 | | | | | | | Newsletter | 27.01.2009, 17:15 UTC | | | Newsline | | | World news: international | | | | | | | | | News | | | | | Current Article | | | | German cabinet approves €50bn stimulus plan
The cabinet of German Chancellor Angela Merkel's coalition government has approved a 50 billion euro economic stimulus package. The plan includes tax cuts and infrastructure spending aimed at lifting Germany out of its worst recession since World War Two. The package now goes to parliament. The plan forces Germany to take on a significant amount of new debt and Finance Minister Peer Steinbrueck has acknowledged his country will next year break EU rules aimed at keeping down public deficits. |  | | Obama's Middle East envoy arrives in Cairo
The new US Middle East envoy has arrived in Cairo in a bid to revive Israeli-Palestinian peacemaking and shore up a fragile Gaza truce. George Mitchell, a former US senator, is due to meet Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak on Wednesday at the start of a week-long trip that will also take him to Israel, the West Bank, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, France and Britain. Earlier US President Barack Obama said his administration would adopt a more comprehensive approach in its ties with the Muslim world. Speaking to the al-Arabiya network in his first formal TV interview as president, Obama also said that his administration would lay the framework for diplomacy with Iran. Formal diplomatic relations between the United States and Iran were broken off in 1980. | | | Israeli troops, militants clash along Gaza border
Palestinian witnesses and the Israeli military say troops and militants have clashed along the Israel-Gaza border. The incident is the first outbreak of violence since a ceasefire went into effect ten days ago. The Israeli military said there was an explosion along the border targeting an Israeli patrol. One soldier was killed in the attack and three others wounded. | | | Germany's Central Council of Jews boycotts main Holocaust ceremony
The Central Council of Jews in Germany is boycotting an official parliamentary Holocaust ceremony marking the liberation of the Auschwitz death camp in 1945. The council's general secretary, Stephan Kramer, said in an interview with the German daily Der Tagesspiegel that the boycott of the Bundestag ceremony was in protest over increasing hostility and disrespect toward Jews in Germany. He said that more than six decades after the holocaust, hostilities in the Middle East were fuelling creeping anti-Semitism at the centre of German society. Kramer said that during the Gaza war, the amount of hate mail to the Central Council rose markedly, including explicit death threats against council members. German President Horst Koehler will give the main speech at the Holocaust ceremony in Berlin, which will be attended by the majority of Germany's political class, including Chancellor Angela Merkel. | | | Greek farmers protest falling prices
Greek farmers have cut access to all major highways and blocked border crossings for a ninth day on Tuesday in a showdown with the government over falling commodity prices. Dozens of blockades have cut the country in half as farmers occupy key junctions along the highway connecting the Greek capital, Athens, with the northern city of Thessaloniki. Thousands of farmers demanding tax rebates and subsidies have kept all border crossings into Bulgaria shut and have also blocked borders with Macedonia, Albania and Turkey. Only emergency medical supplies have been allowed to pass. | | | Spain pledges €1bn in food aid to developing nations
Spain has pledged one billion euros over the next five years to boost food security in developing nations. Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero made the pledge at the end of a two-day conference on food security in Madrid. The funding is part of Spain's aim to achieve the United Nations Millenium Development goals. These envisage the world's richest nations helping the poorest by providing 0.7 percent of their gross domestic product in development aid by 2015. However, so far only a handful have met this target. Speaking in Madrid, UN Secretary General Ban ki-Moon said the food crisis had brought the total number of hungry people in the world to an intolerable one billion. He warned the situation could get worse unless the problem is addressed soon. | | | Still no clear result on Zimbabwe political deadlock
Leaders of the Southern African Development Community have decided that Zimbabwe should form a unity government by next month. The 15-nation group that's been meeting in Pretoria, South Africa in an effort to resolve Zimbabwe's power-sharing crisis also decided that opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai should be sworn in as the country's prime minister on February 11. Tsvangirai however has said he is not satisfied with the meeting's results and has refused to commit to the latest timeline. President Robert Mugabe has stated he would set up a government without the opposition if need be. This is the fifth attempt by the SADC to end the political deadlock since last June's disputed presidential run-off poll. | | | Somali insurgents take government stronghold, introduce sharia law
Hardline Islamist militants in Somalia say they have introduced sharia law in Baidoa just hours after taking the city that seats the country's central government. The assertion by the insurgent group al Shabaab comes two days after the last Ethiopian forces completed their withdrawal from Somalia. Some 3,000 Ethiopian soldiers had been helping the government battle Islamists for the past two years. The African Union and the United Nations are now pushing for a unity government as the only option for peace in the country. In the meantime, Somalia's parliament has voted to double its size and invited 200 members of the moderate Islamist opposition to join. The Horn of Africa nation has been mired in violence since the ouster of the dictator Mohamed Siad Barre in 1991. The UN says the country is suffering a humanitarian catastrophe, with some 3.25 million Somalis, almost half the population, dependent on food aid. | | | Montenegro calls March 29 parliamentary poll
Montenegro's President Filip Vujanovic has called early parliamentary elections for March 29. The announcement comes just hours after the assembly dissolved itself and almost one year before its mandate was to expire. The dissolution was supported by 42 deputies in the 81-seat parliament. It was pushed through by Prime Minister Milo Djukanovic's ruling coalition, which says it wants to win a new four-year term for reforms that will take Montenegro closer to the European Union. The opposition has criticised the move, saying the government wants to be re-elected before the global financial crisis hits the country with full force. | | | Iceland looks to form minority government
Iceland's President Olafur Ragnar Grimsson has asked the country's Social Democrats to hold talks with the Left-Greens and Progressive parties to form a minority coalition. Former Prime Minister Geir Haarde, leader of the Independence Party, tendered his resignation on Monday after talks to save his government failed. Iceland has been in crisis since December when it was saved by an IMF loan from the brink of bankruptcy. | | | Japan passes €40bn economic stimulus budget
Japan has passed a contentious stimulus budget aimed at boosting the nation's recession-hit economy. Parliament approved a 40-billion-euro extra budget for the current fiscal year to March 31. The deal was struck after hours of wrangling between Prime Minister Taro Aso's ruling party and the opposition bloc. The extra budget, the second for fiscal 2008, contains expanded credit for small businesses and a cash payout to taxpayers totaling almost 17 billion euros. | | | | | |  | | |  Up-to-date news at DW-WORLD.DE | | | | | | |  | | | Note
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Jewish Leaders Boycott German Holocaust Memorial Ceremony
