Euro Weekly News | City debts mount in Malaga | Costa del Sol | News

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Euro Weekly News | City debts mount in Malaga | Costa del Sol | News: "MALAGA City is the provincial capital which is most indebted to banks in Andalucia, and the fifth in Spain according government data. Malaga Council owes a total of 719.7 million euros, 16.4 per cent more than in 2008. It is followed by the city of Sevilla, with 522.1 million euros."

The Associated Press: Prostitution scandal hits French soccer players

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The Associated Press: Prostitution scandal hits French soccer players: "police probe into a suspected prostitution ring at a Paris nightspot has cast serious doubt as to whether France soccer players Franck Ribery and Karim Benzema will be named to the team's World Cup squad.
Ribery has already testified, and Benzema is set to be questioned over alleged sexual relations with an underage prostitute operating out of a trendy Paris club.
With France coach Raymond Domenech set to name his squad in about three weeks, the sex scandal could not have come at a worse time for the beleaguered team. It follows a difficult qualifying campaign, during which Ribery was one of the rare players to shine."

Postal Service is debt ridden and the Ministry of Public Works has unilaterally decided to reduce the workforce by at least three thousand employees b

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The planned privatisation of (parts of) the Spanish Postal Service has led to unrest among its employees, who are threatening a general strike starting June 10th if no concessions are made at the negotiating table. A couple of thousand postal workers, supported by the Unions, took to the streets in Madrid Thursday to voice their dissatisfaction with government plans.The Postal Service is debt ridden and the Ministry of Public Works has unilaterally decided to reduce the workforce by at least three thousand employees before starting negotiations with possible partners to take over (parts) of the company, the oldest and biggest public company in Spain. More protests are planned for the coming weeks, but should no deal be reached by June 10th, a national strike will be called, supported by all of the Unions.

Youth unemployment in Spain will remain above 40% until at least 2011.

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The rate of youth unemployment in Spain, which has been in the OECD's fastest growing percentage since the beginning of the crisis, is forecast to remain above 40% for at least 2011, according to projections released today. The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) said in a working document that this year youth unemployment could be 20.5% on average in its thirty member countries and around 24% for the European Union ( EU), with a peak in Spain, where there could be a turning point in the upward trend at the end of the year. Spain has seen higher levels of unemployment among persons up to 24 years at 24.6 points since the crisis began two years ago, the highest percentage followed distantly (18.5 additional points) by Ireland, where unemployment this group has tripled in this period.

Europe's high court dealt Spain a blow in ruling that France can let Salvador Dali's heirs keep royalties

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Europe's high court dealt Spain a blow in ruling that France can let Salvador Dali's heirs keep royalties from Dali works sold in France, even though the influential surrealist had willed his entire estate to Spain.
Dalí's 1931 painting "The Persistence of Memory," featuring melting pocket watches over a harsh landscape, is one of the most well-known surrealist work. He died in 1989 at age 84, a widower without children. He willed his entire estate, including artistic creations, to Spain.
A foundation established in Spain to administer royalties from Dalí's work challenged its French counterpart, which distributed its profits to Dalí's five surviving family members. French law allows only heirs to benefit from the inheritance of intellectual property, despite the will of the deceased.
The Court of Justice for the European Union ruled that the guiding principle for copyright inheritance establishes merely that works must be allowed to be sold for 70 years.
The court said member states can decide who gets to benefit from this right.

Marbella is set to be the first part of Spain to recover from the country's beleaguered real estate hole

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Marbella is set to be the first part of Spain to recover from the country's beleaguered real estate hole with property sales reaching their best level in four years, it is claimed.Figures released by the Marbella tax office shows that 2,499 properties were sold in the first three months of this year, a rise of more than 200% compared to the same period in 2009 when just 820 properties were sold.In the first quarter of 2008 there were 1,263 sold, 1,602 in the same period in 2007 and 1,224 in 2006. And Marbella mayor Angeles Muñoz says the town' will be the first out of the crisis' and is now recovering not just from the fall in the market but also from its illegal property scandals.She said that its new town plan, which comes into effect this month, means that some 16,000 properties will be legalised, enabling owners to sell them, raise a mortgage or use them as an asset.The latest figures from the National Institute of Statistics indicate that it is not just Marbella where the property market is picking up. They show that the Spanish property market grew by 16% in February compared to the same month last year. This suggests that the market in some areas is bottoming out and is starting to recovery after two years of decline.

