user: Q:
Man accused of throttling girlfriend
A Brisbane man with a history of domestic violence breaches has been accused of throttling his latest girlfriend.

The 35-year-old father of two appeared in the city's magistrates court on Saturday on a charge of unlawfully strangling his partner of six months following an argument over finances.

It was conceded there was a lack of medical evidence to back-up the claim and the accused man was bailed on his own undertaking.

He is required to report to police three times a week and have no contact with the female.

The court heard he had been convicted four times of contravening a domestic violence order against two other partners.

The man is also on bail for a charge of breaching a domestic violence order relating to his previous partner.

Besides being accused of strangling his current partner, he is alleged to have left a threatening voice message on her mobile phone message bank.

The accused man's solicitor said his client claimed the woman had mental health issues and he'd been merely trying to prevent her taking an overdose of pills when the incident occurred this week.
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A:
A man, who has four times been convicted of breaching a domestic violence order, has been charged with unlawfully strangling his latest partner.


Spanish Stocks, Bonds Pummeled
Spanish and Italian stocks slumped and yields on the countries' government bonds jumped amid disappointment that the European Central Bank didn't hint that it would pump more money into the banking system.

Other national markets failed to find support from monetary stimulus measures that the ECB, Bank of England and the Chinese central bank did announce. Spain's IBEX-35 slumped 3% to 6954.20, Italy's FTSE MIB lost 2% to 14088.74 and the Stoxx Europe 600 index fell 0.2% to end at 256.93.

Losses were most pronounced in Italy and Spain because of the pressure on government finances and banks there. BBVA sank 4.8% in Madrid, while UniCredit tumbled 5.1% and Intesa Sanpaolo dropped 4.4%, both in Milan. As investors sold Spanish bonds, the 10-year yield soared 0.37 percentage point to 6.78%.

"The ECB's monetary policy easing, although unanimous and significant, amounts to little more than a 'tweaking at the edges' as far as the euro zone's ailing peripheral economies are concerned," said Nicholas Spiro, managing director of Spiro Sovereign Strategy, referring to troubled countries such as Italy and Spain that are the geographic edges of the euro zone.

Some commentators said that the central-bank action was potentially a sign that the global recession was deepening. In a news conference, ECB President Mario Draghi warned that risks to the economic outlook remain tilted to the downside. Concerns about growth by a weak reading on data for the U.S. service sector, and investors shrugged off better-than-expected reports on the U.S. labor market.

Mike Ingram, markets commentator at BGC Brokers, said he was among those looking for more "urgency" from the central bank in addressing the crisis, following last week's European Union summit.

"We were finally starting to get momentum behind the political agenda, but Draghi dropped the ball," he said. "A lot hinges on just keeping things moving, but we now worry we could have a situation like last year, where policy makers go on holiday, congratulate themselves and come back and markets are a mess."

Thursday, the ECB, as expected, cut its key interest rate 0.25 percentage point, to a record low of 0.75%. The Bank of England kept rates on hold, but boosted its quantitative-easing program by £50 billion ($77.96 billion). The People's Bank of China unexpectedly cut its interest rates for the second time in less than a month.

But during his press conference, the ECB president brushed off questions about whether the central bank would engage in another round of cheap, unusually lengthy lending—known as an LTRO, or Long-Term Refinancing Operation. And there was no indication that the central bank would restart the moribund Securities Markets Program, a program of government-debt purchases.

"There was no SMP reopening, there was no new LTRO, there was no real steer on a banking license for the ESM"—the European Stability Mechanism, the euro-zone's bailout fund, said Lyn Graham-Taylor, a fixed-income strategist at Rabobank in London. "The ball has been knocked firmly back to the politicians."

The Italian 10-year bond also rose, to 5.99%, and shorter-term Spanish and Italian bonds were hurt even more. That suggests investors are growing more fearful of trouble in the near term.

Spanish bond yields climbed even ahead of the ECB announcement as the Spanish government sold €3 billion ($3.76 billion) of bonds with maturities of three, five and 10 years and raising the amount targeted. But it also saw borrowing costs rise for the longer-dated debt.

The euro hit a five-week low against the dollar.

Among other major national indexes, Germany's DAX shed 0.4% to 6535.56 and France's CAC-40 slid 1.2% to 3229.36. The U.K.'s FTSE 100 edged up 0.1% to 5692.63.

Volkswagen jumped 5.1% after it said it would take over in August the portion of Porsche Automobil Holding that it doesn't already own. Porsche shares fell 1.2%.

Miners rose in London, aided by the Chinese rate cut. Anglo American rose 1.1%.

U.K. engineering firm GKN surged 13% after acquiring Volvo's aero division in a deal that is expected to significantly enhance GKN Aerospace's engine-components business.

Among commodities, light, sweet crude for August delivery was down 18 cents at $87.48 on the New York Mercantile Exchange as European markets closed. Comex Gold for August delivery was down $13.90 at $1,607.90.
Please write a summary below.


assistant: European equity markets slipped as investors worried about global growth prospects following aggressive policy action by central banks.