Worldcrunch
WARSAW – There is a smell of perfume in the air and salespeople dash between white leather armchairs and handbags worth thousands of euros. Welcome to the first Polish Louis Vuitton store, which opened in Warsaw earlier this month. I am here to meet Robert Eggs, president of the French luxury brand for Northern Europe. […]
-OpEd- BEIJING – On June 6, the Guardian newspaper in Britain and the Washington Post in the United States revealed the American government’s ongoing efforts to monitor the activities of people all around the world. They did so only after verifying the authenticity of the confidential documents they had obtained. The top-secret documents showed that […]
A school sex-abuse scandal has reignited concern for those left most vulnerable by China’s rapid migration and industrial expansion.
DUBAI – Beer? Of course not! Sayed Kamal looks at his guests with astonishment. Alcohol is only served in the big hotels. This is a youth hostel! It is in fact the only youth hostel in Dubai. “But I can offer you something similar,” says blue-shirted, tie-wearing Kamal as he emerges from behind the counter […]
In Poland, after criticism of the treatment of asylum seekers, the government has responded with some very practical training for those who come face-to-face with immigrants every day.
Eat that octopus before it slithers away, call the maggots to your turning cheese, and other moving selections from the living menu.
MUNICH – People notice you when you’re with a baby – and not only when it’s screaming its lungs out in the supermarket. Just being pregnant earns a woman kudos for having a special kind of radiance. Once the child is born of course parental beauty is not usually the thing others remark on – […]
For the past six months, the Chinese media has been reporting that rice grown in the south-central Hunan Province contains unacceptable levels of cadmium, a carcinogenic heavy metal. Last month, an inspection of samples in Guangzhou, Guangdong Province, revealed that more than half the batches of cadmium-tainted rice came from three rice mills in the […]
WARSAW – Children’s education used to be in hands of educated women – for whom it was the only way to make a living – or less well-off students. Many famous writers and scientists have held this position at some point in their life. The governess may seem like a thing of the past, but […]
NEW DELHI – Dreaming with BRICs, the study published in 2003 by Goldman Sachs that traced the rise of four emerging economies (Brazil, Russia, India and China) also marked the birth of a concept that has yet to disappoint. Between 2004 and 2011, average growth in China was 10.8%, in India 8.3% — to mention […]
A recent visit to Beijing by a top Pyongyang envoy may be the precursor to reigniting of negotiations between the two Koreas. Eyes now on Xi Jinping’s visit with Barack Obama.
Though it may look pristine, a new study finds that the lake’s water contains significant amounts of “microplastic contamination,” that is causing real harm.
The first generation of entrepreneurs who built their businesses after the 1978 Chinese economic reform are giving way to their children, just as resentment against the rich explodes.
DIE WELT (Germany) Worldcrunch BERLIN – Google Maps is now calculating routes for German cyclists, meant to enable people to get where they’re going “more simply and more safely” on their bicycles, says product manager Kai Hansen. Sounds like a nice new App indeed. Just don’t forget your helmet — or compass! Google’s map-makers got […]
After a wave of nostalgia for the Communist regime of East Germany, debate is opened in Germany about whether Communism was as bad as Nazism.
By 2015, Hunan Province alone plans to build seven new airports, joining the existing five that are losing money each year. What’s driving the boom.
A dark history is reopened after Green leader Daniel Cohn-Bendit won a Prize for “exemplary democratic disposition.” Digging into his and others’ past finds shocking acceptance of pedophilia.
New polls finding Germany has few fans in Europe should guide neither Berlin’s policies nor Germans’ own sense of self-worth. Other Europeans will come around, for their own good.
A stinking, snorting tale of NIMBY cruelty from the Bavarian heartland.
YONHAP, THE KOREA TIMES (South Korea), AAP (Australia) Worldcrunch SEOUL – North Korea fired its fifth test missile in three straight days on Monday, in the latest series of weapons drills that have been condemned by South Korea and United Nation chief Ban Ki-moon, reports the AAP. According to the South Korean Defense Ministry, the […]
A German reporter takes a tour with the radical feminist group at the newly opened Barbie House in Berlin.
