Tuesday, December 08, 2009 MARSEILLE: A French court on Tuesday banned France's anti-immigrant National Front party from giving out leaflets attacking plans to build a giant mosque because they used pictures of it without permission.The ruling was to protect the architects' intellectual property, but also came at a sensitive time after a ban on minarets in neighbouring Switzerland stoked debate about Islam in France, home to Europe's biggest Muslim minority.The Marseille court ordered the far-right party to destroy all leaflets on which it had reproduced designs for the planned Grand Mosque in the southern city, alongside the slogan "No to the mosque."It also ordered the National Front to pay 1,500 euros (2,210 dollars) in costs, according to a copy of the judgement.The architects' lawyer Armelle Bouty told the court that they had also been attacked on the party's website and the use of their intellectual property on the leaflets was "the last straw.""In the extremely political and polemical context, that was intolerable," she said.
Sunday, February 28, 2010 HAVANA: Hundreds of wealthy merchants and cigar aficionados from all parts of the world gathered in Havana this week to bid high stakes for humidors full of premium cigars. Cuba's annual Habanos festival ended on Friday night with an auction of ornate humidors of cedar and mahogany stacked with hand-rolled stogies that raised 800,000 euros ($1.09 million dollars). Habanos S.A. executives this month said cigar sales fell 8 percent to $360 million in 2009, so they have created the Julieta, a smaller, milder version of the Romeo y Julieta cigar, aimed specifically at female smokers. Women now make up only 5 to 10 percent of customers for Habanos. But even with the creation of the Julieta, Garcia said Habanos has only modest hopes for 2010 sales, due largely to a weak economy in Spain, the biggest market for Cuban cigars. The flavor of premium tobacco relies on the soil and climate in which it is grown. The western province of Pinar Del Rio, famous fo...
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