Welfare

The World Bank - and not the International Monetary Fund - is bringing back to the negotiating table with the country's creditors the reduction of the income tax-free threshold to 5,000 euros per year in the context of welfare benefit restructuring.

Greek police have fired pepper spray at retirees taking part in an anti-austerity protest against pension cuts in central Athens near the prime minister's office.

About 1,000 people, some of them with canes, took party in Monday's protest. Dozens of protesters at the front of the rally tried to break through a police cordon and chanted "Shame on you, shame on you!"

A court in Athens is due on Monday to start hearing the case against a man accused of causing the death of three bank employees during a violent anti-austerity protest in the city center in May 2010.

Dragan Vulevic, from Serbia's Ministry of Labour and Social affairs, says about 390,000 children in Serbia - about 23 percentage of the nation's children - live in families that receive child allowance as social support.

GRACANICA - French humanitarian organisation 'Solidarity for Kosovo' released on Thursday that it raised nine tons of food for the Majka Devet Jugovica soup kitchen in Gracanica.

The organisation has been assisting the work of soup kitchens in Kosovo-Metohija ever since 2004.

Canadian Police arrested at least 80 people after an anti-austerity demonstration in Montreal.

Shops and businesses were closed along the protest route.

US stocks were slightly slower in opening trade Tuesday, falling with European equity markets on political uncertainty in eurozone member Greece.

Five minutes into trade, the Dow Jones Industrial Average stood at 18,008.31, down 29.92 points (0.17 percent).

The European Commission approved Friday an operational program envisaging the allocation of EUR 104.8 M to the most deprived in Bulgaria.

The program spans the period 2014-2020 and it will provide basic material assistance for the poorest citizens of the country.

Minister: Those fit for work must work for welfare

BELGRADE -- Serbia's Minister of Labor Aleksandar Vulin rejected on Tuesday the criticism leveled at him for saying that persons receiving welfare should work.

OBRENOVAC - Serbia's Minister of Labour, Veteran and Social Affairs Aleksandar Vulin rejected on Tuesday the criticism related to putting people on welfare to work.

"Those who are fit to work and are on welfare will work for that welfar and they will do what is in accordance with their skills and physical fitness... and that will be determined by the Social Work Centre," he stated.