Business week in pictures

Alistair Darling risked alienating key swing voters when he announced in his pre-budget report a surprise increase in national insurance for 10 million middle income earners and pay cuts for nearly 4 million public sector workers, in the biggest spending squeeze since the 1970s. The chancellor deferred much of the pain until 2011 – including a 0.5 % increase in national insurance on anyone earning more than £20,000 – as he tried to soften the potentially lethal political impact before the general election Photograph: Suzanne Plunkett/guardian.co.uk

CityCenter in Las Vegas, Nevada, a joint project between MGM Mirage and Dubai World. Dubai World may sell off domestic and overseas assets as it attempts to rescue itself from the burden of $60bn (£36.5bn) debts, the emirate's government said this week. The stricken conglomerate, which owns a variety of assets around the world including P&O, the QE2 and a stake in Cirque du Soleil, has played down suggestions that it would have to give up prized assets since it emerged it was struggling to repay its debts. But on Monday the Dubai government's finance chief, Abdul Rahman al-Saleh, said that some assets could be sold, although he did not say which may be up for grabs Photograph: Ethan Miller/guardian.co.uk

French President Nicolas Sarkoz and British Prime Minister Gordon Brown greet each other at the start of a bilateral meeting during a European Union leaders summit in Brussels, Belgium. Gordon Brown and Nicolas Sarkozy put aside their differences to make a joint demand for a global tax on bankers' bonuses this year. The pair have penned a comment piece, published in the Wall Street Journal, in which they call on other world leaders to impose tougher limits on remuneration in the financial sector. The day before, Alistair Darling announced a 50% one-off tax on City bonuses above £25,000, a measure that he claimed would raise around £550m. It appears that Sarkozy's administration is now ready to follow suit with similar measures Photograph: Yves Herman/guardian.co.uk

A car tries to makes its way through piles of rubbish in a street in Athens due to a strike of municipal workers. Financial markets around the world sold off after Greece's credit rating was cut amid mounting concerns about its fiscal health. European stock markets tumbled and the euro weakened sharply with investors becoming increasingly worried about dragging debt problems worldwide. The fallout also followed a ratings downgrade for six companies in Dubai, reinforcing fears of a global debt crisis. The Fitch rating agency cut Greece's long-term debt to BBB+ from A minus Photograph: Louisa Gouliamaki/guardian.co.uk

Spain's Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero holds up a document while speaking about the unemployment rate. Worries about corporate and sovereign debt continued to overshadow world markets on Wednesday as Spain became the latest country to come under the spotlight. The ratings agency Standard & Poor's revised its outlook on Spain to negative and warned that the country faced a risk of a debt downgrade in two years if the government did not take tough action. Spanish bank shares fell on the news Photograph: Paul Hanna/guardian.co.uk

Representatives of smaller shareholders in Northern Rock carry placards in January, to highlight the claim for fair compensation after losing shares when the bank was nationalised. housands of Northern Rock investors suffered a setback in their claims for compensation following the nationalisation of the Newcastle-based lender nearly two years ago after the independent valuer concluded that there was 'no value' in the bank's shares. After receiving 'several thousand' responses, the independent valuer Andrew Caldwell published a consultation document in which he concludes that shareholders should receive 'no compensation' Photograph: Kieran Doherty/guardian.co.uk

Volkswagen AG's Chief Executive Officer Martin Winterkorn, right, and Suzuki Motor Corp Chairman and Chief Executive Office Osamu Suzuki attend their joint news conference in Tokyo. Volkswagen underlined its ambition to become the world's largest carmaker when it acquired a £1.5bn stake in Japanese firm Suzuki Motor – a key player in the growing Indian market – just days after buying half of Porsche Photograph: Issei Kato/guardian.co.uk

An Easyjet plane lands at Berlin's Schoenefeld airport. The wave of management departures from easyJet claimed its most senior figure as chief executive Andy Harrison announced plans to stand down following a long-running dispute over strategy with the carrier's founder and largest shareholder, Sir Stelios Haji-Ioannou. Harrison is the fifth member of easyJet's eight-person management board to resign over the past 12 months, following a year marked by a public boardroom rift over the budget airline's expansion plans Photograph: Michael Urban/guardian.co.uk

A worker serves an electrolysis furnace in the RUSAL aluminium smelter in the Siberian city of Krasnoyarsk. Rusal, the world's largest aluminium producer, suffered a humiliating setback as it was forced to delay its long-awaited $3bn share flotation on the Hong Kong stock exchange. In a blow to Rusal's billionaire owner, Oleg Deripaska, Hong Kong's listing committee said it was not satisfied with the company's flotation plans. Deripaska has been struggling to restructure Rusal's massive, complex debts against the backdrop of Russia's economic woes. Once Russia's richest man, he is the most high-profile oligarch victim of the financial crisis Photograph: Ilya Naymushin/guardian.co.uk

A Euro sign in the Quays Shopping Centre, Newry. A surge in cross-border shopping has helped Northern Ireland emerge from the recession. The Northern Bank said the province 'pulled out of recession' in the second half of 2009. The local economy was boosted in part by bargain-hunters from the Irish Republic who have benefited from the euro's rise against the pound, the bank said Photograph: Julien Behal/guardian.co.uk

The coal fuelled Cottam power station generates electricity in Retford, Nottinghamshire. Britain's energy suppliers must cut their domestic prices early next year, the energy regulator Ofgem warned this week, just hours after it announced it was allowing the six big power companies to put up electricity prices to pay for network upgrades. Issuing these contradictory statements, Ofgem chief executive, Alistair Buchanan, said the big six power firms were enjoying strong margins following a slump in the price they pay for their energy on wholesale markets. His words came as the regulator said it would allow the power firms to increase electricity bills by £4.30 a year on average to pay for upgrades to regional distribution networks Photograph: Christopher Furlong/guardian.co.uk

Miguel Estrada, lawyer for Conrad Black, centre, talks with reporters outside the Supreme Court. Disgraced press baron Conrad Black received a boost in his quest for a release from prison as US supreme court judges peppered prosecutors with sceptical questions over the controversial fraud law at the centre of his conviction. Several of Black's family members including his daughter, Alana and his elder son, James, were in a packed public gallery at the highest court in America for a last-ditch appeal by the 65-year-old peer to overturn his six-and-a-half-year prison sentence for fraud and obstruction of justice. Black, who is incarcerated in Florida, was not allowed to attend. The fallen media mogul's appeal lawyer, Miguel Estrada, told the nine supreme court justices that Black's conviction for embezzling from shareholders was unconstitutional Photograph: Evan Vucci/guardian.co.uk

The Corus steelworks at Redcar, Teesside. Lord Mandelson unveiled a £60m emergency assistance package to help the north-east reinvent itself as a hi-tech industrial zone days after Corus announced that it was closing a steelworks with the loss of 1,700 jobs in the area Photograph: Nigel Roddis/guardian.co.uk

City workers walk across London Bridge on their commute to the financial district. UK employers reported their most encouraging hiring intentions in over a year for the first quarter of 2010, spurring hopes that the labour market was on the road to recovery. In a survey of 2,100 employers, recruitment specialist Manpower found that while the UK may not yet be out of recession, there are indications that the overall labour market is starting to pick up again Photograph: Oli Scarff/guardian.co.uk

Christmas shoppers walk past Debenhams in Oxford Street. The directors of department store group Debenhams earned big bonuses last year – despite cutting the dividend paid to shareholders. Chief executive Rob Templeman was paid a total of £1.2m, including a bonus of £428,000, while finance director Chris Woodhouse received £1.01m including a £458,000 bonus Photograph: Peter Macdiarmid/guardian.co.uk