SAN FRANCISCO, Sept 13 (Reuters) – U.S. prosecutors have launched a criminal probe into whether eBay Inc (EBAY.O: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) employees misappropriated confidential information from classified ad service Craigslist, according to a copy of a grand jury subpoena obtained by Reuters.

The two companies have been feuding for years in civil court over allegations that online giant eBay used its Craigslist board seat to glean confidential information about the classified ad business as eBay prepared to launch a rival service.

An eBay spokeswoman, Amanda Miller, said the company would cooperate in any inquiry related to the disputes with Craigslist.

“EBay believes that Craigslist’s allegations against eBay are without merit,” Miller said in an email on Tuesday. “We will continue to vigorously defend ourselves, and we will aggressively pursue our claims against Craigslist.”

EBay shares traded at $29.27 on Tuesday in after-hours trading, down slightly from their $29.40 close.

Last year, a Delaware’s Chancery Court judge ruled that Craigslist properly removed an eBay representative from its board. The judge also ruled that Craigslist could not dilute eBay’s 28.4 percent stake in the company.

The subpoena, issued by a federal grand jury in San Jose, Calif., last week on behalf of the U.S. Justice Department, seeks an array of information and documents, including those pertaining to eBay founder and Chairman Pierre Omidyar.

By Alexandria Sage

PARIS (Reuters Life!) – Duck fat has a rich history in French cuisine as the key ingredient in savoury cassoulets and confits, but now industrious farmers are turning the grease into biodiesel and biogas.

A farm cooperative based in St. Aquilin, a rural village in the southwestern region of the Dordogne, is powering a tractor and two other vehicles with biodiesel made from duck fat and hopes to convince others to do the same.

The animal product is in no short supply in this scenic area where two million of the web-footed birds are raised each year, according to the regional agricultural council.

“We’re really doing this out of activism, to recognize that we have to do something to help save the planet. We should stop the big speeches and start with little acts,” said Jules Charmoy, who raises russet-hued Limousin cattle on his organic farm.

Concerned about the world’s reliance on oil, Charmoy and a partner identified a recycling need close to home given the profusion of duck used by many restaurants and food businesses.

Their 50-farm cooperative of like-minded farmers collects the fat from neighboring businesses once every two weeks, and then makes a veritable duck soup that will end up as fuel.

PARIS (Reuters) – A French court ordered an investigation on Thursday into the role of IMF head Christine Lagarde in a large settlement paid to a businessman friend of President Nicolas Sarkozy when she was finance minister.

The investigation will get under way at once into Lagarde’s alleged complicity in the misuse of public funds in her approval of a 285 million euro ($407 million) arbitration payout to Bernard Tapie in 2008, the court’s prosecutor said.

Lagarde — who took up her post as International Monetary Fund managing director last month — has denied any misconduct and her lawyer said the probe would be “in no way incompatible” with her functions at the global lender.

Analysts said the development would be awkward for Lagarde as she makes her IMF debut and tries to turn the page from her predecessor Dominique Strauss-Kahn’s exit from the post in a sex assault scandal — but they also said it should not immediately hurt her credibility.

“Today’s news is politically unhelpful but on the other hand I would be surprised if this triggered a dynamic making this a major issue and affecting Lagarde’s stewardship at this stage,” said Thomas Klau of the European Council on Foreign Affairs.

“There is obviously no direct link between her responsibilities at the IMF and the issue under review, which goes back to her early days as finance minister. That said, any appearance of impropriety of any kind has become potentially more virulent as a result of the Strauss-Kahn affair,” he said.

There has never been any question that Lagarde, who won wide international respect as finance minister and is herself a former high-flying lawyer, benefited personally from the affair.

PARIS (Reuters) – A French court ordered an investigation Thursday into the role of IMF head Christine Lagarde in a large settlement paid to a businessman friend of President Nicolas Sarkozy when she was finance minister.

The investigation will get under way at once into Lagarde’s alleged complicity in the misuse of public funds in her approval of a 285 million euro ($407 million) arbitration payout to Bernard Tapie in 2008, the court’s prosecutor said.

Lagarde — who took up her post as International Monetary Fund managing director last month — has denied any misconduct and her lawyer said the probe would be “in no way incompatible” with her functions at the global lender.

