Germany

No more than two days were needed for the CETA text, only just signed in front of the cameras, to be rejected again. The German Greens announced their intention of blocking its ratification, in its present form, in the Bundesrat, something that is within their capacities given the way that its system functions. Is the participation of the Bundesrat indispensable for ratification of the treaty? German jurists are working on this question, and it is thorny.

At the end of Wednesday’s session, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg confirmed that the United States, Britain, Germany and Canada had agreed to provide the leading elements of the battle groups to be deployed respectively in Poland and the three former Soviet Baltic republics: Estonia, Lithuania and Latvia.

Germany is one of the world's top four arms exporters, but Gabriel, who heads the Social Democratic Party (SPD), has vowed to make arms export policy more restrictive, especially with regard to the Middle East.

Onlookers reportedly encouraged a 17-year-old Somali asylum seeker who committed suicide to jump to his death from a fifth story apartment building in the eastern German town of Schmölln, according to the town's mayor.

Late on Friday, Canada’s trade minister – the former FT journalist Chrystia Freeland – declared that the trade agreement with the EU (the so-called Ceta) had failed. She’d been commuting between Brussels and Namur, the seat of Wallonia’s regional parliament, for a few days, trying to get the region’s left-wing government to support the trade deal. But her efforts, and those by others, were in vain. Wallonia didn’t budge. All the EU leaders that were in Brussels to seal the deal ahead of Justin Trudeau’s visit on Thursday, had to return back home empty-handed.

TO BALKONI. Memories of Occupation

Deutsche Bank’s shares plunged to record lows this week, sparking talk of a government bailout to avert a new financial crash. The turmoil surrounding Germany’s biggest bank demonstrates that all of the contradictions of the global financial system that led to the meltdown of 2008 are once again erupting. Now, however, these contradictions are fuelling

MANUEL OCHSENREITER: THE END OF MERKEL'S POLITICS (VIDEO)

The mortgage debts in post-Soviet economies and Iceland are more explosive. Although these countries are not in the Eurozone, most of their debts are denominated in euros. Some 87% of Latvia’s debts are in euros or other foreign currencies, and are owed mainly to Swedish banks, while Hungary and Romania owe euro-debts mainly to Austrian banks. So

More than 160,000 demonstrators thronged seven major cities across Germany on Saturday in protest over a massive transatlantic trade deal, dealing a new blow to the disputed accord.