Roger Federer produced an astonishing turnaround to beat Rafael Nadal for the first time on clay courts in the final of the Hamburg Masters on Sunday. His 2-6, 6-2, 6-0 win over the French Open champion underlined his belief that he has a chance of winning in Paris in three weeks’ time and to become the first player since Rod Laver in 1969 to hold all four Grand Slams at the same time.
Irish rock stars Bono and Bob Geldof on Tuesday accused the group of eight (G8) nations of falling far behind on pledges of aid to Africa and put pressure on Germany as current head of the club to donate nearly -billion. Geldof said German Chancellor Angela Merkel needed to channel a minimum of -million in aid to Africa this year.
Private equity firm Cerberus will buy the majority of DaimlerChrysler’s struggling Chrysler Group for ,4-billion, a fraction of the -billion deal that created the transatlantic car union nine years ago. Cerberus Capital Management gets an 80,1% stake in Chrysler and its related financial services business, DaimlerChrysler said on Monday.
Roger Federer has split from coach Tony Roche just two weeks before the world number one tennis player makes another attempt to win the only Grand Slam title eluding him, the French Open. The announcement to end the partnership after more than two years comes during Federer’s worst slump in years.
The virtual world of Second Life can be a place where people make new friends, listen to concerts and even campaign for president — but German investigators are looking into a more dangerous use: as a platform for real and virtual child pornography.
Industrialised nations have broken promises to alleviate poverty and provide better health and education, leading to the deaths of millions of people in poorer nations, Oxfam International said on Thursday. Group of Eight (G8) nations had fallen far short of meeting a -billion funding pledge made at a summit in Gleneagles, Scotland two years ago.
German authorities launched raids in six German states on Wednesday over concerns that left-wing radicals were planning attacks to disrupt a Group of Eight (G8) summit in the Baltic resort of Heiligendamm next month, prosecutors said. The prosecutor’s office said in a statement that about 900 security officials were searching 40 sites in six northern German states.
A man cut off his own head with a chainsaw after stabbing his 70-year-old father to death in their apartment in the German city of Cologne, police said on Tuesday. The body of the offender (24) was found headless when police raced to the apartment Monday after an emergency call, apparently from the dying father, had been broken off in mid-sentence.
The United Nations urged far tougher action to fight climate change at a 166-nation climate conference on Monday, the first after reports warning of growing damage from droughts, floods or rising seas. More than 1Â 000 government delegates at the May 7 to 18 meeting will try to find ways to break gridlock in international negotiations.
Porsche, the German maker of luxury sports cars, has launched an official bid to acquire Volkswagen, Europe’s largest auto manufacturer. Stuttgart-based Porsche announced in late March that it would exercise an option to buy an additional 3,6% stake in Volkswagen.
Germany is to provide an additional â,¬1,5-million to humanitarian organisations working in Somalia, the Foreign Ministry said in Berlin on Friday. The Foreign Office said the move was in response to recent developments in Mogadishu, described as ”cause for concern.” The Red Cross will receive â,¬1-million and a German disaster aid agency the remainder.
Cycling team T-Mobile announced on Tuesday they will investigate allegations made against two of their doctors who, it was claimed in a report on Monday, injected cyclists with erythropoietin. A former trainer claims team doctors Lothar Heinrich and Andreas Schmid administered injections of the banned blood booster in 1996.
Osasuna take a 1-0 lead into their Uefa Cup semifinal return leg against holders Sevilla while Espanyol have virtually one foot in the final after a 3-0 demolition of Werder Bremen. Roberto Soldado got the only goal for the game for Osasuna nine minutes after the interval.
A German man called on his bank for an unusual service when he was too tired and drunk to go home — he bedded down there for the night with his horse. The man, identified as ”Wolfgang H” by German media, went to sleep next to cash machines in the local branch of the Mittelbrandenburgische Sparkasse in Wiesenburg, south-west of Berlin.
A pregnant cow being chased by police and fire fighters caused â,¬25Â 000-worth of damage on a three-hour rampage through the German city of Hanover. Uschi escaped from a farm late on Monday and became increasingly violent as she encountered shocked drivers and pedestrians in the city.
A laptop, a mouse and a printer: that’s the complete list of standard equipment for many workstations. There has, however, been a certain trend of late to add more colour to the picture: cup warmers, small ”swan neck” fans and even mesmerising lava lamps have begun to make inroads into the uniformly grey PC desk landscape.
