"Excessively cheap money in the US was a driver of today's crisis," she told the German parliament. "I am deeply concerned about whether we are now reinforcing this trend through measures being adopted in the US and elsewhere and whether WE COULD FIND OURSELVES IN FIVE YEARS FACING THE EXACT SAME CRISIS."

There have been calls from outside Germany for it to beef up fiscal support, but Ms Merkel has been wary of raising public borrowing to stimulate demand, fearing that the extra income could boost Germans' savings rate, which is already high. The chancellor defended her government's modest fiscal stimulus – worth €12bn over the next two years – as a "measured and proportional response, tailored to the situation".

A European slowdown was one of the factors contributing to a decision by the Chinese authorities to slash interest rates by 108 basis points, THE BIGGEST CUT IN A DECADE. The move reflects concern about a weak housing market and declining export demand.

A panel at Leeds Employment Tribunal today awarded Miss Fletcher £186,896 from the Ministry of Defence for her sexual harassment ordeal at the Royal Artillery stables based at RAF Topcliffe. The payout included a punitive award of £50,000 in exemplary damages, £20,000 in aggravated damages and £30,000 for hurt feelings - the maximum possible.

It is believed to be the first time an employment tribunal has ever awarded exemplary damages in this country. The payout exceeds the £161,000 recently offered to 21-year-old double amputee Marine Ben McBean. McBean, of 40 Commando, was hailed 'the real hero' by Prince Harry after losing an arm and a leg in a blast in Afghanistan. It is also higher than the £152,150 that Lance Bombardier Ben Parkinson, 24, received after losing his legs in Afghanistan.

Spokesman Shaun Rusling said: "We don't agree with anyone being picked on but it is just Miss Fletcher's feelings that have been hurt. She will get better. YOU DO NOT GET BETTER WHEN YOUR ARMS AND LEGS HAVE BEEN BLOWN OFF. It seems that there is one law in peacetime and another law when you are at war, fighting for Queen and country." The MoD faces a further bill of £100,000 for its defence costs. And Miss Fletcher has THREE MORE VICTIMISATION CLAIMS PENDING AGAINST THE ARMY, which could increase her compensation by further tens of thousands of pounds.

But they also seem to be part of a new campaign to hit busy urban targets, popular with foreigners and wealthy Indians, in a bid to cause maximum damage to India's economy and international reputation. Many of the targets - especially the Taj and Oberoi hotels - are popular with visiting tourists, diplomats and foreign business people as well as the city's own wealthy elite.

India has blamed most of the recent terror attacks on its soil on Islamist militant groups based in Pakistan or Bangladesh which it says have links to Pakistan's intelligence service. Other alleged culprits of recent attacks include Maoist rebels and separatist groups in India's remote northeast, on the borders of China, Bangladesh and Myanmar. However, an apparently new Islamist group calling itself the Indian Mujahideen has claimed responsibility for several multiple bomb attacks in the last year.

Last year, out of 22,000 people killed in terrorist attacks worldwide, 2,300 people, or 10.5 per cent, were in India, according to the US State Department's latest report on global terrorism. Yet India rarely arrests, let alone convicts, the culprits, because of its poorly-trained and under-staffed law enforcement agencies and its chronically overloaded judicial system, experts say.

UPDATE:- Indian security forces have been exchanging fire with gunmen holding dozens of hostages in two luxury hotels in the Indian city of Mumbai (Bombay). Troops surrounded the premises shortly after armed men carried out a series of co-ordinated attacks across the city, killing 101 people and injuring 287.

The President-Elect's intention to shift the focus of the fight against terrorism to Afghanistan has been bolstered by Robert Gates agreement to stay on as Defence Secretary. Mr Gates is a strong believer in an Afghan surge, which would not only put thousands more boots on the ground but involve negotiations with malleable branches of the Taliban.

