FRANKFURT, Oct 9, 2008 (AFP) - Germany's trade surplus contracted in August as the pace of exports fell faster than that of imports, figures released on Thursday by the national statistics office showed.

KATHMANDU, Oct 9, 2008 (AFP) - Poor visibility caused the crash at a tiny airstrip in Nepal's Mount Everest region that killed 18 people, including 12 German tourists, officials said Thursday.

FRANKFURT, Oct 9, 2008 (AFP) - Frankfurt's DAX opened 0.81 percent higher at 5,054.09 points on Thursday a day after central banks around the world cut interest rates in a bid to bring calm to financial markets.

FRANKFURT, Oct 9, 2008 (AFP) - At the Frankfurt stock exchange, silent traders frowned as they watched shares pitch lower in a sign of how bad the international financial crisis has gotten.

The only sound came from large clicking boards that display movements on the German market.

BERLIN, Oct 8, 2008 (AFP) - The US military said Wednesday that a private is to be tried over the death of Army Sergeant Juwan Johnson, beaten to death by a gang in Germany in July 2005.

FRANKFURT, Oct 8, 2008 (AFP) - Frankfurt's DAX index of leading shares recovered sharply after global central banks annnounced coordinated interest rate cuts.

WASHINGTON, Oct 8, 2008 (AFP) - US President George W. Bush on Wednesday discussed efforts to stem the worldwide financial crisis with German Chancellor Angela Merkel and President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, the White House said.

KATHMANDU, Oct 8, 2008 (AFP) - A passenger plane crashed on landing at a remote airfield in Nepal's Everest region on Wednesday, killing 18 people most of whom were German tourists, Nepalese officials said.

KATHMANDU, Oct 8, 2008 (AFP) - A small passenger plane crashed on landing Wednesday morning in Nepal's Everest region, killing 18 people believed to be mostly German tourists, Nepalese officials said.

The aircraft, flying from the capital Kathmandu to Lukla in eastern Nepal, burst into flames after crash-landing on the sloping airstrip, eyewitnesses reported.

BERLIN, Oct 8, 2008 (AFP) - German carmaker BMW said Wednesday that the financial crisis led to a 15-percent plunge in unit sales in September, with deliveries in the United States alone dropping by more than a quarter.

'The crisis in the financial markets is currently making consumers highly reluctant to purchase, especially in the United States,' BMW said in a statement.

FRANKFURT, Oct 8, 2008 (AFP) - German industrial production jumped by a surprise 3.4 percent in August from the level the previous month, figures released on Wednesday by the economy ministry showed.

The ministry warned however that the upturn might be a temporary development amid the global financial crisis.

BERLIN, Oct 8, 2008 (AFP) - The world's only transplant recipient of two full arms appeared in public Wednesday to talk about the success of the procedure, calling the feeling of being whole again 'indescribable'.

BERLIN, Oct 8, 2008 (AFP) - The German banking federation halved its 2009 growth forecast for Europe's biggest economy on Wednesday but said that the world financial crisis will not lead to a global recession.

ARUSHA, Tanzania, Oct 8, 2008 (AFP) - A former Rwandan minister suspected of having played a major role in the 1994 genocide was Wednesday transferred from Germany to the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR).

BERLIN, Oct 8, 2008 (AFP) - The world's only recipient of two full arms in a transplant appeared in public Wednesday to talk about the success of the procedure, calling the feeling of being whole again 'indescribable'.

BERLIN, Oct 7, 2008 (AFP) - Chancellor Angela Merkel's announcement of a guarantee for all savings in Germany has achieved its aim of soothing people's worries about their money not being safe, the government said Tuesday.

BERLIN, Oct 7, 2008 (AFP) - German Chancellor Angela Merkel criticised Ireland's unilateral move to protect its banks as 'unacceptable' Tuesday, in a keenly awaited address to parliament on the financial crisis.

BERLIN, Oct 7, 2008 (AFP) - German Chancellor Angela Merkel said Tuesday that the German economy was 'strong' and that she was confident it would be able to cope with the consequences of the global financial crisis.

BERLIN, Oct 7, 2008 (AFP) - Cologne's mayor on Tuesday called on Turkey's prime minister to back a Turkish shrine for Saint Paul in return for support for the construction of a hotly disputed mosque in the German city.

