Worldcrunch
WASHINGTON – As Mitt Romney would say, it’s a particularly well-stuffed “binder full of women.” The 2012 vintage of candidates for public office is one of the best — at least in terms of quantity. More women are running for Congress this year than ever before. The newspapers are comparing it to the 1992 so-called […]
MOSCOW – On the evening of October 10th, Turkish Air Force jets forced Syrian Air flight 442, a civilian passenger plane, to land at the airport in Ankara, Turkey. They suspected that the plane, which was carrying 35 passengers from Moscow to Damascus, contained cargo not allowed under the rules of civilian aviation. After searching […]
HAMBURGER ABENDBLATT (Germany), DUTCH NEWS (Netherlands) Since May 2012, selling marijuana to non-Dutch buyers has been illegal in the south of the Netherlands. This measure came into law in an effort to prevent large numbers of foreigners, especially Germans, from crossing the border specifically to buy drugs. Dutch buyers had to show a “weedpass” to […]
MUNICH – According to exclusive information obtained by Süddeutsche Zeitung, the German, French, Italian, Spanish and Moroccan governments are pushing forward their green power “Desertec” project. Electricity produced by a solar thermal plant in Morocco, which would cost 600 million euros to build, would supply Europe with renewable energy. The planned power plant site is […]
THE NEW YORK TIMES, THE WASHINGTON POST, CNN (U.S.) Worldcrunch With less than a week until election day, President Barack Obama and Mitt Romney remain in a virtual dead heat, according to latest poll figures. The latest Washington Post-ABC News tracking poll tips Romney with 49% and Obama at 48%. There has not been one […]
CAIRO – Five male members of an atheist group congregate in one of Cairo’s crowded downtown bars, sipping beer and Pepsi as they discuss their thoughts on religion, sex, science, culture, politics and Egypt’s new ruling regime. The group, which also shares idea on an atheist website, has been holding weekly meetings since Mohamed Morsi […]
LE MONDE (France), ANSA, MISNA (Italy) Worldcrunch TRIPOLI – Some 100 armed men stormed Libya’s parliament late Tuesday, preventing the confirmation of 30 cabinet members for the new government of prime minister Ali Zeidan, Italian news agency ANSA reported. Fighters have invaded parliament several times before, each time bringing proceedings to a halt. “This has […]
-Op Ed- SANTIAGO – The most urgent problem for the second term of President Barack Obama or the first term of President Mitt Romney will be a problem that neither of them created. We are talking about the cryptically dubbed ‘fiscal cliff,’ which, if it is not solved, will push the United States into another […]
Worldcrunch As Sandy pummels the United States, the Pacific typhoon season has been well underway on the other side of the world, resulting in some 500 deaths and $3.36 billion in total damages in Asia. Take a look at the five storms that you may have missed: 1. Typhoon KhanunIn mid-July, Typhoon Khanun swept over […]
They appear out of the darkness, men and women moving across a field carrying flaming torches, white hoods covering their heads. After forming a circle, in broken English they swear allegiance to “white power” – to the white race and the nation. Then they light a cross as high as a man. This is a […]
The future of Bhutan“s agriculture industry will be organic. The country, which mainly grows oranges, apples, rice and potatoes, had decided to become 100% organic in the next 10 years. Situated in the craggy foothills of the Himalayas, only 3% of the kingdom’s territory is actually farmland. However, 80% of the population of Bhutan, a […]
SÜDDEUTSCHE ZEITUNG (Germany) Worldcrunch COLOGNE – A German court has ruled that male Lufthansa pilots must continue to wear their hat with their uniform at the airport – even though the same policy does not apply to female pilots at Lufthansa, the Süddeutsche Zeitung daily reports. A male Lufthansa pilot had filed a suit against […]
BELGRADE – “Go to Republic Square first, and then walk along Knez Mihailova Street, that’s Belgrade at its most beautiful…” With the counsel of the young woman at Reception, a rickety Dacia taxi gets me from the residential neighborhood of Senjak – pretty, but with some parts in urgent need of a facelift – past […]
