Spanish Banks Mull Merger Under Continued Debt Crisis

Spanish savings banks Ibercaja, Liberbank and Caja3, are mulling a merger to strengthen their balance sheets as Spain’s debt crisis continues to sting the economy. The banks said their boards would meet on Tuesday to vote on the merger. While Caja3 is the result of a three-way merger of regional savings banks, Liberbank emerged after a four-way merger. The Spanish property crash has forced a wave of mergers upon the Spanish banking sector as it seeks to shore itself up against the bad debt mountain. Meanwhile, Investors are worried about the amount of bad loans Spanish banks could be holding and how the government can afford to keep bailing out the struggling financial sector. The Spanish government is requiring its banks to set aside an extra £24 billion to cover bad debts resulting from the collapse of its property sector. To make matters worse, Bank of Spain has predicted that the recession will continue in the second quarter of 2012.The perilous condition of the country’s finances was emphasized by the latest retail sales figures, which were also released on Tuesday by the National Statistics Institute. Spanish retail sales dropped in April, showing the biggest fall since the figures started being collected in 2003. Sales fell 9.8% last month compared with the same month in 2011. The fall was much worse than had been expected, and marked the 22nd consecutive month of declining sales. Sales had fallen by 3.8% in March. Retail sales fell 11.3% in April having dropped 4% in March. Spanish shoppers are struggling because of government austerity measures, rising taxes and Europe’s highest rate of unemployment.

Spain Set For Deeper Slump As Retail Sales Drop

Retail sales drop at fastest pace in more than eight years -- Jan-April budget deficit at 2.4% of GDP due to one-offs -- Central bank warns of second quarter economic contraction -- Ratings agency Egan-Jones cuts Spain to B From BB- MADRID -- Spain's economy showed fresh strain Tuesday as retail sales fell at a record pace in April, showing the government's austerity program is strangling consumption and suggesting deepening recession. Data Tuesday from the National Statistics Institute, or INE, showed seasonally-adjusted retail sales fell 9.8% on the year in April, compared with a 3.8% drop in March. The decline was the sharpest since INE started collecting the data in January 2004. Household spending is dropping as unemployment approaches 25% of the workforce. Spain is in recession, seen by most economists as two consecutive quarters of contraction. The Bank of Spain said in its monthly economic report Tuesday that data point to a second-quarter fall in gross domestic product. The government is caught between the floundering economy and European Union requirements to cut the deficit to 3% of GDP by 2013. State spending had been the one cushion since a property bust in 2008 and drove a brief, temporary recovery up to the fourth quarter. Spanish second-quarter GDP will fall at a "markedly sharper rate" of between 0.7% and 0.9% after declining by 0.3% in the first quarter from the fourth, said Raj Badiani, an analyst at IHS Global Insight. Concerns over Spain's economy and the government's ability to repay debt pushed the yield on the 10-year government bond to as high as 6.49% today. There is speculation the country may follow Portugal, Ireland and Greece to a bail out by international lenders, though it could potentially be covered by existing rescue funds and the International Monetary Fund, said analysts at Societe Generale. There are "worrying signs that European countries are, one by one, crumbling," they wrote in emailed comments. Spanish consumers spent 20% less on personal equipment such as clothes and cosmetic goods in April compared with the same month last year. The four-month fall was 8%, INE said. Spending on household goods such as furniture and washing machines fell an annual 15% and by over 10% in the first four months, INE said. Spain said the central government budget deficit was EUR25.5 billion--or 2.4% of gross domestic product--between January and April, up from 1.9% of GDP in January-March. The increase is due to fund transfers to cash-strapped regional governments and other payments made earlier than usual to give liquidity to the credit-starved economy. That means lower-than-usual transfers later this year and make it easier for the government to bring the budget deficit down to a targeted 5.3% of GDP in 2012 from 8.9% in 2011, Deputy Budget Minister Marta Fernandez Curras said. Less consumer spending cuts into state funds and value-added tax revenue decreased 8.2% in the first four months of the year, compared with the same period of a year ago. Spain has already raised VAT to a main 18% rate; slightly below that of many European countries. Fernandez Curras said the government is not looking to raise that rate as another hike may only depress consumption further. Between January and April, Spain's central government revenue rose by 1.3%, while expenses soared 10.3%, largely the result of the accelerated transfers and higher debt interest payments. The central bank said Tuesday that exports, a chief economic support, decreased 2.3% on an annual basis in March. Ratings firm Egan-Jones cut Spanish sovereign debt to BB- from B today. It was the third downgrade in a month and pushed the country further into junk status. In its cut, Egan-Jones said Spain continues to be weakened by government debt and the shrinking economy. Unemployment is also concerning, it said. Additional bank losses and possible depositor withdrawals from the banking system add to the country's already weak fiscal position, it added. "Spain will inevitably be faced with payments to support a portion its banking sector and for its weaker provinces. Assets of Spain's largest two banks exceed its GDP," wrote Egan-Jones. "We are slipping our rating to "B'; watch for more requests for support from the banks and money creation." Following the decision from Egan-Jones, the euro dipped below $1.25 to touch $1.2470--its lowest level since July 1.

Spain's economy on cliff edge as bank's shares dive

Spanish 10-year borrowing costs neared the 7% danger level and Bankia shares hit record lows yesterday after the government, struggling to sort out its finances, proposed putting sovereign debt into the struggling lender.  Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy pinned the blame for rising borrowing costs - the spread over Germany reached the highest since the euro's launch - on concern about the future of the single currency. He again ruled out seeking outside aid to revive a banking sector laid low by a property boom that has long since bust. "There are major doubts over the eurozone and that makes the risk premium for some countries very high. That's why it would be a very good idea to deliver a clear message there's no going back for the euro," Rajoy said. "There will not be any [European] rescue for the Spanish banking system." He gave no details of bank recapitalisation plans but backed calls for the eurozone bailout fund, which will be in place from July. The government said Spain might shore up Bankia with sovereign bonds in return for shares in the bank and could use this method to prop up other troubled lenders - moves which would push the country's debts above the 79.8% of economic output. The source said the European Central Bank had not been specifically informed of the plans to inject state bonds into Bankia. A final decision had not yet been made on which option to take. Bankia's parent company, BFA, has asked for à19-billion in government help, in addition to à4.5-billion the state has already pumped in to cover possible losses on repossessed property, loans and investments. Investors believe weak banks, undermined by the collapse four years ago of a decade-long property boom, coupled with heavily indebted regions, could force Spain to seek an international bailout, which the eurozone can barely afford. The premium investors require to hold Spanish government bonds over German counterparts hit a euro-era high at 505 basis points, denoting a lack of confidence in Madrid's efforts to stabilise its finances and ailing banks. Having dropped to about 4.7% earlier this year, helped by the ECB's creation of a glut of three-year money, 10-year borrowing costs are now approaching 6.5% and closing in on the 7% level widely seen as unsustainable. Ireland and Portugal were frozen out of capital markets and forced to seek international bailouts soon after their yields topped 7%.

