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PARIS -- The French government announced more than $91 million in aid Monday for the country's struggling wine industry, hit by falling consumption at home and increased competition in export markets. The government will also allow the destruction of vines in overproducing regions and apply for EU permission to distill millions of surplus bottles into alcohol, Agriculture Minister Dominique Bussereau said. Bussereau said $15 million would be paid out to winemakers in extra grants and tax breaks, along with $71.7 million in loans to producers and cooperatives in financial difficulty. The government will also pay for 500 vintners to take...

In a radical departure from years of Parisian critical rhetoric, the French ambassador to Israel, Gerard Araud, told The Jerusalem Post on Tuesday that he thought Israel "has tried to show the utmost restraint" in the course of the conflict with the Palestinians since 2000. The ambassador even evinced a certain understanding of the deaths of Palestinians during the course of Israeli army activity. "It's unavoidable that in some operations...," he said, leaving that sentence uncompleted. "War is dirty, war is always dirty," he went on, and then added: "Occupation is never clean." France has been at the forefront of...

PARIS -- For France, those were the days. The French aren't pining for the return of their 19th-century empire, but the 200th anniversary Thursday of Napoleon Bonaparte's crowning as emperor is a reminder of their country's former glory. The Corsican, whose diminutive size belied his continental ambitions, is back in the news for the bicentennial -- and the timing couldn't have been more telling for a country facing an identity crisis and searching for its role in a 25-member European Union and a wider world led by the United States. "History has been a little hard on the French lately,"

Italy goes after its lost terrorists 26.08.2004 By PETER POPHAM in Rome Incensed by the disappearance last weekend from Paris of convicted terrorist Cesari Battisti, Italy says it will press France and Nicaragua to return 12 other convicted left-wing terrorists who have evaded justice by living in exile. They include Alessio Casimirri, the only member of the Red Brigade gang that kidnapped and killed former Italian Prime Minister Aldo Moro still at liberty. He is living in Nicaragua. All the others are believed to be in France. France agreed in 2002 to return Italians who are wanted for serious crimes,...

Spain's new Prime Minister wasted no time yesterday shaking up the European political landscape, putting Madrid back in the Franco-German camp and urging a swift adoption of the stalled Eurpoean constitution. The election poll was held three days after the Madrid train bombings, in which 201 people died.Voter anger at the Aznar government's blaming of local separatist group ETA, despite evidence that Islamic terrorist were responsible.Mr. Aznar's departure is a blow to British Prime Minister Tony Blair. One of Mr. Zapatero's senior lieutenants, Jose Bono, recently called the British Prime Minister a 'gilipollas' which can be translated as 'd*ckhead.'

By RONALD O. RICHARDS Monday, December 15, 2003 - Page A16 Los Angeles, Calif. -- The capture of former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein does nothing to change the fact that he was no threat to the United States, that he had no weapons of mass destruction, that his brutal regime was for years supported and armed by the United States and that the government of President George W. Bush out and out lied to the American people about the reasons for going to war. It does nothing to change the fact that Mr. Bush went to war in violation of...

We are in a cabin deep down below decks on a Navy ship jam-packed with troops that’s pitching and creaking its way across the Atlantic in a winter gale. There is a man in every bunk. There’s a man wedged into every corner. There’s a man in every chair. The air is dense with cigarette smoke and with the staleness of packed troops and sour wool. “Don’t think I’m sticking up for the Germans,” puts in the lanky young captain in the upper berth, “but…” “To hell with the Germans,” says the broad-shouldered dark lieutenant. “It’s what our boys have...

112 Gripes about the French Published in Paris in 1945 by the 'Information & Education Division' of the US Occupation Forces. Forward by original editors. THE FRENCH AND US 1. "We came to Europe twice in twenty-five years..." 2. "At first, when we came into Normandy.. the French gave us everything..." 3. "The French don't invite us into their homes.". 4. "The French rub me the wrong way.". 5. "I'll never love the French.." "I hate the French!" 6. "We're always pulling the French out of a jam..." 7. "We can't rely on these French." 8. "We've had more beefing...

Decision to bring forward $36 billion in tax cuts to next year could result in Germany busting deficit ceiling again FRANKFURT - Desperate to revive Germany's moribund economy, Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder's government has approved plans to accelerate a sweeping tax cut, raising fears that Europe's largest economy will bust European Union (EU) deficit rules yet again. Such chronic violations could have profound implications for the fiscal rules that govern Europe's monetary union. The government's decision, reached at an unusual Sunday Cabinet meeting, would bring tax cuts scheduled for 2005 ahead by a year. The government estimates that the cuts, which...

As the war with Iraq draws to an early close, a chorus of diplomatic "experts" are getting their "multilateral" music sheets out, singing about the necessity of making the European Union a co-partner in rebuilding that nation. They are cheerfully chanting that a U.S.-European partnership on Iraq — brokered by the U.N. — will be an outstanding opportunity to heal the diplomatic wounds from the past year and repair our fractured trans-Atlantic alliance. At the heart of their vision is the belief that America's "unilateralism" has hurt Europe's feelings and that we have to atone for our boorish behavior...

Jewish World Review Feb. 12, 2003 / 10 Adar I, 5763 Michael Kelly Germany's Mr. Tough Guy "Excuse me. I am not convinced." -- German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer, lecturing to Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld in Munich last week, after Rumsfeld's argument for war against Iraq. Mr. Rumsfeld may have convinced the leaders of 18 European nations, but not you, Mr. Fischer. It's personal. This seems to me the right way to look at it. The question of failing to convince must be seen in the context of whom we have failed to convince. Sometimes "who" explains "why." Mr....

Security Council Meeting: Cliff's Notes Version Powell: The inspectors have been bamboozled. Here's some pictures. The inspectors have been compromised. Here's some audio. Sorry to embarass you in public like this, but them's the breaks. Spain: What he said Syria: France is our friend. Israel Bad! Germany: Saddam has gassed his own people, invaded his neighbors and repeatedly violated Security Council resolutions. No biggie. Anyone else hungry? Iraq: All lies! You've used those fancy cipher machines to make up this evidence. We've heard of your "ENIAC" and the demonic magic it's conjured. Germany: Let's Eat!