Villiger was reacting to a ruling by the Federal Administrative Court last week that the transfer of customer data broke the law. His comments were published by the German-language Tages-Anzeiger newspaper on Wednesday.

The court decision has cast doubt on the agreement reached between the authorities in the US and Switzerland last year under which the Swiss agreed to hand over data on an estimated 4,450 bank customers.

Villiger said in the newspaper interview that the ruling had placed the bank and the country in a “extremely difficult situation”.

There have been calls within Switzerland for UBS to take responsibility for its past actions, which encouraged US tax payers to transfer funds to Switzerland in order to avoid paying taxes, something Villiger rejected.

“There can be no solution without an agreement between states,” he said. He further pointed out that those at the bank who had been responsible for the crisis had now left.

He added that it was difficult to draw up a sustainable strategy for the bank when there was so much uncertainty about many aspects of its work, including the future of bank secrecy.

The Missouri Supreme Court overturned a death penalty sentence for man who is mentally retarded. Andrew Lyons, 52, was convicted of first-degree murder in 1996 and sentenced to death for the 1992 killing of his estranged girlfriend.

Lyons filed a petition in mandamus, claiming to be mentally retarded and therefore ineligible to be executed.

A court-appointed master supported Lyons' claims. The master concluded that Lyons' IQ was in a range of 61 to 70, that Lyons had continual extensive related deficits in two adaptive behaviors, and that the symptoms were present and documented before Lyons had turned 18.

"Although there is evidence, as noted earlier, that Lyons manifested these conditions before age 18, the state contends there was insufficient documentation of these conditions," the court wrote in a unanimous opinion.

"The state vigorously notes the lack of an IQ test result from prior to age 18 and the scant school records and other evidence with respect to the adaptive behaviors.

On the 17th floor of the Phillip Burton Federal Building in a city known for being at the edge of social change, a federal trial is under way that could lead to a landmark ruling on same-sex marriage in America.

Perry v. Schwarzenegger, which began Jan. 11 in the US District Court for Northern California, challenges the constitutionality of California's voter-approved ban on gay marriage. Over the past 10 days, lawyers have made a broad-based case against Proposition 8, ranging from arguments that it reflects prejudice against gays and lesbians to discussions about the nature of modern marriage, and the notion that homosexuality requires special protections like gender and race.

Many gay-marriage advocates say the case is ultimately destined for the US Supreme Court and represents the best path to legalizing same-sex marriage. They hope this lawsuit will be their Loving v. Virginia – the 1967 case that ended race-based restrictions on marriage.

But not all activists are on board. Some worry the stakes are too high: a federal challenge at a time when most states and voters reject gay marriage could be premature. Even if the Supreme Court eventually takes the case – bound to be appealed by the losing side in San Francisco in the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals and then to the Supreme Court– the court has historically been reluctant to move too far ahead of the people. A defeat in the Supreme Court would deal a huge setback to a movement that has seen significant gains over the past decade.

"The national marriage project was assiduously avoiding a federal court challenge. They were working slowly toward [it]," says Marc Spindelman, a law professor at Ohio State University and an expert on gay and lesbian rights. But, he adds, "if there's a circuit court that's likely to recognize same-sex marriage" it's the Ninth Circuit, under which the district court falls and which is often branded the most liberal.