GERMANY - Mounting tension in the Crimea is prompting calls for compulsory military service to be reintroduced in Germany. A number of German ex-generals have raised fears over the nation's military strength should it be drawn into a Nato-led conflict. "We need compulsory military service. There is no other way for Germany to guarantee national defence within the Nato mutual defence alliance," retired Nato general Egon Ramms told Bild newspaper. "It certainly can't be done on a voluntary basis." Ramms was commander of the Allied Joint Forces Command between 2007 and 2010, one of the highest-ranking positions in the Nato alliance.

USA - Detroit's emergency manager expects the city's $18 billion bankruptcy plan to win court approval by the fall despite obstacles such as a dispute over swap agreements and a vote by retirees on the plan that could potentially slow or derail the process.

AUSTRIA - Austria’s Jewish community was outraged on Monday, after a local politician compared the European Union (EU) to the Third Reich in Nazi Germany, Reuters reported. Following the comments by Andreas Moelzer, co-lead candidate for Austria’s far-right Freedom Party (FPO), the leader of Austria’s Jewish community called on him to drop his campaign for re-election to the European Parliament. The German newspaper Sueddeutsche Zeitung had quoted Moelzer as calling the EU a dictatorship that made the Third Reich look “informal and liberal” by comparison. The Third Reich “certainly did not have as many rules and regulations, commandments and bans,” Moelzer was quoted as telling a gathering in Vienna last month. In response, Austrian Jewish leader Oskar Deutsch said on Monday that Moelzer’s refusal to distance himself from the comment showed he was apparently unable to come to grips with the fact that proponents of extreme-right thought shared responsibility for Nazi crimes.

CHILE - More than 300 earthquakes have shaken Chile's far-northern coast the past week, keeping people on edge as scientists say there is no way to tell if the unusual string of tremors is a harbinger of an impending disaster. The unnerving activity began with a strong magnitude 6.7 quake on March 16 that caused more than 100,000 people to briefly evacuate low-lying areas, although no tsunami materialized and there was little physical damage from the shaking. But the land has not settled down. More than a dozen perceptible quakes were felt in the city of Iquique just on Monday. "The situation is out of the ordinary. There's a mix of a string of tremors and their aftershocks that make things more complex to evaluate," Mario Pardo, deputy head of the Universidad de Chile seismology center, told the local newspaper La Tercera. "We can't rule out a larger quake."

BELGIUM - As Belgium's capital and host to the EU and Nato, Brussels is used to deploying heavy security when big names pop by. But US President Barack Obama's visit on Tuesday will strain the city like never before with €10 million (£8.4 million) of Belgian money being spent to cover his 24 hours in the country. The president will arrive on Tuesday night with a 900-strong entourage, including 45 vehicles and three cargo planes. Advance security teams orchestrating every last detail have combed Brussels already, checking the sewers and the major hospitals, while American military helicopters were last week given the green light for overflights. The city hosts at least four EU summits a year, with each of these gatherings costing €500,000 in extra police, military and transport expenses. "But this time round, you can multiply that figure by 20," said Brussels mayor, Yvan Mayeur.

SYRIA - Jabhat al-Nusra, a Syrian salafist organization that is identified with Al Qaeda, has uploaded to Youtube a video documenting the preparations by one of its members for a suicide mission, in Edra, east of Damascus. The mission led to the overrunning of Syrian army positions and to the capture of officers and soldiers from the Syrian army.

ISRAEL - MK Motti Yogev (Jewish Home) said on Monday that he was “absolutely in favor” of ending the talks with the Palestinian Authority (PA). "I'm not in favor of continuing negotiations. I am in favor of us creating peace on the ground, first and foremost by annexing Judea and Samaria in stages, first in area C,” he told Arutz Sheva. “The Arabs would have better lives under Israeli sovereignty than anywhere else. Let’s take things into our hands and give the Palestinians better lives than they would get in any other state. We should continue our relationship with the Palestinians, but not necessarily with the PA which seeks our destruction, and educates its children and its future generations towards that destruction,” he said. “There's nothing to talk to them about and certainly we should not make any ‘gestures’ to them. As for the American pressure, we have to know how to handle it.”

