President. It is official and definitive former italian Prime MinisterSilvio Berlusconi is a convicted criminal. Just an hour ago, the sentence was reached. That will probably end up meaning house arrest or community service. After a threeday hearing, the judges rejected the media mogul turned politicians appeal. The judges referred a ban on berlusconi from Holding Public office for five years to a milan court for review. Lets get more from rome. Is this the end or the beginning of berlusconis colorful political life . Not necessarily. We do not know the link of the ban on his Public Office. That has to be recalculated. And then this is a Crucial Point it has to be ratified by parliament, where we would expect that berlusconis supporters would put up a last ditch attempt to save their leader. Thats the first point. The second is that while he has been told he cannot sit in parliament or a government, he can still lead his party. He even hinted at that saying before the verdict was announced, saying that he might do the same is that the grid of as beppe grillo and lead his party from outside the government. It is not clear whether he can do that while he is still under house arrest. Also, he has suffered a huge blow to his prestige and image. Very quickly, the blow to italys political situation right now. Yes, it has cast a long shadow over the left right coalition, which berlusconis party is a partner. After so many convictions, this is actually the first one to stick. 30 cold cases ranging from fraud and corruption to sex with an underage prostitute. This could eventually lead to his departure from Public Office. Berlusconi has been in and out of Public Office for a long time. Are less goings most recent political comeback return him to the political scene this march as a rush term senator berlusconis most recent political comeback i. Populist Campaign Appeals paved the way for his return. Do you want lower taxes on businesses . Lower taxes on families . Lower income taxes . Berlusconis promises went down well with many voters tired of the tough austerity that came in with his successor, mario monti. Berlusconi has charisma. He makes us believe in the future. He is like a rubber raft people can hold onto so they do not get sucked under. Despite dozens of indictments ranging from corruption to tax fraud and sex scandals, until now, berlusconi had managed to come away clean he was named Prime Minister four times beginning in 1994. Im doing this less for personal motives than out of concern for my country. There has been a big shift here with all the manipulation and corruption scandals, the old lyrical class has disappeared. Berlusconi also sought the spotlight on the international stage. In 2003, he sent italian troops to iraq. There are people like me working to boost italys international prestige, and then there are other people people who want to discredit italy. But berlusconis flair for drama did not do much to help romes reputation. He responded sharply to criticism from german representative monte schultz, now president of the european parliament. I know there is a movie being made in italy about not see concentration camps. I suggest you play the prisoner functionary. Two elections later, berlusconi found himself struggling against italys debt crisis. His perceived failure to tackle the countrys economic woes led him to ultimately resigning in november 2011. 15 months later, he was elected senator, one last triumph over technocrat mario monti, who failed to get italians onboard with his reforms. Moving onto other news now now, american fugitive Edward Snowden has left a moscow airport after five and a half weeks stuck in transit. That has hit a raw nerve in the united states, who say that free is another twist of the knife. The former analyst of the National Security agency has been on the run since releasing documents showing how the u. S. Spies on citizens around the world. Snowdens father has thanked president vladimir pearson. Where is Edward Snowden . His lawyer will not say, but he did confirm the fugitive nsa analyst has been granted temporary asylum in russia and has left the airport transit area. What concern is his place of residence . He will choose it himself. He can live in a hotel or an apartment. He is one of the most wanted people on earth. They will make sure his place of residence is absolutely safe. Snowden could attempt to reach countries who have offered him asylum. Latin america is a far way off in more ways than just geography. Its snowden stays in russia, he could become a stumbling block in u. S. Russian relations. Washington wants moscow to extradite snowden to face charges of espionage and the theft of class of five nsa documents, but that is something the russian government has declined to do. Where might snowden be . Is he safe . For more, lets cross over to our moscow correspondent. Do we have any idea where snowden may be and what his conditions are for him in russia . His whereabouts are still the big secret that is not revealed due to security reasons. For told the last image was a man very similar to him getting into a car surrounded by men who look like security officers. Also with his russian lawyer next in him, and where the car was headed, we do not know. His lawyer says he has american friends in russia who would now take care of his safety. He does not elaborate any further. We can assume, though, that the russian authorities would play some role in protecting snowden because it would be quite an embarrassing moment for russia if such a famous refugee were to suddenly disappear. The white house has said t tt they are extremely disappointed with the development. How will this affect bilateral negotiations. They seem to hope it will not affect relations to badly. Putins advisor and International Affairs tried to downplay the situation, calling it not very significant today, underlining that president putin still hopes there