the country since the law was adopted there.

"I'm in favour of a law to convict a husband who forces a women to wear the niqab and who forces her to stay at home. But I'm also for a law that lets these women move freely in the streets, because freedom of movement, just like any freedom, is the most fundamental thing in a democracy, " Nekkaz told reporters outside the courtroom in Belgium.

The police chief in charge of the phone-hacking investigation spoke of her anger tonight as a detective in her own team was arrested over leaks to journalists.

Officers arrested and suspended their 51-year-old colleague as former News of the World feature writer Dan Evans was questioned on suspicion of voicemail interceptions.

The Home Office is refusing to guarantee that it will cover all police force spending on overtime, equipment and cancelled leave which was used in bringing the rioting in London, Manchester, Birmingham and other British cities under control.

Its reluctance is causing concern among senior officers and police authorities that the Government will try and take the extra costs out of their already stretched police budgets rather than using the Treasury reserve.

Supporters of Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán say he has a strict leadership style, while critics warn of the threat of forced political conformity, Jew-baiting and labor camps. Meanwhile, the European Union is saying nothing, apparently accepting the fact that a member state is getting out of control.

The recent events in Hungary don't easily fit the narratives of the day in the Euro area crisis (if anything, Hungary is years ahead of the Eurozone area on the austerity curve), but are serious nevertheless. Instead of writing a diary, I'll quote and comment multiple parts of the long Spiegel article below.

_{*Lunatic*, n.
One whose delusions are out of fashion.}

The solitary confinement of Anders Behring Breivik, the man who has confessed to killing 77 people in a July 22 shooting rampage, has been extended by four weeks to ensure he cannot contact possible accomplices, an Oslo court said Friday.

A dispute is brewing on the divided island of Cyprus over plans to begin oil and gas exploration in the east Mediterranean.

The Greek Cypriot government in Nicosia is planning to start drilling in six weeks, but Turkish Cypriots in the north of the island have strongly objected. They fear any potential revenue from oil and gas will be solely for the Greek side of the island.

Turkey also claims the Turkish Cypriot community has not been represented in Cyprus' drilling agreements with its neighbors. Kudret Ozersay, chief aide to Turkish Cypriot leader Dervis Eroglu, said unless Nicosia delays the start of drilling, they will start their own exploration scheme.

European shares continued to slide Friday amid mounting concerns that the world's major economies could be heading for recession and that policymakers have no solutions for the Euro zone debt crisis.

The eurozone's second bailout for Greece, agreed in July, already looks in trouble as a series of smaller EU countries demands that Athens puts up collateral in return for national loans.

The Finnish government has been leading the push. Helsinki on Tuesday (16 August) announced that a deal had been reached with Greece that would see Athens make a cash deposit to guarantee Finland's share in the €109 billion bailout.

Finland has taken a hard line after the anti-bailout True Finns party burst onto the domestic political scene and scooped 19.1 percent of the vote in the April elections.

But the Tuesday deal has sparked a domino effect - Austria, the Netherlands, Slovenia and Slovakia have all indicated that they want the same treatment.

The €5 billion of savings to reduce the deficit aim to fend off debt market attacks. However, the government steered clear of drastic cuts that could damage the ruling Socialists' chances in November's general election.

Moves to cut drug costs for regional governments with a new bill on generic medicines will save €2.4 billion, and a further €2.5 billion will be saved by front-loading tax payments from large businesses each year through to 2013.

The government said the measures would make it easier for Spain to hit its deficit targets this year as it battles to avoid being dragged into a eurozone debt crisis which has pushed borrowing costs to record levels.

REUTERS - Hewlett-Packard may spin off the world's largest PC business, part of a wrenching series of moves away from the consumer market, including killing its new tablet and buying British software company Autonomy Corp for as much as $11.7 billion.

The moves underscore the problems plaguing personal computers and devices, HP's core business, and a decade-long search for direction by the original Silicon Valley garage startup, whose "HP Way" was once a model for businesses.

The iconic company associated with the birth of Silicon Valley also plans to kill WebOS-based phones and the TouchPad tablet, which was launched in June but has failed to excite consumers.

GERMANY: Deutsche Bahn has awarded Ansaldo STS a €13·8m contract to design, supply, install and commission ETCS Level 2 on the Berlin - Rostock route which connects the port of Rostock with TEN-T corridors to southern Italy.

That's interesting in the context of the German federal government 's recent announcement that it wants to delay ETCS rollout for budget savings reasons. Meanwhile, Switzerland is moving ahead with a migration of the entire network to ETCS.

_{*Lunatic*, n.
One whose delusions are out of fashion.}

Designed for holidaymakers rather than people making an end to end journey, the trip takes 14 days and includes stops for guided tours in Kazan, Yekaterinburg, Novosibirsk, Krasnoyarsk, Irkutsk, Ulan-Ude, Ulaanbaatar and Erenhot, as well as a trip to Lake Baikal. Onboard services are provided in seven languages, and the entertainment programme includes musical evenings, films and local food.