USA - You will be shocked at what some Americans actually believe. For example, close to 90 percent of us believe that we are eating a healthy diet, and yet more than third of the population is officially obese. 65 percent of all Americans say that they are dissatisfied with the government, and yet nearly a third of us would be willing to submit to a "TSA body cavity search" in order to get on an airplane. Americans are angrier and more frustrated with government and with their lives than ever before, but we also exhibit almost unbelievable levels of sloth and apathy.

UK - Midwives, GPs and registrars will be enlisted to help couples stay together and reduce levels of family breakdown under government plans, The Daily Telegraph has learned. Iain Duncan Smith, the Work and Pensions secretary, is examining a series of new policies aimed at reducing the "stigma" surrounding counselling and relationship support services.

Under the plans, which were presented to ministers at the social justice cabinet meeting earlier this month, midwives, GPs and registrars will be encouraged to talk to couples about their relationships. The policies, which will be unveiled this summer, come amid concerns that family breakdown is costing taxpayers billions every year.

UK - Calls for a Parliamentary inquiry into the scale of Islamic law in the UK are mounting after the body representing solicitors in England and Wales issued formal guidance on making “Sharia compliant” wills. The Law Society was accused of giving its stamp of approval to discriminatory practices after it published advice on writing wills which deny women an equal share and exclude “illegitimate” children or unbelievers. The society denied promoting Sharia Law and insisted that it was simply responding to demand. Meanwhile Peter Tatchell, the human rights campaigner and patron of Tell Mama, the group which combats anti-Muslim hate crime, said: “The Law Society is wrong. It should withdraw its guidelines assisting or promoting Sharia Law in the UK.”

TAIWAN - Taiwanese police have clashed with hundreds of students who occupied government headquarters to protest at a trade deal with China. Police used water cannon and dragged out students one by one, clearing the building by dawn on Monday. Close to 60 people were arrested and more than 100 hurt, reports said. The protesters say the agreement with China would hurt Taiwan's economy and leave it vulnerable to pressure from Beijing. The governing Kuomintang party says it is determined to ratify the deal with Beijing, which it says will boost the economy and create jobs. China formally regards Taiwan as a part of its territory, despite the island governing itself for six decades.

UK - Many types of brown and wholemeal bread contain higher levels of sugar than white loaves, a Telegraph analysis shows. A number of popular manufacturers are adding sugar to bread seen as a “healthier” option, while equivalent white loaves remain free of the substance. Campaigners described the findings as “alarming”, suggesting that families who opted for wholemeal varieties for health reasons were being misled. One nutritionist said the added sugar partly undermined the benefits of eating wholemeal. The disclosure comes amid growing warnings by scientists over the effects of sugar on health.

USA - Authorities in the US state of Washington have found six more bodies after Saturday's huge landslide, bringing the number known to have been killed to 14, say police. Officials now say as many as 176 people may remain unaccounted for after the 177ft (54m) wall of mud hit near the town of Oso, north of Seattle. Search crews have worked day and night, using helicopters and laser imaging. But officials admit they have little hope of finding survivors. Speaking earlier after surveying the area from the air, Washington Governor Jay Inslee said it was "devastation beyond imagination". He said the slide "basically cut a mountain in two" and deposited it on the town below. Nothing in the path of the slide was still standing.

GUINEA, WEST AFRICA - There are no known treatments or vaccines for the hemorrhagic fever, which kills up to 90 percent of those who become infected. Guinea’s capital Conakry has been hit by an Ebola epidemic that has already claimed dozens of lives in the country’s southern forests. “At least 59 out of 80 who contracted Ebola across the West African country have died so far,” said UNICEF in a statement to Agence France-Presse (AFP). The virus is spread through direct contact with blood, feces or sweat, by sexual contact or unprotected handling of contaminated corpses. First discovered in the Democratic Republic of Congo in 1976, the disease has spread in several outbreaks, mainly in sub-Saharan Africa.

FRANCE - France's far-right National Front party dealt a major blow [which] will put them in pole position in the second round on March 30 [beating] Socialists after several of its candidates took prime position in the first round of local elections. The main centre-right opposition UMP party also hailed a "big victory" as initial estimates showed it came out trumps in the elections, as President Francois Hollande suffers record unpopularity against a backdrop of near-zero growth and high unemployment. Far-right candidates came ahead in several key towns and cities.