Munich - Germany captain Michael Ballack has defended his recent criticism on coach Joachim Loew, naming it a wakeup call.

"Sometimes you have to go public deliberately in order to shake
things up. There were a few irritations during and after the European
championships," Ballack told German pay-TV network Premiere ahead of
the European Champions League match of his club Chelsea at Girondins
Bordeaux on Wednesday.

Ballack said "you can't discuss everything internally," insisted he
"issued his opinion in decent way" and said "I didn't want to attack
anyone."

Wuerzburg, Germany - Conductor Jin Wang, 48, has been sacked from his post in Germany after an allegation that he sexually harassed a young woman musician, municipal authorities said Tuesday.

Chinese-born Wang, who was director of music at the Mainfranken Theatre and conducted the Wuerzburg Philharmonic Orchestra, had resisted pressure to resign after the city of Wuerzburg suspended him on full pay.

A municipal spokesman said he was sacked last Friday after fruitless efforts for a negotiated solution.

Amsterdam - Italian national Giuseppe Nirta, aged 35, will remain in custody in the Netherlands until an Amsterdam court has decided whether or not he will be extradited to Italy to serve a prison sentence of 14 years and 18 months for dealing in drugs.

The leader of the so-called 'Ndrangheta clan from Italy is also a suspect for the German police in the gangland-style massacre.

In August 2007, a total of six Italians were murdered in Duisburg.

Wim de Bruin, spokesman of the Dutch public prosecutor, told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa on Tuesday that Italy had filed its request for the Nirta's arrest last month.

Berlin- A former state premier who was a prominent minister at federal level quit Germany's Social Democrats (SPD) on Tuesday after receiving a reprimand over critical remarks that "breached party solidarity."

Wolfgang Clement ended 38 years of membership in the centre-left party that co-rules in Berlin with Chancellor Angela Merkel's conservatives after calling the rebuke "inappropriate and wrong."

Hamburg - The fans loved it, some of the players as well, but the ruling German football body DFB was not amused about a referee showing two yellow cards simultaneously during a second division match on the weekend.

On Sunday, referee Thomas Metzen dug deep into his shirt pockets and threw up his hands with a yellow card in each one to book Mainz 05 player Miroslav Karhan und St Pauli Hamburg's Florian Bruns.

News reports on Tuesday said that Metzen has received a warning from the DFB and was told never to do this again. He reportedly escaped further sanctions and told the Bild daily that "it was a mistake."

Berlin - Germany is ready to contribute up to 1,400 military personnel to a European Union security mission to combat piracy off the coast of Somalia, a leading daily reported Tuesday.

The Frankfurter Allgemeine said the defence ministry had given the green light for the troops and sailors to take part in Operation Atalanta, due to be launched around mid-December.