Morning business round-up: Greek PM to meet Germany's Merkel

What made the business news in Asia and Europe this morning? Here's our daily business round-up:

In Europe, Greece and the eurozone debt crisis continued to dominate headlines.

Greek Prime Minister Antonis Samaras will meet German Chancellor Angela Merkel later today as he seeks more time for Greece to make spending cuts. He will then travel to France on Saturday for talks with President Francois Hollande.

Mrs Merkel and Mr Hollande met on Thursday to discuss Greece and urged Athens to stick with the tough reforms if it wants to continue receiving bailout loans.

In Asia, a South Korean court has ruled that Apple and Samsung both infringed each other's patents on mobile devices.

The court imposed a limited ban on national sales of products by both companies covered by the ruling, which found that US-based Apple had infringed two patents held by Samsung, while the Korean firm had violated one of Apple's patents.

The decision comes as a jury in California is deliberating on a patent trial between the two firms in the US.

The UK economy shrank by less than previously thought between April and June, official figures have shown.

Revised data from the Office for National Statistics show the economy contracted by 0.5% during the quarter, less than the 0.7% it announced last month.

The ONS said output in the construction sector was higher than it had previously estimated

Platinum miner Lonmin, grappling with the fallout from a violent strike in South Africa that left 44 people dead, has named a temporary chief executive.

Chief financial officer Simon Scott will take over from Ian Farmer, who has begun treatment for an unspecified illness, the company said.

It added Mr Farmer would not return to work full-time for "some months".

One of the first things Mr Scott will have to deal with is an investigation into the deaths at the Marikana mine.

In Australia, shares in Fairfax Media hit a record low after the firm wrote down the value of its newspapers by almost A$2.5bn ($2.6bn; £1.6bn).

The writedown resulted in the firm reporting a net loss of A$2.73bn for the last financial year.

The stock price was also hurt by the failure of Gina Rinehart, the firm's biggest shareholder, to sell almost 5% of her stake at 50 cents per share.

Its shares fell as much as 12% to 44.5 cents in Sydney.

The latest Business Daily programme from the BBC World Service looks at unemployment. In the United States it will be a key battleground in the Presidential election. The team takes a closer look at the situation in the state of New Jersey.

And they hear the views of two French businessmen about President Hollande's latest measures to encourage job creation. Do government policies make much difference anyway?