 | | | | | | | Newsletter | 22.11.2008, 17:15 UTC | | | Newsline | | | World news: international | | | | | | | | | News | | | | | Current Article | | | | German Chancellor says hard times ahead
German Chancellor Angela Merkel has warned that 2009 will be "a year of bad news" for the economy. She told the German newspaper "Welt am Sonntag" that the Berlin government's financial rescue package had stabilised financial markets but that it was important that trust was re-established and that inter-bank lending functioned properly again. She added that the European Union's planned stimulus package should be used to promote innovation and make Europe more competitive, especially in those areas where technological improvements were necessary. |  | | GM rules out sale of Opel or job cuts in Germany
The struggling US auto giant General Motors says it will neither sack workers nor close or sell factories at its German Opel unit. The president of GM Europe, Carl-Peter Forster, told the Welt am Sonntag newspaper that Opel had sought loan guarantees from the German government but was not bankrupt. Opel's directors have said that the company plans to cut output next year and is mulling a 30-hour work week. The automaker, which has some 26,000 employees in Germany, has been hit by a slump in sales and financial problems at its parent company. GM has said it will run out of cash as early as January if it does not get help from the US government. | | | Obama: economic recovery plan to create 2.5m jobs
US President-elect Barack Obama says he will sign a sweeping two-year stimulus plan to revive the troubled economy soon after taking office next January. Obama said in the Democratic Party's traditional radio address that his administration would make an effort to create 2.5 million jobs by 2011. He pledged long-term investments in the country's economic future, including alternative energy technologies and fuel-efficient cars. His address came after an additional 540,000 jobless claims were filed last week, the highest in 18 years. The US economy has shed 1.2 million jobs this year alone. | | | German police conduct anti-terror raids
German police have carried out raids in three states in search of suspected supporters of a terror cell whose plans to attack US targets in Germany were foiled last year. The raids were jointly conducted by investigators from the Federal Criminal Police Office and police from the respective states but no arrests were made. A spokesman for the federal prosecutors said police raided the residences of several people suspected of acquiring detonators for the alleged terror plotters. However, he did not say where the raids had been conducted. The three suspected plotters who are standing trial allegedly operated as a German cell of the radical Islamic Jihad Union.
| | | Germans held over Kosovo attack are spies: media
Media reports say that three Germans arrested in Kosovo on suspicion of involvement in a bomb attack on the offices of the European Union's envoy there are spies. A spokesman for the German intelligence agency refused to comment on the report published in the German media. An explosive device was hurled at the Pristina headquarters of the EU special envoy to Kosovo, Peter Feith, on November 14. No one was injured in the blast, which shattered the windows of the International Civilian Office. According to the Spiegel magazine, the three Germans had told interrogators they were inspecting the premises after the explosion. The report said the incident had caused friction between Berlin and Pristina as the agents had not been officially accredited to operate in Kosovo. | | | US strike in Pakistan kills British militant: reports
Pakistani television channels are reporting that Rashid Rauf, a British Islamist militant with al Qaeda links, has been killed in northwestern Pakistan. Rauf, who escaped from a Pakistani jail last December, was the alleged mastermind of a 2006 plot to target transatlantic airplanes with liquid bombs. Pakistani officials said a suspected US drone demolished the house of a local Taliban leader in a village in the tribal district of North Waziristan killing at least four militants, including Rauf. Saturday's airstrike came two days after Pakistan's Foreign Affairs Ministry summoned the US Ambassador to lodge a formal protest over cross-border attacks by US forces stationed in Afghanistan. Pakistan is an ally of the United States in its war on terror, but it opposes any violation of its territory. | | | Aubry to lead French Socialists
Martine Aubry has won the leadership battle for the French Socialist party by a small margin. Officials from France's main opposition party said the Lille Mayor and former labour minister won about 50.04 percent of Friday's vote against 49.98 percent for her arch rival Segolene Royal. Supporters of Royal contested the result and demanded a re-run. Both Aubry and Hollande rejected the calls to have the party's 232,000 members vote again. The 58-year-old Aubry is to replace Francois Hollande, Royal's former partner, who is stepping down after leading the party for 11 years. The Socialists hit a peak of political power with the 1981 presidential election victory of Francois Mitterrand. Today, they are the main opposition to President Nicolas Sarkozy's conservatives. | | | Annan, Carter cancel Zimbabwe trip
Former United Nations secretary-general Kofi Annan and ex-US president Jimmy Carter have cancelled a planned visit to Zimbabwe because they were denied travel visas. The two former world leaders had planned to go to Zimbabwe on a humanitarian mission along with rights activist Graca Machel, the wife of former South African president Nelson Mandela. Robert Mugabe's government had voiced objections to the visit, accusing the three, who belong to a group of statesmen known as the Elders, of trying to support the opposition in power-sharing talks. | | | Tibetan exiles to continue Dalai Lama's policy
Tibetan exiles have decided to continue with the Dalai Lama's "Middle Way" approach that envisages greater autonomy within China by means of dialogue. Hundreds of Tibetans responded to a call by their spiritual leader to meet in the northern Indian town of Dharamsala, to chart a future course for their movement after eight rounds of official talks with Beijing failed to make any progress. A speaker of Tibet's parliament-in-exile told the gathering that the so-called ''Middle Way'' would be continued for the time being. However, he warned that if no progress was made within a short period of time other options, including independence, would be considered. | | | | | |  | | |  Up-to-date news at DW-WORLD.DE | | | | | | |  | | | Note
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Two Dead, Dozen Hurt As Winter Arrives in Germany
