Industrial production in the eurozone was stable in December 2014 when compared to November.

But annual production was slightly lower by 0.2% than it had been in December 2013.

Portimão communist party members have spotted that the council is trying its best to sneak through the Quinta da Rocha development on the shores of the Ria de Alvor.

The communists argue that the project in question - two holiday villages, two 5-star hotels, a total of 300 beds on an area of just over 200 hectares - is slap bang in the middle of the Natura 2000 network and is a protected landscape along the shores of the Ria de Alvor, one of the most important ecosystems in the Algarve.

In a further sign of the deepening strain between Spain and Britain, the Cervantes Institute in Gibraltar is to be closed by Madrid.

The Spanish foreign minister told parliament of the decision to shut the language school.

Clothing manufacturer Benetton appears to be showing its true colours in the face of ongoing pressure to contribute to the fund for the victims of a factory disaster in which more than 1,100 people died.

The factory complex Rana Plaza in Bangladesh collapsed in April 2013. Benetton along with a number of other brands employed workers there to make their clothes.

About 50 customers who bought over-the-counter investments at Banco Espírito Santo branches, today invaded a branch of Novo Banco in Oporto demanding the return of the money they had invested, saying that they had been "cunningly deceived” by the old BES, according to a report on iOnline.

"The people here were extorted. At BES then had a cunning approach from a commercial point of view," said Alberto Neves, one of the out-of-pocked investors, who said the invasion of Novo Banco’s branch had been spontaneous and was a peaceful demonstration.

The Foreigners and Borders Service announced today that its officers stopped and arrested a German citizen at Faro airport as she was wanted for extradition and subject to a European Arrest Warrant.

The would be air passenger, a 55-year-old woman, is a convicted computer fraudster sentenced in Germany to 15 years in prison.

The Spanish government is contemplating legal action against HSBC bank after it was learned that its private bank in Switzerland helped clients avoid tax authorities.

The files show that 2,694 Spaniards had accounts in HSBC’s Swiss subsidiary, worth a total of more than €2 billion.

Jails in England and Wales were found by an official study not to be overcrowded, but to have three times as many prisoners sentenced to life than elsewhere in Europe.

In England and Wales, prison density "per 100 places" was 95.5, meaning it was just scraping overcrowding levels.