The European Union's Court of Justice ruled Thursday that Greece illegally ignored an EU order to recover millions of euros (dollars) in aid it gave to the ailing Olympic national airline.

The Luxembourg-based court said Greece "had not fulfilled its obligations" to take back the handouts from Olympic Airlines SA and its predecessor Olympic Airways.

EU officials said last November that Olympic would have to repay 130 million euros ($189.6 million) to the Greek government.

The ruling confirmed three previous EU court decisions since 2002, which backed the EU's executive Commission's arguments that the millions of euros (dollars) in direct aid and subsidies violated state aid rules and gave Olympic an unfair advantage over competitors.

Greece and Olympic Airlines still have an appeal pending in a lower EU court to annul earlier Commission decisions against restructuring aid and subsidies given to the airline.

Olympic Airlines won a small victory last year at the EU court when it said the Commission failed to prove some of the funds violated EU state aid rules. Those funds involved unpaid taxes on fuel and spare parts, as well as unpaid fees to Athens International Airport.

For years, Greece supplied subsidies to the struggling national airline, which in 2001 had debts totaling some 120 million euros ($166 million). In 2003, the government incorporated the assets of debt-ridden Olympic Airways and two subsidiaries into the newly named Olympic Airlines.

Exxon Mobil has gone after the assets of state oil company Petroleos de Venezuela SA in U.S., British and Dutch courts as it challenges the nationalization of a multibillion dollar oil project by Chavez's government.

A British court has issued an injunction "freezing" as much as $12 billion in assets.

"If you end up freezing (Venezuelan assets) and it harms us, we're going to harm you," Chavez said during his weekly radio and television program, "Hello, President." "Do you know how? We aren't going to send oil to the United States. Take note, Mr. Bush, Mr. Danger."

Chavez has repeatedly threatened to cut off oil shipments to the United States, which is Venezuela's No. 1 client, if Washington tries to oust him. Chavez's warnings on Sunday appeared to extend that threat to attempts by oil companies to challenge his government's nationalization drive through lawsuits.

"I speak to the U.S. empire, because that's the master: continue and you will see that we won't sent one drop of oil to the empire of the United States," Chavez said Sunday.

"The outlaws of Exxon Mobil will never again rob us," Chavez said, accusing the Irving, Texas-based oil company of acting in concert with Washington.

A U.S. Embassy spokeswoman did not immediately return a call seeking comment.

Venezuelan Oil Minister Rafael Ramirez has argued that court orders won by Exxon Mobil have "no effect" on the state oil company PDVSA and are merely "transitory measures" while Venezuela presents its case in courts in New York and London.

Exxon Mobil is also taking its claims to international arbitration, disputing the terms it was granted under Chavez's nationalization last year of four heavy oil projects in the Orinoco River basin, one of the world's richest oil deposits.

Other major oil companies including U.S.-based Chevron Corp., France's Total, Britain's BP PLC, and Norway's StatoilHydro ASA have negotiated deals with Venezuela to continue on as minority partners in the Orinoco oil project.

The court overturned an April 2007 ruling by a lower court that forbade the 12 Muslims from returning to Christianity on the grounds that Islamic law would consider that apostasy.

There is no Egyptian law against converting from Islam to Christianity, but in this case tradition had taken precedent. Under a widespread interpretation of Islamic law, converting from Islam is apostasy and punishable by death — though the state has never ordered or carried out an execution on those grounds.

Judge Mohammed el-Husseini sidestepped the issue by saying the 12 should not be considered apostates since they were born Christian, said a judicial official on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media.

The judge also ordered the Ministry of Interior to list converts' former and current religious status on identification cards, which the government body had previously refused to do.

A French trader was ordered to be jailed Friday while investigations continue into the billions in losses he allegedly caused at Societe Generale bank.

A probe into the case broadened as well, with police taking into custody a brokerage employee who reportedly had been in contact with Jerome Kerviel, the 31-year-old futures trader.

Prosecutors sought to jail Kerviel to keep him from contacting accomplices, if he had any, and from jeopardizing what promises to be a long and complex investigation.

Judges allowed Kerviel to go free last month after his lawyer argued he did not pose a flight risk.

It was unclear if Kerveil had been taken into custody Friday.