will not be any harm. However, after news from washington today that obama might reconsider the meeting planned in moscow with Vladimir Putin in september, i think the kremlin cannot be as optimistic anymore. Both sides actually wanted to avoid an escalation because they need each other when it comes to fighting International Crime or international terrorism, but certainly, the case case is a burden. Thank you very much. These latest developments, as Britains Guardian newspaper has published another raft of secret guardians provided by snowden. The report says the nsa can monitor pretty much everything a user does online. They can mine data for names, telephone numbers, and keywords used in private, stations, all without a warrant. The agencys director insisted at a Hacker Convention that the goal was to find terrorists and not to spy on average citizens. Is this surprising . That this level of surveillance is even possible . What is surprising is that there are still surprises left in this ongoing story. Technically, it is not really surprising. Just a question of how much money we had to throw at the task of collecting a huge amount of data and mining that. The affair began with a couple of internet handful with a couple of Internet Companies in the u. S. The big unanswered question remains who has access to the software and who controls what has been done with it . Thats a very good question who has access to the software . Can this technology be used by criminal organizations, perhaps . We should hope that the nsa has entitlement on the software. Even if the other parts of the systems are not being exported, we can be pretty sure that other nations have something similar in place or under development. Is there any way of protecting our own data and privacy . A very common suggestion is to encrypt your data, but it is not really easy to be done. You do not need a degree in computer science, but it is not a trivial task. My message is use common sense. Look at who you are doing business with. Is it an American Company . Is it a European Company with an extra layer of protection in their portfolio . Also think which data needs to be transported unencrypted and which data should be under a layer of protection. Thanks for the analysis. Moving on to the african state of zimbabwe, where the president has claimed landslide victory, but the challenger and Prime Minister has declared the vote no and void. He has called for passive resistance. The two men have been political rivals for over a decade. Residents are going about their business one day after the poll, but the calm on the streets cannot mask the brewing political tensions. Opposition leaders accuse the president s party of latent vote rigging. The Prime Minister said many voters were prevented from voting. He said the election was neither free nor fair. Our conclusion is that this has been a huge farce. The credibility of this election has been marred. The African Union says the vote was peaceful and orderly, but human rights activists dispute the assessment. Unfortunately, they have quite often endorsed elections that were clearly flawed. But it is everyones hope, but given past examples, it does not look good. Mugabes party says allegations of vote rigging are unfair because we do not do that. Rightfully stoked up position in front of the Prime Ministers partys headquarters shortly after he went public with allegations of fraud. Finally, guilty on 937 counts of aggravated murder, assault, kidnapping, and rape. A u. S. Court has sentenced ariel castro to life in prison without parole plus 1000 years. That was the verdict after the 53yearold leader guilty to of ducting, abusing, and holding three women cap there were more than a decade. He was arrested after one of the women managed to escape his cleveland welcome back. It sounds like another showdown is looming. Egypts rulers are urging protesters to abandon their camps. Protests were even declared a threat to National Security. Protested supporters of ousted president Muhammad Morsi say say they are going ahead with a march of the millions on friday. Meanwhile, diplomatic efforts to head off confrontation are picking up. The German Foreign minister is in cairo to urge foreign camps to avoid bloodshed. Hes the First Western foreign minister to visit egypt since the military ousted the president last month. Westerwelle chose his words carefully after a meeting with his fidgeting counterpart. The decision about the future of egypt that is a decision that only egyptians can make. In our view, it is important to seek useful solutions and reject the use of force. To make possible a new democratic getting in egypt, with elections in which all Political Forces can participate. In other words, including the Muslim Brotherhood of mohamed morsi. Westerwelle is urging all sides to exercise restraint. A peaceful future for egypt requires that all of the forces and its society become involved in the process of transformation. Any appearance of selective justice must be avoided. But he did not repeat calls for morsis release. His priority now is to use whatever influence germany has to try to calm egypts troubled waters. Can europe help in the search for Common Ground . What can the German Foreign minister accomplished in egypt . The german born minister the message from all sides as all the same. They are trying to avoid violence and bloodshed. There is a big fear that there might be bloodshed. That is, i think, the main purpose of this trip, trying to create some kind of small, confidence building measures, but it is far from clear that this approach is going to work. Sounds like security and demonstrators are set to lock horns. Where are things headed, do you think, in the next 24 hours . Security is going to clear the square. They asked people to leave, and at least now, they will have a safe exit before they clear the square. They gave them yesterday for days. It is