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Disgraced former chairman of Anglo Irish Bank Sean FitzPatrick has again refused to apologise for his role in ruining the now State-owned bank, as he flew in to Dublin from his Marbella hideaway last week.Arriving home on an Aer Lingus flight from Malaga last Tuesday, Mr FitzPatrick was met by the Sunday Independent and repeatedly refused to apologise for his role in the scandal, which forced the bank into nationalisation last year.Mr FitzPatrick's refusal to apologise comes as the head of Nama, Brendan McDonagh, has said it will fight "tooth and nail" to pursue borrowers who owe it money and are displaying wealth in defiance of their indebtedness.
Mr FitzPatrick fled to Marbella following his arrest and questioning by gardai last month and was out of the country when Finance Minister Brian Lenihan announced the Nama bailout.

Skepticism over euro alive and well in D.C. Capitol Report - MarketWatch

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Skepticism over euro alive and well in D.C. Capitol Report - MarketWatch: "Greece is a potential domino that could knock over the economies of Ireland, Portugal, or Spain, he said"

Spain Banks at Risk From Unemployment, Regulator Says (Update1) - BusinessWeek

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Spain Banks at Risk From Unemployment, Regulator Says (Update1) - BusinessWeek: "Spain’s “mass unemployment” is the greatest risk facing the country’s banking system, which could become a drag on the economy rather than a support for it, Central Bank Governor Miguel Angel Fernandez Ordonez said.
“If Spain maintains for a prolonged period these millions of workers out of jobs, the banking system could become an obstacle to achieving economic recovery after being a support for the economy during the crisis,” Ordonez said in a speech today in Madrid.
Spain’s unemployment rate is the highest in the euro area at 19 percent in February, and the country accounts for half the region’s job losses over the last two years, according to the European Union’s statistics office. Unless the country comes up with changes to its labor market to address the “very Spanish” problem of high unemployment, banks will suffer the consequences in terms of higher defaults, less business and a higher cost of financing, Ordonez said."

A foodie's delight in Marbella

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A foodie's delight in Marbella: "Marbella conjures up images of the tackier side of tourism: cheap sangria and greasy fry-ups. But a 20-minute drive from the package holiday strip of the Marbellan beachfront, is a hotel a million miles away from this image
With the La Concha Mountain as a backdrop, the Hotel Villa Padierna is an impressive sight and although only six years old, it is reminiscent of a grand Tuscan villa, complete with over 700 pieces of original artwork from the 18th and 19th century.
Grand and beautiful
The hotel sits between its two golf courses and has views to the Mediterranean and despite its size (129 rooms and suites and 11 villas) the setting feels tranquil and uncrowded. Inside the main building the rooms are built around a 20-metre tall glass atrium with a double marble staircase leading up to the luxurious rooms of the first floor.
For all its luxurious modern conveniences, Villa Padierna is all about old-school glamour and staying here it feels like you've stepped back to a time when life was carefree and all there was to worry about was whether to have your gin and tonic by the pool or on the terrace overlooking the golf course.
Spanish flavours
La Veranda is one of three restaurants in the hotel and at its helm is Chef Martin Berasategui, who has three Michelin stars to his name. He has developed a tasting menu that fuses Northern and Southern Spanish cuisine. The dishes are imaginative, and give a flavour of Spain at its best and at €58 it's a chance to taste exquisite food at an affordable price."

Spain slams Catholic Church for its response to scandal < | Expatica Spain

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Spain slams Catholic Church for its response to scandal < | Expatica Spain: "Spanish parliament's socialist president Jose Bono criticised Monday the Catholic Church for its 'clumsy' response to child abuse scandals and said he favoured ending clerical celibacy.
'The Church hierarchy is behaving clumsily by not stating clearly that a few rotten apples don't spoil the whole barrel, said Bono, himself a Catholic, when he appeared on Spanish television.
'How can the image that all priests are paedophiles be allowed to spread, it is insulting', he said, while stressing that cases of paedophilia should be condemned.
Bono also asked why celibacy was imposed on priests when 'there are Catholic priests of the Oriental rite (who) are allowed to get married'.
'If this is permitted in one part of the universal Catholic Church, why can it not be done in the rest?' he asked, referring to the Vatican's refusal to link enforced celibacy to paedophilia.
Spain, a country with a strong Catholic tradition, has not seen the sort of large-scale paedophile scandals that have rocked the Irish, German and US churches in the last few weeks."

