Belgium: Political stalemate to end?
Moves were made to put an end to the political stalemate in Belgium this week, with Elio di Rupo as the likely candidate to become the next prime minister after the King asked the French speaking socialist leader to form a new government.
The move comes after the political parties reached a deal on the 2012 budget in which Belgium commits to reduce its deficit to 2.8 per cent of GDP. The agreement symbolises an important step towards to the formation of a new government more than 18 months after elections were held.
Pressure was building on Belgium to act after Standard and Poors downgraded the country’s credit rating stating the government’s inability to respond to economic pressures as one of the principal factors contributing to the downgrade.
Latvia:
Latvijas Krajbanka goes bust
The Latvian financial watchdog Finansu un Kapitala Tirgus Komisija (FKTK) announced this week that the troubled
Latvian bank Latvijas Krajbanka had no further deposit availability, meaning
that the bank is no longer able to function.
The Latvian
government has announced that there will be no state bail out for Latvijas
Krajbanka, of which the Lithuanian government is the majority shareholder. The
Latvian government has instead urged Lithuania to bail out the bank.
Krajbanka's
clients will receive their state-guaranteed compensations for their deposits up
to the sum of LVL 70,000 (EUR 100,000) within 20 days. Deposits beyond that sum
will be lost if no takers are found to bail out the bank. Several Latvian state
institutions have much larger deposits in Krajbanka.
While the majority of deposits in Latvijas
Krajbanka – LVL 343 million altogether – is private individuals' money, small
and medium-sized enterprises, corporate entities, and state-owned companies are
also entitled to receive the state-guaranteed compensation. Despite the much
larger size of their deposits however, these companies and intuitions will only
receive a maximum of LVL 70,000 each, the same sum as individual investors.
Germany:
Neo-nazi activities to be investigated
The east-German authorities faced scrutiny this
week over whether official protection was afforded to a trio of neo-Nazis who
murdered members of minority groups – mostly Turkish store owners but also one
German police officer – between 2000 and 2007.
Two male members of the far-right group called the
‘National Socialist Underground’ were found dead this month, in suspected
suicide cases.
Investigations
are currently being undertaken to ascertain whether the killers benefited from sympathy from the German information
services. All unsolved cases with a possible racist motive since 1998 were
reopened this week.
By Sonia Jordan
By Sonia Jordan