Brussels - European Union businesses called Monday for a cut in interest rates amid predictions that the bloc's economic slowdown could lead to more than 1 million jobs being lost in 2009.

BusinessEurope, which groups national business federations from 34 European countries, also called on governments to ensure a continued flow of credit and to approve structural reforms aimed at improving the continent's competitiveness.

Brussels - The European Union on Monday welcomed a ceasefire agreement in Somalia, while NATO said it had successfully completed its first anti-piracy mission off the Somali coast.

EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana and NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer stressed the importance of cooperation between the two Brussels-based institutions during a regular meeting of ambassadors at the alliance's headquarters.

One area in which the two organizations are working together is in the fight against pirates operating in the Gulf of Aden.

Prague - Czech Prime Minister Mirek Topolanek's party lost the Senate run-off elections Saturday in a defeat that could reshape the Czech Republic's EU presidency in the first half of next year.

The loss could topple the premier and empower vocal European Union critic President Vaclav Klaus, just weeks before the country takes over at the helm of the 
27-member EU bloc on January 1.

Analysts said a boost to the followers of the eurosceptic president could weaken the Czech presidency.

Beijing  - Asian and European Union leaders on Saturday called for the international community to act quickly and decisively at a conference on responses to the global financial crisis next month in Washington.

"We have all understood that it would not be possible simply to meet and have a conversation," French President Nicolas Sarkozy said of the planned summit on the crisis on November 15.

Amsterdam - Dutch politicians were Saturday expressing little opposition to the airport "naked" body scanners which have met with angry resistance or incredulity elsewhere in the European Union.

The appliances, being tested at Amsterdam's Schipol airport, were "absolutely discreet", Dutch Justice Minister Ernst Hirsch Ballin was quoted as saying in de Volkskant newspaper and other media.

"Personally, I'd be for them, and make use of them," the Christian Democrat politician said, adding that he had seen them in action at Schipol, where they have been tested since May 2007.

Berlin  - Germany is to oppose European Union plans to deploy full-body scanners at airports as protection against hijackers, a Berlin government spokesman said Friday.

The devices have been described as "strip scanners" because they construct an image of each traveller's body without clothing.

"I can tell you with complete clarity that we are not going to cooperate in this mischief," a Federal Interior Ministry spokeswoman said Friday at a government news conference.