Paris - French carmaker PSA Peugeot Citroen said Wednesday that it lost 343 million euros (444 million dollars) in 2008, after registering a profit of 885 million euros the previous year.

Badly hit by the economic crisis, which forced the company to close down production in the fourth quarter, Peugeot also saw its turnover fall by 7.4 per cent last year, to
54.356 billion euros.

Lyon, France  - The international police organization Interpol said on Tuesday it had issued an unprecedented global alert for 85 terrorists suspected of planning attacks against Saudi Arabia from abroad.

The 83 Saudis and two Yemenis are wanted by Saudi Arabia on terrorism-related charges, including links to al-Qaeda in Saudi Arabia, Iraq and Afghanistan, Interpol said in a statement issued in Lyon, where its headquarters are located.

"Never before has Interpol been asked to alert the world about so many dangerous fugitives at one time," the organization's secretary-general, Ronald K. Noble, said.

Geneva  - Carla Bruni-Sarkozy will visit AIDS programmes in Burkina Faso on Wednesday, during her first trip as Global Ambassador for the protection of mothers and children against AIDS.

She received the position from the Global Fund last December, on World AIDS Day.

Nicolas Demey, a spokesman for the organization, said it was financing almost 45 million dollars worth of projects in the African nation, where 130,000 people are living with HIV or AIDS.

The fund is a mechanism for raising money to fight HIV, tuberculosis and malaria and has close ties to the United Nations.

Paris - French President Nicolas Sarkozy has tried to ease British irritation over comments he made regarding Prime Minister Gordon Brown's strategy for fighting the economic crisis, Sarkozy's office said.

"The Elysee Palace has contacted Downing Street to assure Prime Minister Brown that President Sarkozy deplored the manner in which his comments on the British economy were reported in Britain," Sarkozy's office said in a statement.

Paris  - A powerful storm packing winds of over 140 kilometres per hour cut power to some 600,000 households in western and northern France and shut the two main airports serving the city of Paris, French media reported Tuesday.

A spokesman for the state-owned utility EDF said current was being gradually restored Tuesday in the west of the country, which bore the brunt of the storm.

The French Civil Aviation Authority (DGAC) had banned take-offs and landings at Orly and Charles de Gaulle airports beginning at 1900 GMT on Monday.

As a result, the carrier Air France cancelled more than 200 flights. Some 3,000 passengers spent the night in hotels waiting for the airports to reopen.