Europe, France | featured news

Former International Monetary Fund leader Dominique Strauss-Kahn was believed to be heading to his native France.

Several European countries that banned short-selling have extended the prohibition until the end of September. When concerns about European banks’ exposure to Greek debt sent their stocks plummeting two weeks ago, market regulators in Belgium, France, Greece, Italy and Spain stepped in to prohibit traders from betting on the decline in a share’s price.

Cleared of sex assault charges, Dominique Strauss-Kahn could be back in France within days but may not get a hero's welcome, if sober newspaper editorials and cautious statements by his Socialist allies are anything to go by.

An airport in France is experimenting with "virtual" boarding agents in a bid to jazz up its terminals with 21st century avatars who always smile, don't need breaks and never go on strike.

Standard & Poor's head of France said on Thursday that the agency was confident of maintaining France's AAA credit rating unchanged with a stable outlook.

French economic growth ground to a halt in the second quarter, raising pressure on the government to cut spending and abolish tax breaks to convince turbulent financial markets it will deliver on debt reduction targets.

France and Britain are most vulnerable within Europe to a rating review following the U.S. downgrade, with anemic growth and hefty borrowing placing them among the shakiest of the world's triple-A rated lenders.

If the New York sexual assault case against Dominique Strauss-Kahn ever goes to trial, much will doubtless be made of his accuser’s background. But what about his? Since his New York arrest, a French writer has brought a criminal complaint in Paris about an attempted rape she says she suffered at Strauss-Kahn’s hands in 2003. The New York prosecutors made an apparent allusion to her claim at Strauss-Kahn’s first court appearance in May.

A French novelist will file a complaint on Tuesday accusing Dominique Strauss-Kahn of attempted rape, her lawyer said, raising the prospect of a new sex assault investigation starting just as the U.S. case against the former International Monetary Fund chief falters.
The announcement threw Strauss-Kahn’s legal situation in his home country into question, and injected fresh uncertainty into a national debate about whether he will be able to return to his political career and enter the 2012 presidential race.

The rating agency said a plan proposed by the French government and banks to roll over some debt could fall within the definition of default.