The Swiss parliament has voted to withdraw the country’s long-standing application to join the European Union (EU) amid a row on immigration. The National Council, the lower house of the Swiss parliament, voted by 126 to 46 to formally withdraw
GENEVA (Reuters) – Switzerland will draw up its own plans for limiting the flow of migrants from the European Union if it can not reach agreement with Brussels on the issue before a February 2017 deadline, the foreign minister said
Swiss voters headed to the polls Sunday to decide on a controversial initiative sought by a right-wing, nationalist party that could lead to automatic expulsions of foreigners who commit even low-level crimes. The referendum follows repeated efforts in recent years
Thirty men have been fired from Geneva airport in Switzerland just days after a major terrorist threat. All the men – reported to be baggage handlers – had their security passes removed in December with no reason given by the authorities. It
The Local reports: Switzerland signed off on a secret deal with the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) in 1970 in a bid to prevent terrorist attacks on its soil, a new book suggests. The deal forged by the then Foreign Minister Pierre
The Swiss city of Lucerne is to launch a poster campaign telling migrants not to harass women ahead of its annual carnival parades. Following the mass sex assaults in the German city of Cologne on New Year’s Eve, concern has
ZURICH – The Swiss attorney general has opened criminal proceedings against a director of the Islamic Central Council of Switzerland on suspicion of violating a ban on groups including al Qaeda, the attorney general’s office said on Saturday. The council
ZURICH (Reuters) – Switzerland’s next president has said he still hopes to strike an accord with the European Union to maintain the free movement of workers, but warned that his government’s threat to impose limits on immigration was no bluff.
The much-touted seven-day cease fire in Yemen began on Tuesday afternoon and lasted maybe an hour, before there were reports of both Saudi warplanes dropping bombs on Houthi insurgents, and the Houthis shelling a loyalist stronghold. Naturally, each side blames the other for breaking the agreement.
A week-long cease-fire in Yemen’s civil war is scheduled to begin on Monday, followed on Tuesday by peace talks in Switzerland brokered by the United Nations.
GENEVA (Reuters) – Two Syrian nationals were arrested in Geneva on Friday and traces of explosives were found in their car, the local newspaper Tribune de Geneve and Swiss television said. The newspaper gave no details on the identity of
The Embassy of the United States in Switzerland is urging U.S. citizens to exercise caution after Geneva raised its terror alert level on Thursday following reports that four alleged Islamic militants are suspected of having made their way to Geneva.
The imminence and severity of the terror threat currently facing Switzerland by Islamic jihadists is without precedent, according to Jean-Paul Rouiller, the creator of the counterterrorism unit of the Swiss Federal Judicial Police (PJF). “To my knowledge, and after twenty
Acting on information provided by U.S. intelligence services, Geneva officials have raised the terrorism alert level and are actively seeking four alleged Islamic State (ISIS/ISIL) terrorists thought to be linked to the attacks in Paris who are now suspected to be hiding in or near the city.
GENEVA (AP) — Geneva police were “actively searching” for suspects in connection with an investigation into the Paris attacks last month, Swiss security officials said Thursday. Geneva’s security department said that city authorities received word on Wednesday that Swiss federal
ZURICH (Reuters) – Switzerland should take unilateral action to restrict immigration from the European Union (EU), the billionaire and leading right winger Christoph Blocher was quoted as telling a Swiss newspaper on Sunday. Blocher, 75, is a lead figure in
The Swiss government announced that two FIFA officials were detained in Zurich Thursday, confirming reports of new arrests in the broadening FIFA scandal, and said the pair were suspected of taking millions of dollars in bribes. “The high-ranking FIFA officials
The town of Ticino in Switzerland approved a referendum to ban burqas, after the Swiss parliament decided a ban would not “violate the country’s federal law.” Women could receive a fine up to £6,500 ($9,828.84) if caught wearing a burqa, which covers their entire body from head to foot.
