WorldcrunchTuesday’s edition of Icelandic daily Fréttablaðið features the national soccer team celebrating their historic win over England in the European Championship: “Iceland 2 – 1 England, where will this end?” Monday night’s victory sends Iceland to the quarterfinals, where they’ll face host nation France. The Icelandic victory against one of the iconic football teams continues […]
The once Great Britain has just gotten smaller. But Brexit has also rendered the meekness of the European project evident to all. And the big players like the U.S. and China will eat them for lunch if something doesn’t change quickly.
Trump University isn’t the only questionable American higher education institution. Other self-proclaimed universities are virtual scams, and China is a prime customer.
-Analysis- PARIS — It’s a company like any other, in the 11th arrondissement of Paris. Except that in the BeMyApp offices, you’ll hear a dinosaur screech and a stream of puns. Jokes that fail to get a laugh are taxed. Employees and managers put 20 cents in a jar. It’s the “bad joke tax.” “Me, […]
SPOTLIGHT: BRITISH BREAKUPS AFTER BREXIT Whatever the result, last Thursday’s referendum was always going to leave Britain deeply divided. It was also bound to divide the UK’s major political parties, whose leaders now face the daunting task of both negotiating the best possible exit deal and bringing the country together, avoiding, if possible, a breakup […]
Geraldine Roman, a 49-year-old former journalist, survived a brutal campaign to win a seat in the national legislature — and a place in Filipino history.
La Voz de Galicia, June 27th The Monday edition of Spanish daily La Voz de Galicia features a victorious Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy kissing his wife, Elvira Fernandes, after winning the most seats in Spain“s parliamentary elections. Sunday’s vote followed an inconclusive election in December, when the parties failed to agree on a coalition. […]
BERLIN — When exactly should the British leave? How should the European Union react? Following the initial horror at the UK vote in favor of Brexit, the search is now on, from Brussels to Berlin and beyond, to find practical solutions to pick up the pieces and set Europe on a new path forward. Here […]
Violent death is a regular ocurrence in Rio’s infamous slums. But that doesn’t make it any less excruciating for the families of the departed.
FindFace, a revolutionary facial recognition tool, makes it possible to instantly identify an attractive stranger or petty criminal. It could also provide states with new ways to monitor their citizens’ activities.
PHILADELPHIA — Try as he might, Tom Nelson just could not get any other gay people to the gun range. For the past four years he sent out email invitations to a local mailing list for Pink Pistols, a shooting group that encourages members of the LGBT community to carry concealed firearms. Then, on the third Sunday of each month, he would head to a gun club in the Philadelphia area and wait. Nobody ever showed. “It’s been very lonely out there,” said Nelson, a 71-year-old retiree who continued to make the trek lest his own shooting skills deteriorate. Nelson […]
“This has implications for absolutely everything,” political editor for BBC News Laura Kuenssberg declared of the prospect of Britain leaving the European Union. And now that Brexit camp has won, and the UK prepares to bid farewell to the EU, the parties and the gawkers have begun to gauge the fallout of ending the 43-year-long […]
The editor-in-chief of top French daily Le Monde says the UK’s departure from the EU must be a wake-up call for the remaining 27 countries. But the answer may be more Europe, not less.
The result is in: The British have voted 52% to 48% in favor of having the UK split from its continental partners. It’s a momentous decision that has deep economic, political and cultural ramifications. Some will come down the line, and others — like Prime Minister David Cameron’s resignation — are more immediate. Here’s a […]
SPOTLIGHT: BREXIT WINS, CAMERON’S BAD BET No one ever forced David Cameron to call the referendum to decide whether the UK should stay in the European Union or not. But the British Prime Minister’s calculation was clear: Popular sentiment against the EU (particularly among his fellow Conservative Party members) was strong enough to make a […]
El Espectador — June 24, 2016 Colombian daily El Espectador featured an AK-47 assault rifle with the headline “Do not recycle” on the paper’s front page on Friday. Rebels from the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, signed a historic ceasefire deal with the government in the Latin American nation. After more than 50 […]
Britain is making the news today. I took this shot in Edinburgh“s Princes Street, just five years after Scotland, as part of the UK, joined the European Union.