Spain's Beloved Four-Day Weekends Are At Risk

One of the perks of living in Europe is the generous vacation schedule. But the austerity moves across the continent could be changing that, at least in some places. Portugal, for example, recently cut four of its 14 annual holidays. And Spain is shuffling its calendar to shorten extended weekends — something the prime minister says it can no longer afford. The change could mean the loss of a celebrated tradition: the four-day weekend. A Holiday For Bullfighting The paso doble anthem blasts from the iron gates of Madrid's ornate bullring. It's a Tuesday in May, and the people of Madrid are off work yet again. It's a local holiday for the start of the spring bullfighting season. Sangria flows at bars in the bullring's shadow. Most people haven't worked since Friday. It's what Spaniards call a puente — or bridge — weekend. When a holiday falls on a Tuesday, people skip work Monday — the bridge day — to make an extra-long weekend. Some offices close altogether. Even people hit hard by Spain's recession, like Clara de Jorge, who's 23 and unemployed, find ways to celebrate. "I didn't have money to go away, but I still try to enjoy it," she says. "Just staying in the park, going to museums — everything is for free. So that's what I do, because I can't afford going on a trip." But these long weekends are about to get shorter. Later this year, the government plans to move any holidays that fall on a Tuesday or Thursday to Monday — similar to the way Americans celebrate Memorial Day or Labor Day. Four-day weekends will become just three days. Every penny counts. Say it buys you half a billion euros' worth of GDP. I mean, then you don't need to scrape it from education or health care or other expenditures. So that's very nice. - Javier Diaz-Gimenez, a business school professor, on Spain's plan to shorten four-day holiday weekends De Jorge says that's not enough time to visit her family in Valencia. "What we do on the puentes, we have a chance to get the car, get your family and go away for a few days," she says. "But if we have just three days, we're not going to have that chance to go to the country, go to the beach or whatever." Getting On The World's Schedule The Spanish government says the weekend shift is necessary to boost productivity and bring work schedules more in line with the rest of the world. "I can remember working in the banking sector and the problems we had being on the same schedule with other financial centers," says former banker Gayle Allard, now an economist at Madrid's IE Business School. "People were working their traditional day, with the long lunch," she says. "If they could kind of align working hours, drop the idea of the siesta — it actually might even be beneficial to Spaniards to work a more compact day and week." But aside from regular Spaniards who relish their time off, there's also opposition from the Catholic Church. The church bristles at the idea that holidays like the Day of the Blessed Virgin's Immaculate Conception, for example, might be moved. Christmas and Easter would stay put, however. Talks are under way to get Spain's different regions to agree, as well. The country's provinces all have their own holidays. During any given week, at least one Spanish city is on vacation. That's frustrating to outsiders — such as EU leaders in northern Europe, whom Spain is trying to court, says economist Fernando Fernandez. "This is the kind of symbolic change which gives an indication of the degree of reform commitment of the government," he says. "It's one of those things the markets love. They love to see that the government is determined to take unpopular decisions for the good of the nation." 'People Are Used To It' The shorter weekends are likely to save the Spanish government some money — and that couldn't come at a better time, says Javier Diaz-Gimenez, a professor at IESE Business School. "Every penny counts," he says. "Say it buys you half a billion euros' worth of GDP. I mean, then you don't need to scrape it from education or health care or other expenditures. So that's very nice." But back near the bullring, Clara de Jorge says she's not convinced. "We have these traditions, and we can't change that. People are used to it. I don't think that works," she says. But de Jorge, like roughly half of 20-somethings here, is jobless. The government hopes that shorter weekends and wide-ranging labor reforms might — just might — help her and other young Spaniards find work.

Spain Hit By Fears on Banks

Fears about a potentially messy Greek exit from the euro zone washed up on Spain's shores on Monday, pulling local stock prices to lows not seen in eight and a half years as the country's borrowing costs continued to soar. Analysts warned that the ripples of a Greek exit would be stronger in vulnerable economies like Spain's, whose companies, banks and government rely heavily on foreign funding. Those flags came amid ongoing concerns about Spain's public finances and the health of its battered banking sector. On Monday, Moody's Investors Service warned that Spanish banks will remain vulnerable to rising loan delinquencies even after they set aside an additional €30 billion ($39 billion) in provisions against real-estate loan losses. Separately, Fitch Ratings Inc. said any disorderly exit by Greece from the euro would lead to widespread market disruption and severely weaker growth prospects in vulnerable economies such as Spain. On Friday, the Spanish government told banks that they must bolster their provisions to protect themselves against potential losses from loans to real-estate developers that aren't currently considered to be at risk of default. The new provisioning measures come after the government took a 45% stake in Bankia SA, BKIA.MC -8.93% Spain's fourth-largest bank by market value. On Sunday and early Monday, lenders detailed the impact of the new provisioning rules on their earnings. As expected, Bankia is taking the biggest hit, saying it would set aside €4.72 billion to meet the new requirements. Banco Popular Español SA, POP.MC -4.37% which has a balance sheet that is roughly half the size of Bankia, said it would set aside €2.31 billion, but ruled out having to ask for state aid to cover the provision. Following the lenders' disclosures, the country's key IBEX-35 stock market index fell 2.7%, hitting lows not seen since October 2003. Spain also paid higher interest rates when it sold Treasury bills Monday, a bad omen ahead of a longer-dated bond offering Thursday. After the auction, the yield on Spanish 10-year sovereign bonds rose to its highest level since November, settling at 6.24%, a level that many analysts see as unsustainable. Spain's latest effort to shore up its banks is its fourth in three years. While the added provisions will improve the capacity of banks to absorb losses, the institutions remain vulnerable to the country's economic recession and continuing real-estate crisis, Moody's said Monday. "We expect problem loans and loan losses to grow further, including in loan categories such as residential mortgages, loans to small and midsize enterprises and consumer finance," senior analysts Alberto Postigo and Tobias Moerschen wrote in Moody's weekly credit outlook. Spain's latest bank plan has some of the same problems as the previous three, namely that it doesn't address all the problems in the sector and that the amount of public support is lower than many believe is needed, economists said. The latest plan "has left many questions unanswered, and is unlikely to be sufficient to assuage investor concerns towards the health of the financial system and its impact on Spanish growth and the government's fiscal accounts," said Guy Mandy, an interest rate strategist at Nomura International. Moody's said that a recession in Spain will lead to deeper losses in segments such as residential mortgages, loans to small and mid-size enterprises and consumer finance. None of these areas were covered in Spain's latest bank-sector overhaul. The credit-ratings firm expects Spain will need to inject some €50 billion into the sector, compared with a government estimate of €15 billion in fresh support. "This will likely further increase Spain's already elevated public debt burden," Moody's wrote Monday.