Spain jobless total rises in March to 4.16 mln-UPDATE 1

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Spain jobless total rises in March to 4.16 mln-UPDATE 1: "Spanish unemployment rose slightly in March as jobs were cut in the dominant services sector but the jobless level in the hard-hit construction market fell for the first time in six months.The jobless rate rose in Spain by 0.87 percent in March or 35,988 people, according to Labour Ministry data on Tuesday, some way down on the 123,543 jobs lost in the same month last year.In February, the jobless rate rose by 2.0 percent.That took the number of unemployed to 4.16 million people, up from the 4.13 million hit in February.'While there was an increase in the past month the data confirm that the rise in unemployment is slowing,' said the head of the Labour Ministry's employment department Maravillas Rojo."

Editorial - An Injustice in Spain - NYTimes.com

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Editorial - An Injustice in Spain - NYTimes.com: "Spain’s best-known investigative magistrate, Baltasar Garzón, is now being prosecuted in a politically driven case that should have been thrown out of court.
Judge Garzón is charged with ignoring a 1977 amnesty law when he decided to investigate the disappearances of more than 100,000 people during Spain’s 1930s civil war and the decade of Francoist repression that followed. The charges were brought by two far-right groups who fear an open investigation of the Franco-era record. Unfortunately, one of Mr. Garzón’s fellow magistrates sustained the complaint and brought formal charges this week.
As a result, he will now be suspended from his duties pending trial. If convicted, he could be barred from the bench for up to 20 years, effectively ending a career dedicated to holding terrorists and dictators accountable for their crimes. That would please his political enemies, but it would be a travesty of justice.
The real crimes in this case are the disappearances, not Mr. Garzón’s investigation. If, as seems likely, these were crimes against humanity under international law, Spain’s 1977 amnesty could not legally absolve them. The suspected perpetrators are all dead, and Mr. Garzón long ago halted his investigation, passing jurisdiction to local Spanish courts in the areas where the victims were exhumed."

The Associated Press: Europe's Roma say woes deepen amid economic crisis

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The Associated Press: Europe's Roma say woes deepen amid economic crisis: "Europe's estimated 12 million Gypsies, daily life is getting even worse and tens of thousands of children face shocking discrimination by authorities who shunt them off into schools for the mentally disabled, activists said Friday.
At a two-day conference in Spain on the plight of Gypsies, also called Roma, EU officials pledged in a final statement to keep working to integrate Roma and make sure aid funds reach them effectively.
The conference took place during a week when 17 people were detained in Romania on suspicion of trafficking nearly 170 Roma children to Britain for begging and stealing, and an anti-Gypsy party in Hungary was poised to make major gains in elections Sunday.
One of the participants in the Spain conference, Violeta Naydenova, knows all about the challenges children face.
Growing up in a Gypsy settlement with open sewers in Bulgaria, Naydenova was supposed to go to a segregated school for Roma children.
But because of her daughter's fair skin, Naydenova's mother managed to sneak her and her brother into a regular Bulgarian school as a possible ticket out of the grinding poverty and discrimination affecting Europe's largest ethnic minority.
In the end, Naydenova's story is one of triumph: she went on to earn a journalism degree and work for a foundation run by philanthropist George Soros, helping young Roma.
Naydenova, however, is one of the lucky ones because many activists say the situation for Gypsies is getting worse. The reasons, they say, include inertia and institutionalized racism against these nomadic, generally dark-skinned people who trace their roots to India and are often associated with petty crime and begging."

Gibraltar loses air link

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Gibraltar loses air link: "Ándalus airline has announced it is to cancel its service started last April to link Gibraltar to Madrid, as well as plans to offer further links to Barcelona and Bilbao. The Barcelona link was to have started on July 3.Since its launch the airline has made several changes to the flight times of the service, but it has only obtained an average occupancy of 30%."

FOXNews.com - Southern Spain Hit by Strong Quake

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FOXNews.com - Southern Spain Hit by Strong Quake: "magnitude-6.2 quake hit southern Spain on Monday about 15 miles to the southeast of the city of Granada, the U.S. Geological Survey said.
The quake occurred at a depth of about 382 miles near the Sierra Nevada mountain range, the U.S.-based survey said."