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Swiss Info

Thu, 23 Jun 2022 08:06:05 GMT
Toblerone will no longer be exclusively Swiss made
The triangular chocolate bar will also be manufactured in Slovakia from the end of 2023. Toblerone’s parent company, confectionery giant Mondelez International, confirmed the Slovakian outsourcing plan on Wednesday, according to Swiss public radio...

Wed, 22 Jun 2022 13:58:00 GMT
Switzerland to ease exchange of Ukrainian currency in line with EU
Refugees with a special legal status will be able to exchange a limited amount of Ukranian banknotes for Swiss francs. The Swiss government on Wednesday announced that adults with a protection S status may exchange one amount of up to 10,000 hryvnia...

Wed, 22 Jun 2022 13:05:00 GMT
Alpine rail tunnel and suburban train services to get boost
The government has presented plans for an upgrade of the country’s railway network, including an additional Alpine tunnel in western Switzerland. About CHF720 million ($745 million) have been set aside to upgrade the Lötschberg base tunnel and ot...

Wed, 22 Jun 2022 10:02:00 GMT
Innovative Swiss tourism projects to benefit from extra funds
The government has earmarked CHF20 million ($20.7 million) to promote sustainable tourism and innovative projects in Switzerland. The funds, which still need approval by parliament, are also meant to boost digitalisation in the sector and city touri...

Wed, 22 Jun 2022 08:44:00 GMT
ETH Zurich experts downgrade Swiss economic growth forecast
The KOF Swiss Economic Institute has revised downwards its growth forecast for this year and 2023. However, the unit of the ETH Zurich remains optimistic despite the war in Ukraine and rising inflation, according to a statement published on Wednesda...

Tue, 21 Jun 2022 16:02:51 GMT
Muslim preacher faces deportation for fraud and racial hatred
A court in the Swiss town of Biel/Bienne has convicted Muslim preacher Abu Ramadan of welfare fraud and inciting racial hatred. Ramadan, a Libyan national, was given a 14-month suspended jail sentence and faces expulsion from Switzerland for six yea...

Tue, 21 Jun 2022 14:46:30 GMT
Glencore pleads guilty to bribery in London court
A British subsidiary of Swiss commodities giant Glencore on Tuesday pleaded guilty to seven counts of bribery in connection with oil operations in several African countries. At a court in London, Glencore Energy formally admitted to paying more than...

Tue, 21 Jun 2022 13:34:00 GMT
Swiss researcher wins European Inventor award
Swiss biotechnologist Madiha Derouazi has been awarded a prestigious European Inventor prize together with the French immunologist Elodie Benoue. The two scientists won the European Inventor Award jointly in the SMEs category from the European Paten...

Tue, 21 Jun 2022 11:57:30 GMT
Patients should have more say in health care, says commission
Patients in Switzerland should be more involved in health care decisions, says the Federal Quality Commission in its first annual report published on Tuesday. There are also other “gaps” in the Swiss health system, including an overly sectoral a...

Tue, 21 Jun 2022 10:14:00 GMT
Swiss put security ahead of freedom, survey finds
Nine out of ten Swiss citizens said at the beginning of the year that they feel secure and their optimism about the future has increased compared with 2021, according to a new survey. The latest edition of the annual report by the military academy a...

Tue, 21 Jun 2022 07:22:00 GMT
Swiss wind and solar power lack political backing
Switzerland still lags behind other European countries when it comes to the production of solar and wind power. The latest survey by the private Swiss Energy Foundation – an organisation pushing for sustainable energy – found Switzerland in posi...

Mon, 20 Jun 2022 14:04:00 GMT
Swiss expect ‘long and complex’ reconstruction process in Ukraine
President and Foreign Minister Ignazio Cassis says the planned Ukraine conference is Switzerland’s contribution for stability in Europe. Cassis said the Ukraine Recovery Conference (URC2022) was not meant as a donor event but as a step towards ref...

Mon, 20 Jun 2022 12:50:00 GMT
Study reveals economic impact of Swiss cannabis legislation
Cannabis generates an annual turnover of around CHF1 billion ($1.03 billion) in Switzerland, according to a new study. The figure, published by the University of Geneva on Monday, contains production, import and trade in the shadow economy as well a...

Mon, 20 Jun 2022 10:33:00 GMT
Greenland glacier named after Swiss climate researcher
Officials have paid homage to Konrad Steffen, a prominent Swiss glaciologist who died in Greenland in 2020, by naming a glacier in the north of the territory after him. It was announced on Monday that three glaciers in Greenland had been named after...

Mon, 20 Jun 2022 08:06:00 GMT
New Covid surge could infect over one million Swiss this summer
Around 15% of the Swiss population could get infected this summer with new Omicron subvariants, warns the former head of the government’s Covid-19 taskforce. Tanja Stadler believes the risk of intensive care units becoming overloaded by this new w...