Paul Farrell has written about this phenomenon on Marketwatch:

He speaks of "all the too-greedy-to-fail fatheads running Wall Street. And, unfortunately, Main Street America's 95 million irrational and self-sabotaging investors" being to blame.

"Yes, all of us. We're Americans. Don't confuse us with facts, with reality. We're the greatest in history, a legend in our own minds. And a rapidly mutating virus is spreading this lethal pandemic far beyond the shores of Lake Wobegon. Yes, folks, the "Lake Wobegon Effect" is hard-wired in America's brain, an illusion of superiority, a smug arrogance where each knows we are the best, the chosen ones.

"Warning: The Lake Wobegon Effect is the single best summary of today's stock market psychology, high frequency trading, behavioural economic theories and the new science of irrationality ... and it's sucking the life out of America's soul. Here, listen to more of these arrogant musings surfacing everywhere from deep in our collective brains."

MercoPress: Wind farms have come out on top in the latest round of power auctions organized by Brazil's government. Slowly letting go of government protection to compete head-to-head with historically cheaper fossil fuel energy, the wind power sector indicated its potential strength.

MercoPress: Colombia/Argentina bilateral trade is set to reach 2 billion dollars, eight times its 2003 value, and remains favourable for Argentina, according to Minister of Industry Debora Girogi.

UNITED NATIONS, Aug 19, 2011 (IPS) - As one of the world's emerging economic powerhouses, Brazil is vigourously pursuing one of the key economic objectives on the U.N.'s development agenda: South-South Cooperation.  The Brazilian Cooperation Agency is currently participating in scores of economic projects, mostly in the agricultural sector, in over 80 developing countries in Asia, Africa and Latin America and the Caribbean. The projects range from livestock and fisheries to horticulture and food production.

WASHINGTON, Aug 19, 2011 (IPS)-"Latin America cannot count on fast growth in terms of demand for commodities from China forever, and this of course means there are some policy challenges that [the region] will have to face," said Mauricio Cárdenas, director of the Latin America Initiative at Brookings. "Latin America has to begin thinking about ways to generate growth more indigenously."

REUTERS - Turkish warplanes and artillery pounded Kurdish rebels in northern Iraq for a second night, hours after the rebels mounted attacks on security forces in southeastern Turkey.

The Turkish raids, the first against rebels holed up in the mountains of northern Iraq in over a year, mark a stark escalation of the 27-year-old conflict after the collapse of efforts towards a negotiated settlement.

The Turkish military said on Friday warplanes had attacked 28 Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) targets on Thursday in the areas of Qandil mountain, Hakurk, Avasin-Basyan and Zap.

Rebel fighters on Friday claimed they had taken control of the oil refinery in Zawiyah, 48 km to the west of Libyan capital Tripoli.

It is the last functioning refinery in the country and supplies most of the precious petrol to Muammar Gaddafi's forces.

...Rebel fighters are still trying to root out Gaddafi's sharpshooters from key locations across the city, taking the fight one building at a time.

REUTERS - Ivory Coast's ex-president Laurent Gbagbo and his wife Simone, detained in the north of the country since they were ousted from power in April, were charged for the first time this week with "economic crimes, armed robbery, looting and embezzlement", the public prosecutor said on Thursday.

AP - A coordinated attack Friday on a British compound in Kabul involving two suicide bombers and a five-hour long firefight between Afghan security troops and attackers who penetrated the complex killed at least 10 people, Afghan officials said.

The attack on the British Council occurred as Afghans on Friday celebrated Independence Day, marking the day the country achieved full independence from Britain in 1919.

A spokesman for the Taliban, Zabiullah Mujahid, claimed responsibility for the attack.

The dead included eight Afghan policemen, a security guard whose nationality was not immediately known and an Afghan municipal worker, according to Kabul police official Farooq Asas. Two of four people wounded in the blasts were not Afghans, he said.

REUTERS - A blast ripped through a congregation of worshippers during Friday prayers at a mosque in Pakistan's northwestern tribal region of Khyber, killing at least 26 people, government officials said.

More than 60 people were also wounded in the attack in Jamrud, the main town of Khyber, where militants have been active for the past several years.

AFP - Activist Anna Hazare vowed a "revolution" in India as he began a public fast Friday amid astonishing scenes of celebratory protest that sent an intimidating message to a shell-shocked government.

"We have to bring a total change in this country," the 74-year-old told a huge crowd of chanting, flag-waving supporters at the open Delhi venue for his 15-day hunger strike to demand stronger laws against official graft.

"The whole world will see you as an example of how to bring about revolution with non-violence," the diminutive, bespectacled Hazare told the massed audience which cheered at every word.

Once seen as just an annoying thorn in the side of the establishment, Hazare has transformed into a national figure whose popularity has destabilised a government elected in 2009 with an unassailable parliamentary majority.