complaint was filed May 8, against Carlos Divar, President of the Supreme Court of Spain, on the grounds of having paid out of public funds, luxury travel.

The daily El Mundo and El Pais, in their editions of Wednesday, May 9, 2012, reveal that a complaint was filed May 8, against Carlos Divar, President of the Supreme Court of Spain, on the grounds of having paid out of public funds, luxury travel.

 

 

The representative of the Higher Judicial Council, Jose Manuel Gomez Benitez, filed a complaint with the Attorney General's office against the President of the Supreme Court, Carlos Divar, for alleged embezzlement.

 

The newspapers El Mundo and El Pais unveiled, in their editions Wednesday that the complaint was filed on May 8 The President of the Supreme Court of Spain, Carlos Divar, very close to a conservative Partido Socialista Obrero Español, is believed to have settled out of public funds, the costs of its luxury travel, the weekend, for a worth around 16,000 euros.

 

Indeed, according to Gomez Benitez, a professor of criminal law, the travel, trips, destination Marbella and Malaga, southern Spain, from Friday evening to Monday morning, have no connection with the activities assigned to the position Chief Justice conferred, Carlos Divas, the title of President of the Supreme Court.

 

Aside from these trips, between September 2010 and November 2011, in the words of the complaint, Corlos Divar was accompanied by bodyguards whose expenses totaled more than 20,000 euros.

 

The representative of the Higher Judicial Council, Jose Manuel Gomez Benitez said, moreover, that in the body of his complaint to the Attorney General, Eduardo Torres Dulce, there is specified that President Carlos Divar '  lives in Madrid and that it has no domicile in Marbella or Malaga "and"  it does not appear in the official records of activity that could motivate them, that the activities for which the President of the Supreme Court is suspected of embezzlement suspected, all took place on weekends and holidays,  "

 

It has also specify that the complaint filed in the office of the Attorney General "  only covers six travel destination Malaga which would have generated at least 36,000 euros for wrongful payments  ", and do not report, further investigation is needed to support a second complaint of many trips, always performed on weekends or holidays, destination Marbella, between September 2008 and September 2010, and after November 2011.

 

It is finally noted that the Supreme Court refuses to provide documents, relating to the case of alleged misappropriation of funds, to the Attorney General of State because, if the allegations are true, they constitute a crime that goes into the jurisdiction of the Second Chamber of the Supreme Court qualified to investigate a complaint lodged against the President and the Chief of the Supreme Court and the Supreme Judicial Council against .

Brink's Mat the reason that Great Train Robber was shot dead in Marbella

The Brink’s-Mat curse even touched on the Great Train Robbery gang of 1963. One of them, Charlie Wilson, found himself in trouble when £3 million of Brink’s-Mat investors’ money went missing in a drug deal. In April 1990, he paid the price when a young British hood knocked on the front door of his hacienda north of Marbella and shot Wilson and his pet husky dog before coolly riding off down the hill on a yellow bicycle.

British tourist falls to her death from hotel balcony in Magalluf

23 year old British tourist has fallen to her death from the third floor balcony of her hotel in Magalluf, Mallorca. Emergency sources said it happened at 4.25am Saturday morning at the Hotel Teix in Calle Pinada. Local police and emergency health services went to scene. After 20 minutes of an attempt to re-animate her heart, the woman was pronounced dead. Online descriptions for the Hotel say it is the best place to stay of you are looking for non-stop partying, adding it not suitable for families.

Four of the last reporters and photographers willing to cover crime stories have been slain in less than a week in violence-torn Veracruz state