Analysts said the development would be awkward for Lagarde as she makes her IMF debut and tries to turn the page from her predecessor Dominique Strauss-Kahn’s exit from the post in a sex assault scandal — but they also said it should not immediately hurt her credibility.

“Today’s news is politically unhelpful but on the other hand I would be surprised if this triggered a dynamic making this a major issue and affecting Lagarde’s stewardship at this stage,” said Thomas Klau of the European Council on Foreign Affairs.

“There is obviously no direct link between her responsibilities at the IMF and the issue under review, which goes back to her early days as finance minister. That said, any appearance of impropriety of any kind has become potentially more virulent as a result of the Strauss-Kahn affair,” he said.

There has never been any question that Lagarde, who won wide international respect as finance minister and is herself a former high-flying lawyer, benefited personally from the affair.

PARIS (Reuters) – A French court ordered an investigation on Thursday into the role of IMF head Christine Lagarde in a large settlement paid to a businessman friend of President Nicolas Sarkozy when she was finance minister.

The investigation will get under way at once into Lagarde’s alleged complicity in the misuse of public funds in her approval of a 285 million euro (249 million pounds) arbitration payout to Bernard Tapie in 2008, the court’s prosecutor said.

Lagarde — who took up her post as International Monetary Fund managing director last month — has denied any misconduct and her lawyer said the probe would be “in no way incompatible” with her functions at the global lender.

Analysts said the development would be awkward for Lagarde as she makes her IMF debut and tries to turn the page from her predecessor Dominique Strauss-Kahn’s exit from the post in a sex assault scandal — but they also said it should not immediately hurt her credibility.

“Today’s news is politically unhelpful but on the other hand I would be surprised if this triggered a dynamic making this a major issue and affecting Lagarde’s stewardship at this stage,” said Thomas Klau of the European Council on Foreign Affairs.

“There is obviously no direct link between her responsibilities at the IMF and the issue under review, which goes back to her early days as finance minister. That said, any appearance of impropriety of any kind has become potentially more virulent as a result of the Strauss-Kahn affair,” he said.

There has never been any question that Lagarde, who won wide international respect as finance minister and is herself a former high-flying lawyer, benefited personally from the affair.

PARIS (Reuters) – A pleat is just a pleat — unless, of course, your name was Madame Gres.

For this celebrated couturier, who pleated and draped her way through a half-century career in fashion, the art of meticulously folding fabric over the body to create dramatic sculpted forms elevated craft to art.

Some 80 flowing creations from the artist, who died in 1993, are on display this summer at the Musee Bourdelle in the French capital. The collection, culled from the archives of the temporarily shuttered Musee Galliera of fashion, is the first retrospective of this legendary Parisian with the signature Angora turban to whom contemporary fashion designers owe much.

In one stunning example, electric orange silk falls in hundreds of tiny folds in three tiers accentuated with brown ribbon in a 1977 dress that is at once contemporary and classic.

In another room, seven white evening gowns dating from the 1950s to the 1970s offer versatility around a common theme. The dresses move from modest Grecian simplicity to the avant-garde, with one featuring an exposed torso and a torpedo-like brassiere.

As the haute couture shows in Paris wind down — a fashion free-for-all in which top designers vie to outdo rivals with ever-escalating glitz and glamour — the exhibit provides a rare look at a 20th century designer for whom simplicity and perfection, rather than ostentation, were lifetime goals.

“Perfection is one of the goals I’m seeking,” Gres was once quoted as saying. “For a dress to survive from one era to the next, it must be marked with an extreme purity.”

MONACO (Reuters) – Tragedy and scandal have chipped away at the fairy tale principality of Monaco but locals hope a long-awaited wedding between Prince Albert and his South African fiancee will revive a faded gem on the Cote d’Azur.

His Serene Highness Prince Albert II, the 53-year-old ruler of the tiny city-state of Monaco and head of the centuries-old House of Grimaldi, will wed Charlene Wittstock, 33, this weekend in the palace courtyard during a lavish three-day celebration.

Monaco, the sunny stomping ground of the rich, known as much for its Grand Prix car race as for its lack of income tax, is abuzz with the nuptials, which take place just two months after Britain’s royal wedding of Prince William to Kate Middleton.

Monegasques — who number only around 8,000 — hope having a dazzling new princess could revive the fortunes of Monaco, and the gambling center of Monte Carlo, which lives off its image as the epicenter of luxury, fast cars and betting tables.