Colombia Reports: More than two million Colombians were displaced by the 2010-11 rainy season, affecting every region in the country, announced statistics agency DANE.

Colombia Reports: Colombian ex-Senator Piedad Cordoba fled the country Friday after police alerted her that extreme right-wing groups have been planning her assassination, her lawyer told reporters.

Colombia Reports: A demobilized paramilitary boss testified on Friday that he met with Alvaro Uribe in 2002, in contradiction to the ex-president's testimony to the Accusations Commission the day before.

WSJ: SAO PAULO, Brazil--President Dilma Rousseff replaced her fourth cabinet minister in three months on Thursday amid a cascade of scandals that have hobbled her eight-month-old government. The disarray has reached such a level that many analysts here now expect Ms. Rousseff's predecessor and mentor, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, to return and run for president in her place in the 2014 election.

El Universal, MEXICO: The Chief of Staff Jose Francisco Blake Mora, of Foreign Relations Patricia Espinosa, the Director of CISEN Guillermo Valdes and the Technical Secretary of the National Security Council Alejandro Poire admitted before lawmakers that there is a presence in Mexico of agents of the DEA, FBI, CIA and ATF. Even civilians of State Department of the United States.

BBC, PARAGUAY: Brazilian ranchers and private European investors, mainly from France, Germany and the Netherlands. Their arrival has seen a 21st Century land rush that has wiped out 1m hectares (2.5m acres) - nearly 10% of the forest - in just four years, according to satellite imagery. The vegetation is burned and bulldozed to create prairie-style grasslands to rear cattle, mainly for export to foreign beef markets.

IPS: WikiCrimes in Brazil, and similar initiatives in Venezuela, Panama, Mexico, Argentina and Chile, provide interactive maps that people can use to anonymously report crimes, describe what happened and pinpoint the location. In this way, crime mapping identifies danger zones - crime hotspots - within a region with generally high crime rates, to enhance people's awareness, preparedness and safety.

n an investigative feature on "The harsh life of East European truckers," De Morgen reports that drivers who hail from Bulgaria, Romania, Poland and Moldavia are often employed by Belgian logistics companies with offices in Eastern Europe, where employers can take advantage of lower wages and much more flexible labour laws. A practice that is "the bane of Belgians," who worry that they may soon be out of work, is nonetheless "a solution for East European truckers" who take home larger salaries than their colleagues working for local businesses. That said, the Flemish daily notes that their life "is far from enviable."

Crisis-hit Italian farmers are turning to the intensive cultivation of maize for biogas production, which is more profitable than growing it for food. But they're laying themselves open to the mercies of speculators -- and they're threatening biodiversity too, declares the founder of the Slow Food movement.

Global warming is causing animals and plants to migrate further up mountains and away from the equator in attempts to avoid the higher temperatures associated with climate change, scientists have found in an exhaustive survey of nearly 1,400 species.

The rate of movement is on average up to three times faster than previously expected for species migrating towards the poles and about twice as fast for organisms that are migrating further up the sides of mountains, the scientists said.

A major review of the distribution of animals and plants, published in the journal Science, found wide variations between individual species but taken as a group there appears to be unequivocal evidence that climate change is the cause of the mass movement, said Professor Chris Thomas of the University of York.

At least three people were killed and more than 70 injured on Thursday after a storm swept through an open-air music festival in eastern Belgium, causing two stages to collapse.

AFP - Nearly 30 years after making the sci-fi cult classic "Blade Runner," British director Ridley Scott has agreed to direct a new installment, the producers said Thursday.

The new "Blade Runner," produced by Alcon Entertainment, will not be a remake but rather a follow-up or a prequel to the original. Scott has yet to decide between the two options, the company said in a statement.

Love camping but hate the winter cold? Well, now your problem is solved. A new hotel in Berlin offers all the charms of outdoor camping inside a former vacuum-cleaner factory.

A diet book for six-year-olds with a cover that features a plump child holding a skinny frock in front of the mirror has been attacked by nutrition experts.

Maggie Goes on A Diet by Paul Kramer, is due for publication in the US in October but is already listed on many bookseller's websites. The book tells the story of 14-year-old Maggie who "is transformed from being extremely overweight and insecure to a normal-sized girl who becomes the school football star". "Through time, exercise and hard work, Maggie becomes more and more confident and develops a positive self-image," it adds.

REUTERS - A new book about the life of Coco Chanel published in the United States on Tuesday aims to strengthen claims the French designer collaborated with the Nazis during World War II as a spy code-named "Westminster."

The book, "Sleeping With The Enemy: Coco Chanel's Secret War," by Paris-based American journalist Hal Vaughan, claims that not only was the designer the lover of a German officer, Hans Gunther von Dincklage, which has been well-documented, but they were spies who went on missions to Madrid and Berlin.

In addition, the book claims Chanel was deeply anti-Semitic.