It would also aim to boost co-operation with Iran and Pakistan where some elements have supported the anti-Western insurgency. The need for more US troops in addition to the 32,000 already serving, has been accelerated by the Afghan presidential election in September 2009, and the voter registration process that begins in the New Year, Mr Gates said.

Some analysts believe Washington ultimately will need more than 100,000 troops to stabilise Afghanistan before the Afghan army is ready to take over security. "I suspect that to succeed in Afghanistan, we're eventually going to have to swing a sizeable fraction of what we now have in Iraq into Afghanistan," said Stephen Biddle of the Council on Foreign Relations. "The scale of the shift will be large, and the time needed to pull it off will be long," he said.

In an era where EU member states, MOST NOTABLY THE UK, VIOLATE PRIVACY RIGHTS TO A DEGREE INCONCEIVABLE EVEN TWO DECADES AGO, Europeans would be justified in expecting that their unelected officials in Brussels would at least make a show of protecting their rights. The forces, internal and external, in favour of reducing personal data protection are formidable.

"National security" and the "War on Terror" have taken the entire western legal order into dangerous territory in terms of reversing advances human rights law has made since its inception after World War II. Even in the United Kingdom, no reduction in criminal activity has been noted. Initially designed to weed out "terrorists," this movement now feels justified to undertake FULL-SCALE SURVEILLANCE OVER ALL INDIVIDUALS.

Once the state has full access to our personal data, communicated or stored in our hard disks or held by internet service providers, NO ONE IS SAFE and there is no reason to believe that good faith will prevail.

Meanwhile, official data confirmed the British economy shrank by a devastating 0.5 per cent between July and September. Consumer spending dropped by 0.2 per cent over the three months - its biggest drop since 1995 and the first consecutive quarter fall since the 90s recession.

The 0.5 per cent reduction in total output is in line with predictions last month. It is the first time the economy has shrunk in 16 years. IT CONFIRMS BRITAIN IS SET TO BE IN AN OFFICIAL RECESSION - classed as two quarters of negative growth. 'There is nothing here to suggest that the economy is not going to carry on contracting for a prolonged period,' says economist Jonathan Loynes. 'We continue to expect GDP to fall by around 1.5 percent next year and by another one percent or so in 2010.

Woolworths' is hoping it can persuade its backers to accept a restructuring plan which would avoid the 800-strong chain going under and COSTING 30,000 jobs. MFI, which runs 110 stores and employs more than 1,000 staff in the UK, was also struggling to avoid collapse. Meanwhile, 100 jobs were lost when cross-Channel company SpeedFerries went into liquidation.

THE YEAR IN WHICH BRITAIN WAS TO HAVE BEEN TRIUMPHANT, BASKING IN INTERNATIONAL OLYMPIC GLORY, WILL BE THE YEAR WHEN THE DEBT HITS HOME. In schools and hospitals and social services departments, in libraries and nurseries and courts, 2012 will be the year that high times turn to hard times. The Institute for Fiscal Studies estimated yesterday that the country faces spending cuts of £19 billion in 2012-13. Cabinet ministers have already begun fighting over who takes the hit. The unemployed, the homeless, the destitute will join the athletes parading through London.

IT WILL BE PAYBACK TIME, BIG TIME. In 2011-12 the tax increases strike: the 45p top rate, the rise in national insurance. In 2012 national debt is forecast to reach the magic £1 trillion. And in 2012 we throw billions of pounds at the Olympics. Oh, that we could cancel them instead. We obviously cannot afford them any more. THE OLYMPICS BUDGET HAS SOARED FROM AN ORIGINAL GUESSTIMATE OF £2.7 BILLION, winner of the gold medal for kite-flying, TO £9.3 BILLION, AND WILL RISE FURTHER: there is as yet no clear security plan, the issue that was the biggest cause of cost overruns in Sydney and Athens. Only £500 million is still unspoken for in the £2.7 billion contingency fund, and there are four years still to go.