Four of the last reporters and photographers willing to cover crime stories have been slain in less than a week in violence-torn Veracruz state, where two Mexican drug cartels are warring over control of smuggling routes and targeting sources of independent information. The brutal campaign is bleeding the media and threatening to turn Veracruz into the latest state in Mexico where fear snuffs out reporting on the drug war. Three photojournalists who worked the perilous crime beat in the port city of Veracruz were found dismembered and dumped in plastic bags in a canal Thursday, less than a week after a reporter for an investigative newsmagazine was beaten and strangled in her home in the state capital of Xalapa. Press freedom groups said all three photographers had temporarily fled the state after receiving threats last year. The organizations called for immediate government action to halt a wave of attacks that has killed at least seven current and former reporters and photographers in Veracruz over the last 18 months. Like most of those, the men found Thursday were among the few journalists left working on crime-related stories in the state. Threats and killings have spawned an atmosphere of terror and self-censorship, and most local media are too intimidated to report on drug-related violence. Social media and blogs are often the only outlets reporting on serious crime. Veracruz isn't the only battleground for Mexican media. In at least three northeastern states, journalists are under siege from assailants throwing grenades inside newsrooms and gunmen firing into newspaper and TV station buildings. In the state of Tamaulipas, on the border with Texas, local media stopped covering drug trafficking violence, mentioning drug cartels or reporting on organized crime shortly after two gangs began fighting for control of Nuevo Laredo in 2004. As part of that war, reporters were targeted to keep them silent or because they had links to gangs. Mexico has become one of the world's most dangerous countries for journalists in recent years, amid a government offensive against drug cartels and fighting among gangs that have brought tens of thousands of deaths, kidnappings and extortion cases. Prosecutions in journalist killings are almost nonxistent, although that is widely true of all homicides and other serious crimes in Mexico. The latest killings came in Boca del Rio, a town near the port city of Veracruz where police found the bodies. The victims bore signs of torture and had been dismembered, the state prosecutors' office said. One victim was identified as Guillermo Luna Varela, a crime-news photographer for the website http://www.veracruznews.com.mx who was last seen by local reporters covering a car accident Wednesday afternoon. According to a fellow journalist, who insisted on speaking anonymously out of fear, Luna was in his 20s and had begun his career working for the local newspaper Notiver. The journalist said Luna was the nephew of another of the men found dead, Gabriel Huge. Huge was in his early 30s and worked as a photojournalist for Notiver until last summer, when he fled the state soon after two of the paper's reporters were slain in still-unsolved killings. He had returned to the state to work as a reporter, but it was not immediately clear what kind of stories he was covering recently. State officials said the third victim was Esteban Rodriguez, who was a photographer for the local newspaper AZ until last summer, when he too quit and fled the state. He later came back, but took up work as a welder. The London-based press freedom group Article 19 said he, like the other two, had been a crime photographer. The fourth victim was Luna's girlfriend, Irasema Becerra, state prosecutors said. Article 19 said in a report last year that Luna, Varela and Rodriguez were among 13 Veracruz journalists who had fled their homes because of crime-related threats and official unwillingness to protect them or investigate the danger. The Committee to Protect Journalists said in 2008 that Huge had been detained and beaten by federal police as he tried to cover a fatal auto accident involving officers. Last June, Miguel Angel Lopez Velasco, a columnist and editorial director for Notiver, was shot to death in Veracruz along with his wife and one of his children. Authorities that month also found the body of journalist Noel Lopez buried in a clandestine grave in the town of Chinameca. Lopez, who disappeared three months earlier, had worked for the weeklies Horizonte and Noticias de Acayucan and for the daily newspaper La Verdad. The following month, Yolanda Ordaz de la Cruz, a police reporter for Notiver, was found with her throat cut in the state. Lopez was found after a suspect in another case confessed to killing him, but the other two murders have not been resolved. The cartel war in Veracruz reached a bloody peak in September when 35 bodies were dumped on a main highway in rush-hour traffic. Local law enforcement in the state was considered so corrupt and infiltrated by the Zetas and other gangs that Mexico's federal government fired 800 officers and 300 administrative personnel in the city of Veracruz-Boca del Rio in December and sent in about 800 marines to patrol. Mike O'Connor, the Committee to Protect Journalists' representative for Mexico, said journalists in Veracruz were exercising an unusual degree of self-censorship even before Ordaz and Lopez were killed. He said media avoided much coverage of crime and corruption. "Important news was not covered because it might upset the Zetas. Then these guys were killed and self-censorship cracked down even more," O'Connor said. "Almost all of the police beat reporters left town after those killings." Regina Martinez, a correspondent for the national magazine Proceso, continued to cover crime-related stories along with a handful of other journalists, however. On Saturday, authorities went to her home in Xalapa, the state capital, after a neighbor reported it to be suspiciously quiet. They found the reporter dead in her bathroom with signs she had been beaten and strangled. "Self-censorship was extraordinarily strong but whoever killed these journalists wanted more," O'Connor said. "It still wasn't enough to satisfy whoever killed these journalists." Mexico's human rights commission says 74 media workers were slain from 2000 to 2011. The Committee to Protect Journalists says 51 were killed in that time. It noted in a statement on the Mexico killings that Thursday was World Press Freedom Day.

Greek far-right parties could end up with as much as 20 percent of the vote in Sunday's elections. The neo-Nazi Golden Dawn party has intensified the xenophobic atmosphere in the country.

