Barroso defends link to shipping tycoon

Jose Manuel Barroso, the European commission president, yesterday refused to withdraw from handling competition cases involving the shipping industry despite fresh controversy over his links with Spiros Latsis, a shipping and banking billionaire. Mr Barroso was forced to disclose this week that he and his wife enjoyed a free two-week holiday on board one of Mr Latsis’s yachts last August before he took office in November.