-OpEd- BEIJING — On June 9, U.S. company XpressWest suddenly announced that it would end the joint venture agreement that it had signed with China Railway International to build a high-speed rail linking Las Vegas and Los Angeles. The U.S. firm said its decision to terminate the relationship with China Railway International was based “primarily […]
BEIJING — Recycling used materials is great. School athletics, too! But in China this week, we see where the two activities should never cross paths. The Tuesday night edition of Economic 30 Minutes, a program of CCTV, the Chinese state television broadcaster, exposed the shady story of China’s plastic school tracks and sports fields made […]
Ever since the financial crisis, casinos have been losing money. To survive, Las Vegas must lose its reputation as a place good only for gambling, boozing and prostitution.
SPOTLIGHT: BEYOND BREXIT The big day has arrived. Britons have begun voting to decide if their country should remain a member of the European Union, or go its own way. The latest polls all suggest the race is too close to call, with two surveys putting the “Remain” camp ahead while two others say those […]
PARIS — The fateful day has arrived. Voters in the United Kingdom go to the polls Thursday to decide if they should stay or should they go from the familiar but increasingly unpopular arms of the European Union. The consequences of an potential “Brexit” extend beyond Britain, as the EU would lose a major economic […]
Venezuela, a land that made 19th-century travelers marvel at its natural treasures, has become one of the last places any tourist would visit these days.
MILAN — Taking home leftover food from a restaurant is not common practice in Italy, where your fresh plate of lasagna should be finished the first time around. Basta. But as the world struggles to reduce food waste, even Italians may be coming around to the idea of leaving a meal with leftovers in hand […]
Signing a petition challenging Donald Trump’s right to run for U.S. president is one bad good idea. A novelist who lived through Balkan tragedies knows this well.
-Essay- PARIS — Nothing ruins the cheese course more than the smell of burning tires. Yes, it seems, the hour of camembert and brimstone is at hand. Angry mobs are burning Michelins at the picket lines. Congestion at the gas pump. Travel chaos as metro and rail lines strike. Power outages and the River Seine […]
SPOTLIGHT: A LOADED TRANSCRIPT It’s hard to recall the last time the FBI flip-flopped so quickly. The release yesterday morning of transcripts of the Orlando nightclub gunman’s calls to 911 had initially withheld Omar Mateen’s references to his apparent Islamist motivations for the attack that killed 49 people. Outrage was immediate. House Republican Speaker Paul […]
PUEBLA — Mexico’s recently opened International Museum of the Baroque, in this historic colonial city, is as much a work of art as the numerous 17th- and 18th-century pieces it contains. Designed for Puebla by Japanese architect Toyo Ito, the structure — with its 53 white walls, all a little different from each other, and […]
Amalienborg, the winter home of the Danish royal family, is located next to a ferry docking point — very convenient for tourists. You may notice this slide is a little bit dusty, but my grandson and I didn’t want to photoshop that away.
An estimated 150 Kenyan soldiers were killed five months ago in an al-Shabab ambush in Somalia, a tragedy made all the more troubling by the fact that authorities in Nairobi are mysteriously mum about it.
A video of Chinese bank employees being spanked with a kind of bat or paddle for poor job performance has gone viral, setting off outrage online in China. The video, apparently recorded during a training session at a rural bank in the poor western province of Shanxi, shows eight staff members — both men and […]
Europe has seen its relative economic and military power decline for decades, but its “soft power” has held strong. But even that is now at risk.
GENEVA — Alain Thébault is working on making a small bubble-shaped electric catamaran that can “fly” over water. And perhaps be remotely controlled. This vehicle may sound like something that belongs to the realm of science fiction except for the fact that Thébault is a successful inventor. He created the Hydroptère, one of the fastest […]
SAO PAULO — The brains of highly trained athletes function more efficiently than others. Sports players activate only the parts of the cortex — the outer layer of the brain — necessary for specific movements like dribbles, tackles or saves such as those employed by soccer goalkeepers. “These athletes activate a smaller part of their […]