The Islamic State has a cell operating in peaceful Switzerland and has sent fighters to Syria, according to reports. Challenging the conventional wisdom that Islamist extremism is prevalent in Western nations which have invaded middle eastern countries, the claim about the
Police have arrested five migrants at an asylum centre in Switzerland, a country which until now has been relatively untouched by migrant violence. Local police detained the migrants staying at the shelter in Urdorf, near the city of Zurich, yesterday
ZURICH, Switzerland – Swiss voters swung to the right in parliamentary elections on Sunday dominated by concerns over Europe’s migrant crisis, with the country’s largest party, the populist Swiss People’s Party, on track to win a record number of seats.
A pro-migrant protest turned violent today, with Swiss police forced to use water cannon and rubber bullets to quell the self-described ‘anti-fascists’ who violated law by demonstrating on an election day. Hundreds of the hard-left protesters, and a group calling
“We should be helping our own people before giving them handouts,” says Gianpaolo Ferrari, glancing towards the African men clustered around Chiasso’s main square. The 58-year-old restaurant worker in this small southern Swiss town on the Italian border echoes sentiments
Outspoken liberal priest The Reverend Canon Giles Fraser has used his weekly Guardian column to denigrate the “neoliberal right” for championing the free movement of capital around the world while opposing the free movement of people, a position which he
The Swiss people have just chosen, through a reality TV-style voting process, their new national anthem. Drawing on the same melody as the “Swiss Psalm,” the winner–written by healthcare director Werner Widmer–reportedly better embodies secular “Swiss values.”
A Swiss politician has called for the nation to take advantage of the Greek crisis to establish a Swiss empire overseas by taking an island in return for the money Athens owes. The unusual suggestion was made by Pierre Rusconi, a member of parliament
The nuclear talks with Iran in Lausanne, Switzerland, dissolved into a confusing mess as the Tuesday deadline passed, with everyone simultaneously saying they agree on everything important while still unable to come to an agreement.
Different sources have provided a variety of opinions on the status of Iranian nuclear negotiations over the past twenty-four hours.
The UK Telegraph does an epic job of burying the lede in their story about Amir Hossein Motaghi, a media aide to Iranian President Hassan Rouhani who bailed out of the theocracy and requested political asylum while attending nuclear negotiations in Switzerland.
Russian President Vladimir Putin’s absence from the public eye this month has spawned a bevy of rumors about what could prevent him from being seen in public. One rumor gaining traction on social media and in Russia arrives via Switzerland tabloid Blink, which is reporting that Putin, 62, is attending the birth of the child of his alleged girlfriend.
In a rare victory for democracy and common sense, 92 percent of Swiss voters have rejected green taxes in a referendum which took place on Sunday. The proposal, put forward by the Green Liberal Party of Switzerland, had the backing of
(Reuters) – A 19-year-old American skier survived 48 hours half-buried in snow in the Swiss Alps before being rescued and taken to hospital where he is recovering, police said on Wednesday.
Global warming activists employed a quixotic method to protest global warming in Davos, Switzerland, as members of the World Economic Forum gather to meet this week. They built 193 snowmen, each one to represent a country of the world that they contend global warming will affect.
Fox News apologizes for misreporting on ‘no-go zones’ in Europe; Swiss franc revaluation panics East European currency markets; Troops and police spread across Europe, in fear of terror attacks; Thousands in Muslim countries protest cartoon depiction of Mohammed; Barack Obama describes an American advantage over Europe
Something is brewing in Europe now that has the Swiss National Bank worried. If you haven’t been paying attention in the last 24 hours, the currency and equity markets have been rocked by a surprise move to delink the existing currency peg
The German anti-Islamist group PEGIDA (Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamization of the West) organized the largest rally in its history Monday, with official crowd size estimates at about 25,000. As the movement grows in Germany, fueled by anger at radical Islam for the deaths of 12 during last week’s massacre at the offices of French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo, other countries are beginning to establish their own PEGIDA branches.
