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With chants of "Fill the gap!" protesters attempt to bring forward a styrofoam replica of a piece of the Berlin Wall in order to fill a gap created by construction workers in the East Side Gallery, which is the longest still-standing portion of the former Berlin Wall, as police try to block the protesters on March 1, 2013 in Berlin, Germany.

Markus Schreiber / AP

Protestors are gathering in front of a part of the former Berlin Wall in Berlin, Germany, on March 1, 2013.

David Rising, The Associated Press

Thomas Peter / Reuters

People protest against the removal of a segment of the former Berlin Wall, now known as East Side Gallery, in Berlin on March 1, 2013.

Hundreds of angry protesters on Friday prevented construction workers from removing a section of one of the few remaining stretches of the Berlin Wall, part of a plan to build a road to a new luxury condominium being built on the banks of the reunited city's Spree river.

Crews only managed to remove one section from the famous East Side Gallery before about 300 protesters pressed too close for work to continue. Demonstrators then wheeled in a mock wall section they had set up in front of the gap.

The East Side Gallery is the longest remaining stretch of the Berlin Wall and is one of the German capital's most popular tourist attractions. It was recently restored at a cost of more than €2 million ($3 million) to the city.

Continue reading.

Thomas Peter / Reuters

Police keep watch as workers remove a piece of the former Berlin Wall, now known as East Side Gallery, in Berlin on March 1, 2013.

Thomas Peter / Reuters

Police carry away a protester's styrofoam copy of a segment of the Berlin Wall at a demonstration against the removal of several segments of the original former Berlin Wall, now known as East Side Gallery, in Berlin on March 1, 2013.

Ina Fassbender / Reuters

A man jumps during the 'Nostalgic Ski Race' in the town of Neuastenberg, Germany.

Ina Fassbender / Reuters

Vintage skis and sticks.

Ina Fassbender / Reuters

Reuters photographer Ina Fassbender describes the scene at the 'Nostalgic Ski Race' in the German town of Neuastenberg:

I saw the first competitor arriving, a man dressed in an old-fashioned manner, with wooden skis and bamboo sticks in his hands. He wore some kind of fur on his back, looking like a poacher. He was joined by women with long black skirts, a boy with an old leather satchel, teenage girls in Bavarian leather trousers, young and old, men and women, about 40 competitors altogether.

The short and not too steep racing track was like a small island, surrounded by the modern ski community. Everybody was wondering where all these strange people came from. It was a jubilee race, marking 300 years since the foundation of the small city of Neuastenberg. Most of the competitors knew each other. The youngest participant was a 7-year-old girl and the eldest was about 65 years old.

Read more at Reuters' Photographers Blog.

Editor's note: Pictures taken on Feb. 17, 2013 and made available to NBC News today.

Ina Fassbender / Reuters

A man checks his son's skis before the race.

Ina Fassbender / Reuters

The 'Nostalgic Ski Race' is held every two years with about 40 participants and is organized by the ski club of Neuastenberg, a town which was founded in 1713.

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The sculpture of polar bear Knut is exhibited at the Museum of Natural History in Berlin on on Feb. 15.

Markus Schreiber / AP

Late polar bear Knut is on display at the Natural History Museum in Berlin, on Feb. 15. Knut was hand-raised after his mother rejected him. He rose to stardom in 2007 as a cuddly cub, appearing on magazine covers, in a film and on mountains of merchandise. He died in 2011 after suffering from encephalitis.

Reuters -- Knut, the hand-reared polar bear who captured Germans' hearts before his early death in 2011, returned to his adoring Berlin public on Friday as a life-sized model bearing the animal's real fur.

Knut will stand for a month in the entrance foyer of the city's natural history museum, which has modified its entrance for the anticipated rush of visitors, a museum spokeswoman said.

The museum is keen to stress that Knut has not been stuffed. Rather, a replica of the bear was made, based on Knut's skeleton, in one of his favorite poses, and this was covered with the creature's pelt, in a procedure known as dermoplasty.

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Arnd Wiegmann / Reuters

Knut plays with a blanket during the bear's first presentation in Berlin zoo on March 23, 2007.

Lisi Niesner / Reuters

Peter Breiter, CEO of Raiffeisen Gammesfeld eG bank, serves a customer at the counter of the bank in Gammesfeld, Baden-Wuerttemberg. Things do not seem to have changed much since the bank was founded in 1890.

Lisi Niesner / Reuters

Peter Breiter works with an old adding machine. The bank is not connected to a database system, there are no cash machines and its customer base consists only of residents of the town of Gammesfeld, which has a population of around 510.