really not going to be clear what is going to be happened what is going to happen. Maybe the International Efforts at least created enough pressure to put the whole thing for a few days on hold. Thanks for the update. In syria, a blast at an Ammunitions Depot has killed at least 40 people, including many civilians. The depot is in the part of the city that is held by government troops. Reports from the region say the explosion was triggered by rocket fire from rebels. The antiassad forces are attempting to begin control of governmentcontrolled districts. Turning to businesses now, Interest Rates in the eurozone will stay at their record low. The European Central banks decision comes as positive indicators show up a sweet, including a drop in unemployment figures. Mario draghi said he expects modest recovery in the second half of the year, but he admits that the threat of recession is still there. Euro zone Interest Rates are low, and they will stay that way for the time being. That was the message from the European Central bank chief. He even refused to rule out further cuts in the benchmark rate if needed. The governing Council Confirms that it expects the key ecb Interest Rates to remain at present or lower levels for an extended period of time. The cheap money policy is intended to stimulate the economies of the 17 euro zone states. Awash in liquidity, banks would pass the money onto the private sector at favorable rates at least in theory. The ecb is doing what the u. S. Federal reserve has long done. Namely, support the economy. Draghi even says it openly. In the u. S. , the benchmark rate is even lower at just. 25 . Some insiders expect the ecb will cut its rating and in october after german elections. Interestrate decisions are always carefully observed by the markets. Our Frankfurt Stock Exchange correspondent has this reaction from the trading floor. Mario draghi sounds very different from the u. S. Central bank, and that is intentional. The fed wants to gradually withdraw from crisis mode. It wants to stop buying bonds as soon as the economy permits. Not sooner, but as soon as it is possible, it wants to dial back. Not so with the ecb. Mario draghi says low Interest Rates well into the next year, and that is to help the economy here, to help countries in crisis. Good news for equities because that aids the financing of firms, and because investors carry a lot of the money that does not yield very well low paying Investment Opportunities into the equity markets. For the euro, low Interest Rates are not that good, so the euro went down on this news. Here are the numbers for you now germanys dax ended the trading day well up in positive territory by more than one. 5 . The euro stoxx 50 also up by almost 1. 5 . Across the atlantic, markets were off to the races this morning after the Federal Reserve vowed to maintain its stimulus program. The Dow Jones Industrials at the moment of i 0. 7 up by 0. 7 . The euro losing today at the moment, trading for 1. 32. This week, we are airing a series of reports looking at different aspects of the Election Campaign underway here in germany. Germans go to the polls on September September 20 22 elect a new government, and the parties are fighting hard for every last vote, including those for new citizens. 10 of those eligible to cast ballots in september have an immigrant background. Its mainly social democrats who are attracting their votes, and heres why. Campaigning in germanys industrial heartland. 11 in four people here are immigrants. The deputy chair of the main opposition party, the social democrats, hopes her turkish background will help connect with minority voters. She even helps translate. He says he is working on european projects and has many guest here. She has urged her party to reach out more to immigrants. We need to be more open minded. We walked down every street here around the train station. We go to places where many others do not go, where other parties say, lets not campaign here. Lets concentrate on the better districts. We say, no, these areas all belong to the same city. In businesses, long time spd supporters come facetoface with the with the electorates changing demographics. Many new germans refuse to be pigeonholed by their cultural backgrounds. When i speak about germany german cars, for example, i say, we build the best cars. It is home for me. Parties are competing for the minority vote like never before, and they are searching for hot button issues like education and training for dual citizenship, but even here, the opinions very vary. I think there are too many people immigrating. Too many . Yeah. The social democrats have a lot to gain by mobilizing the minority vote. Many naturalized germans are nonvoters but sympathetic to spd positions. She says immigrants need to make their voices heard. I have to vote and get involved. Thats also why we are canvassing. Many immigrants maintain a healthy skepticism for politics and politicians. Many perceive the candidates as willing to promise anything for votes, just like parents do with children. We say yes to whatever the children want, and then whatever then do whatever suits us. Its the same with political parties. They say yes to everything and then just leave things the way they are. They forget everything. Thats the way it is. It can be tough out on the campaign trail. Theres always the pressure of another meet and greet when all people want to do is enjoy themselves. Chances are you probably have not heard of a German Village in the countrys far north. Unless, that is, you are a fan of heavy metal music. Some 75,000 tickets have been sold this year with some 150 bands playing on eight stages. The celebration of eardrum bursting headbanging music runs until sunday. An great time in the middle of the summer where temperatures are up so high. Thats all for us for now. Thank you so much. Captioned by the National Captioning Institute www. Ncicap. Org