WorldcrunchDie Welt (“The World”) is a German daily founded in Hamburg in 1946, and currently owned by the Axel Springer AG company, Europe’s largest publishing house. Now based in Berlin, Die Welt is sold in more than 130 countries. A Sunday edition called Welt am Sonntag has been published since 1948.
BERLIN — Anyone caught writing about Chuck Norris should tread very carefully because, according to one meme, the Texas Ranger has threatened to switch off the Internet if he finds any more stupid jokes about him posted online. This threat is not to be taken lightly: according to another post, the only reason why there […]
BADEN-BADEN — There is no fur in sight here — no wraps, mink collars, not even real-fur trim on a hood at Baden-Baden’s casino. Granted, this is not ideal fur weather, as the Sparkasse Bank thermometer reads 22° Celsius. But for rich Russians, it is still very much the winter travel season, and one wonders […]
BERLIN — Over the past week, the term “original inhabitants” has been used repeatedly to characterize Crimean Tatars, who seem to be the only inhabitants of the peninsula who don’t see a home for themselves in Russia. “The original inhabitants since the late Middle Ages were the Tatars,” a serious historian and professor of East […]
Shiran Ebadi, 2003 winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, says Iran’s supposed reformist leader Hassan Rouhani has done little to improve human rights. Anyway, he doesn’t have final say.
PEREVALNE — While Russian flags fly in Simferopol and people celebrate the “return home” in the main square, a few miles away in the village of Perevalne a strange calm has descended. For weeks now, the Ukrainian military regiments here have been surrounded by Russian forces, and armored vehicles have patrolled the streets. Pro-Russian activists […]
BERLIN — Sonya* disappeared during the fall school vacation in the German state of Baden-Württemberg. The 16-year-old high school student, the daughter of an Algerian and a German, left her family’s house in Konstanz and never returned. Sonya’s parents called the police fearing the worst. Had their daughter been kidnapped? Was she possibly the victim […]
KEMPTEN — Perhaps it’s a rather tired comparison, but the Allgäu region in the southern German state of Swabia is well known for its snow. This past weekend it was piled several feet deep on the Nebelhorn mountain. Eight ski lifts were in operation, with winter vacationers on every run. A few miles to the […]
The crisis in Crimea says more about Russian ambitions and European foot-dragging than it does about indecisiveness in Washington.
The hotel’s location is practical, in one of the most sought-after areas of Edinburgh: just steps away from the railroad station, with the Old Town and Princes Street shopping only close by. Old and imposing on the outside, inside it’s all modern, minimalist, and even a little Scottish. Chairs in the reception area are upholstered […]
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.
The Swiss are training the first generation of Mandarin-speaking ski instructors, part of a campaign to lure newly rich from China to come play in the snow — with help from Bollywood.
-OpEd- BERLIN — Among the rituals that North Korea’s young dictator Kim Jong-un has embraced is saber rattling. And in the run-up to annual military maneuvers between South Korea and the U.S., he was at it again. He threatened an “unimaginable holocaust” or “catastrophe” that would destroy inter-Korean relations if the traditional army operations went […]
Much more freedom is allowed in Lithuania than across the border in Belarus, where strongman Alexander Lukashenko shut down top universities.
The singular story of a Somali restaurateur who left the sweet life in the UK to return to his war-ravaged homeland, where he has survived multiple attacks on his restaurant.
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.
HAMBURG — Georgios Titokis is actually too old for the remote-controlled car he’s holding in his hand. But the toy interests him. Cautiously, the Greek-born Titokis removes the beach buggy from its box and checks to see if any parts are missing. Then he checks the batteries and looks for any sign of wear and […]
During the country’s civil war in the 1980s, countless children were abducted and sold off into adoption. Some in Europe are now joining the hunt to know their origins.
Since its inception, Israel has exempted ultra-Orthodox Jews from military service and offered them a host of subsidies. But as demographics change, many say the policy must end.
MAKHACHKALA — A woman is standing near the police cordons, looking into the dark space where the Golden Empire restaurant stood until a few moments earlier. First came the grenades, and then a car exploded in front of the entrance. All that’s left now is debris. When the woman repeatedly tries calling her sister, a […]
With rumblings that young people are disenchanted with the social network, a reporter visits the Harvard University campus where Mark Zuckerberg founded Facebook 10 years ago.
One tortured by the regime, another by Islamist rebels, both offer evidence of the worst kind of brutality that reigns in Syria today.
