Washington  - The International Monetary Fund must be given more resources to rescue poorer nations battered by the financial crisis, US legislators said Wednesday, calling the global recession a threat to national security.

Democratic Senator John Kerry, who heads the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, warned the economic crisis had the potential to create "failed states" that could become breeding grounds for terrorism, drug trafficking and other security threats.

Harare  - Revenue from tax on alcohol and tobacco has been the key contribution to Zimbabwe's overall income, Finance Minister Tendai Biti said in presenting a revised 2009 budget to Parliament.

"Indirect taxes made up of customs and excise duty have contributed 88 per cent of government revenue which means that the government has been literally sustained by beer and cigarettes. This is unacceptable," Biti said.

Bern  - Revised government figures for 2009 released Tuesday showed that Switzerland's economy would shrink by 2.2 per cent and the recession would be significantly worse than had been envisaged.

Previous statistics by the Swiss Economic Ministry had predicted a contraction of 0.8 per cent.

The latest forecast said that if there was an easing of the global financial crisis, Switzerland could see slightly positive growth of 0.1 per cent in 2010, even as the labour market would continue to deteriorate.

Washington  - The construction of new homes in the United States unexpectedly surged in February, the Commerce Department said Tuesday, signalling that the housing downturn at the heart of the US economic crisis may finally have reached bottom.

Privately-owned housing starts in February were 583,000 at an annual rate, up 22 per cent from January but still down 47.3 per cent from the same month in 2008. Economists had expected a further monthly decline to 450,000 last month, according to a Bloomberg News survey.

Kiev  - The German real estate developer ECE Projektmanagement on Tuesday announced it was shutting down its operation in the former Soviet republic Ukraine, the Interfax news agency reported.

ECE Ukraine, the branch office of the Hamburg-headquartered company, will close its doors for good by March's end with all staff sacked, according to the report.

The company was freezing all operations in Ukraine for the "indefinite future", according to a statement.

Wellington - New Zealand's 4-month-old conservative government moved Tuesday to relax rules governing foreign investors, hoping to attract more outside capital to the country, which has been in recession since early last year.

Finance Minister Bill English said overseas investment could play an important role in an economic recovery and job creation.

Announcing a review of the Overseas Investment Act, English said the current law was cumbersome and the rules often difficult to interpret.

He said an application to buy land near the sea, or otherwise declared "sensitive" because of historical or cultural importance to the indigenous Maori population, had to pass 27 different criteria.