Belgium's Queen Fabiola was sedated using hypnosis during her recent surgery. The 80-year-old royal had surgery - believed to be on her thyroid - at the University Hospital of Liege on Thursday but elected not to have a general anesthetic.

Fabiola - the widow of King Baudouin, who died in 1993 after 42 years as sovereign - underwent a technique called hyposedation, which the hospital is famed for.

French Justice Minister Rachida Dati is being criticized for returning to work just five days after giving birth to daughter Zohra. After Dati left a Paris clinic where she delivered her baby by Caesarean section on Jan. 2, she attended a cabinet meeting Wednesday.

Dati is quite an unconventional woman. She is a single mother at 43 and refused to divulge the identity of the infant's father.

Champagne sales are nothing to toast to this year. Makers of the bubbly are reeling from the sour economy and feelings its effects. Makers of both inexpensive sparking wines and expensive bottles are feeling the pinch following 2007's strong 4 percent gains, the biggest since the buying frenzy in 1999 to ring in the new millennium.

Nearly 21 million bottles were shipped to the United States from the region of France known as Champagne in 2007. Through August, sales were down 17 percent over the corresponding period last year, according to Sam Heitner, director of the Office of Champagne U.S.A., a trade organization, and that doesn't include the last three months of the year, when much of the Champagne is sold.

French First Lady Carla Bruni-Sarkozy admitted in a one-hour interview for a French TV program her wedding to President Nicolas Sarkozy was decided in just two days.

Because of the short notice to find an appropriate wedding outfit, Bruni bought a cream Hermes dress off the rack in a high-end Paris shop. The small, private nuptials held in February, had few guests including French couturiers Christian Lacroix and Jean Paul Gaultier.

A French cardiologist has claimed that he is no longer an alcoholic because an anti-muscle spasm pill that he had been taking for many years caused him to lose desire to drink liquor.

The claim by Dr. Olivier Ameisen, 55, is contained in his book "Le Dernier Verre" ("The Last Glass") set for release in the U.S. next year under the title "The End of My Addiction."