Spain is enjoying a healthy olive harvest this after two poor seasons, sending prices soaring by more than 50%.

The upshot has been a rise in thefts by roving gangs of robbers. Dozens of thefts have been reported each week since the harvest began.

The Italian government expects it will get nearly €4 billion from tax dodgers who used an amnesty deal to declare money and assets abroad.

The year-long voluntary disclosure scheme resulted in nearly €60 billion being declared, according to the economy ministry.

Portugal's new minister for planning and infrastructure, Pedro Marques, said he is in talks with Gateway as the state wants to buy back a controlling share of TAP.

The Gateway company control 61% of TAP but one of the Socialist Party’s pre-election commitments was to reverse recent privatisations, TAP’s amongst them.

Banif bank shareholders faced a further 19% drop in value today to a new historic low.  The bank led by Jorge Tomé now has lost 77.14% of its value and has a market capitalisation of just  €150.3 million.

The shares just keep falling with investors apprehensive over the bank's ability to repay state aid of €825 million.

Wider concerns exist over the bank’s ability to survive at all with the EC having ‘major doubts’ about Banif’s ability to complete its restructuring plan as money keeps leaving the Madeiran institution and its retail business could hardly be referred to as profitable.

The recently empowered Portuguese Communist Party has put forward a draft resolution to end once and for all the social injustice and predation being imposed on the Ria Formosa islanders in the Algarve.

The Communists are presenting a resolution to parliament which demands recognition of the social, economic and cultural value of the villages on the Ria Formosa islands and for an end to the demolition of houses by the out-of-control, state controlled Polis Litoral Ria Formosa company whose actions to date have caused outrage locally, nationally and internationally as it's contractors have demolished properties owned in many cases by generations of the same family.

Germany now has the world’s second oldest population, trailing behind only Japan.

The average age in Germany has shot up to 44.1 years by 2013, according to the Federal Institute for Population Research.

The derelict Guarda Fiscal building in Cabanas now is the centre for protest and activity as locals are fed up with hosting an abandoned state owned building in their midst.

The Tavira Left Bloc wants to turn the old Guarda Fiscal post, in Beco Vasco da Gama, into a community centre, an exhibition centre, a tourist information centre, in fact anything other than leaving the building to deteriorate further.

Venice is hoping to restore parts of its historic Ghetto to coincide with the 500th anniversary of its establishment.

The non-profit organisation Venetian Heritage Council, headed by fashion designer Diane von Furstenberg, is asking fashion and show business celebrities to donate millions to the work.