At night, the streets leading to Omonoia Square are empty. That wasn't always the case. The area was the premier multicultural neighborhood of Athens and one of the first quarters to be gentrified. Jazz bars and Indian restaurants lined the streets, separated by the occasional rooms-by-the-hour hotel. It was a quarter full of immigrants, drug addicts and African prostitutes, but also of journalists, ambitious young artists and teenagers from private schools. Today, the immigrants stay home once night falls. They are afraid of groups belonging to the "angry citizens," a kind of militia that beats up foreigners and claims to help the elderly withdraw money from cash machines without being robbed. Such groups are the product of an initiative started by the neo-Nazi Chrysi Avgi -- Golden Dawn -- the party which has perpetrated pogroms in Agios Panteleimon, another Athens neighborhood with a large immigrant population. There are now three outwardly xenophobic parties in Greece. According to recent surveys, together they could garner up to 20 percent of the vote in elections on Sunday: the anti-Semitic party LAOS stands to win 4 percent; the nationalist party Independent Greeks -- a splinter group of the conservative Nea Dimokratia party -- is forecast to win 11 percent; and the right extremists of Golden Dawn could end up with between 5 and 7 percent. My name is Xenia, the hospitable. Greece itself should really be called Xenia: Tourism, emigration and immigration are important elements of our history. But hospitality is no longer a priority in our country, a fact which the ugly presence of Golden Dawn makes clear. A Personal Attack Shaved heads, military uniforms, Nazi chants, Hitler greetings: How should a Greek journalist deal with such people? Should one just ignore them and leave them unmentioned? Should one denounce them and demand that they be banned? One shouldn't forget that they are violent and have perpetrated several attacks against foreigners and leftists. I thought long and hard about how to write about Golden Dawn so that my article was in no way beneficial to the party. On April 12, the daily Kathimerini ran my story under the headline "Banality of Evil." In the piece, I carefully explained why it was impossible to carry on a dialogue with such people and why I thought the neo-Nazi party should disappear from media coverage and be banned. Five days later, an anonymous reply to my article appeared on the Golden Dawn website. It was a 2,500-word-long personal attack in which the fascists recounted my entire career, mocked my alleged foreign roots (I was born in Hamburg) and even, for no apparent reason, mentioned my 13-year-old daughter. The unnamed authors indirectly threatened me as well: "To put it in the mother tongue of foreign Xenia: 'Kommt Zeit, kommt Rat, kommt Attentat!'" In other words, watch your back. Most Greeks believe that Golden Dawn has connections to both the police and to the country's secret service. Nevertheless, I went to the authorities to ask what I should do. I was told that I should be careful. They told me that party thugs could harass me, beat me or terrorize me over the phone. It would be better, they said, if I stopped writing about them. If I wished to react to the threats, they suggested I file a complaint against Golden Dawn's service provider. That, however, would be difficult given that the domain is based somewhere in the United States. Like Weimar Germany A friend told me that I should avoid wearing headphones on the street so that I can hear what is going on around me. My daughter now has nightmares about being confronted by members of Golden Dawn. Three of her classmates belong to the party. The three boys have posted pictures of party events on their Facebook pages. For their profile image, they have chosen the ancient Greek Meandros symbol, which, in the red-on-black manifestation used by Golden Dawn, resembles a swastika. The group's slogans include "Foreigners Out!" and "The Garbage Should Leave the Country!" The fact that immigration has become such an issue in the worst year of the ongoing economic crisis in the country can be blamed on the two parties in government. The Socialist PASOK and the conservative Nea Dimokratia (New Democracy, or ND) are running xenophobic campaigns. ND has said it intends to repeal a law which grants Greek citizenship to children born in Greece to immigrant parents. And cabinet member Michalis Chrysochoidis, of PASOK, has announced "clean up operations" whereby illegal immigrants are to be rounded up in encampments and then deported. When he recently took a stroll through the center of Athens to collect accolades for his commitment to the cause, some called out to him: "Golden Dawn has cleaned up Athens!" Yet, Chrysochoidis is the best loved PASOK politician in his Athens district, in part because of his xenophobic sentiments. His party comrade, Health Minister Andreas Loverdos, is just as popular. Loverdos has warned Greek men not to sleep with foreign prostitutes for fear of contracting HIV and thus endangering the Greek family. High unemployment of roughly 22 percent, a lack of hope, a tendency toward violence and the search for scapegoats: Analyses in the Greek press compare today's Greece with Germany at the end of the Weimar Republic. "We didn't know," said many Germans when confronted with the truth of the Holocaust after Nazi rule came to an end. After elections on May 6, no Greeks should be able to make the same claim.

Locked Up Abroad is different.

Reality TV is, at its core, about letting viewers revel in the bad decision-making of others: those who speak without thinking, who backstab, who have sex without condoms, who cheat. Frustratingly, though, reality shows—to which I am unapologetically addicted—tend to reward bad behavior, by giving its villains notoriety, spinoffs, opportunities to endorse weight-loss products, a nice sideline in paid interviews with supermarket tabloids, and other D-list rewards.

Locked Up Abroad is different. The National Geographic show, the sixth season of which premiered last week, gives its stars something they wouldn’t get on other reality shows: their comeuppance.

Having debuted in the U.K. (under the title Banged Up Abroad), Locked Up Abroad showcases one person (sometimes a couple) who ends up in prison overseas. Participants fit into one of two categories. The first group are the (largely) innocent: the married missionary couple who were kidnapped in the Philippines by the Islamist group Abu Sayyaf, for instance, or the seemingly goodhearted duo who wanted to help children in Chechnya, but ended up held hostage. These tales of the altruistic and naive can be difficult to watch.

But then there are those who rather deserve what happens to them. Typically these are drug smugglers, and their episodes follow a familiar arc. A young person—they’re almost always young—is bored or in need of cash (usually both). She is desperate or feels invincible (usually both). Someone approaches her and offers a seemingly great deal: an all-expenses-paid, luxurious overseas trip in exchange for a small favor. Sometimes the would-be employer is upfront and admits he needs a drug mule, but downplays the risk; other times, he hints at harmless-sounding illegalities, like bringing back legal goods to beat the export tax. In a few cases, the cover story is painfully thin: Come with me to check out this cool new nail polish technology only available in Thailand, for example. (That woman was in a vulnerable place: She had just been released on bail after killing her partner’s former husband—in self-defense, she claimed.)

The drug smugglers are caught, of course, usually at the airport, and brought to prison. And while a few episodes have taken place in developed countries—Spain, Japan, South Korea—the majority of our anti-heroes end up incarcerated in places with some of the dirtiest and most dangerous penitentiaries in the world.

Take last week’s episode, “From Hollywood to Hell.” (And pardon my spoilers, but this installment is too good not to describe in detail.) In 2001, actor Erik Aude was living the marginal Hollywood dream. An ür-bro, he had played bit parts in Dude, Where’s My Car?(credited as “Musclehead”) and 7^th Heaven (“Boyfriend”) when a gym buddy asked him to go to Turkey to bring back “leather goods.” Aude makes the trip, and though a drug-sniffing dog alerts authorities at the Turkish airport, they find nothing—so Aude feels sure the whole thing is legit. He even recommends that one of his brothers start couriering for his friend. Then, when his brother backs out of a planned trip to Pakistan in 2002, Aude steps in, and shit gets real.

It is difficult to feel sorry for Aude. After his escort dumps him in an Islamabad hotel and warns him not to leave because the area is unsafe for Americans, he doesn’t head to the embassy or the airport. Instead, he goes jogging—and even tries to flirt with girls in headscarves on the street (with disastrous results). And when he is taken to the airport with just one suitcase, he is (he claims) not the least bit suspicious that he might be a drug mule. When a customs official asks him whether his trip was for business or pleasure, he cheeses, “Pleasure is my business.”

Aude’s episode is mind-bogglingly watchable, not least because he—of course!—plays himself in the re-enactment. In his telling, he was a virtual action star: On at least three occasions, he single-handedly fights back dozens of Pakistanis. After he takes out a prison bully, he is hailed a hero. He rejects a reduced sentence because it would require him to plead guilty—and his pride is more valuable than his freedom, he says.

Aside from those truly in the wrong place at the wrong time, the most sympathetic characters of Locked Up Abroad may be the embassy employees called in to assist the suspected smugglers. Inevitably, Locked Up Abroad participants are horrified that the embassies of their homelands—usually English-speaking countries like the U.S., the U.K., or Australia—can’t do more for them. I can just imagine U.S. Embassy workers calling “not it” every time they get word from local authorities about some young American knucklehead who thought he could sneak past security with a bag full of cocaine.

