By TROTTER, Chris THE New Zealand revolutionary tradition, such as it is, had its birth in the West Coast mining town of Blackball a century ago. But that wasn't the tradition which Cabinet Ministers and high-ranking trade union officials turned out to celebrate last weekend.

By Katrin Bennhold President Nicolas Sarkozy plans to press ahead with reforms but tone down his flashy image in a bid to restore his popularity with low-income voters after his center-right party suffered a setback in local elections Sunday, officials close to his office said.

By Elizabeth Nash Spain's socialist Prime Minister, Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, squeaked through for a second term in general elections yesterday with a wafer-thin majority closely matching predictions and his victory four years ago.

The conservative Popular Party conceded defeat Sunday in Spain's general elections, but the Socialist Party failed to win an absolute parliamentary majority.

Excerpt from report by Interfax-Ukraine news agenc