CNN, NBC NEWS, NYT (USA), BBC (UK), INSTAGRAM Worldcrunch As superstorm Sandy continues to wreak its deadly destruction over the Northeast, here are the latest developments, by the numbers: • 16: number of reported deaths caused by the storm in the U.S. • 68: number of lives claimed outside the U.S., including 51 in Haiti […]
Last week at an unlicensed Montessori kindergarten in Taiyuan, in the western province of Shanxi, a teacher slapped a five-year-old girl in the face more than 70 times and kicked her twice because she didn’t manage to do her arithmetic. While an online video of the abuse was setting off a huge public outcry, another […]
EL COLOMBIANO, EL TIEMPO (Colombia), BBC NEWS (UK) Worldcrunch POPAYAN – Six police officers were killed while on patrol in the South West province of Cauca, reports BBC News. The ambush took place in a rural zone between the towns of Puerto Tejada and Villa Reca, reports El Tiempo. The investigation has shown that the […]
LE TEMPS (Switzerland), THE FINANCIAL TIMES (UK) Worldcrunch ZURICH – Swiss bank UBS officially announced Tuesday it is cutting 10,000 jobs worldwide after losing $42 billion during the financial crisis. The Zurich based bank, which currently employs 64,500 people, is aiming to reduce its workforce by 2015, Swiss daily Le Temps reports. The bulk of […]
THE TIMES, THE TELEGRAPH, THE MIRROR (U.K.), ABC (U.S.), Worldcrunch In his new book Running My Life, Sebastian Coe, the former track star who led Britain’s move to secure the 2012 Olympics for London, recounts the final sprint to see who would host the Summer Games. Coe says Paris was the favorite of the Olympic […]
SYDNEY MORNING HERALD (Australia), BBC NEWS, THE GUARDIAN (UK) Worldcrunch MELBOURNE – Two million liters of water were shot into the air after a faulty valve ruptured in a peaceful neighbourhood of Melbourne, reports BBC News. At least one house has been significantly damaged, with water flooding into its living room and the garage roof […]
PARIS – The new tablets and smartphones have blurred the boundaries between businesses and their employees, partners and customers. The danger of computer piracy has never been so great. The threat is invisible but incessant, as the recent large-scale attack on British bank HSBC shows. In information technology, we live in a time of fantastic […]
KIEV POST (Ukraine), INTERNEWS EURASIA (U.S.), DIE ZEIT (Germany), BBC NEWS (U.K.), HURRIYET (Turkey) Worldcrunch KIEV – The Russia-friendly Party of Regions of incumbent president Viktor Yanukovych was claiming victory Monday in the closely watched Ukraine parliamentary elections. Together with its Communist party allies, the Regions party says it will have a simple majority in […]
MOSCOW – “At the time of transition, there were hopes that Russia would transform itself into a high-skilled, high-income economy with strong social protection programs inherited from the Soviet Union era…” So starts the Credit Suisse report on Russia as part of its 2012 Global Wealth Report. According to the bank’s experts, since 2000 the […]
Worldcrunch Wait a minute. Ok, so Sandy is on its way and the race for the White House is up for grabs, but the rest of us are fretting about our Halloween costumes. We global news types naturally look for inspiration from other events that have been happening around the world over the past few […]
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE, WUNDERGROUND.COM, BALTIMORE SUN, STRATFORD PATCH (U.S.), INDEPENDENT (U.K.), STERN (Germany) Worldcrunch NEW YORK – As day breaks, Hurricane Sandy is bearing down on the east coast of the United States, with schools, stock exchanges, airports, subways and a presidential election on lockdown, as residents and rescue personnel brace for what may be […]
HAARETZ, THE JERUSALEM POST (Israel), BBC NEWS (UK) Worldcrunch GAZA CITY – An Israel Air Force strike hit a Palestinian rocket launching pad and two militant activity sites in the Gaza Strip on Monday, reports Haaretz. The strike ended an Egyptian-brokered truce, which had calmed cross-border fighting since Thursday. The informal cease-fire went into effect […]
The German publishing giant has completed a mega merger of its Random House publisher with Penguin books. And it isn’t done yet.
