A SPIEGEL reporter has accompanied Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer on his first trip to the US since the Iraq war and provides a first-hand view of the attempt at rapprochement between the US and Germany.

"Fakes on Prescription"

The pharmaceutical industry: Unscrupulous suppliers are ever more frequently funnelling manipulated medicaments into German pharmacies. Such copies involve losses running into billions for the multinationals in the pharmaceutical industry - and incalculable risks for the patients. The German government will now take action against the dealers in tablets. Cautious estimates put the loss for the industry at 20 billion dollars. Quality assurance is unknown in the backyard factories run by the pharmaceutical Mafia. Whether it's packages with incorrect expiry dates, lack of hygiene in re-packing or even missing ingredients - taking manipulated medicaments can have horrifying effects on a patient's health and in extreme cases even lead to death. Organized crime is pushing into high-price oases on a growing scale. Germany and the USA are seen as especially popular markets.

"Fatal Mixture?"

Lawsuits: For the first time a tobacco concern is having to face a claim for damages before a German court. The pilot hearing is aimed at establishing whether cigarettes make people addictive. In legal terms Germany has hitherto been a paradise for the tobacco industry - with no lawsuits, no trouble. Yet the Central Office for the Dangers of Addiction puts the number of people dying every year in the HB brand's home country as a result of smoking at around 111,000.

The urn containing philosopher Herbert Marcuse's ashes has returned to Germany 20 years after his death in the US. It was buried in Berlin.

"Vertical Starter on the Gulf"

Civil aviation: The airline giants could soon be facing awkward competition - from Dubai, where airline Emirates is ordering the new Airbus A380 by the dozen. Not doing things by halves is the motto of the thriving airline controlled by the ruling Bedouin family, the Al Maktoums. The crisis in the international civil aviation industry lasting for nearly two years now has affected barely any other airline so little as this long-haul specialist from the glittering metropolis of Dubai.

"Somehow estranged"

Europe: For the first time the European Union is acquiring a security strategy of its own. The idea is that this should be taken seriously in the world - even by the USA. The Americans see themselves as confronted by a European challenge going far beyond all Europe's previous attempts at emancipation. Long passages of the European doctrine stand in stark contrast to the new US strategy on national security. The Europeans are less and less convinced of the USA's supposed omnipotence.

"Hoodwinking The Hague"

The Balkans: The governments in what was formerly Yugoslavia are only handing over those charged by the War Crimes Tribunal unwillingly. The USA is also torpedoing the work of the judiciary in The Hague. In recent weeks the United States has repeatedly undermined the credibility of the Tribunal with its campaign against the recently established International Criminal Court. For some time now the Americans have been urging governments in the Balkans to assure them by treaty that they will never hand over Americans to the new court whose legitimacy Washington denies.

"The GDR as a Surprise Packet"

Exhibitions: Berlin's New National Gallery is celebrating the long derided art of defunct socialist East Germany - in a large-scale overview of an unprecedented kind. This is a fascinating show that will nevertheless cause irritation because the most controversial pictures have simply been left out. There will be much to see in the Berlin exhibition - 400 works by over 130 artists. A great deal of abstract art has been conjured up - and otherwise many works that were produced in total secrecy in the days of the GDR. Visitors will have cause to be amazed by Pop Art from Saxony and Op Art from Berlin, by a symbolism laden with meaning that - as one tasty detail - has Walter Ulbricht consigned to hell fire, by cool Constructivism and portraits of young Punks.

"Uncanny Encounter"

SPIEGEL in-depth interview with artist Via Levandovsky on the rediscovery in Berlin of East German art, old ideological ballast and the threat that the past will be rendered harmless:

"GDR art is a gigantic convolution of individual histories. Not even drawing vague distinctions such as those between state art, art in opposition and niche art can produce an adequate term for it. To survive under the pressure of cultural policy, moreover, many artists came to exist in a kind of twilight, yet the label 'GDR art' is now being attached to them. Even now, then, misunderstandings will arise... Art in the GDR had a distinct political function and formed part of a totalitarian apparatus of supervision and education. To stand in front of these pictures and to be astonished at their artistic innocence, so to speak, makes for an uncanny encounter... There's a collector in New York who places statues of Lenin on his roof as decoration. Perhaps that is the only way of treating the inheritance of GDR art: To regard it as folksy Kitsch."

"A rootless cosmopolitan"

SPIEGEL in-depth interview with American cultural historian Peter Gay on the political misdemeanours of the Bush government, his family's life under the Nazis and German anti-Americanism:

"The whole debate and the question of what they really knew about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and what they possibly embroidered in addition only shows me how little this government is to be trusted... Agnostics always had a hard time in US politics. Some historians may see us as now entering a battle between cultures and an era of religious wars, but I regard that as somewhat questionable... Anti-Americanism naturally has a long history... That eternal charge of materialism... Quite honestly, I am at a loss, all the more so since this prejudice that culture does not exist in the United States is patently absurd. There are wonderful orchestras and opera houses, not to speak of the architecture."