Berlin - The German car market is facing its worse downturn, the nation's auto industry association warned Wednesday as the deepening sense of economic gloom in the country leads to a shakeout in the industry and the prospects of big job cuts.

The German Automotive Industry Association (VDA) said it expects car sales in Europe's biggest auto market to slide to 2.9 million next year, down from a forecast 3.1 million in 2008.

Hamburg - Olympic television broadcasts from 2014 onwards could be aired by private networks in Europe instead of the state-run stations which covered the Games for the last 50 years, a German television executive said on Wednesday.

Dieter Gruschwitz, the head of sports at the ZDF state network, said that such a scenario was not out of the question after the International Olympic Committee rejected an offer from the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) for the 2014 and 2016 Games.

Berlin - Germany and Lebanon are working on a pilot project to improve security along Lebanon's border with Syria, Chancellor Angela Merkel said on Wednesday.

A bilateral commission was looking into ways to promote economic prosperity for Lebanese in the border region, she told a news conference after talks with Lebanese President Michel Suleiman.

The two leaders discussed the new political situation in Lebanon following last May's Doha agreement, which ended a week of bitter fighting between followers of the anti-Syrian ruling majority and the opposition led by the fundamentalist Hezbollah.

Frankfurt/Hamburg - TSG Hoffenheim are playing almost perfect football going into Friday's Bundesliga topper at Bayern Munich, according to their sponsor Dietmar Hopp.

But Hopp, 68, a German billionaire co-founder of software giants SAP and former striker at the club, won't be on hand for the hyped game as he is on holiday in Florida.

Tensions between the leaders Hoffenheim and the champions Munich rose when Munich general manager Uli Hoeness suggested that Hoffenheim's players were earning more than the club said.

Berlin - A US author who is based in Italy, Carolyn Christov-Bakargiev, was appointed Wednesday to one of Germany's top arts jobs, as curator of the Documenta art fest held every five years.

In Kassel, Germany, the Documenta board picked her from a short list of art critics and exhibition managers to run the 100-day Documenta beginning in June 2012.

Christov-Bakargiev, 50, hails from New Jersey and did her academic studies in Italy.

Potsdam, Germany - Some 63 years after the end of World War II, a German prince is trying to secure the return of land and property seized from his family after an abortive bomb plot against Hitler.

Prince Friedrich zu Solms-Baruth, 45, is due to appear before an administrative court in Potsdam, near Berlin, on Thursday to pursue a claim against the Brandenburg state government.

The prince claims that after German reunification, his own father had "fought the German authorities tirelessly for restitution of the family's estates and property - until his death in January 2006."