Were they the “right rats?” The controversial study by Gilles-Eric Séralini of the University of Caen, on the toxicity of genetically modified NK603 corn and the weed killer Roundup, has raised a host of questions concerning the type of rodent used in the experiment. Is the Sprague-Dawley rat appropriate for two-year feeding experiments, when this […]
ANKARA – Turkish opposition groups plan to defy a government ban of a rally outside parliament to mark Turkey’s Republic Day. The Oct.29 rally has been banned by the Ankara Governor’s office, who claim to have received intelligence that warns of mass provocation at the rally. If the banned protest takes place as planned, legal […]
On October 18, water started flowing along a 20 kilometer (12.4 mile) aqueduct from the Yellow River into a gigantic pit in Zhengzhou City. In two months this pit will turn into an artificial lake with a surface of 5.6 square kilometers (3.5 square miles). It has taken two years of digging and has cost […]
KOMMERSANT (Russia) Worldcrunch MOSCOW – The government in Chechnya, Russia’s Caucasian republic that has tried twice to gain independence in bloody wars of secession, has decided to start teaching the basics of Islam in preschools, Kommersant reports. Chechnya is predominantly Muslim. The initiative comes directly from the Chechen leader, Ramzan Kadirov, who has already appointed […]
CAIRO – Mohamed Gad al-Rab, more commonly known as Sambo, was not a committed revolutionary. He did not participate in the 18-day uprising that ousted Hosni Mubarak, nor the immediate events that followed it. Inadvertently, he became an icon in events after much of the history had been made, having been caught up in the […]
PHILIPPINE DAILY INQUIRER (Philippines), CHINA TIMES (Taiwan) Worldcrunch BANGKOK– A new survey that ranks cities with the “most promiscuous men” has been making the buzz all over Asia over the past few days, the China Times reported. The survey was conducted by SeekingArrangement.com, an American-based dating website. According to the Bangkok Post the study involved […]
KABUL – There was a day when executions took place in Kabul’s Ghazi Stadium, and until 11 years ago it was a place where the Taliban punished renegades with public amputations. But for the past few weeks all you could hear in this part of the Afghan capital was the sound of chatter, dancing, celebration […]
EL OBSERVADOR (Uruguay) CLARIN (Argentina)

 Worldcrunch MONTEVIDEO – As the Southern Hemisphere’s summer vacation season approaches, the tourism industry in Uruguay is already sweating Argentina’s new restrictions on changing money to dollars and using it for travel abroad. The Association of Hotels and Restaurants of Uruguay has taken extra steps to attract Argentines, including publishing […]
LA STAMPA, CORRIERE DELLA SERA (Italy) Worldcrunch MILAN – Former Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi was sentenced Friday to four years in prison for tax fraud in his dealings with the Mediaset televsion network, which he owns. The case, which took six years to arrive at a verdict, is the latest in a long string […]
NEW YORK TIMES (U.S.), THE BBC (UK) Worldcrunch BEIJING – China’s foreign ministry Friday blocked access to the website of the New York Times in response to the newspaper’s investigation into the wealth of Chinese premier Wen Jiabao’s family. The article by David Barboza, which was published late Thursday, reported that Wen’s extended family have […]
SUDDEUTSCHE ZEITUNG (Germany) Worldcrunch MUNICH – Extreme-right wing British writer David Irving, infamous as a Holocaust denier, has filed a suit to challenge a ban on his travel to Germany after local authorities in Munich had denied his request to visit the city, Suddeutsche Zeitung reports. Irving, 74, is barred entry into Germany until 2022, […]
BUENOS AIRES – Many people think of it as an illness of the past, something you see only in books and historical movies. Wrong: Leprosy is a reality in modern Argentina, and the passage of time has not eradicated the stigma of the disease. Lepers are discriminated against at work and even by their own […]
KIEV – “If we don’t stop Yanukovych, we will lose Ukraine…” Speaking in perfect Russian, one of Yulia Tymoshenko’s young supporters is talking about the upcoming election while working a shift at one of the protest tents set up along Kiev’s main street, Khreshchatyk. The stakes she sees in Sunday’s election are high indeed. “We […]