The week at a glance...Europe

Paris

DSK fights back: Dominique Strauss-Kahn said this week he would sue a key aide to French President Nicolas Sarkozy and five media outlets for linking him to a high-end prostitution ring in the city of Lille. Though Strauss-Kahn has not been charged in the prostitution prosecution, Sarkozy adviser Henri Guaino said in a television interview that Strauss-Kahn’s sexual excesses had entered “a zone where private life meets criminality.” Various press outlets reported that Strauss-Kahn was a regular client of the ring, and that his activities may have been financed by a French construction company, Eiffage. One prostitute, quoted at length by Le Parisien, said she told police of having sex with Strauss-Kahn at 11 orgies over six years, and that he had “exceptional vigor.” French media this week reported that Strauss-Kahn’s wife, Anne Sinclair, told friends she had “had enough” and was about to leave him.

Madrid

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Win for Right: Spain’s main center-right party, the People’s Party, won a resounding victory in this week’s general election, taking 45 percent of the vote, versus 29 percent for the incumbent Socialists—their worst performance since Spain returned to democracy, in 1975. Parliament is not due to meet for several weeks, however, and it may be a month before the PP leader, Mariano Rajoy, is sworn in as prime minister. Rajoy, who inherits sky-high unemployment and a deepening sovereign debt crisis, warned that he was coming to power amid “the most delicate circumstances Spain has faced for 30 years,” adding, “There won’t be any miracles. We never promised any.”