Since Russia's invasion of Ukraine in February and the start of Western sanctions, Switzerland has frozen some CHF7.5 billion ($7.9 billion) of Russian funds, authorities have said. The figure, a slight increase on the CHF6.7 billion reported in Jul...

In 2021, the booming jewellery trade in China meant that the country overtook Switzerland as the world’s leading luxury goods hub. The “Global Powers of Luxury Goods” report by consultancy firm Deloitte, published on Thursday, said China’s s...

Switzerland has fallen behind in its protection of animals and plants over the past decade, carrying out just 1.4% of its international obligations, nature organisations have said. NGOs BirdLife and Pro Natura said on Wednesday that Switzerland is b...

Migration authorities say that while numbers of asylum applications remain extremely high, they have boosted capacities and are now able to slightly ease the burden on cantons. With numbers of asylum seekers reaching levels not seen since 2016, the ...

Switzerland’s highest court has upheld a decision by competition authorities to prevent the country’s biggest telecoms provider using single-mode optical fibre cables for the expansion of its network. In 2020, the Swiss Competition Commission (C...

Paris was not angry over the Swiss purchase of fighter jets from the US, and the two countries are talking again, says French ambassador to Switzerland Frédéric Journès. Last year, Switzerland approved the purchase of F-35 jets from the US, snubb...

The International Committee of the Red Cross “continues to move heaven and earth” to gain access to all prisoners of war in the Ukraine conflict, its director Robert Mardini has told Swiss public broadcaster RTS. The ICRC has been regularly crit...

The new generation of undemocratic rulers fear neither elections nor citizen participation in public life. But they forget people’s desire for freedom, says the Global State of Democracy 2022 report published on Wednesday.     Last weekend Sh...

Switzerland’s second-biggest shoe chain Vögele Shoes will cease trading at the end of the year. The measure affects 131 employees. The St Gallen-based company, which has been granted a four-month moratorium, has been unable to convince new invest...

Construction workers and trade unions in Switzerland have reached an agreement in a long-running labour dispute. Builders will receive CHF150 ($158) more a month in effective wages from next year and minimum wages will increase by CHF100 a month. Th...

The Venice Biennale closed its doors on Sunday with a record number of visitors. The contemporary art show had recorded more than 800,000 admissions up to one day before closing. The Swiss Pavilion was visited by 500,000 people, the Swiss Arts Counc...

Ahead of Friday’s mustn’t-lose match against Serbia at the World Cup in Qatar, Swiss footballers are playing down political tensions from the two sides’ previous encounter. Four years ago at the World Cup in Russia, Switzerland captain Granit ...

The Swiss sociologist and ethnologist Bernard Crettaz, who died on Monday aged 84, was close to death long before it caught up with him. For about ten years, until 2014, he hosted the “Cafés mortels”, meetings in cafés to talk about death. “...

Businesses in Switzerland are being forced to cope with an historic shortage of highly skilled workers, according to job placement company Adecco. Demand for the likes of doctors, nurses, IT specialists and engineers is outstripping supply in the jo...

Swiss trade officials have held talks with Indonesia and the World bank to promote a sustainable means of implementing a controversial free trade agreement. The State Secretariat for Economic Affairs (SECO) laid the foundations for a roadmap that in...

After two years of pandemic-related Words of the Year, the energy crisis facing Europe has left its mark on the jury in 2022. Strommangellage (energy shortage), boycotter (to boycott), penuria (shortage) and mancanza (shortage) are the Words of the ...

A coordinated police operation between Switzerland and Hungary has broken up a criminal network involved in trafficking women for forced sex work. Four people have been arrested, two in each country, and a number of items of value were seized by pol...

Some 5,000 soldiers and scores of armoured vehicles are winding down Switzerland’s largest military exercises since 1989. The ‘PILUM 22’ war games have been taking place in Switzerland over the last week against the backdrop of Russia’s inva...

Tens of thousands of visitors descended on Bern to celebrate the Swiss capital’s traditional ‘Zibelmärit’ onion festival. Some 30 tons of onions were sold on Monday, which is an improvement on last year but around half the amount sold in the ...

Political and humanitarian actors have called on Switzerland to sign the United Nations Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW). Former foreign minister Micheline Calmy-Rey and ex-interior minister Ruth Dreifuss joined the appeal on Mond...

A new 250-megawatt power plant in northern Switzerland will be functional on February 15, its operator General Electric (GE) confirmed on Monday. The reserve plant was ordered by the government in September in response to potential power shortages t...

Wet weather was responsible for the sale of 2,259 tonnes of plant protection products in Switzerland in 2021. The Federal Office for Agriculture (FOAG) said on Monday that farmers had increased the number of treatments to save certain crops. An add...

A correspondent of Swiss public television RTS was briefly detained by Shanghai police after a live broadcast on the anti-lockdown protests that have flared across China. Michael Peuker was reporting live from Shanghai on the RTS Sunday evening news...

Swiss apprentices have won 19 medals, including five golds, at the international WorldSkills competition, which wrapped up in Austria on Sunday evening. This put the country in third place in the medal table. "Over 55 per cent of our team made it on...

Voters in Basel City have backed a strict climate target for the canton – to reduce net greenhouse gas emissions to zero by 2037. They had to decide whether to support the Green party-driven “climate justice initiative”, which set the net zero...

Voters in the canton of Valais have come out in favour of a controversial law regulating palliative care and assisted suicide in the region’s care homes. The law on palliative care and the framework conditions for assisted suicide in institutions ...

Many Swiss towns and cities will use energy more sparingly for their Christmas lights and markets, according to reports. But they won’t do without the “Christmas magic” entirely. The move comes amid calls by the government for people and busin...

The head of Credit Suisse’s Swiss division says that only a few clients are actually closing accounts at the bank. His comments came after the troubled bank reported high customer fund withdrawals globally. “Some clients have withdrawn part of t...

All four candidates to succeed outgoing government ministers Simonetta Sommaruga and Ueli Mauer are now clear, after the Social Democratic Party nominated two women for Sommaruga’s job this Saturday. Environment Minister Sommaruga and Finance Mini...

Several hundred people have been demonstrating in the Swiss capital, Bern, calling on the authorities to stop the “healthcare exodus”. “We are sounding the alarm,” said the protestors, many of whom came with healthcare-related items like bed...