The German driving legend has been in an artificially induced coma for more than a month since a ski accident. Doctors take us inside the state-of-the-art head trauma treatment.
And Igor Luzenko is the lucky one. The other activist with whom he was abducted, beaten and interrogated didn’t make it home alive.
A Die Welt editor spent four months living and working in California, and though many of his countrymen are critical of the U.S., he fell in love with its cool, can-do spirit.
DAR ES SALAAM — Tanzania has a lot to offer: safaris, mountains, tropical islands. But hardly anyone knows about Dar es Salaam. The country’s largest city offers not only culture but also beautiful beaches. In the early evening, before the tropical night sinks into the Indian Ocean’s deep blackness, the beach at the Oyster Bay […]
MUNICH – After soccer star Robert Enke took his own life in November 2009, public dismay at the news was considerable. At a memorial service in the Marktkirche church the next day, followed by a funeral march in Hannover attended by some 35,000 people, fans were out in force for the German national soccer team’s […]
A Washington D.C. jury has convicted a 49-year-old German man of killing his 91-year-old wife in their home in the capital’s posh Georgetown neighborhood.
FUJAIRAH — Once they’ve finished, the fishermen of Fujairah, in the United Arab Emirates, drag their boats up onto the beach, sit in the shade to mend their nets, and begin to chat: about Allah, about the world, about soccer and bullfights. But talk also turns to how the pace of life has sped up […]
JERUSALEM — Aharon Shulov was a man of faith who knew his Scriptures by heart. Especially the passage in which Isaiah promises a new heaven: “The wolf and the lamb will feed together, and the lion will eat straw like the ox, and dust will be the serpent’s food. They will neither harm nor destroy […]
BERLIN — Purple is intense like no other color. It is opaque, disturbing and seductive. It is also the color of 2014. So says the Pantone Color Institute, which has named “Radiant Orchid” this year’s preeminent hue. Red and blue combine to make it: hot and cold, fire and water, the male and female elements […]
HAMBURG — It’s good to have a clear conscience about breakfast, so when the yogurt container or milk bottle pictures happy animals, it’s reassuring. Consumers frequently imagine happy cows in lush pastures and roomy stalls where everything is good. But that’s only part of the truth. To meet organic and animal rights standards, farmers are […]
-Commentary- BERLIN — When two soldiers fell in the first hours of the French military operation that began last week in the Central African Republic, President Francois Hollande declared, “Morts pour la France.” Yes, killed for their country. But the young soldiers also lost their lives fighting for Europe, even if Europe has hardly shown […]
JOHANNESBURG – When Nelson Mandela was sworn in as president 19 years ago, he proclaimed that South Africa was entering “a covenant” to create a society that guaranteed human rights for both blacks and whites, “a rainbow nation at peace with itself and the world.” Mandela, who died on Thursday at the age of 95, […]
DUSSELDORF — The air is ice cold without a hint of wind. As night falls over Düsseldorf, they come flocking from all directions: thousands of ring-necked parakeets. They land on the plane trees that line the luxury Königsallee shopping street. Men in expensive suits and women in fur coats look up in amazement. A little […]
Using the power of light to combat the dark ideology of the Taliban. It sounds like the start of a bad movie, but that is exactly what Shahbaz Sharif, chief minister of the Pakistani province of Punjab, intends to do. “More jobs will mean fewer extremists because we can give people a better chance in […]
HAMBURG — When Natalie Leroy talks about this German city’s water, her voice changes. It’s as if it was bubbling directly from the holy spring in Lourdes, not from one of the thousands of faucets in Hamburg. “It’s just water…” you might want to tell her, but then you would be getting it totally wrong. […]
BERLIN — During his election campaign, Iran’s new president Hassan Rouhani had criticized his predecessor Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s aggressive behavior towards the West. He claimed that Iran needed to moderate its tone in order to win the West’s trust about its nuclear program. Since his election victory, Rouhani has launched an unprecedented charm offensive on the […]
In the wake of the immigrant tragedy off the coast of Lampedusa, a reporter sneaks into a detention center in southern Italy to witness living conditions and hear tales of refugees.
Hard times for American foreign policy, which no longer seems to differentiate between friend and foe. European heads of state who have been spied on don’t appreciate that one bit.
Since the discovery, Csanad Szegedi, one of the founders of Hungary’s far-right party, has lost his old friends and found a new way to spend his Saturdays.