Sun, 19 Jun 2022 16:38:00 GMT
Mapping Africa’s disease transmission hotspots
Swiss researchers have created a risk map of sub-Saharan Africa, based on population density and infrastructure, which they hope can help anticipate the spread of disease outbreaks. The research by the federal technology institute ETH Zurich and the...

Sun, 19 Jun 2022 14:05:00 GMT
Ukrainian Ambassador: Swiss could look harder for oligarch assets
While he is grateful for the Swiss organisation of the upcoming Ukraine Recovery Conference, Switzerland could do more to chase down Russian oligarchs, Artem Rybchenko says. Rybchenko, the Ukrainian ambassador in Bern, told the Blue News website tha...

Sun, 19 Jun 2022 10:44:00 GMT
Credit Suisse: fresh legal worries linked to former rogue banker
Russian oligarch Vitaly Malkin plans to sue Credit Suisse for CHF500 million ($515 million) due to losses caused by a former employee of the bank, according to a newspaper report. The SonntagsZeitung writes that Malkin is chasing the bank in connect...

Sat, 18 Jun 2022 16:37:00 GMT
Zurich Pride: thousands march for transgender rights
Huge crowds turned out for the Pride Parade in Zurich on Saturday, which this year focussed on the rights and challenges of transgender people. Organisers spoke of some 40,000 participants in the Swiss city, which would make it the biggest edition s...

Sat, 18 Jun 2022 13:20:00 GMT
Avalanche forecasters train AI to help predict risks
The Swiss Institute for Snow and Avalanche Research SLF has trained a computer programme to churn out avalanche forecasts which are just as accurate as those written by human forecasters. The artificial intelligence (AI) tool, trained with two decad...

Fri, 17 Jun 2022 16:49:00 GMT
CERN to cut research ties with Russia and Belarus
The European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN), located on the French-Swiss border near Geneva, has decided to end all cooperation agreements with Russia and Belarus when they expire in 2024 over their roles in the war in Ukraine. The CERN Co...

Fri, 17 Jun 2022 16:06:00 GMT
Global trade compromise on vaccines and food draws fire
The pharmaceutical industry and several NGOs have criticised deals on vaccines and food security made at a six-day meeting of the Geneva-based World Trade Organization (WTO). The WTO’s 164 members agreed on a package of trade reforms in the early ...

Fri, 17 Jun 2022 14:46:00 GMT
Switzerland wants to intensify talks with EU
The Swiss government has resolved to "step up" exploratory talks with the European Union aimed at resolving differences concerning future bilateral relations. Switzerland has repeatedly rejected EU demands to replace a series of separate treaties wi...

Fri, 17 Jun 2022 13:10:00 GMT
Mediation fails to solve dispute over Syngenta insecticide in India
An attempt to mediate a dispute between crop science company Syngenta and a group of NGOs over the sale of an insecticide in India has acrimoniously collapsed. Both parties blamed each other for failing to make progress on resolving claims that Syng...

Fri, 17 Jun 2022 10:04:00 GMT
Covid-19 ravages Tour de Suisse cycling race
Multiple cases of Covid-19 have caused chaos at the Tour de Suisse cycling race in Switzerland, forcing three teams and numerous riders to pull out. Overall leader Aleksandr Vlasov tested positive the day after winning the fifth stage, the Russian r...

Fri, 17 Jun 2022 09:06:00 GMT
EC President to attend Ukraine conference in Switzerland
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen is expected to attend the Ukraine Recovery Conference in Lugano, Switzerland, in July, according to media reports. Her appearance at the major international conference on the reconstruction of Ukrai...

Thu, 16 Jun 2022 17:56:00 GMT
Swiss government forced to halve 2023 Covid vaccine orders
A divided Swiss parliament has demanded that the government tear up orders for 14 million doses of Covid-19 vaccines and renegotiate contracts for half of this supply. Switzerland had ordered seven million doses from Pfizer/Biontech and the same amo...

Thu, 16 Jun 2022 17:39:00 GMT
Parliament rejects calls to halve Swiss petrol tax
A proposal to halve taxes on petrol, diesel and heating oil to cushion the effects of rising commodity prices has been rejected by parliament. On Thursday, the House of Representatives joined the Senate in voting down the motion from the People’s ...

Thu, 16 Jun 2022 12:09:00 GMT
Switzerland steps up drive to integrate Ukrainian refugees in workforce
Swiss cantons have so far handed out at least 1,500 work permits to the 57,000 refugees who have arrived from Ukraine. Ministers are meeting with employers and cantons to work out ways to increase the number of refugees joining the workforce. Not e...

Thu, 16 Jun 2022 10:24:00 GMT
Man indicted for jihadist knife attack in Switzerland 
The Office of the Attorney General of Switzerland (OAG) has filed an indictment against a Swiss-Turkish man who fatally stabbed a man in the Swiss town of Morges in 2020 in a “jihadist-motivated” attack. The 28-year-old Swiss-Turkish dual natio...



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