The World Trade Organization (WTO) serves to secure peace, prosperity and a sustainable economy, said Economics Minister Guy Parmelin at the opening of the WTO’s 12th Ministerial Conference in Geneva on Sunday. Following Covid-related delays, the ...

Almost three-quarters (72%) of respondents to a Swiss survey are in favour of increasing the price of airline tickets for climate reasons. In the event of an introduction, 42% of respondents back a levy of CHF30 ($30.40) for short-haul flights and C...

The Federal Office of Police (Fedpol) is investigating war crimes in Ukraine. The aim is to gather evidence in order to be able to respond quickly to any subsequent criminal proceedings or requests for mutual legal assistance, namely from the Interna...

Swiss tennis star Roger Federer said he is “definitely” intending to return to top-level tennis in 2023, but he added that he had not made any concrete plans beyond his scheduled appearances at the Laver Cup and his home tournament in Basel later...

Around 160 female mayors of Swiss cities and municipalities have met in the Swiss capital for the first time. The aim of the meeting, organised by government minister Simonetta Sommaruga, was to exchange experiences and knowledge and to improve netw...

Energy supply is the most pressing problem for the Swiss economy, according to Christoph Mäder, president of economiesuisse, the Swiss Business Federation. The fact that Switzerland could be confronted with a power shortage as early as this winter ...

The Swiss government has adopted the latest set of European Union sanctions against Russia and Belarus over the war in Ukraine, including an embargo on crude oil imports and certain refined petroleum products from Russia. The Federal Council on Frid...

Despite continued growth in its asset management sector, Switzerland is set to lose ground compared with competitors in the coming years, an annual report predicts. The “Global Wealth Report 2022”, published on Thursday by the Boston Consulting ...

Swiss researchers have created a large inventory of microorganisms found in cryospheric ecosystems such as the Antarctic and in glaciers. The cryosphere covers nearly 20% of the Earth’s surface and includes polar ice caps, mountain glaciers, glaci...

The son of a top Indonesian politician has drowned in the River Aare in central Switzerland. He had gone swimming on May 26 and had been missing since then. The body of Emmeril Mumtadz, 22, was found floating in the overflow basin of the Engehalde w...

The volume of sustainable investments in Switzerland increased by almost a third last year, reaching an all-time high of CHF1.98 trillion ($2 trillion). This continuing growth – the rate is almost the same as last year – is mainly due to the in...

The federal technology institute ETH Zurich is the best non-English-speaking university in the world, according to this year’s QS ranking. Overall, however, Swiss unis lost ground. ETH Zurich remains the top university in continental Europe and th...

The 125th anniversary of the First Zionist Congress will be held in the Swiss city of Basel at the end of August. Israeli President Isaac Herzog is expected to attend. The festivities will take place on August 28-29 in the Stadtcasino and at the Con...

Parliament has approved restrictions on online reservation platforms to protect the Swiss hotel sector. Senators on Wednesday came out in favour of a legal reform to fight unfair competition. In line with the House of Representatives, the Senate ap...

Parliament has thrown out two proposals to grant foreign residents in Switzerland full voting rights. The House of Representatives voted against a Green Party plan paving the way for foreigners living in Switzerland for at least five years the right...

The trial is underway in a Swiss court of the former FIFA president, Sepp Blatter, and ex-UEFA chief, Michel Platini, accused of corruption. The two former prominent figures of football face charges of unlawfully arranging a payment of CHF2 million ...

The Swiss flag carrier is planning to reduce the number of flights notably in Europe over the next few months as a result of staff shortages. Swiss International Air Lines said about 2% of the scheduled flights to destinations in neighbouring German...

Floods, landslides and rockfalls across Switzerland last summer resulted in damage costs of about CHF450 million ($466 million). The Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research (WSL) said that for the first time since 2007 these costs ...

Switzerland and ten other countries have successfully prevented the rapid spread of the so-called FluBot malware, which infects Android mobile phones via text messages and steals sensitive data from devices, federal prosecutors say. Since 2020, the ...

The return of foreign tourists last winter after Covid-19 restrictions were eased has given a boost to Swiss tourism figures. In all, 14.6 million overnight stays were recorded in Swiss hotels and other accommodation for the November 2021-April 2022...

A Swiss-Chinese research team has found new signs that giraffes developed their long necks not to reach high-lying food, but rather to boost their mating chances. Analysis of a 17-million-year-old giraffe-like fossil in the Xinjiang region of north-...

An academic survey has found that homophobia remains rife in Swiss classrooms, the NZZ am Sonntag reported on Sunday. One in four high school students admit to uttering anti-gay slurs or engaging in violence against a presumed homosexual classmate i...

The president of the International Federation of Pharmaceutical Manufacturers and Associations (IFPMA) says rich industrialised countries and the pharmaceutical industry must prepare for the next pandemic. Critical of vaccine nationalism, Thomas Cuen...

Swiss pharmaceutical giant Novartis has been targeted by hackers, according to media reports. The Basel-based company says no sensitive data has been stolen. Novartis confirmed to Swiss media on Sunday that it had been the victim of a hacking attack...

Swiss Economics Minister Guy Parmelin says it is the responsibility of unions to negotiate a salary raise to cope with rising food prices due to the war in Ukraine. He also expects energy prices to rise further due to new sanctions on Russia. “The...

About 24,000 Swiss people offered to provide housing for Ukrainian refugees after Russia invaded Ukraine. The private hosts could accommodate 57,000 people but most of the rooms, apartments and houses are still empty, according to the Swiss NGO Campa...

Electronic payment systems across a variety of platforms experienced a brief disruption on Saturday. The outages affected banking services and digital payment apps. The services of Swiss bank UBS and Raiffeisen, along with credit card company Visa, ...

A three-day weekend has caused long tailbacks at the Gotthard tunnel in central Switzerland, with a south-bound traffic jam up to 14 kilometres long forming on Saturday morning. In most Swiss cantons, Whit Monday is a public holiday. The Gotthard ro...

The Federal Council on Friday re-confirmed neutral Switzerland’s policy of not supplying arms to conflict zones. It had been facing increasing pressure to review its position in light of the war in Ukraine. “The criteria applicable to exports de...

Switzerland’s Federal Court has upheld a ruling that the US ride-hailing firm should be treated as an employer, rejecting Uber’s attempt to overturn a Geneva court’s verdict. “According to the Federal Court, the cantonal court did not rule a...