I have another question: why can't we have this in Beijing? All the expensive stadiums are already there and the Games have been moved before: in 1906 the decision was taken to move the 1908 Olympics from Rome to London after Mount Vesuvius erupted and the Italians needed the money to rebuild Naples. Now the world financial system has erupted, and WE NEED THE MONEY TO HELP TO REBUILD THE ECONOMY, not a dozen deserted stadiums and thousands of empty homes.

By mid-November, with the financial crisis growing worse by the day, it had become obvious that one President was no longer enough (at least not the President we had). So, in the days before Thanksgiving, Obama began to move — if not to take charge outright, then at least to preview what things will be like when he does take over in January.

He became a more public presence, taking questions from the press three days in a row. He named his economic team. He promised an enormous stimulus package that would somehow create 2.5 million new jobs, and began to manoeuvre the new Congress toward having the bill ready for him to sign — in a dramatic ceremony, no doubt — as soon as he assumes office.

Bush could have boosted the public spirit — and the auto industry — by announcing that he was scrapping the entire federal automotive fleet, including the presidential limousine, and replacing it with hybrids made in Detroit. He could have jump-started — and he still could — the Obama plan by releasing funds for a green-jobs program to insulate public buildings. He could start funding the transit projects already approved by Congress. In the end, though, it will not be the creative paralysis that defines Bush. It will be his intellectual laziness, at home and abroad. He is less than President now, and that is appropriate. He was never very much of one.

But the People's Alliance for Democracy (PAD) said it would not leave and a government spokesman told Reuters it also rejected the army's proposal. The PAD took over the airport on Tuesday after months of protests. Thai Prime Minister Somchai Wongsawat, who was due to return to Thailand on Wednesday from an Asia-Pacific summit in Peru, was reported to have landed in the northern city of Chiang Mai. He told reporters there that he had not yet made any decision on dissolving parliament, AFP news agency reports.

Thailand has been in a state of political stalemate since former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra was ousted in a military coup in 2006. Fresh elections at the end of 2007 failed to resolve the crisis, when a party made up of former allies of Mr Thaksin returned to power.

However, Gen Anupong said the government was still in control. "This is not a coup," he told a news conference. "The government still has full authority. These points are the way to solve the problem which has plunged the country into a deep crisis. If a coup could end all the troubles, I would do it."

It was a rich-country affair with Russia invited in during the 1990s - but that was to tackle international political issues, not for the sake of a contribution to the economic discussions. How times have changed. A global economic problem needed a presence from developing country leaders.

The G20 was already up and running as a forum for finance ministers with the big developing economies as members - China, India, Russia, Brazil, Saudi Arabia and others. And so they came to Washington, as countries hit by the developed world's financial crisis and, in some cases, as countries that might be able to help fix it.

The communique issued after the summit is not on its own going to change the world. Nevertheless, there are elements in what was agreed that might lead to something significant. The political machinery of the global economy is not going to be turned upside down, although those big developing countries at the summit are beginning to get a tentative grip on the levers. It has certainly changed the cast of characters we are going to have to look to in the future to address the world's economic problems.

Made by the FAMILY PLANNING ASSOCIATION, 'Why Abortion?' Shows a range of scenarios in which actresses justify abortion on the grounds that they cannot afford to have a child or that it could jeopardise their relationship with parents or boyfriends. Their choices are then debated in the video by a group of teenagers from Northern Ireland - where abortion remains illegal – with the majority defending women's right to choose. THEY CLAIM THAT ABORTION IS LEGAL AND SAFE, AND THAT RELIGIOUS LEADERS SHOULDN'T "MORALISE OR DICTATE" ABOUT THE ISSUE.

The pro-choice FPA says that abortion is a fact of life and so it makes sense for teenagers to learn about it. England and Wales has the second-highest termination rate in Europe, WITH 205,600 ABORTIONS CARRIED OUT IN 2007, while Labour MPs rejected moves to cut the upper time limit from 24 to 20 weeks earlier this year.

