Worldcrunch
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 […]
TREVISO — This kind of news is hard to swallow: the historic Beccherie restaurant in Treviso that created tiramisu decades ago, will close its doors March 30. Gone will be the original version of the legendary dessert that has become a worldwide symbol of Italian cuisine. That’s because the economic crisis has been tough on […]
MILAN — The economic crisis isn’t affecting just bipeds. Our furry four-legged friends have also been struggling, as many have been abandoned or neglected when their families no longer had the resources to care for them. Italy has launched its first food bank for animals to help with this problem, thanks to the volunteer group […]
KHARKIV — There’s a critical situation in the eastern Ukrainian city of Kharkiv, and it doesn’t involve human rights. If the city zoo doesn’t get more money by Monday, officials say the animals there will begin to die of starvation. Zoo director Aleksey Yakovlev says that there is a pregnant elephant named Tandy who is […]
The financial crisis has seen middle-aged French increasingly returning to their family nests. For many, it can be a special kind of shame to move back in with elderly parents.
A failure of the American peace initiative in the Middle East could cause a severe political crisis that will undermine both the economy and the stability of the Palestinian Authority.
With French unemployment at record levels, times are tough for clients and workers of an unemployment agency in one of Marseille’s poorest, most crime-ridden areas.
Barack Obama made American inequality the central challenge of his State of the Union address. Europe and the rest of the West should be listening too.
BEIJING — Last week Maison Boulud Beijing, a French restaurant owned by the three-Michelin-star chef Daniel Boulud, shut down. Just before closing its doors for good, the restaurant suddenly became busy. Eating the foie gras, a Belgian expatriate couldn’t help but sigh: “It’s one less place to dine out and experience French haute cuisine.” Maison […]
As the Brazil’s “commodities supercycle” grinds to a halt, Dilma Rousseff’s economic policy has failed to find a new path. Is World Cup excitement enough to avoid a national bust?
-Editorial- SAO PAULO — It’s the image that became the symbol of Nelson Mandela’s memorial in Soweto: the handshake between U.S. President Barack Obama and Cuban President Raul Castro. And it’s only fitting that this is the image that remains. The United States and Cuba have been living in open animosity since the Cold War. […]
Europe represents the freedom from political dictatorship. But at what cost?
SANA’A — Antar Al-Aldharij pins his opponent down on the mat without using a dagger or a rifle. Yemen“s national judo champion, who trains every afternoon in a gym just outside of the capital, Sana’a, just needs the strength of his arms and bare hands. Al-Aldharij and his teamates share the small room of just […]
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 […]
TEL AVIV — It has been a while since Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has pulled out some impromptu economic graph or catchy slogan. You can say he matured. Netanyahu of the third term is not the same man he was during his first or second, where he’d been drunk on victory from decimating the left […]
One writer outlines what German Chancellor Angela Merkel is doing right; and sees potential deep flaws in the economic policies of Japan’s Shinzo Abe.
–Op-Ed– MUNICH — We Germans have always struggled with the euro crisis. We talk about it a lot, muse about what would happen if the euro zone split up, bitch about those nasty countries frittering our money away. But there’s one thing we don’t do: suffer from the economic crisis. On the contrary. Even if […]
Stiffer penalties for baby traffickers are all well and good, but what China really needs is to regain its moral integrity.
MODENA – A place like this — where milk costs one point and olive oil four points instead of nine euros, where you can buy food even if you don’t have the money to do so — seems possible only here, between the Torre della Ghirlandina (the bell tower of the Cathedral of Modena) and […]
CARACAS – The ongoing shortage of basic products – including food, personal hygiene products and medicine – is having a huge effect on Venezuela. President Nicolas Maduro and his government have made several announcements to fight the shortage and have accused the opposition of fanning the flames. Meanwhile, people continue to struggle to find the […]
Beyond the playboy billionaires and international tax dodgers, people work regular jobs in this slice of Mediterranean paradise.
MILAN – “Prestanome for hire: thirty years old, good credit rating, permanent job…” More and more advertisements like this one are finding their way onto the Internet. Literally a “lend-name,” the prestanome has made the leap from mafia-esque dodgy dealings into the real world. “The only thing I had left was my name: so I […]
Our intrepid reporter signs up for a new course taught by homeless people in the Polish city of Lodz for those who want to learn how to lives on the streets.