Tonight’s episode is called “The Juggler Smuggler,” and its “hero” is Mark Greening, a “party-loving” drug-runner who knows his latest trip is “doomed” when he doesn’t get his fortune told by “his favorite Gypsy woman.” I can’t wait.

Low fare airline bmibaby to close

Low fare carrier bmibaby is set to close later this year, threatening the loss of hundreds of jobs and the ending of its flights. The carrier transferred to International Airlines Group, the owners of British Airways, last month, but consultations have now started with unions about its closure in September. The GMB union said it was "devastating" news, especially for the East Midlands, where hundreds of jobs are now threatened with the axe. With bmi Regional, bmibaby transferred to International Airlines Group ownership on completion of the purchase from Lufthansa. IAG has consistently said that bmibaby and bmi Regional are not part of its long-term plans. A statement said: "Progress has been made with a potential buyer for bmi Regional, but so far this has not been possible for bmibaby, despite attempts over many months by both Lufthansa and IAG. Bmibaby has therefore started consultation to look at future options including, subject to that consultation, a proposal to close in September this year." Peter Simpson, bmi interim managing director, said: "We recognise that these are unsettling times for bmibaby employees, who have worked tirelessly during a long period of uncertainty. Bmibaby has delivered high levels of operational performance and customer service, but has continued to struggle financially, losing more than £100 million in the last four years. In the consultation process, we will need to be realistic about our options. "To help stem losses as quickly as possible and as a preliminary measure, we will be making reductions to bmibaby's flying programme from June. We sincerely apologise to all customers affected and will be providing full refunds and doing all we can with other airlines to mitigate the impact of these changes." Jim McAuslan, general secretary of the pilots' union Balpa, said: "This is bad news for jobs. Bmibaby pilots are disappointed and frustrated that, even though there appears to be potential buyers, we are prevented from speaking with them to explore how we can contribute to developing a successful business plan. "The frustration has now turned to anger following the news that Flybe (which is part owned by BA) has moved onto many of these bmibaby routes without any opportunity for staff to look at options and alternatives. Balpa's priority is to protect jobs; and we will use whatever means we can to do so." The changes mean that all bmibaby flights to and from Belfast will cease from June 11, although this will not affect bmi mainline's services to London Heathrow. Bmibaby services from East Midlands to Amsterdam, Paris, Geneva, Nice, Edinburgh, Glasgow and Newquay, and from Birmingham to Knock and Amsterdam, will end on the same date.

Reopen Madeleine case, police urge

Scotland Yard has urged Portuguese authorities to reopen the search for Madeleine McCann as detectives said there are 195 potential leads to finding her alive. The detective leading the Metropolitan Police review said the case can still be solved before officers released a picture of what she might now look like as a nine-year-old. Detective Chief Inspector Andy Redwood said he believes her disappearance was a stranger abduction, as he said there are 195 "investigative opportunities". Police refused to say what evidence they had uncovered to suggest Madeleine is alive. Mr Redwood confirmed that his team of more than 30 officers involved in the case had been out to Portugal seven times, including a visit to the family's holiday flat in Praia da Luz. It will be five years ago next week since the three-year-old went missing as her parents, Kate and Gerry McCann, dined with friends nearby. A spokesman for the McCanns said the family was pleased with the image. Mr Redwood said his 37 officers had dealt with 40,000 pieces of information but the "primacy still sits in Portugal" in the attempt to find her. Commander Simon Foy said: "Most significantly, the message we want to bring to you is that, on the evidence, there is a possibility that she is alive and we desperately need your help today to appeal directly to the public for information to support our investigation." Mr Redwood said "evidence that she is alive stems from the forensic view of the timeline" that there was the opportunity for her to be taken. Investigations show "there do appear to be gaps", he added. Detectives in Portugal are also understood to want the case reopened but must gain judicial approval via the courts.

Insecure websites to be named and shamed after checks

Companies that do not do enough to keep their websites secure are to be named and shamed to help improve security. The list of good and bad sites will be published regularly by the non-profit Trustworthy Internet Movement (TIM). A survey carried out to launch the group found that more than 52% of sites tested were using versions of security protocols known to be compromised. The group will test websites to see how well they have implemented basic security software. Security fundamentals The group has been set up by security experts and entrepreneurs frustrated by the slow pace of improvements in online safety. "We want to stimulate some initiatives and get something done," said TIM's founder Philippe Courtot, serial entrepreneur and chief executive of security firm Qualys. He has bankrolled the group with his own money. TIM has initially focused on a widely used technology known as the Secure Sockets Layer (SSL). Experts recruited to help with the initiative include SSL's inventor Dr Taher Elgamal; "white hat" hacker Moxie Marlinspike who has written extensively about attacking the protocol; and Michael Barrett, chief security officer at Paypal. Continue reading the main story “ Start Quote Everyone is now going to be able to see who has a good grade and who has a bad grade” Philippe Courtot Many websites use SSL to encrypt communications between them and their users. It is used to protect credit card numbers and other valuable data as it travels across the web. "SSL is one of the fundamental parts of the internet," said Mr Courtot. "It's what makes it trustworthy and right now it's not as secure as you think." Compromised certificates TIM plans a two-pronged attack on SSL. The first part would be to run automated tools against websites to test how well they had implemented SSL, said Mr Courtot. "We'll be making it public," he added. "Everyone is now going to be able to see who has a good grade and who has a bad grade." Early tests suggest that about 52% of sites checked ran a version of SSL known to be compromised. Companies who have done a bad job will be encouraged to improve and upgrade their implementations so it gets safer to use those sites. The second part of the initiative concerns the running of the bodies, known as certificate authorities, which guarantee that a website is what it claims to be. TIM said it would work with governments, industry bodies and companies to check that CAs are well run and had not been compromised. "It's a much more complex problem," said Mr Courtot. In 2011, two certificate authorities, DigiNotar and GlobalSign were found to have been compromised. In some cases this meant attackers eavesdropped on what should have been a secure communications channel. Steve Durbin, global vice president of the Information Security Forum which represents security specialists working in large corporations, said many of its members took responsibility for making sure sites were secure. "You cannot just say 'buyer beware'," he said. "That's not good enough anymore. They have a real a duty of care." He said corporations were also increasingly conscious of their reputation for providing safe and secure services to customers. Data breaches, hack attacks and poor security were all likely to hit share prices and could mean they lose customers, he noted.

