Barbell slide on charms

Landmark Egyptian elections enter second day
Egyptians turned out on Tuesday for the second day of voting in the country’s landmark parliamentary elections. Polls under deposed president Hosni Mubarak were marred by allegations of widespread fraud. This vote to choose a new lower house of parliament will be staggered over six weeks. It is being viewed as the first real test of Egypt’s transition to democracy following a week of clashes that claimed 42 lives. Officials said yesterday’s voting was carried out peacefully with turnout high, especially amongst women. The final results will be known on January 13th. Elections for Egypt’s upper house begin shortly afterwards. The country’s military rulers says they will transfer power to an elected president by the end of June. But protesters in Cairo’s Tahrir Square want a speedier handover.

Rooney Euro ban reduced
UEFA has reduced Wayne Rooney’s ban at next year’s European championships from three to two games following an appeal hearing in Nyon Switzerland, Thursday. The Manchester United striker was handed the punishment for kicking out at a Montenegro player during England’s final qualifier in October – a ban that originally ruled him out of the Euro2012 group stage. Adrian Bevington, the managing director of Club England, said: “Wayne will be available for the final group game at the Euro against Ukraine. So in effect its a two match suspension with one carried over for a four year period for the national teams.” Although Rooney will be eligible to play against the co-hosts in Donetsk on June 19, he will miss England’s opening two group D matches against France on June 11 and Sweden four days later.

Cool sounds in with Earth Wind & Fire Experience and Liz McComb
Al McKay was the original EWF guitarist. Now, following the deaths of some other band members, and the illness of others, his band, the Al McKay Allstars perform their show, the Earth Wind and Fire Experience. Euronews cultural reporter Wolfgang Spindler caught up with them in Paris. He said: “There is a feeling from the heart from the musicians. It’s just one of those things that just continues to grow. We are still attracting 10 year olds, 12 year olds to our show. It’s new music to them, so I just think that the soul of the music , the heart of the music, comes from the musicians. Great songs last for ever.” American gospel and blues diva Liz McComb also gave an incredible performance in Paris.Originally from Mississippi, Liz McComb now lives in Paris. She has worked all over the world, building a reputation as one of the finest pianists and singers of her generation. And this Lady got the Blues under her skin She said: “I’ve got a lot of stories to tell, I’ve got more than one story. My heart has been broken so I know how to sing the blues. I am at my best when my heart is broken, I am like Billie Holiday and all those other ladies that… When you are down it’s true, there’s something about the music.” Pee Wee Ellis, the mythical saxophonist, also played. His cv reads like a list of musical greats… he’s worked with James Brown, Van Morrison and many others. He now lives in the UK. Pee Wee Ellis said, about playing the sax: “It’s a physical activity, its a mental activity and its hard work sometimes. I prefer to let my music speak for me and if I can make a diffrence in any body’s life through music, my job is done.” Liz McComb kicks off a European tour in January. For more dates, venues and all other information see her official website: ???www.lizmccomb.com??�

Euro zone growth remains weak
The euro zone’s economy grew in the third quarter but barely according to the latest reading of data from the EU’s Statistics Office Eurostat. Growth in the 17 countries using the euro was just 0.2 percent the same as the second quarter according to Eurostat’s second reading of the data first released on November 15. Slumping business confidence and slowing industrial output point to a recession giving the European Central Bank grounds for an interest rate cut this week. Household spending and exports kept the euro zone’s economy in positive territory in the third quarter, adding 0.2 percentage point and 0.6 percentage point respectively to the final outcome. But in a sign of the evaporating confidence at factories and businesses across the region, investment was flat for the second quarter running and companies sold down inventories, which subtracted 0.2 percentage point from the quarterly figure. Imports took away another 0.4 percentage point. For many economists and the ECB a recession is all but a certainty, as the euro zone’s sovereign debt crisis drags the economy down.

Ligety claims victory at World Alpine Rock Fest
The world’s best athletes of the Alpine World Cup circuit took part in an extraordinary Giant Slalom race; the Alpine Rock Fest at the Paganella ski resort near Andalo, Italy. The 2006 Olympic gold medallist Ted Ligety found his ideal line, and positioned himself perfectly along the slalom, to cross the finish line with a time of 34.72 seconds. This was good enough for victory and the 60,000 euro cash prize just in time for Christmas. In second was Italian Alpine Racer, Giovanni Borsotti, who also got off to a flying start and weaved his way flawlessly through the course with poise and precision. But despite his best efforts he failed to beat the American, falling into second place by an excruciating one hundredth of a second. In third place came French skiing champion Cyprien Richard. The World Alpine Rock Fest Champion from 2009, looked on track to possibly claim another victory, but a slight mistake on one of the jumps proved costly, bringing him in in a time of 34.72 seconds. More about: Italy, Skiing, Sport, Winter Sports

European markets at close: 23.12.11
A roundup of the days markets data from euronews.net, brought to you as video on demand. More about: Business, Economy, European markets

