Brussels - The European Union on Thursday approved a German scheme for providing low-interest loans to businesses in a bid to revive an economy battered by the global financial crisis.

The scheme, which allows the German authorities to grant reduced interest rates on loans agreed before the end of 2010, meets the EU's rules because it is limited in time and value, the EU's executive, the European Commission, said in a statement.

In particular, the scheme is limited to companies whose finances were sound on July 1 - the date on which the global credit crunch is reckoned to have hit Germany.

Brussels  - The European Union's top diplomat is set to pay his first visit to Belarus on Thursday in a further sign of the thaw in relations between Brussels and Minsk, EU officials confirmed.

Javier Solana is to hold talks with Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko and Foreign Minister Sergei Martynov before meeting opposition figures including former presidential candidate Alexander Milinkevich, a statement from Solana's office said.

Brussels- The European Union's executive on Wednesday warned six member states, including France, that they are going too deeply into debt as they struggle to ward off recession, opening a formal process which could in the end lead to legal proceedings.

Euro users France, Greece, Ireland, Malta and Spain, and non-euro country Latvia, saw their government deficits surge to more than 3 per cent of gross domestic product (GDP) in 2008.

Beirut  - The European Union announced on Tuesday that it will send monitors to observe Lebanon's parliamentary elections in June.

"The EU is ready to send a delegation to monitor the June 7 parliamentary elections," EU commissioner for external relations Benita Ferrero-Waldner told reporters after meeting Lebanese Prime Minister Fouad Seniora at the Governmental Palace in downtown Beirut.

The commissioner, who is on a two-day visit to Lebanon, also held talks with President Michel Suleiman, Foreign Minister Fawzi Salloukh and Interior Minister Ziad Baroud.

Brussels - Up to 3.5 million European Union citizens face losing their jobs in 2009 owing to the current economic crisis, the EU's executive warned Tuesday.

According to the European Commission's first monthly survey of the EU's job market, "further deterioration in the labour market is foreseen for the months ahead ... with overall employment contracting by 1.6 per cent, or some 3.5 million jobs."

Unemployment across the 27-member bloc - which in 2008 was estimated at 7.0 per cent - is set to climb to nearly 10 per cent by the end of 2010, the report said.

Brussels - The European Union's executive sent a formal letter to Spain on Tuesday asking for more information on a 4.1-billion-euro (5.4-billion-dollar) rescue plan for the car industry, officials in Brussels confirmed.

The move is a "precautionary measure, because we have not received full details" of the rescue package which the Spanish government finalized on Friday, Jonathan Todd, spokesman for EU Competition Commissioner Neelie Kroes, told journalists in Brussels.