PARIS, Nov. 18th, 2008: The Director-General of UNESCO, Koichiro Matsuura and representative of H. H Dr Sheikh Sultan bin Mohammed Al Qassimi, UAE Supreme Council member and ruler of Sharjah Abdullah Al Owais awarded the 2008 Sharjah Prize for Arab Culture to Egyptian Professor Gaber Asfour and Portuguese author Adalberto Alves in a ceremony in the Organization's Headquarters in Paris.

Present at the ceremony were UAE Ambassador to France Abdullah Al Ameri as well as members of the diplomatic corps in Paris, Matsura said the Award.

Paris - France is planning to hold another international summit on the economic crisis in January, the office of President Nicolas Sarkozy said on Tuesday.

Sarkozy and former British prime minister Tony Blair will co-host the summit, which will be held on January 8 and 9 in Paris.

Those who have already agreed to participate include Nobel Prize- winning economists Josef Stiglitz and Amartya Sen as well as US philosopher Francis Fukuyama.

Paris - The French Socialist Party and its self-appointed diva, former presidential candidate Segolene Royal, are fighting for their political survival, and it is not a pretty sight.

After last weekend's bad-tempered party congress in Reims failed to choose a leader or a platform, the party's more than 168,000 dues-paying members are to vote for a new head on Thursday - and if necessary, on Friday.

The vote will be decisive for Royal's political future, and could also be critical for the chances of the Socialists to unseat President Nicolas Sarkozy in 2012.

Paris  - An appeals court in the northern French city of Douai on Monday reversed an earlier court decision annulling a marriage on the ground that the bride had lied about her non-virginity.

"A lie is no basis for the annulment of a marriage if it does not concern the fundamental character (of one of the partners)," the court wrote in its judgment.

The attorney for the husband said that the ruling "threatens individual liberties."

The couple, both Moroccan-born Muslims, married in 2006. The husband, a 30-year-old engineer who, asked for the annulment after his bride was unable to produce a bloody bedsheet on the wedding night.

Reims, France  - France's opposition Socialist Party failed to decide on a candidate for the post of party leader Sunday after lengthy negotiations that lasted through the night.

Warsaw - Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk said Saturday that the establishment of the US missile shield in his country was solely of concern to Poland and the United States.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy, who currently holds the rotating presidency of the European Union, would have no influence on the project, Tusk said in Warsaw, according to Polish news agency PAP.

He expected "no comments, no actions" for a third country on the issue of the missile shield. Even friendly countries should not interfere, Tusk said.