Anti-depressants likely do more harm than good, study suggests

Commonly prescribed anti-depressants appear to be doing patients more harm than good, say researchers who have published a paper examining the impact of the medications on the entire body. See Also: Health & Medicine Pharmacology Birth Defects Mental Health Research Mind & Brain Depression Disorders and Syndromes Psychiatry Reference COX-2 inhibitor Psychoactive drug Seasonal affective disorder Anti-obesity drug "We need to be much more cautious about the widespread use of these drugs," says Paul Andrews, an evolutionary biologist at McMaster University and lead author of the article, published recently in the online journal Frontiers in Psychology. "It's important because millions of people are prescribed anti-depressants each year, and the conventional wisdom about these drugs is that they're safe and effective." Andrews and his colleagues examined previous patient studies into the effects of anti-depressants and determined that the benefits of most anti-depressants, even taken at their best, compare poorly to the risks, which include premature death in elderly patients. Anti-depressants are designed to relieve the symptoms of depression by increasing the levels of serotonin in the brain, where it regulates mood. The vast majority of serotonin that the body produces, though, is used for other purposes, including digestion, forming blood clots at wound sites, reproduction and development. What the researchers found is that anti-depressants have negative health effects on all processes normally regulated by serotonin. The findings include these elevated risks: developmental problems in infants problems with sexual stimulation and function and sperm development in adults digestive problems such as diarrhea, constipation, indigestion and bloating abnormal bleeding and stroke in the elderly The authors reviewed three recent studies showing that elderly anti-depressant users are more likely to die than non-users, even after taking other important variables into account. The higher death rates indicate that the overall effect of these drugs on the body is more harmful than beneficial. "Serotonin is an ancient chemical. It's intimately regulating many different processes, and when you interfere with these things you can expect, from an evolutionary perspective, that it's going to cause some harm," Andrews says. Millions of people are prescribed anti-depressants every year, and while the conclusions may seem surprising, Andrews says much of the evidence has long been apparent and available. "The thing that's been missing in the debates about anti-depressants is an overall assessment of all these negative effects relative to their potential beneficial effects," he says. "Most of this evidence has been out there for years and nobody has been looking at this basic issue." In previous research, Andrews and his colleagues had questioned the effectiveness of anti-depressants even for their prescribed function, finding that patients were more likely to suffer relapse after going off their medications as their brains worked to re-establish equilibrium. With even the intended function of anti-depressants in question, Andrews says it is important to look critically at their continuing use. "It could change the way we think about such major pharmaceutical drugs," he says. "You've got a minimal benefit, a laundry list of negative effects -- some small, some rare and some not so rare. The issue is: does the list of negative effects outweigh the minimal benefit?"

Madeleine McCann, the British girl who went missing while on holiday in Portugal half a decade ago, could still be alive, Scotland Yard said on Wednesday.

Madeleine McCann as she might look aged 9  Photo: Teri Blythe

Detectives released a new “age progression” image of the toddler, which they said showed what she would look like today at the age of nine.

On Wednesday, Britain’s biggest police force said that as a result of evidence uncovered during a review “they now believe there is a possibility Madeleine is still alive”.

Officers have so far identified nearly 200 new items for investigation within historic material and are also “developing what they believe to be genuinely new material”.

Scotland Yard urged Portuguese authorities to reopen the search for her amid the new "investigative opportunities".

Police said the image, created ahead of what would have been her ninth birthday on May 12, had been created in “close collaboration with the family”.

Dengue Fever Asian Mosquito Could Invade UK

The mosquito can carry dengue and chikungunya viruses

 

A mosquito that spreads tropical diseases including dengue fever may be poised to invade the UK because of climate change.

The Asian tiger mosquito has already been reported in France and Belgium and could be migrating north as winters become warmer and wetter.

Scientists have urged "wide surveillance" for the biting insect across countries of central and northern Europe, including the UK.

The mosquito can carry dengue and chikungunya viruses, both of which cause high fevers. The infections usually occur in tropical regions of Africa, Asia and South America.

Scientists led by Dr Samantha Martin, from the University of Liverpool, used climate models to predict how changing conditions might affect Asian tiger mosquito distribution.

They wrote in the Journal of the Royal Society Interface: "Mosquito climate suitability has significantly increased over the southern UK, northern France, the Benelux, parts of Germany, Italy, Sicily and the Balkan countries."

The research shows that parts of the UK could become hot-spots of Asian tiger mosquito activity between 2030 and 2050.

The mosquito has been introduced into Europe from Asia via goods shipments, mainly used tyres and bamboo.

Climate change is now shifting conditions suitable for the insect from southern Europe to central north-western areas.

The mosquito could survive in water butts and vases, and may find winter protection in greenhouses, said the researchers.

Spanish real estate boom was one of the headiest ever. Spurred by record-low interest rates, Spaniards piled into holiday villas