SEOUL – The distance between the North Korean border town of Hyesan and South Korea’s capital Seoul is 440 kilometers (273 mi) as the crow flies. It took Park Kun-ha five years to complete the journey. His way turned out not only to be a lot longer but tortuous, taking him through the jungle of […]
–Analysis- BERLIN – At the Sankt Oberholz café, Germany’s future lies in the balance. Here, in Berlin’s “trendy” Mitte district, an international crowd of entrepreneurial 20 and 30-somethings meet. They make up two camps. On one side, you have those who prefer to speak English as they discuss their new projects and business plans. On […]
-Essay- PARIS – Charity starts at home, as the saying goes. So the very least that can be expected of communication consultants is that they are successful at communicating. And they have been successful – well beyond expectations. They have not only managed to take a front-and-center seat in electoral campaigns, they are now also […]
-Op-Ed- BEIJING – On April 28, the Japanese government held a ceremony it dubbed the “Anniversary of Japan’s Restoration of Sovereignty and Return to the International Community.” Held in Tokyo, the occasion celebrated the end of the American-led occupation in Japan in 1952, and featured Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe asking the public to cheer […]
AFP, AAP Worldcrunch DHAKA – Bangladeshi rescuers have found a survivor in the rubble of a garment factory complex more than two weeks after it collapsed, the AFP reports. “She has been located in a gap between a beam and a column. Her name is Reshmi. She may have reserves of water or have drunk […]
DAWN, THE NEWS, NATION (Pakistan) Worldcrunch ISLAMABAD – Pakistan’s bloodiest election campaign ever came to an end overnight, marred by terror threats and attacks that killed at least 117 people including candidates, reports Dawn. On Friday, a motorbike bomb near party political offices killed three people and wounded 13 in the northwestern town of Miranshah, […]
XINHUA, GLOBAL TIMES (China), AFP Worldcrunch WUXI – Zhang Yimou, one of China’s top film directors is being investigated over claims he has fathered seven children, the Chinese media reported on Thursday. The Wuxi City Population and Family Planning Commission, in eastern China’s Jiangsu Province, is investigating the Xi’an-born director, after it has come to […]
TEL AVIV – The apartment in downtown Tel Aviv could feature in any architecture magazine as the quintessential artist’s digs. Two cats doze picturesquely amid piles of photographs, books, scripts. At the big round table sits Sara von Schwarze against a backdrop of trees swaying in the wind visible out the window behind her. The […]
-Essay- BEIJING – On April 10, Fenghuang, a popular tourist town that is on the UNESCO World Heritage tentative list, started charging entry for visitors, triggering public outcry in China. Fenghuang is located in Xiangxi Prefecture, in China’s central Hunan Province, which is home to the Miao and Tujia ethnic minorities. Now, whoever wants to […]
-Blog- BEIJING – The world is big, and has all kinds of people. Given their various historical, cultural and environmental backgrounds, people from each country are naturally very different. Each nation is proud of its national character. And indeed, some people have a lot to be proud of, like those who pioneered science and democracy. […]
REYKJAVIK – Mid-February this year, British tabloids published the news that Iceland’s leftwing-green Minister of the Interior Ögmundur Jónasson wanted to limit access to online porn on the island. Ways of doing that, according to the minister, could be to block certain IP addresses, or to make it impossible to pay certain sites with an […]
LE PARISIEN, LE MONDE, LIBERATION, FIGARO, EUROPE 1 (France) Worldcrunch PARIS – The French National Assembly legalized gay marriage on Tuesday, after months of tumultuous debate both in Parliament and on the streets. The law was passed with 331 votes in favor, and 225 opposed. “It is a historic vote,” wrote Le Parisien newspaper, as […]
BEIJING – Last month, more than 16,000 dead pigs were found in tributaries of the Huangpu River, not far from Shanghai, in eastern China. At the same time, scores of diseased pig carcasses were also found miles away in Liuyang River, in the south-central Hunan Province. The massive number of dead pigs discovered nationwide caused […]
LE PARISIEN (France) Worldcrunch PARIS – No, Gérard Depardieu has not just been arrested in New York for nothing of the kind.. Instead, this is reportedly the first photo of the new DSK movie, directed by Abel Ferrara and starring Depardieu as the disgraced IMF boss accused and later cleared of raping a maid at […]
THE IRRAWADDY (Burma), HRW (USA), RADIO AUSTRALIA Worldcrunch RANGOON – A new report by NGO Human Rights Watch (HRW) published on Monday says there is evidence of government complicity in crimes against humanity and ethnic cleansing against Burma’s Rohingya Muslim ethnic minority. Since June 2012, more than 220 people have died in sectarian fighting between […]
ECONOMIC OBSERVER (China) Worldcrunch BEIJING – With air pollution continuing to plague Beijing, there are increasing signs that it is pushing foreigners, often well-to-do expats, to leave the city. “It’s supposed to take up to a decade to solve the smog problem, but who knows what problems the pollution might have caused our bodies by […]
New York 2001. Bali 2002. Djerba 2002. Istanbul 2003. Madrid 2004. London 2005. Mumbai 2006. Boston 2013. “Terror Is Back,” trumpeted newspaper headlines in the U.S. – as if it had ever left. Only minutes after the latest terror attack, German Wikipedia had updated its List of Bomb Attacks. The list begins on Dec. 13, […]
Imagine your child’s school is always open — and serves breakfast, and takeaway meals at pickup. It exists, affordably, in Sweden, where the private sector pushes education innovation.
BEIJING – The city of Xi’an in central China is known for its army of Terracotta Warriors. Local authorities have decided to apply for UNESCO World Heritage status for a number of historical sites in Shaanxi Province along the Silk Road, the ancient trade route linking many points west to China. In their proposal to […]