She begins by describing the plucky survival of Venice after the fall of the Serene Republic to Napoleon's army in 1797.

ECONOMIST: Venice

However, last November, with Mr Kabila installed as president of the renamed Democratic Republic of Congo, the agreement began to fall apart.

ECONOMIST: Mining in Congo

The mark briefly outlived the fall of the German Empire and the foundation of the Weimar Republic in 1918, but was ruined by the inflation of the early 1920s.

BBC: Coining a new Europe

Meanwhile, after Malta and the UK, the countries with the highest instances of male obesity were Hungary - where 21.4% fall into that category - and the Czech Republic, where 18.4% are classed as such.

BBC: UK women are 'fattest in Europe'