 Spanish real estate boom was one of the headiest ever. Spurred by record-low interest rates, Spaniards piled into holiday villas along the Costa Blanca, gaudy apartments in Madrid and millions of starter homes throughout the country. Enlarge This Image Carlos Luján for the International Herald Tribune Marta Afuera Pons is juggling two mortgages — one on her house, another on an investment property that went sour — and is about 350,000 euros in debt. She is trying to persuade her lender, the savings banks BMN, to take back the mortgage and the property. But since the frenzy drove Spanish home prices to a peak in 2007, they have fallen by at least one-fourth, and the bottom seems nowhere in sight. As Spain endures its second recession in three years and unemployment nears 25 percent, an increasing number of debt-heavy Spaniards can no longer meet monthly payments on the mortgages that their banks were all too eager to give. With a rising portion of Spain’s 663 billion euros, or $876 billion, in home mortgages at risk of default, many economists say it is only a matter of time before some of Spain’s biggest banks will need a bailout. And the Spanish government, staggering under its own debt and budget deficit burdens, may not have the money to come to the rescue. The implications of all this for the rest of Europe were a prime topic at last weekend’s meetings of the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank in Washington. The big fear is that the European Union will need to step in with a Spanish bailout — one much bigger than any of those already extended to Ireland, Greece and Portugal. “Retail mortgages are set to become the Achilles’ heel of the Spanish banking system,” said Edward Hugh, a Barcelona-based economist and blogger who has closely studied the issue. Two years ago, when Ireland’s banks succumbed to a real estate bust, the Irish government’s rescue effort eventually forced it to take 80 billion euros from the European Union and I.M.F. Analysts say that a similar rescue for Spain would cost at least 200 billion euros, or $264 billion — nearly double the 110 billion euros given to Greece, whose debt travails had long raised the question of which European economy might be next to require a rescue. Last week, the Spanish central bank reported that the nation’s nonperforming loans had hit the highest level since 1994. And while the government’s official estimate of mortgages going unpaid is only 3 percent, Mr. Hugh and other economists say the actual numbers are probably much higher — in double digits for some lenders. There is no doubt that the number of new home mortgages has fallen off sharply in Spain. The number of mortgages signed in February were down by 46 percent from a year earlier — the biggest drop since such data was first published in 2004, Spain’s national statistics institute said Tuesday. The real estate boom, while it lasted, gave Spain the world’s highest rate of homeownership — with more than 8 of every 10 Spanish households owning the places they lived. But lenders are now depending on people like Marta Afuera Pons, who is juggling two mortgages — one on her house, another on an investment property that went sour — and is about 350,000 euros in debt. In late 2010, Ms. Afuera Pons, who had just lost her job as a social security administrator, stopped making payments on the mortgage of 132,000 euros that she and the man she lived with had taken out for their home in Tordera, near Barcelona. Separately, they still owe 185,000 euros to the same bank after receiving further financing in 2007 to buy a house that was never built, because the developer went bankrupt a year later. Like many Spaniards, Ms. Afuera Pons is hitting the two-year limit for receiving unemployment benefits. This month, she will receive her last 1,100-euro unemployment check. Finding no buyers for her Tordera house, Ms. Afuera Pons says she is trying to persuade her lender, the savings banks BMN, to take back the mortgage and the property. She would then probably move in with her mother, because her partner left last summer for Brazil and is now married there. Ms. Afuera Pons says she accepts blame for her financial disaster but considers her lender, BMN, the enabler. She has joined an association of mortgage holders that has been staging demonstrations to demand relief. “It’s now easy to say that wanting this new house was a risky investment, but the bank fully supported this idea,” she said. “Everybody lost any sense of caution, starting with the banks.”

Women visit lonely rural town in central Spain to try to ease its bride shortage

 Country boy, meet city girl. Inspired by a Hollywood western, a Spanish dating association is trying to slow a population drain from the country’s beleaguered central villages, introducing bachelors to women bussed in from the big city of Madrid with hopes of ending a bride shortage. 0 Comments Weigh InCorrections? Personal Post Candeleda, a town of 6,000 on the banks of the picturesque Lobera River, hosted a weekend fiesta to welcome 68 women for a meet-and-greet with the village’s single men. Ancient cave paintings show Candeleda has been inhabited for some 5,000 years, and resident Jose Miguel, 67, said he would hate to see its population dwindle after such a long history. “I’ve checked out the few widows and single women here,” said Miguel. “I signed up for this to meet new ladies and to hopefully show them the beauty of my town.” The group, Asocamu, was set up in 1995 to promote rural re-population by organizing parties for single men and woman, but Spain’s painful financial crisis and the lure of city jobs has made the need more pressing than ever, Manuel Gozalo, one of the organizers, said Sunday. Many villages are falling into ruin, with national statistics showing that of Spain’s 5,000 villages up to 100 are under imminent threat of abandonment. Large swathes of central and northern Spain are at risk of depopulation. In the small agricultural communities of Spain’s central plain single, male residents were finding the loneliness too tough to endure, Gozalo said. Asocamu credits as its inspiration the 1951 film “Westward the Women,” starring Robert Taylor and Denise Darcel, which tells the story of how the American west was populated by organizing wagon trains of women to provide company, and brides, for lonely pioneers. In the red-roofed village of Candeleda, men and women danced, flirted — and considered their prospects. Blanca Fernandez, 52, works in sales in Madrid and was attracted by the idea of a nice day out and a chance for romance. “I know it’s difficult to find the love of one’s life, but some of these meetings have led to marriages,” she said.

Women visit lonely rural town in central Spain to try to ease its bride shortage

 Country boy, meet city girl. Inspired by a Hollywood western, a Spanish dating association is trying to slow a population drain from the country’s beleaguered central villages, introducing bachelors to women bussed in from the big city of Madrid with hopes of ending a bride shortage. 0 Comments Weigh InCorrections? Personal Post Candeleda, a town of 6,000 on the banks of the picturesque Lobera River, hosted a weekend fiesta to welcome 68 women for a meet-and-greet with the village’s single men. Ancient cave paintings show Candeleda has been inhabited for some 5,000 years, and resident Jose Miguel, 67, said he would hate to see its population dwindle after such a long history. “I’ve checked out the few widows and single women here,” said Miguel. “I signed up for this to meet new ladies and to hopefully show them the beauty of my town.” The group, Asocamu, was set up in 1995 to promote rural re-population by organizing parties for single men and woman, but Spain’s painful financial crisis and the lure of city jobs has made the need more pressing than ever, Manuel Gozalo, one of the organizers, said Sunday. Many villages are falling into ruin, with national statistics showing that of Spain’s 5,000 villages up to 100 are under imminent threat of abandonment. Large swathes of central and northern Spain are at risk of depopulation. In the small agricultural communities of Spain’s central plain single, male residents were finding the loneliness too tough to endure, Gozalo said. Asocamu credits as its inspiration the 1951 film “Westward the Women,” starring Robert Taylor and Denise Darcel, which tells the story of how the American west was populated by organizing wagon trains of women to provide company, and brides, for lonely pioneers. In the red-roofed village of Candeleda, men and women danced, flirted — and considered their prospects. Blanca Fernandez, 52, works in sales in Madrid and was attracted by the idea of a nice day out and a chance for romance. “I know it’s difficult to find the love of one’s life, but some of these meetings have led to marriages,” she said.