Analysis: Whether it is for a factory opening or a ceremony honoring her hero, “Evita,” Argentine leader Cristina Kirchner finds plenty of opportunities to speak. Many discourses, but not much dialogue.
Month: May 2012
TAGES-ANZEIGER (Switzerland) ZURICH – Sparks are set to fly as groups on both sides of the right-to-die debate prepare to descend on Zurich – with just one street to divide them. The Swiss city is known throughout the world as being something of a mecca for the practice of assisted suicide and what’s been dubbed, […]
In their search for extra-terrestrial life, scientists are zeroing in on so-called exoplanets. To narrow the field down even more, they use powerful telescopes to draw conclusions about the chemical makeup of those planets’ atmospheres.
Some Swiss are questioning the parallel lifestyle of rich and highly skilled migrants, some of whom come for tax breaks. The foreign residents are often set apart, for good, in their choice of schools. Can this be remedied?
Categories
Why Tobacco Companies Love French Films
LE PARISIEN and LES ECHOS (France) A public health advocacy group called the French League Against Cancer is taking advantage of World No Tobacco Day – today – to sound the alarm about “hidden advertising” for cigarettes. Tobacco advertising was outlawed in France in 1991. And yet cigarette manufacturers are still finding a way to […]
LA POLITICA ITALIANA and ZENIT (Italy) ROME – For the first time in its over 150-year history, L’Osservatore Romano, the Vatican’s official daily newspaper, is publishing a supplement specifically for women. The four-page insert is called “Women, Church, World” and is written “by and for” Catholic women, La Politica Italiana reports. In an interview with […]
How would you like it if in your company, deceased employees were automatically replaced by family members, even if they didn’t have the training?
CARACOL RADIO (Colombia) FLORENCIA – Among the first to react to the release Wednesday of Roméo Langlois, a French journalist who was captured in late April by members of Colombia’s FARC, was one of the guerilla army’s old nemeses: ex-President Álvaro Uribe (2002-2010). But rather than celebrate the handover, Uribe used the opportunity to question […]
North Korea’s Kim Jong-Il has “transferred the country into an undefeated country with strong political ideology, a nuclear power state, and invincible military power,” according to the updated constitution posted on its portal
A German engineer abducted in January by gunmen in Kano in northern Nigeria has been killed during an attempt by Nigerian forces to rescue him.
LE JOUR (Cameroon) NKOL-METET – When class is over in Nkolya II School, in the small Cameroonian village of Nkol-Metet, children get to work. As in many Cameroonian schools, children, sometimes as young as six years old, do personal tasks for their teachers — like carrying firewood to their teachers’ houses at the end of […]
Categories
Syrian troops shell Houla, site of massacre
Syrian troops shelled the country’s central region of Houla where more than 100 people were massacred last week. At least one person was killed in the latest violence and scores fled in fear of more government attacks.
Food-related news in China in recent years has been mostly about toxins and scandals. A new documentary is a pleasant reminder of the richness of Chinese culinary culture.
A visit to Salt Lake City, Utah, finds some surprises about the Mormon faith, and the faithful, who are watching for the first time as one of their own has become nominee of a major party to bid for the presidency.
CORRIERE DELLA SERA, LA REPUBBLICA (Italy) ROME – The Italian government has issued a decree raising the excise tax on petrol by 0.02 euros per liter in order to raise funds for the victims of the earthquake that struck Tuesday in the northern part of the country, Corriere della Sera reports. Italian Prime Minister Mario […]
RUE89 (France) Good news: beer does not give you beer belly! Although we’ve been led to believe there was a direct correlation between beer and abdominal obesity, a group of very serious scientists from the University of Gothenburg in Sweden discovered that beer is not responsible for our beer guts. The Swedish researchers went to […]
EL TIEMPO (Colombia) FLORENCIA – UPDATE: The operation was carried out successfuly, with a smiling Roméo Langlois freed in the remote village of San Isidro. See the first video images of the released reporter: [youtube https://www.youtube.com/embed/6Yib9n-u6ug expand=1] Earlier in the day, reports circulated that operations were currently underway in Colombia to free Langlois, a French […]
Foreign students in the Russian city of Orenburg are being asked to move out of their dorms because city officials think African students risk raping children in the nearby summer camp. And this is supposed to be a Russian city known for tolerance…
As a consequence of the bad economy and high real estate prices, more and more couples continue to share the same home, even after they divorce.
Democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi told an ecstatic crowd of Myanmar migrants in Thailand she would do all she could to help them, as she kicked off her first trip abroad in 24 years.
