Authorities in Switzerland have warned of high avalanche risk in mountain regions after heavy snowfall. Some eastern parts of the country experienced up to 80 centimetres of snowfall in 24 hours. Parts of the Goms valley on the border with Italy wer...

Three-quarters of residents of a nursing home in southern Switzerland and half its workers have been infected with the coronavirus variant first found in Britain. Italian-speaking canton Ticino said a series of infections occurred in rapid successio...

German authorities have now handed over all 14 works from the art trove accumulated by Cornelius Gurlitt that are proven to have been looted under Nazi rule, the government said. Piano Playing, a drawing by Carl Spitzweg, was handed over to Christie...

Opponents of new Swiss laws to combat terrorism have gathered enough signatures to challenge the controversial legislation by referendum. They argue that the law violates civil liberties, particularly those of children. The “No to Preventative Pun...

Swiss band Patent Ochsner have been honoured for their work at the Swiss Music Awards. Their hits, always sung in Bernese German, include W Nuss vo Bümpliz, Scharlachrot and Bälpmoos. “The work of the band is characterised by a great diversity a...

Franco-Swiss author and graphic artist Frédéric Pajak has been awarded this year’s Swiss Grand Prix for Literature for his life’s work. Pajak, 65, has edited and contributed to cultural and satirical periodicals and is the editor of the biannu...

Health Minister Alain Berset has defended further Covid-19 restrictions as a preemptive attempt to prevent a third wave of the pandemic. Shops will be closed and gatherings further restricted from Monday. In addition, existing restrictions will be e...

The coronavirus crisis has given a boost to the Swiss motor home market with a 26% increase in new registrations, surpassing a record set in 2019. With international travel restricted over the last year, more people in Switzerland are taking to the ...

The government says there are sufficient measures in place to combat terrorism and violent extremism in Switzerland. However, it pledged to implement recommendations to boost cooperation between national and cantonal units and to improve communicati...

The president of the Swiss-based international ice hockey federation, René Fasel, has apologized for a public embrace with the embattled president of Belarus, Alexander Lukashenko. Fasel, a Swiss national at the helm of the federation since 1994, t...

Campaigners have handed in signatures in a bid to bring two recently passed laws to a national vote: the Covid-19 Act underpinning the government’s pandemic action, and the so-called CO2 law to tackle the climate crisis. The campaigns, which are n...

Health regulator Swissmedic has given the green light for the ‘immediate’ use of the vaccine produced by US company Moderna. The country has already pre-ordered 7.5 million shots, 200,000 of which will be delivered on Wednesday. The vaccine sati...

The firearms – including assault rifles and pistols – went missing last year, the army confirmed on Tuesday. Army guns disappear every year. According to the newspaper Blick, 70 army weapons were reported missing last year, including 57 assault ...

Scammers are selling dangerous fake coronavirus vaccines on the internet, Switzerland’s health regulator Swissmedic warned on Tuesday. Vaccinations are underway across Switzerland, but demand for vaccines currently far outstrips supply. The fact t...

The village in western Switzerland has managed to preserve its traditional architecture and scenery despite undergoing an intense process of urbanisation, said the organisation awarding the annual Wakker prize. The municipality’s “clear” devel...

The closures will affect 44 of the bank’s 239 branches in the country, mainly smaller ones, UBS confirmed on Tuesday. The bank plans to continue beefing up its online offers. The announcement, which had been rumoured for a few months already, was ...

Interventions by law enforcement authorities since protective face masks became mandatory in enclosed public spaces nearly three months ago have mainly taken the form of dialogue with members of the public. Cantonal police forces are generally satis...

Organisers of the iconic Lauberhorn ski race in Switzerland have performed a U-turn and pulled the event in the face of coronavirus uncertainties. It was due to take place this weekend and had only been given the green light on Sunday. On Monday the...

Switzerland must examine the human rights situation when issuing extradition orders and not rely solely on prior experience with diplomatic assurances given by Moscow, the Federal Court has said. In a ruling published on Monday, the court accepted t...

The coronavirus pandemic has been identified as the reason for a significant decline in requests for asylum in Switzerland. The number of applications stood at 11,041 at the start of this year, compared to around 16,000 at the same point in 2020. Th...

The trial of Israeli billionaire Beny Steinmetz, accused of corrupt business practices in Guinea, started in Geneva on Monday. Steinmetz is alleged to have paid bribes to secure mining rights in the African country at a fraction of their fair value. ...

This year’s edition of the FIS Ski World Cup in the Swiss resort of Wengen is to go ahead next weekend as planned, despite a recent rise in coronavirus cases there. Doubts had been raised over the weekend because of the rise in Covid-19 infections...

The closure of Swiss schools in the spring of 2020 was one of the most effective measures to reduce travel and so the transmission of Covid-19, says a new study. Researchers at the Federal Institute of Technology ETH Zurich found that the closure of...

Half of all hotel and restaurant businesses in Switzerland will go bankrupt by the end of March if they do not receive immediate financial compensation for the effects of coronavirus restrictions, warns the sector’s umbrella organisation. Based on...

The Swiss economy has held up well in the face of the Covid-19 crisis and could even boom this year, says a top government economist. Eric Scheidegger, director of the State Secretariat for Economic Affairs, told the NZZ am Sonntag that the outlook ...

Up to 600 restaurant owners have protested in the western Swiss city of Neuchâtel in anger at a possible extension to the end of February of their shutdown. The authorised demonstration was peaceful and drew 500 to 600 people, according to the orga...

The director of Switzerland’s health office has urged patience in the country’s vaccination campaign, saying all at-risk groups should be vaccinated by the end of March. Anne Lévy, director of the Federal Office of Public Health (FOPH), told S...

Solothurn has become the last Swiss canton to open its ski resorts, despite what it says is a worrying coronavirus situation. Resorts in this north-western canton can operate as of Saturday, after its authorities granted the necessary permits. The c...

Goats appear to like problem solving – something that could contribute to their welfare on the farm, according to Swiss and German researchers. The study, funded by the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF) and the German Research Foundation, o...

The Covid-19 pandemic caused a significant rise in unemployment in Switzerland last year. The massive use of short-time work measures helped mitigate the impact on businesses and workers, the authorities say. The annual unemployment rate rose to 3.1...