Thousands of plant and animal species are disappearing every month due to the effects of global warming, leading environmentalists say. Data has been compiled by scientists from around the world for the new report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, to be released in Brussels on April 6.
Are newspapers set to become yesterday’s news? Don’t count on it, say editors at some of Europe’s iconic publications. The pressures on the industry — in Europe as in the United States — are prodigious: tumbling circulation and ad revenue, competition from the internet and the proliferation of free papers.
A DNA sample taken from former Tour de France champion Jan Ullrich has been matched to blood bags seized in the Spanish doping scandal, German prosecutors said on Tuesday. Prosecutors said the Ullrich investigation would continue and did not comment on when or if he would be charged with anything.
Differences between the United States and other Group of Eight (G8) industrialised countries were highlighted on the closing day of an environment ministers’ conference in Potsdam near Berlin that ended on Saturday. While no negotiations were conducted in Potsdam, the delegates prepared the ground for the G8 summit in June.
Environment ministers from 13 nations responsible for most of the world’s greenhouse-gas pollution began a two-day meeting near Berlin on Friday, seeking a way forward in the global-warming crisis. The meeting at the Cecilienhof chateau gathers the Group of Eight countries and five major developing nations: Brazil, China, India, Mexico and South Africa.
The European Union must substantially increase financial resources for research on a vaccine against HIV, which causes Aids, leading non-governmental activists say. Ann Katrin Akalin, spokesperson of the German Aids Foundation, says the EU is contributing only 6% of the world’s total public financing for research on a vaccine.
A German court was forced on Monday to postpone the end of a civil case featuring Gustav the ostrich whose owner claims was made impotent by firecrackers thrown into his enclosure. The court in the eastern town of Bautzen had hoped to find an agreement between the owner and three teenagers suspected of throwing the fireworks in 2005.
European travel agencies are ceding a rising share of their business to the internet, as consumers grow accustomed to less personal service but more flexibility. Thirty-six percent of tour operators in the European Union offer online reservations, as well as 40% of package operators and a full 62% of hotels, according to figures compiled by the European Commission.
Airbus plunged into its first-ever operating loss in 2006 and will be in the red again this year, parent company Eads said on Friday in another twist of the crisis at the European plane maker. Analysts at Citigroup investment bank said that prospects for Airbus were now "awful" after management warned about vast cost problems.
Three teenagers may face a hefty fine if a court decides their festive firecrackers outside an eastern German farm scared the libido right out of an ostrich named Gustav. Rico Gabel, a farmer in Lohsa, north-east of Dresden, is claiming â,¬4Â 900 in damages for the alleged antics by the three youths.
Winter failed this year on the lower slopes of Europe’s Alps, prompting fresh orders for electric-powered machines that puff out artificial snow on to the pistes when the weather does not oblige. Higher up the Alps, Europe’s highest mountain chain, there has been natural snow, but the melting of the great glaciers in the past couple of decades tells a clear story.
Exam supervisors at a German university stuck to rules so rigidly that a man with a bladder dysfunction had to urinate in a bottle in front of 120 fellow students because they would not let him go to the toilet. Overseers at the University of Freiburg told the man that he would be failed if he left the room during the exam.
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/ 26 February 2007
Volkswagen (VW), Europe’s biggest car maker, expressed optimism last week about prospects in its current business year after earnings rose sharply last year on cost-cutting and capital gains. "We are expecting a slight increase in deliveries to customers in 2007", VW said in a statement.
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/ 22 February 2007
The head of the Catholic Church in Germany called on his compatriots on Thursday to give up their beloved cars for Lent to make a personal contribution to preventing climate change. Cardinal Karl Lehmann said on Thursday that the period of 40 days before Easter in the Christian calendar ”requires us to rethink our lifestyle”.
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/ 18 February 2007
Covering one of the world’s top film festivals may seem like an enviable assignment, filled with leisurely afternoons spent in plush cinemas and evenings at cocktail parties rubbing elbows with the stars. True, it’s hardly the world’s worst job — but no one believes a word when you explain it’s actually 11 days of hard work.
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/ 12 February 2007
Oscar-winning director Bille August has brought the memoirs of one of Nelson Mandela’s jailers to the screen, with Dennis Haysbert playing the famous prisoner — a part that he said regularly left him in tears. Goodbye Bafana premiered on Sunday at the Berlin Film Festival, where it is competing for the Golden Bear award.