Berlin - Germany slumped into a recession for the first time in five years, official data released Thursday showed, amid signs that a global economic downturn was taking hold.

Europe's biggest economy shrank by 0.5 per cent in the third quarter of 2008, after it contracted 0.4 per cent in the three months to the end of June, the Federal Statistics Office said.

Paris - The United States and the nations of the euro zone have entered an economic recession that will be long and could be severe, the Organization of Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) said in a preliminary forecast released Thursday in Paris.

"Economic activity is expected to fall by 0.9 per cent in the US next year, by 0.5 per cent in the euro area and by 0.1 per cent in Japan as OECD countries enter a protracted slowdown," the OECD said.

Johannesburg - When Zafar Wahid, a project manager with Liberty Life insurance company, was relieved of his car at gunpoint in Johannesburg recently, he knew exactly where to go to get a knock-down replacement.

On an unseasonably cold summer's evening, Wahid, still wearing his work trousers and tie, walks past a string of cars in Burchmore's showroom in northern Johannesburg, towards the auction room, where around 200 people are crammed into rows of tiered plastic seats.

Paris - Leaders meeting in Washington on Saturday to deal with the financial crisis must build the basis of "a new Bretton Woods," Russian President Dmitri Medvedev said in an interview published Thursday in the French daily Le Figaro.

In reconstructing the world's economic system, as the 1944 Bretton Woods meeting did, heads of the world's leading industrial nations must establish "new international credit institutions, a new accounting system, a new risk insurance system," Medvedev said.

Kuwait - The oil-rich Gulf state of Kuwait halted its share trading by a court order on Thursday after significant losses on the Kuwait Stock Exchange (KSE), Kuwait news agency KUNA reported.

The court decision came to prevent further losses among traders, after the KSE price index fell to 8,691 points on Thursday, a drop of 160.1 points.

Director of KSE Saleh al-Falah was informed of the court's decision early Thursday, he said that the suspension will continue until November 17, KUNA reported.

Amsterdam - SNS Reaal has increased its equity capital by 1.25 billion euros (1.57 billion dollars), the Dutch bank and insurance firm announced on Thursday.

Of the total equity increase, 750 million euros originates from the Dutch government, which has purchased securities yielding the Dutch state 8.5 per cent interest on an annual basis.

In addition, the Dutch government acquired the right to appoint two people to SNS Reaal's board. Finally, all SNS managers will give up their bonuses.