quell

anti-government protests.

The head of the International Monetary Fund, Dominique Strauss-Kahn, is expected to appear in court in New York shortly over allegations that he sexually assaulted a hotel maid. With more, here's Laura Trevelyan.

A maid at a midtown hotel filed a complaint of sexual assault against Dominique Strauss-Kahn on Saturday. She told detectives that she

was about to

clean his hotel suite when he began assaulting her. Strauss-Kahn was arrested by police on board an Air France plane at John F Kennedy Airport. He's hired a

prominent

New York lawyer to represent him, who says his client will plead not guilty to the charges against him. The manager of the hotel where the maid worked said she'd been there for three years and described her work and behaviour as completely

satisfactory

.

The government in his native France said it considered Mr Strauss-Kahn innocent until proven guilty.

Voters in Zurich have

overwhelmingly

rejected proposals to ban assisted suicide or to limit the practice to residents of the Swiss city. Many people from around the world travel to Zurich each year to end their lives because assisted suicide is illegal in their own countries. The head of the justice department for Zurich, Martin Graf, said the liberal voices had won.

"The proposition would have been

discriminatory

. It would have treated people in the canton of Zurich differently to people outside.