-Essay- GENEVA – May is the month of Europe, celebrating the anniversary of the creation of the Council of Europe on May 5, and of the European Union on May 9. It is the opportunity to commemorate a man who played a determining role in Switzerland’s prosperity. This man was Robert Schumann, the French foreign […]
In the southern Turkish town of Reyhanli, near the Syrian border, anger is rising against Prime Minister Erdogan’s support of Syrian rebels.
–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 […]
MONTBELIARD – The meeting point is located just outside the city limits of Montbéliard, in eastern France, on the parking lot of a fast-food restaurant. A few steps away is the front gate of the Peugeot car factory. Twenty people or so are waiting for the bus that will take them to the workshops of […]
CORRIERE DELLA SERA, LA REPUBBLICA, LA STAMPA (Italy) Worldcrunch ROME – A day after a dramatic shooting outside Italian government headquarters, one of the two injured Carabinieri police officers remains in critical condition Monday as Italy’s entire political system attempts to begin its own recovery with a key confidence vote in Parliament. Sunday morning’s shooting […]
PARIS – Should the 500 euros bill be taken out of circulation? A study by Merrill Lynch raised the question, and it is not a small question, as those bills comprise one-third of the total monetary value of bills currently in circulation, that is to say some 300 billion euros. Still, the bills are very […]
When a crooked system is allowed to fester, there are few who are free of blame — and little chance we will remained unscathed. A view from the European Union’s eastern front.
NICOSIA – The festival atmosphere on this sunny morning in Nicosia doesn’t match the bad vibes coming out of Brussels. The Faneromeni church in the heart of Cyprus’s capital is decked out with garlands made of hundreds of blue and white Greek flags and Cypriot flags with the shape of the island nation depicted in […]
NICOSIA – Cyprus is in a state of shock. The banks have been closed for days and somehow, the country has to raise 5.8 billion euros to qualify for the bailout package proposed by euro zone finance ministers. The initial rejection by the Cypriot parliament to the controversial bank account levy plan, has left this […]
NICOSIA – The Cyprus Parliament’s initial rejection of the terms of the European Union bailout plan is bad news for Russia. The opposition to the required taxes on bank deposits means the risk is rising of a long-term freezing of corporate assets in Cyprus. Meanwhile new proposals for taxes on depositors in the island could […]
PRO-RUSSIAN MILITANTS STORM UKRAINIAN NAVY BASE A group of Crimea’s pro-Russian self-defense militants stormed the headquarters of the Ukrainian navy in Sevastopol, one day after Russia declared the peninsula part of its federation. According to AP, Ukrainian servicemen offered no resistance and calmly left the building. NO SIGN MISSING PLANE ENTERED CHINA China hasn’t found […]
REUTERS, BLOOMBERG Worldcrunch NICOSIA – Global markets tumbled Monday as new doubts spread about the solvency of the eurozone with the Cypriot government preparing to impose a new levy on bank deposits in order to qualify for bailout funds. Finance ministers in the eurozone Sunday had demanded that Cypriots pay up to 10% of their […]
-OpEd- PARIS – Game over for the last of the European Marxists. Europe is getting ready to cap the size of bonuses for bankers. New rules would prevent bankers in European Union countries from receiving bonuses higher than their annual salary. This world first would put an end to the practice that allows these “workers” […]
AUSTRALIAN FINANCIAL REVIEW, SYDNEY MORNING HERALD, AAP (Australia) Worldcrunch SYDNEY – It’s not called the “Lucky Country” for nothing. Australia’s resource-rich economy continued to expand last quarter, extending the country’s run of 21 years of uninterrupted growth. Fourth-quarter GDP grew by 0.6% from the previous quarter, and 3.1% from a year earlier according to the […]
SLOVENSKA TISKOVNA AGENCIJA (Slovenia), BBC NEWS (UK), REUTERS Worldcrunch LJUBLJANA – The Slovenian parliament has ousted Prime Minister Janez Janša and his conservative government amid corruption allegations and growing discontent over the country’s struggling economy. The country’s National Assembly asked opposition leader and finance expert Alenka Bratušek to form a new government, after Prime Minister […]
-Essay- We’re all critical of the leaders of our time: Obama let us down, Merkel isn’t Adenauer, and Hollande and Cameron are just pale copies of Monsieur Mitterrand and Lady Thatcher. Meanwhile, in Italy, in front of the disappointing batch of candidates for national elections, nostalgia runs deep for figures of the past from Christian […]
The dispute over the Diaoyu islands, which Japan calls the Senkaku islands, is prompting some Japanese firms to consider closing Chinese operations. They quickly run into roadblocks.