Five centuries after Spanish conquistadors took over Mexico, Mexican billionaires are busy buying up chunks of Spain. After four years of recession, it was the perfect match between cash-rich customers and a needy economy.
country: Spain
Stay updated with comprehensive news on Spain from Worldcrunch. Discover insights on Spanish politics, economic strategies, societal issues, and cultural landmarks with translations from top international sources. Highlights include Madrid, Barcelona, and events like the Running of the Bulls in Pamplona.
Urged by her friends out of retirement, the 71-year-old retired judge surprised all by winning the mayor’s race on the wave of Spain’s rising protest movement. What will she do with her newfound power?
MALAGA — There’s a classic children’s song in France that says a lot about how the world sees Spain. “Dans mon pays d’Espagne, olé! Y” a un soleil comme ça!” (In Spain, my country, olé! There’s a sun like this). The song also touches on things like bullfighting, the sea, flamenco dancing — all the […]
Architectural and planning innovations have given new life to Bilbao, Spain, transforming it from a grey post-industrial city into a trendy tourist destination.
One of Spain’s richest women is up against banks insisting she pay back her debts. How did the heiress to the Koplowitz construction dynasty come to this?
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The Ebola Risk In Europe Is Very Real
BERLIN – Ebola has reached Europe. No, it is not just here via patients brought to isolation wards under strict security conditions to be saved from an otherwise relatively certain death by high-tech Western medicine. Now the virus has arrived in a Spanish hospital, having managed to pass from a priest infected in West Africa […]
SAN ANTONIO — It’s a mild evening on Passeig de Joan Carlos I, opposite Ibiza’s historic Old Town. The setting sun bathes Life Marina Ibiza, an apartment development designed by renown Paris architect Jean Nouvel, in a surreal sea of color. At the Madrigal Bar, Champagne cocktails are being prepared. At the roundabout by the […]
MADRID — Princess Letizia Ortiz Rocasolano has been preparing for this moment for 10 years. Soon the 41-year-old will be climbing the steps to the Spanish throne — a first for a Spanish commoner — to take her place beside her husband Felipe VI. That everything would happen so quickly after the unexpected abdication of […]
Geraldine Chaplin once recalled her famous father’s resilient humor, which persisted even onto his death bed. At 88, Charlie Chaplin’s health was failing, and as doctors and relatives observed him, his eyes closed and barely breathing, Geraldine’s mother audibly declared that the “final moment” had come. “I’m just playing dead,” Chaplin muttered back. He remained […]
CORDOBA — Back in 1984, UNESCO included Spain’s Mosque-Cathedral of Cordoba on its World Heritage list. Thirty years later, the site that tourist guides describe as one of Andalusia’s architectural masterpieces — a symbol of the golden age of the Umayyad civilization and of the “concord” between religions — now represents conflict. Though the exceptional […]
A German-Spanish startup has created technology it says is so effective turning light into energy that it can also utilize moonbeams and office building windows.
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What Women Want – From Hotels
Some hotel chains have moved beyond just adult-only accommodations to cater directly to women, including such options as man-free zones and champagne pajama parties.
Panhandlers, window-cleaners and street peddlers would be targeted in plan put forth by the mayor of the heavily indebted Spanish capital. Good luck collecting…
The Catalan Igualada Hockey Club has long been one of the best ice hockey clubs in Spain, both the men’s and women’s teams. But due to a recent lack of sponsorship and a cut in subsidies caused by the ongoing Spanish economic crisis, the company decided it could only keep the men’s squad. The women’s […]
A father and son take shelter from the rain. Suddenly, a 76-year old man arrives, wedging himself in between the two of them. After a throwaway remark about the downpour, a question alters the course of the conversation. “During the war, you weren’t in Fonfría by any chance?” the man asks the father, referring to […]
Tuesday, July 8, 2014 ISRAEL PREPARES FOR GROUND OFFENSIVE IN GAZA Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu ordered the army to prepare for a possible ground offensive in Gaza, Haaretz quotes a senior official as saying. This comes after the Israeli military launched “Operation Protective Edge” hitting more than 50 targets in air strikes. Palestinian militants […]
MADRID – Spain is in danger of extinction. There are fewer and fewer children and more and more elders. This stark prognosis has been known for some years now: in 2050 Spain will be the oldest country in the world. People over 80 years old will represent the biggest segment of its population. There will […]
UKRAINIAN ARMED FORCES PUT ON FULL ALERT Acting Ukrainian President Olexandr Turchynov announced that the country’s armed forces had been put on combat alert, as he fears Russia could launch a continental war, Interfax reports. According to Ria Novosti, Turchynov also admitted that “the power structures are incapable of operatively taking control of the situation […]
BARCELONA – The couple looks in love and relaxed. The evening twilight gives the picture perfect lighting and the background is idyllic. But right next to them, in front of the Alpine range, there’s a herd of tourists with their horrible fluorescent bobble hats. You know them – the photo bombers, the people who just […]
Is the American-born Wang the Jeremy Lin of the fashion world?
BARCELONA – Barcelona World. The name says it all. The project is as pretentious as its declared objective: “One of the main investment projects that will transform this region into a tourism industry leader in Europe and in the world.” This is what the Catalan Industry and Labor Minister Francesc Xavier-Mena said of the new […]
LANZAROTE – The photograph looks like something out of a glossy tourist campaign: a surfer, board under his arms, coming out of the turquoise waters that lap against the fine, white sand. Nothing out of the ordinary, seeing as the shot was taken on the island of Fuerteventura, famous around Europe for its natural beauty […]
MADRID – Anyone who has ever been to Madrid knows the Plaza de España. But today, you might not recognize it. The whole area, formerly prosperous and energetic, is a window on the crisis raging throughout Spain. Along the sides of the Plaza and in the side streets, there are entire rows of closed storefronts, […]
Many years ago, when Italian military service was still compulsory, the army subjected its new conscripts to a general culture test with various types of questions. One asked: “Who is Leonardo?,” which prompted a surprising range of responses. Someone, it seems, even replied “The pope.” The artist behind the most famous painting in the world, […]
BARCELONA – Making headway through the streets of Barcelona, closed to traffic for the occasion, seemed almost impossible. A crowd of children, students, retired people, business owners, and the unemployed coming from every part of Catalonia had joined together to wave yellow-and-red flags and voice their support for the creation of an independent state for […]
MADRID – Since September 1, undocumented immigrants in Spain are now excluded from public health care. Only pregnant women and minors can still enjoy free public coverage, which had long been available to all undocumented residents. Others can still get care in cases of emergency, but for basic medical treatment, immigrants in Spain illegally will […]