Berlin walls off the euro

It may be sunny and warm in the German capital, but inside the enormous finance ministry, housed in Hermann Goering's former Luftwaffe ministry on the Wilhelmstrasse, reigns the chilly atmosphere of monetary policy orthodoxy. Those excitable southerners, Sarko and Berlusconi, are urging new political controls on the European Central Bank to force it to cut interest rates and curb the drag of the euro on French and Italian exports and growth.

But the Germans are adamantine. Thomas Mirow, the German deputy finance minister, speaking at the far end of a coldly awe-inspiring conference room, makes plain that Germany would veto any attempt by fellow eurozone members to change the ECB's core mandate of price stability, with the inflation target set close to but below 2%. "There has to be unanimity if the Maastricht treaty [on economic and monetary union] has to be changed," he says. That sacred text, and the ECB itself, are of course inspired by the experience of the Bundesbank, postwar Germany's model institution.

The euro has briefly gone through the $1.60 mark, setting a new record on the way to celebrating its tenth anniversary in January 2009. Members of the ECB's governing council are helping propel it upward by talking anew of the need to raise borrowing costs rather than cut them, with inflation at 3.6%. But Mirow retains his guard, refusing as ever to comment on interest rates and sternly upholding the bank's independence.

Airbus may be increasing the price of its planes to counteract the drooping dollar, at its lowest level for 20 years, and BMW raising output at its South Carolina plant by around half for the same reason. But German exports have so far held up well and its economy is still in full recovery even with slowing growth. What is undervalued about the euro, says Mirow, is the extent to which it has protected people in the current market turmoil, proving itself as a source of stability.

This is all unpalatable news in the Élysée Palace where Sarko and his team are preparing the French presidency of the EU for the second half of this year. But at least the French and Germans, the ex-duumvirate that drove forward EU policymaking, share the same concerns about sovereign wealth funds. Mirow says a draft law imposing some curbs on their investment activities will be pushed through cabinet in the coming weeks but these will be limited and "ensure that the traditional German openness to foreign investment will endure".

The legislation will set up a committee, along the lines of the US body vetting foreign investments, the CFIUS, to review and possibly veto funds investing in sensitive industries such as defence, or acquiring more than a quarter-share in a company. But, says the soft-spoken Mirow, it will primarily endorse EU moves for the funds to agree to codes of conduct on transparency and accountability - much to the anger of some well-established funds such as the Kuwait Investment Authority.

D-Day for Tempelhof

We flew here from Brussels to the grandiose and still glorious Tempelhof airport, home of the 1948 Berlin airlift and monument to the "gigantomania" of the Nazis when it was built more than 70 years ago. There are only around two dozen takeoffs and landings each day and the airport is scheduled to close on October 31 - giving over, eventually, to a new international airport, BBI, on the site of the current Schoenefeld on the outskirts.

But it's soon obvious that the planned closure - first decided back in 1991 - of an airport just five or six stops by underground (u-bahn) from the city centre is meeting fierce resistance. A special action group, founded by business people, gathered 200,000 signatures opposing it and forced the senate, the elected local authority, to stage the city's first referendum.

This takes place on Sunday and the streets are full of posters from supporters and opponents of Tempelhof's closure. The vote is non-binding but people say the mayor, Klaus Wowereit, will be hard pushed to ignore what could turn out to be an overwhelming majority in favour of keeping the airport open. The issue is complicated by a federal court decision saying it must close if BBI is built.

Even if it stays open, though, what can the world's third-largest building (after the Pentagon and Ceausescu's People's Palace in Bucharest) be used for? Lufthansa, the German national carrier, left in 1995 for Tegel, the third and little-loved Berlin airport also due to be closed, and J&uumlaut;rgen Weber, the Lufthansa boss, favours BBI. One suggestion is to use Tempelhof for VIP and business flights, given that its closeness to the city centre and easy reach by public transport make it "greener" compared with outlying airports reached by congested roads. Ron Lauder, the US businessman of cosmetics fame, has suggested turning parts of the building into a health centre. But its future is, clearly, up in the air.

Siemens unseemliness

So, too, is that of Mr Siemens, Heinrich von Pierer, its former chief executive and chairman, who resigned over the long-standing bribery and corruption scandal afflicting Germany's biggest technology group - while denying any involvement in alleged payments of €1.3bn used to win contracts.

Next week, on April 29, the Siemens supervisory board will reportedly consider suing for millions of euros in damages all former executive directors, including Von Pierer, said to have been involved. Von Pierer has repeatedly asserted his innocence, rejecting the latest allegations regarding contracts in Iran and Argentina.

He has voluntarily held talks with the Munich prosecutors investigating some 270 suspects, including foreigners, and his lawyers, who insist he is neither a witness nor a suspect, have handed over to them documents covering dozens of pages about his role.

For a man still clinging to his job as chairman of an advisory body on innovation to the chancellor, Angela Merkel, it could be an unseemly end to a lustrous and influential career.