France warned on Friday it would recognize a Palestinian state if a final international effort to overcome the impasse between Israelis and Palestinians failed, and proposed a two-year timeframe to end the conflict through a U.N.-backed resolution.
Protesters clashed with police in southern France on Saturday over the death of a young activist killed by a police grenade, in the latest of a series of demonstrations which have embarrassed the Socialist government.
Thomas Middelhoff, once one of Germany's most prominent and respected business leaders, was convicted of embezzlement and tax evasion by a state court on Friday and immediately taken to jail to start a three-year sentence.
Algerian President Abdelaziz Bouteflika, who suffered a stroke last year, was hospitalised in the Alpine city of Grenoble in France on Thursday, French police and government sources said.