It comes just weeks after the Government announced that sex and relationships education will become compulsory in primary schools as part of a drive to cut teenage pregnancy rates. The National Children's Bureau also wants all secondary schools to have on-site sexual health clinics, WHILE GIRLS AS YOUNG AS 13 WILL BE URGED TO HAVE CONTRACEPTIVE INJECTIONS AND IMPLANTS.

France and Germany's leaders have called on the EU to ease fiscal rules to allow nations to spend more to boost their economies. A requirement to hold a public deficit below 3% of GDP should be eased, Nicolas Sarkozy and Angela Merkel said.

The two leaders made their comments in a joint newspaper article, to be published on Wednesday, saying that governments had to head off a "recessionary spiral" at home. The Commission has suggested that tax cuts could be made on Value Added Tax, energy efficient goods and labour taxes, while the investment should be focused on construction and car makers.

The BBC's Europe editor Mark Mardell says the emphasis is on the 27 countries acting together - partly so no-one gets an unfair advantage but also because the Commission hopes it will have a much bigger impact on the whole economy of Europe.

The message was hand-delivered to Alexy II by the archbishop of Naples, Cardinal Crescenzio Sepe, on an official visit to Moscow at the invitation of the patriarch. The cardinal gave the message to the patriarch in a meeting that lasted a little more than an hour last Thursday. "I have a deep affection for all the Orthodox brethren, and I am particularly close to them in these most recent days when conflict has caused significant suffering to peoples so dear to me," the [Pope] said. "I NEVER CEASE TO OFFER DAILY PRAYERS FOR PEACE, asking the Lord that the appeals of Your Holiness to resolve all hostility for the good of the nations may be heeded."

He added: "Faith in Our Lord Jesus Christ is a bond that unites hearts in a profound way and invites us all to strengthen our commitment to manifest to the world a shared witness of living together respectfully and peacefully. Our times, marked so often by conflict and grief, make it EVEN MORE NECESSARY TO HASTEN THE JOURNEY TOWARD THE FULL UNITY OF ALL THE DISCIPLES OF CHRIST, so that the joyous message of salvation may be spread to all humanity."

And, Bishop Paglia affirmed, ecumenism is more and more "a demand of contemporary society. THE HARMONY BETWEEN THE CATHOLIC CHURCH AND THE ORTHODOX CHURCH IS EVER MORE EVIDENT," he said, referring to the challenges presented to all Christians in Europe and contemporary society. "Certain limits and challenges can only be faced FROM A PERSPECTIVE OF UNITY."

The UN humanitarian coordination office in Geneva said 8,887 cases have now been recorded and the disease has spread to more than half of the country. The Daily Telegraph reported last week that President Robert Mugabe's government was trying to cover up the epidemic.

Most cases have been reported in the capital, Harare, but the UN said the outbreak was also taking on a "regional dimension," pointing to reports from South Africa's health ministry of suspected cholera cases in Botswana. Oxfam on Tuesday called on Mr Mugabe's government to declare the deadly cholera outbreak a national health emergency.

Cholera is spread by contaminated food and water. The lack of clean water and poorly maintained sewage systems in Zimbabwe have allowed the water-borne intestinal disease to thrive. And as the political and economic crisis in Zimbabwe deepens, most hospitals have been forced to close their doors as they can no longer afford drugs, equipment or to pay their staff.

They argue federal funds could stabilize their trillions in investments and warn that any failure of a life insurer could dry up a key source of corporate financing. But U.S. officials are not convinced. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson said Tuesday he had not yet decided whether other insurers would get federal funds. The only insurer to get government help so far is American International Group Inc, which was saved from bankruptcy with a rescue package that has ballooned to $152 billion.

As the biggest buyers of U.S. corporate bonds, life insurers say they grease the wheel of corporate America. Industry officials insist the failure of a large U.S. life insurer would drastically shrink bond financing, potentially creating another hurdle to the nation's economic recovery.