FRANKFURT, Oct 7, 2008 (AFP) - The German conglomerate MAN said Tuesday it would sell 70 percent of its Ferrostaal subsidiary to the Abu Dhabi state-owned group IPIC for an undisclosed amount.

The transaction would be retroactive to January 1 2008, a MAN statement said, and finalised in the first quarter of 2009, at which point the amount involved would be announced.

BERLIN, Oct 7, 2008 (AFP) - Two Somali-born men arrested on terror charges last month by police commandos on a plane minutes before take-off are to be released for lack of evidence, German prosecutors said Tuesday.

Authorities, however, still assume that attacks were being planned and the investigation is continuing, spokesman for the Bonn prosecutor's office Fred Apostel told AFP.

BERLIN, Oct 7, 2008 (AFP) - German bank Hypo Real Esate, twice rescued from collapse by bailouts, said Tuesday it had named Axel Wieandt, head of the investment branch at Deutsche Bank, as its new chief.

Wieandt, 42, will succeed Georg Funke, who resigned Monday, on October 13.

FRANKFURT, Oct 7, 2008 (AFP) - The biggest German bank, Deutsche Bank, said Tuesday that it did not plan to raise fresh capital, in a bid to cut short rumours to that effect, which have pushed shares in the bank sharply lower.

BERLIN, Oct 7, 2008 (AFP) - Chancellor Angela Merkel's cabinet approved an extension of German participation in the NATO-led force in Afghanistan Tuesday and added 1,000 more soldiers to the mission, government sources said.

FRANKFURT, Oct 7, 2008 (AFP) - Frankfurt stocks opened 1.18 percent higher on Tuesday, after plunging on Monday in line with other markets around the world on fears about the world financial crisis.

The index of 30 leading German shares opened at 5,450.38 points after falling more than seven percent on Monday to 5,387.01 points.

FRANKFURT, Oct 7, 2008 (AFP) - Shares in German banks plunged in morning trades here on Tuesday, as shock waves from the international financial crisis battered the banking sector.

Commerzbank, the second biggest German bank, saw its shares fall by 16.72 percent to 9.91 euros, while number one Deutsche Bank was off by 12.99 percent at 41.64 euros.

FRANKFURT, Oct 7, 2008 (AFP) - Frankfurt stocks fell back into the red midmorning on Tuesday as a rebound from steep losses on Monday ran out of steam amid fresh worries that German banks would fall victim to the financial crisis.

FRANKFURT, Oct 7, 2008 (AFP) - Signs multiplied on Tuesday that the financial crisis is biting in Germany with firms having difficulty in obtaining credit from banks and carmaker Opel suspending production.

LUXEMBOURG, Oct 7, 2008 (AFP) - EU finance ministers agreed on Tuesday to support troubled big banks in order to protect the broader financial system, the deputy German finance minister said.

'We have agreed to support systemic financial institutions,' Joerg Asmussen told reporters after talks in Luxembourg between EU finance ministers.

FRANKFURT, Oct 7, 2008 (AFP) - The head of the troubled German mortgage lender Hypo Real Estate, Georg Funke, has resigned, the fourth biggest German bank said in a statement.

BERLIN, Oct 7, 2008 (AFP) - Chancellor Angela Merkel's cabinet approved an extension of German participation in the NATO-led force in Afghanistan Tuesday and added 1,000 more soldiers to the mission, a government spokesman said.

BERLIN, Oct 6, 2008 (AFP) - German 'schadenfreude,' or gloating over what was considered weak US management of the international financial crisis, is over as Berlin finds itself now caught up in the turbulence.

BERLIN, Oct 6, 2008 (AFP) - German scientist Harald zur Hausen, a winner of this year's Nobel Medicine Prize for his groundbreaking work on cervical cancer, called the news Monday a triumph for research on viruses.

FRANKFURT, Oct 6, 2008 (AFP) - The troubled German bank Hypo Real Estate got its second bailout in as many weeks, raising the total to 50 billion euros (68 billion dollars) as shock waves from the US-bred international financial crisis rattled deep fault lines in Europe's banking sector.

BERLIN, Oct 6, 2008 (AFP) - The German government raced Monday to reassure investors and individual savers that it will protect the Europe's biggest economy from falling victim to the global financial crisis.

The stock exchange may not have got the message however as shares tumbled seven percent Monday in line with heavy losses elsewhere in Europe and Asia as Wall Street plunged too.