Lisi Niesner / Reuters

Fritz Vogt, 82, who used to run the bank and still helps out with paperwork, writes into a savings book. During his time at the bank he rejected the idea of IT, preferring his trusty fountain pen, and now eyes the 'new' computer with its floppy disks warily.

By Victoria Bryan, Reuters

Peter Breiter, 41, is an unusual banker. Not for him the big bonuses, complicated financial instruments and multi-million deals of Wall Street lore.

He is happy instead writing transaction slips out by hand for the 500 inhabitants of the tiny southern German village of Gammesfeld.

The Raiffeisen Gammesfeld eG cooperative bank is one of the country's 10 smallest banks by deposits and is the only one to be run by just one member of staff.

Lisi Niesner / Reuters

Peter Breiter rolls euro coins in paper.

Lisi Niesner / Reuters

Peter Breiter mops the floor in the waiting room of the bank.

A typical day's work for Breiter involves providing villagers with cash for their day-to-day needs and arranging small loans for local businesses. Not to mention cleaning the one-story building that houses the bank, which is 200 meters from his own front door.

Lisi Niesner / Reuters

Peter Breiter holds the floppy disks he uses now that the bank has a computer.

Moving from a bigger bank, where it was all "sell, sell, sell," Gammesfeld-born Breiter says taking up this job in 2008 was the best decision he ever made.

The advertisement required someone to work by hand, without computers. The typewriter and the adding machine bear the signs of constant use, although Breiter, in his standard work outfit of jeans and a sweater, does now have a computer.

"It's so much fun," Breiter, a keen mathematician, says as he deals with a steady stream of lunchtime customers. He knows his customers by name and regularly offers advice on jobs, relationship and money woes.

Lisi Niesner / Reuters

Peter Breiter, right, welcomes customer Mandes Rueger, 30, at the counter of the bank. Rueger, an insurance salesman, comes in around twice a week to use the bank.

Raiffeisen Gammesfeld restricts its business to traditional retail banking --  no credit cards, shares, funds or even online banking. Annual profits are stable at around 40,000 euros ($54,000) and the biggest loan it ever made was for 650,000 euros ($875,000).

Breiter said the financial crisis prompted interest in his bank from all over Germany: "One person rang up five times asking for a 4 million euro loan, but I had to refuse because he wasn't from Gammesfeld!" Read the full story.

Photographer's blog: Lisi Niesner describes her visit to Germany's one-man bank

EDITOR'S NOTE: Images taken on Jan. 29, 2013 and made available to NBC News today.

Lisi Niesner / Reuters

A Raiffeisen Gammesfeld eG bank stamp.

Fabrizio Bensch / Reuters

Benjamin Schmittand Helena Jachmann, supporters of the foodsharing movement sort through food found in a dumpster behind a supermarket in Berlin, February 4. Foodsharing is a German internet based platform where individuals, retailers or producers have the possibility of offering surplus food to consumers for free.

Fabrizio Bensch / Reuters

Helena Jachmann, supporter of the foodsharing movement holds a pepper found in a dumpster behind a supermarket in Berlin, Feb. 4. Foodsharing is a German internet based platform where individuals, retailers or producers have the possibility of offering surplus food to consumers for free.

Fabrizio Bensch / Reuters

Benjamin Schmitt and Helena Jachmann, supporters of the foodsharing movement sort food found in a dumpster behind a supermarket in Berlin, Feb. 4.

Fabrizio Bensch / Reuters

Raphael Fellmer, a supporter of the foodsharing movement shows Christmas biscuits collected from waste bins of supermarket at his home in Berlin, on Jan. 31.

Fabrizio Bensch / Reuters

Raphael Fellmer, a supporter of the foodsharing movement has lunch with his partner Nieves Palmer Muntaner, with food cooked from vegetables from waste of an organic supermarket in Berlin, on Jan. 24.

By Stephen Brown, Reuters

Published at 11:15a.m. ET: BERLIN  - Just past midnight behind a Berlin supermarket, two youngsters with torches strapped to their woollen hats sift through rubbish bins for food that is still edible, load their bikes with bread, vegetables and chocolate Santas and cycle off into the darkness.

It is not poverty that inspires a growing number of young Germans like 21-year-old student Benjamin Schmitt to forage for food in the garbage, but anger at loss and waste which the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organisation estimates at one-third of all food produced worldwide, every year, valued at about $1 trillion. Continue Reading.

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