News that police had arrested a second person, an employee at a brokerage arm of Societe Generale, again raised questions about whether Kerviel acted alone.

Societe Generale, one of France's biggest banks, has said Kerviel did not appear to have accomplices when he made massive unauthorized bets on European futures markets that the bank said cost it more than $7 billion to unwind.

The daily newspaper Le Monde reported Friday, however, that the bank has turned over new evidence, including a message sent to Kerviel through the bank's computer system by the broker now in custody.

The message, sent Nov. 30, read: "You have done nothing illegal in terms of the law," the newspaper reported.

The employee from brokerage Newedge, a 50-50 joint venture between Societe Generale and bank Calyon, was taken into custody Thursday and was still being held Friday, according to a judiciary official who asked not to be identified because of the sensitivity of the case.

Societe Generale spokeswoman Joelle Rosello confirmed the employee was in custody. "We are cooperating closely with police," she said.

Le Monde said Kerviel passed some trades through the brokerage, and that police suspect that the brokerage employee was aware of Kerviel's activities. It said the brokerage was searched Thursday.

Societe Generale announced Jan. 24 that it lost 4.82 billion euros ($7.09 billion) cleaning up Kerviel's unauthorized transactions. It said Kerviel overstepped his authority and bet 50 billion euros ($73 billion) -- more than the market value of the entire bank -- on futures in European equity markets. It also said he did not appear to have profited personally from the trades.

Since the scandal become public, Societe Generale has faced speculation that it could be bought out or broken up, and about how Kerviel's activities went unnoticed or ignored.

Investigating judges have filed preliminary charges against Kerviel for forgery, breach of trust and unauthorized computer activity.

Vasily Alexanian, 36, has said he will die unless he is transferred from his Moscow prison to a specialist hospital, and the Strasbourg-based European court has given three separate instructions to the Russian authorities to move him.

Alexanian is a former vice-president of Yukos, an oil company whose founder, Mikhail Khodorkovsky, was imprisoned in what was widely seen as a Kremlin campaign to punish the businessman for his political ambitions.

A judge at Moscow's Simonovsky district court ordered that Alexanian's trial for fraud and tax evasion be suspended while he receives treatment. It was the first admission by a court that he is gravely ill.

But the court rejected a request for him to be released on bail, saying he was a flight risk and could receive the treatment he needed in the sanatorium at the Sailor's Rest prison in Moscow where he is being held.

'They are not giving me any treatment in there,' Alexanian told reporters from his metal cage in a corner of the courtroom.

'There is no guarantee they will give me access to a specialist clinic. All they are doing is adjourning the trial. That is all. Nothing else.'

Alexanian's lawyers say his condition has left him partially blind, suffering from cancer of the lymph nodes and with suspected tuberculosis.

Lawyers for Vasily Aleksanian, a former lawyer for jailed oil tycoon Mikhail Khodorkovsky and a former vice president of Yukos, had asked the court to allow him to be treated in a hospital. The Simonovsky District Court ruled that Aleksanian should be treated in a Moscow jail because he could flee or pressure witnesses if released.

Authorities' refusal to allow hospital treatment for Aleksanian has sparked criticism that the company and some of its former executives are the victims of a Kremlin revenge campaign.

Khodorkovsky was sentenced to eight years in prison for fraud and tax evasion, a sentence widely seen as the Kremlin's revenge for his political ambitions and funding of opposition parties. Yukos, once Russia's largest oil producer and regarded as one of the country's best-run companies, was sold off in auctions ordered by the state to pay off billions of dollars in back tax claims.

Aleksanian is charged with embezzling funds and shares in Yukos subsidiary Tomskneft worth $490 million, charges he denies.

Khodorkovsky accused officials of trying to extract incriminating, false confessions from Aleksanian and denying him treatment until he cooperates. Khodorkovsky launched a hunger strike on Jan. 30 to protest authorities' refusal to give Aleksanian proper AIDS medication.

The prosecution had raised no objections to suspending Aleksanian's trial, but insisted Aleksanian must remain in custody.

Aleksanian who looked tired and haggard, was visibly angry when he heard the court's verdict.

His lawyer, Yelena Lvova, said he could not get proper treatment in custody and the Moscow-based group For Human Rights denounced the ruling as a "demonstration of the government's inexorable cruelty."