Visa-free travel and financial aid to top EU-Russia summit
Financial aid and visa-free travel will dominate talks when EU and Russian leaders meet in Brussels later this week. Moscow has said it may provide cash, via the IMF, to ease Europe’s debt crisis. An open border deal between the EU and Russia’s Baltic territory of Kalingrad, and possibly Russia itself, is also expected but Russia’s recently disputed poll will not feature, officials said. “I don’t see any time to discuss the elections, they are already in the past,” said Vladimir Chizhov, Russia’s Ambassador to the EU. “We’ll talk about the current issues affecting the strategic partnership between Russia and the EU. Firstly, that means negotiation on a new framework agreement and secondly progress on visa-free travel,’‘ he added. The summit comes at a time of unprecedented opposition to Prime Minister Vladimir Putin after accusations of vote rigging. Tens of thousands of people demanded his ouster in Moscow last weekend. Despite that, many who oppose the current occupants of the Kremlin do not believe Europe is in a position to push for reform. Leading opposition figure, and former World chess champion Garry Kasparov said: “The decisions taken at this summit won’t really matter historically speaking. Today Europe is in such a financial mess it is ready to make concessions. Putin will no doubt take full advantage of this.’‘ Last month Putin criticised the eurozone’s emergency bailout fund — the EFSF — saying Russia would prefer to channel any support through the IMF.

North Korean Christmas greetings
The late North Korean leader Kim Jong-il (centre), his father and founder of North Korea Kim Il-sung (right) and his mother Kim Jung-sook are seen in a propaganda image released by the North’s official KCNA news agency on December 25, 2011. REUTERS/KCNA More about: Communism, Kim Jong-il, North Korea

Christopher Sims : “The ECB can prevent Italy from becoming insolvent, what it can’t prevent is the ECB from becoming insolvent”
As the Nobel Awards are about to be handed out in Stockholm, Sweden Isabelle Kumar from Euronews caught up with Economics Prize winner Professor Christopher Sims, who has been recognised along with fellow professor Thomas Sargent. Both are from the US and received the prestigious award for the research they carried out independently back in the 70s and 80s on cause and effect in the macro economy. Isabelle Kumar for Euronews: “Christopher Sims, many thanks for joining us on Euronews. Sadly Thomas Sargent cannot be with us tody due to illness but I think you can speak for him also when you tell me briefly why you were jointly awarded a Nobel prize.” Professor Christopher Sims: “Tom was awarded the prize for his work on an idea called rational expectations, which is the idea that people look to the future when making decisions today. And at the time that he did his work this apparently common sense notion was not actually incorporated in the models that were being used to guide policy. And this really changed the way models for economic policy were done. What I did was not really related to rational expectations, except indirectly. At the time that I wrote, there was a controversy between people called monetarists and people called Keynsians – these are two branches of economics. The monetarists thought that the money supply drove the economy and that recessions and economic fluctuations were largely caused by mistakes in monetary policy. The Keynsians thought that monetary policy was not the main force pushing the business cycle. I did work that helped develop statistical methods that would untangle this issue.” Isabelle Kumar for Euronews: “Let’s zoom out now and look at the Eurozone crisis which is obviously dominating headlines and has done so for months – how close in your opinion is the Eurozone to meltdown?” Professor Christopher Sims: “I think it’s on the edge. I wrote a paper in around 2002 and it talked about the likelihood that there would be a crisis like this. At the time I said and I think it is still true, that even though we don’t know the answer to the question, the question will be do people want to preserve the Euro enough that they are willing to construct on the fly the fiscal institutions that are necessary, or is the euro weak enough in its political support that it’s going to fall apart.” Isabelle Kumar for Euronews: “Anything that takes place in Europe takes some time to be put into place – it moves quite slowly, so what if in the meantime Italy just becomes insolvent – what would be the knock-on effect from that?” Professor Christopher Sims: “The ECB can prevent Italy from becoming insolvent, what it can’t prevent is the ECB from becoming insolvent. The ECB couldn’t actually become insolvent because they can print money, but if their balance sheet goes bad, they could be forced to inflate. The ECB can raise money by printing money, but if the ECB is forced to do that it could cause inflation which is what the Germans are worried about.” Isabelle Kumar for Euronews: “So, we don’t know how long it will take us to emerge from this crisis, but as we do emerge, are we going to see a new world order settle into place where the once dominant nations of the world, are going to be put on the back foot as we have these strong emerging markets.” Professor Christopher Sims: “No I don’t think so, China is growing very fast but its workers are nowhere near as well educated, its political system is primitive in many ways, and we have the history of other countries who have grown fast as they catch up with the West and then slow down. And there can be terrible adjustments as things slow down, as in Japan. Now the Euro area, there could be big changes according to whether this becomes a dividing line between a period when it’s moving towards union, and a period when it’s moving apart again. I think as it moves towards greater union in Europe, Europe could be tremendously more powerful and would benefit.” Isabelle Kumar for Euronews: “It’s said that when the US sneezes the rest of the world, including Europe, catches a cold, It seems now that the boot is on the other foot, and the US is tremendously worried about the unfolding Eurozone crisis. What’s at stake for the States?” Professor Christopher Sims: “If the Euro area crashes there will be more big losses. Many banks and financial institutions will be in trouble, and we just don’t know how much that will translate into trouble for US financial institutions.” Isabelle Kumar for Euronews: “What’s your take on the situation?” Professor Christopher Sims: “My take is I have no idea what is going to happen. And I am worried that it could create for example a double dip recession in the US if there were a European collapse because it would probably have knock-on effects on US financial institutions.” Isabelle Kumar for Euronews: “You teach university students – the next generation of decision-makers in years to come. How do you see their world?” Professor Christopher Sims: “When we compare the situation of young people today to the situation of young people 80 or 100 years ago, there is nothing to complain about. There’s lots of good things that have happened in the world since then and I think people will go on being ingenious and finding ways to create new political insitutions, and new technologies so I’m optmistic.”