TELSUR (Venezuela) CARACAS – Venezuelan authorities have vowed to submit a formal request for the repatriation of a 30-ton rock that currently sits in the downtown Tiergarten park in Berlin, Germany. The 12-cubic-meter “Kueka” stone used to belong to an indigenous tribe in Venezuela called the Pemón, which consider it to be sacred. Kueka translates […]
Categories
WikiLeaks’ Assange loses sex case appeal
The British Supreme Court has denied Julian Assange’s appeal against extradition to Sweden over sexual abuse allegations –but the judges have left open a surprise avenue for the WikiLeaks founder to fight on.
Ex-Liberian leader gets life for supporting rebels in Sierra Leon, who killed thousands, in exchange for blood diamonds.
BANGKOK POST (Thailand) BANGKOK – Myanmar’s pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi has landed in Thailand for her first trip abroad in 24 years. Upon arrival Tuesday, she was greeted at the airport by a swarm of media, as well as own compatriots, who have a strong immigrant presence in Thailand. Her visit began with […]
BOXUN.COM (United States) Now disgraced Chinese politician Bo Xilai, at the center of a scandal shaking China’s ruling elite, is alleged to have paid large sums of money to have sex with celebrated Chinese actress Zhang Ziyi, according to Boxun.com, a U.S.-based Chinese website. Boxun, which had previously broken news about Bo’s demise and been […]
Categories
The Zuckerberg Private Honeymoon Paradox
Why The Facebook Founder’s Anonymous Roman Getaway With His New Bride Is Barely Worth A Tweet.
CORRIERE DELLA SERA, IL SOLE 24/7 (Italy) An earthquake killed at least 15 people in the northern Italian region of Emilia, just 10 days after another deadly temblor in the same region. Tuesday’s 5.8 magnitude quake struck at 9 a.m., with an epicenter between the cities of Carpi, Medolla and Mirandola. At least five aftershocks […]
Space is so tight at one Brazilian university that some classes are now being held at a nearby kindergarten. The adult students have started to protest, saying it’s hard to concentrate amid the din of shrieking five-year-olds.
L’ACTUALITÉ.COM (Canada) As talks between the Quebec government and student unions on university tuition hikes continue in Montreal, recent figures on the number of striking students per university show a deep Anglo-French divide. The student bodies in Quebec’s English-speaking universities are much less active in the protests. On his blog for L’Actualité.com, Anglophone writer and […]
Categories
The Euro Crisis Is Back With A Vengeance
From Greece to Spain To Italy … and back again. The euro zone domino effect takes another spin.
Categories
Syria, Is This The Tipping Point?
ASHARQ AL-AWSAT (United Kingdom) / LE MONDE (France) DAMASCUS – Syria is burning again, with action intensifying both along the front lines and in diplomatic corridors in the wake of a massacre of civilians that could mark a turning point in the yearlong conflict. Along with Canada and Australia, the major European powers, UK, Germany, […]
Four years after the idea of a free trade agreement between China, Japan and South Korea was put forward, the three countries are stuck in a tense diplomatic game of words and horse-trading.
Categories
France And Australia Expel Syrian Diplomats
French President François Hollande expels Syria’s ambassador amid continuing violence by Syrian government forces against civilians. This follows Australia’s expulsion of two top Syrian diplomats.
Categories
At least 9 dead in Italy’s latest earthquake
At least nine people are reported dead in a magnitude 5.8 earthquake that struck the same area of northern Italy stricken by another fatal tremor on May 20.
Categories
Texas crane standoff ends with deadly fall
A man believed to have fled an earlier crime and holed himself up in a crane cab high over the campus of Southern Methodist University in Texas died in a fall from the cab after a 12-hour standoff with police.
Three Moroccan ferries, seized in order to pay their company’s debts, have been forced to anchor in the French coastal city of Sète for more than five months. Some 200 crew members are living in worsening conditions, with no way out.
SINA NEWS (China) BEIJING – The capital of China wants you! (Or at least, may not kick you out quite so fast…) Making that point, at least with a gesture, the Beijing Municipal Public Security Bureau has announced plans to allow foreigners to enter without a visa for 72 hours, Sina News is reporting. The […]
LE MONDE (France) THE GUARDIAN (United Kingdom) PARIS – It may be a sign that the euro zone crisis is reaching a new low when political leaders say out loud what they share behind closed doors. The typically careful managing director of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), Christine Lagarde, has let loose with some plain […]
AL-ARABIYA (United Kingdom) DAMASCUS – “It seems that the word ‘revolution” is no longer desirable in official circles in Syria,” writes Al-Arabiya reporter Kamal Qubeisi from London. “The Revolution” happens to be the name of one of Syria’s three main official newspapers, but after 50 years on Syrian newsstands, the paper will merge with another […]
From low turnout to campaign blunders, the first round of Egypt’s presidential voting — which saw Muslim Brotherhood’s Mohamed Morsy and former Mubarak ally Ahmed Shafik, advance to next month’s runoff — was anything but predi