Berlin - Germany, the first of the G7 powers to declare an official recession, can expect more bad news on the economic front in 2009, Chancellor Angela Merkel said in an interview released Saturday.

"We have to be prepared for the fact that the coming year, at least in the first few months, will be a year of bad news," she told the newspaper Welt am Sonntag.

She said the current business climate made it much more difficult to predict how the economies of Germany, its partners in Europe and the world at large would develop.

Karlsruhe, Germany  - Karlsruhe SC was defeated at home by Borussia Dortmund 1-0 Friday night, continuing their dramatic downward spiral in the German Bundesliga.

Karlsruhe have now lost seven of their last eight matches and remain third from bottom in the league, while Dortmund climbed to fourth place.

KSC manager Edmund Becker acknowledged his team was in a "difficult situation" only 14 matches into the football season. Dortmund manager Juergen Klopp said his side's win was "deserved."

Mohamed Zidan scored the match's only goal in the 20th minute on a cross from former Karlsruhe player Tamas Hajnal.

Berlin  - Three reeling German banks tapped state funds for billions of euros in aid Friday.

Hamburg-based HSH Nordbank said SoFFin, a federal government agency which has a 480-billion-euro war chest, had agreed to provide it with up to 30 billion euros (37 billion dollars) in guarantees to rescue it.

Chief executive Dirk Jens said the shareholders, which include two German states - Hamburg and Schleswig-Holstein, would also provide equity to the battered institution that announced weeks ago it was seeking SoFFIn aid.

Berlin  - German state-owned Landesbank Baden-Wuerttemberg (LBBW) is to receive a 5-billion euro (6.3-billion-dollar) capital injection, the bank announced Friday, amid reports that the world financial crisis had forced it deeper into the red.

The LBBW's owner, the state of Baden-Wuerttemberg, is to provide the capital support for the bank, which, shareholder sources told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa, is likely to run up a 2-billion-euro loss in the current year.

In announcing the capital injection, LBBW became the latest German bank to seek out state aid to help it limp through the current financial crisis.

Munich  - Turkey midfielder Hamit Altintop resumed training with Bayern Munich Friday after a three-month injury lay-off and could make a comeback before the Bundesliga's winter break.

Berlin - Berlin refused to comment Friday on the arrest in Kosovo of three Germans in connection with an attack on the European Union (EU) headquarters in Pristina.

A German Government spokesman declined to be drawn on speculation about the possible involvement of Berlin's security services (BND) in the case and instead pointed to the ongoing investigations.