“Now there will be a princess,” sighed Martine Ruelle, who has worked at a Formula One store for 20 years. “It brings a dynamism to Monaco and a very beautiful image.”

Saturday’s wedding will be the first of a ruling prince in Monaco since Albert’s father, Prince Rainier III, married Hollywood actress Grace Kelly in 1956, and locals hope Wittstock could bring back some of the glamour which died alongside Kelly in a 1982 car crash.

Albert met Wittstock — a statuesque former national swimming champion whose champagne blonde hair and sculptured figure draws comparisons with Kelly — in 2000 when he presided over a swimming contest in which she was competing.

By Alexandria Sage

PARIS (Reuters Life!) – The work of Serge Gainsbourg, the large-nosed, Gitanes-smoking French icon whose jazzy, bohemian songs exemplified a sexually liberated France of the 1960s and 1970s, is enjoying a resurgence in the most unlikely of places — perfume ads.

Two upscale brands, Christian Dior and Guerlain, both controlled by luxury giant LVMH, have chosen Gainsbourg’s rasping voice for television ad campaigns currently running on French TV for the perfumes Miss Dior and Shalimar.

The artist who half-spoke, half-sang his songs and died in 1991 is beloved in France. Despite what he himself called his ugly face, Gainsbourg had a long string of lovers, including Brigitte Bardot, and brought a sexually charged energy to his music that is now being seized on by advertisers.

In the ad for Shalimar, a brand that first debuted in the 1920s, naked model Natalia Vodianova writhes on an unmade bed as the catchy piano riff of Gainsbourg’s “The Initials BB” plays.

Gainsbourg’s most suggestive and once-censored song, “Je t’aime…Moi Non Plus,” (I love you … me neither’) which he recorded with then-lover Jane Birkin is the soundtrack to a Miss Dior perfume ad shot by director Sofia Coppola and starring Oscar winner Natalie Portman.

As Birkin’s breathy voice catches in an apparent sexual climax, Portman lounges in a lavish, sun-filled Paris apartment, occasionally sniffing pink roses or gazing longingly at her tuxedo-clad lover.

WASHINGTON/PARIS (Reuters) – France’s finance minister Christine Lagarde is set to declare on Wednesday she wants to be the next head of the IMF even though big emerging economies have decried Europe’s “obsolete” grip on the top job.

Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa sharply criticized European officials in a joint statement for suggesting the next International Monetary Fund head should automatically be a European, a convention that dates back to the founding of the agency at the end of the Second World War.

However, the countries known as the BRICS did not suggest any alternative candidate to Lagarde, who appears to have enough support in Europe, the United States and China to handily defeat any potential challengers.

Diplomatic sources said Lagarde plans to formally announce her candidacy on Wednesday.

In the first joint statement issued by their directors at the Fund, the BRICS said the choice of who heads the IMF should be based on competence, not nationality.

They called for “abandoning the obsolete unwritten convention that requires that the head of the IMF be necessarily from Europe.”

Hours before the BRIC statement was issued in Washington, France’s government said China would back Lagarde to succeed Dominique Strauss-Kahn, who quit after he was charged with sexually assaulting a hotel maid in New York.

WASHINGTON/PARIS (Reuters) – Top emerging economies joined forces to slam Europe’s “obsolete” grip on the IMF’s top job, even as France’s finance minister appeared to strengthen her lead in the race to replace Dominique Strauss-Kahn.

Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa, known as the BRICs, sharply criticized European officials on Tuesday for suggesting the next International Monetary Fund head should automatically be a European.

In the first joint statement issued by their directors at the Fund, the BRICs said the choice should be based on competence, not nationality, and called for “abandoning the obsolete unwritten convention that requires that the head of the IMF be necessarily from Europe.”

French Finance Minister Christine Lagarde plans to announce her candidacy on Wednesday after the European Union agreed to back her, diplomatic sources said.

Hours before the BRIC statement was issued in Washington, France’s government said China would back Lagarde to succeed Strauss-Kahn who quit after he was charged with sexually assaulting a hotel maid in New York.

Emerging nations say it is time for Europe’s 65-year grip on the IMF to be loosened but no clear consensus candidate to represent them has emerged.

Mexico’s top central banker said some countries welcomed his decision to run, while South Africa and Kazakhstan may put forward their own candidates.