Worldcrunch
A R A B I C A ارابيكا UPRISING (CONT.)*As the government of President Bashar Assad offers a public face of reconciliation toward protesters while using an iron fist on the ground, fresh video clips suggest that demonstrations and marches are continuing around the country. Despite the growing risk, one thing Arab regimes will never […]
Manola Rajaonarison thought she was going to Lebanon to work as a housekeeper. That’s what the agency said. What she didn’t know was that she would repeatedly be humiliated, beaten and raped.
Brothers Abu and Ghulam Taieb embody the internal rifts that are tearing Afghanistan apart. One a Taliban fighter, the other a policeman, they remain on friendly terms – but swear they will kill each other if needs be.
Armed with a healthy dose of courage – and his own sleeping bag – one Swiss reporter sets off on a perilous quest to brave Zurich’s cheapest sleeping establishment: the infamous Krone.
Designer Giorgio Armani gave reporters an earful Tuesday following a fashion event in Milan, Italy.
Op-Ed: Faced with China’s chain of food safety scares, the Health Ministry’s answer is to clamp down on journalists. But it is the media’s job to monitor the Health Ministry, not the other way round.
Le Monde reports on new documents that may prove costly for French Finance Minister Christine Lagarde. The documents suggest Lagarde may have known that members of an arbitration panel involved in state dispute with a French tycoon were biased.
Op-Ed: A provocative viewpoint from China on the U.S. endgame in territorial disputes between the Chinese “elephant” and smaller “ant” nations like Vietnam. Washington’s pragmatic self-interest can be dislodged only by “belief in its own destiny,” or Jewi
In crime-infested Calabria, the famed Italian national soccer team takes a stand against local mob intimidation by training on a field confiscated from a notorious boss.
A new report by Russian atomic power agency Rosatam paints a grim picture of the country’s aging nuclear power plants, which are ill-prepared for earthquakes and other natural phenomena.
Business in booming for Turkey’s commercial aviation industry. Led by Turkish Airlines, the industry has already ordered some 5.3 billion dollars worth of new aircraft.
Pharmaceutical companies are increasingly carrying out their clinical trials abroad – in developing and emerging nations, including in the so-called BRICS countries. But in their eagerness to save both time and money, are the drug companies also sidestepp
Greece’s deepening economic crisis is prompting some lifelong city-dwellers to return to their ancestral villages, where they are taking up farming, opening B&Bs and rediscovering the quiet charms of rural living.
A R A B I C A ارابيكا SPEECH & SENTIMENT*Syrian President Bashar al-Assad gave a closely-watched speech to supporters at Damascus University, carried live on state television, blaming the past three months of violence on an external conspiracy and “saboteurs.” Assad promised to form a committee to oversee reforms, and pledged that reforms will […]
Essay: First Dominique Strauss-Kahn, now former New York Congressman Anthony Weiner. What is it about power that makes the men at the top behave so badly?
Op-Ed: Nicolas Sarkozy and Angela Merkel were able to hammer out a deal late last week over a new bailout for Greece. The agreement, however, is shaky – and will remain so until the German Chancellor is willing to take a clear stand on the issue.
More than two years after the Pakistani jihadist attacks in Mumbai, India wants to push ahead with peace talks with Islamabad to resolve longstanding disputes over Kashmir. But new questions continue to arise over links between terror outfits and the Paki
Its picturesque surroundings aside, what’s bringing crowds to the French village of Bugarach are rumors that it will survive world destruction. A craze that is pushing up property prices, annoying inhabitants, and worrying the authorities.
Members of the so-called Generation Y look very differently than their elders at working life and careers. This creates new challenges for traditional French firms, which must find ways to keep young talent in their ranks.
Though thousands of Chinese immigrants work as laborers in and around Florence, Suping Liu is the first Chinese to open shop on the city’s famously fashionalbe Via Tornabuoi in Florence. Hers is a story of determination and an east-meets-west eye
Louise Bourgeois’ monumental public sculpture is a modern art icon. Best encountered up close, this itsy bitsy spider just crawled into Zurich.
Interest in Mark Zuckerberg’s once red-hot Facebook is starting to cool off. In the United States, Canada and the UK, millions actually closed their accounts last year. For some reason, though, Italians are still wild about the website.
Political change may at last be forced upon China’s Communist Party, as the society, rich and poor, starts to show that economic growth alone will no longer keep them quiet.
Although their numbers have been halved by the recent economic meltdown, Poles – who now number an estimated 10,000 – continue to be Iceland’s largest ethnic minority.
In an effort to reinforce the ‘Swiss made” label, watch makers have decided to add more locally-manufactured parts to their time pieces.
Op-Ed: Afraid that the fall of Bashar Al-Assad could result in a civil war, the Western powers continue to play a wait-and-see game, even as the Syrian regime continues its bloody repression of anti-government protestors.
The clothing factories of Shenzhen have been hit by a perfect storm, battered by rising labor costs, unstable prices for raw materials, currency appreciation and dipping demand. By year’s end, more than half of the once bustling businesses could be shutte
OpEd: It’s time for European leaders to stop playing for time. Taxpayers alone cannot foot the bill for Greece’s debt disaster, and private creditors must quickly become a part of the equation.
A sheep that crossed the sea from Tunisia adds a light twist to the daily human drama of immigrants landing on the Italian island of Lampedusa. But the warmth doesn’t last.
As repression grows more and more violent, Syrian leaders have reportedly been discreetly preparing to transfer portions of their fortunes abroad. But is it a sign President Assad is preparing to flee?
Vladimir Putin came to Geneva to tout his country’s economic prospects, but Russians are wondering whether it was really an early stop on the campaign trail to take back the Russian Presidency in 2012.
Op-Ed: The new generation of German businessmen is the most female-friendly in history. Yet they are the ones who stand to lose if Germany’s older, chauvinistic business leaders decide to address the problem of workplace inequality with female quota laws.
A controversial Basque nationalist coalition scored big in last month’s local elections. Is the political success of separatists, which follows ETA’s decision last year to call a “permanent ceasefire,” a recipe for lasting reconciliation, or the seeds of
Op-Ed: The bean sprouts identified as the culprit in the recent E. coli crisis in Germany has cast a shadow over the virtues of organic food. Expensive, environmentally demanding — and not always so tasty or healthy — organic food is not the idyll that
Style and technology fuel a unique contest among international design schools to see who can conceive of the best futuristic model of the famous Italian sports car. Fuel efficiency counts – so does pure power.
Op-Ed: Germany is abuzz over the exploits of native son Dirk Nowitzki, who led the Dallas Mavericks to the NBA championship. One German sportswriter says Nowitzki is proof that European-style team ball has eclipsed the star-driven approach Michael Jordan
Essay: Hamzah al-Khatib, the 13-year-old boy who was tortured and killed by Bashar Al-Assad’s regime, has become a potent symbol of the revolution. Moroccan writer Tahar Ben Jelloun meditation on how the victim’s soul holds the power to bring dow
Researchers have shown that the tendency to cheat on a mate is hereditary among a bird species, and probe what role genetics play in human cheating as well?
A R A B I C A ارابيكا SUBVERSIVE TV In a video clip taken from Syrian state television that is circulating with the title, “Syrian girl terrorizes 1,000 men,” a woman named Zubaida calls in to a live broadcast. The banner below the presenter indicates that the next segment of the show will feature […]
More and more well-off Chinese women are going to the United States to give birth to their children. But while an American passport can certainly be beneficial, it can also be more of a hassle than one might expect.