Fatalities and injuries reported in avalanches across Tirol after prolonged snowfall and windy conditions
At least five people have been killed in a string of avalanches in Austria, authorities said on Saturday.
The government office of the Tirol region said intense snowfall over the last week had led to accumulations of up to 1.5 metres (5ft). Combined with strong winds and weak snowpack below, the conditions were especially susceptible to avalanches, it said.
Continue reading...Amateur climber’s conviction over girlfriend’s death could put people off activity, say experts
The decision of an Austrian court to convict an amateur climber of manslaughter after he had left his girlfriend behind to die on an Alpine peak in winter is certain to be examined closely throughout Europe.
In his decision in Innsbruck, the judge, Norbert Hofer – a climber, and an expert in Austrian law relating to the mountains – ruled that the “galaxies-wide” disparity in experience and skills between Thomas P and his late girlfriend Kerstin G meant he had been de facto acting as her mountain guide “as a favour” despite no financial arrangement having been involved.
Continue reading...Thomas P given five-month suspended prison sentence and €9,400 fine over death of Kerstin G by gross negligence
An amateur mountaineer has been found guilty of gross negligence manslaughter over the death of his girlfriend, whom he left behind on Austria’s highest peak after they got into difficulty on their climb.
Thomas P, 37, was handed a five-month suspended sentence and fined €9,400 (£8,200) for causing the death of Kerstin G in January 2025 by gross negligence, an offence that carries a maximum prison term of three years.
Continue reading...Thomas P gives evidence on first day of trial in case that could shape standards for mountain sports
An Austrian mountaineer has said he is “endlessly sorry” his girlfriend froze to death on a joint climb to the country’s highest peak, but denied criminal wrongdoing as his trial began in Innsbruck.
The 37-year-old defendant, identified only as Thomas P, gave evidence on the first day of the high-profile proceedings over the tragedy on Großglockner, in a case that could shape international standards for liability in mountain sports.
Continue reading...Kerstin G froze to death on Großglockner when Thomas P descended mountain to fetch help
An Austrian mountaineer is to appear in court accused of gross negligent manslaughter after his girlfriend died of hypothermia when he left her close to the summit on a climb that went dramatically wrong.
The 33-year-old woman, identified only as Kerstin G, froze to death on 19 January 2025, about 50 metres below the summit of the Großglockner, Austria’s tallest mountain, after an ascent of more than 17 hours with her boyfriend, Thomas P, 36.
Continue reading...Unnamed suspect accused of planning to bomb one of singer’s Eras tour shows in Vienna
Austrian prosecutors have filed terrorism-related charges against a 21-year-old who they say planned to attack one of Taylor Swift’s concerts in Vienna in August 2024.
Three dates in Swift’s record-breaking Eras tour were cancelled after authorities warned of the plot.
Continue reading...Trio given leave to stay in their abandoned convent near Salzburg until further notice, church officials say
Three octogenarian nuns who gained a global following after breaking out of their care home and moving back to their abandoned convent near Salzburg have been given leave to stay in the nunnery “until further notice” – on condition they stay off social media, church officials have said.
The rebel sisters – Bernadette, 88, Regina, 86, and Rita, 82, all former teachers at the school adjacent to their convent – broke back into their old home of Goldenstein Castle in Elsbethen in September in defiance of their spiritual superiors.
Continue reading...Austrian was killed in paragliding accident in July
56-year-old broke sound barrier during 2012 jump
The paragliding crash that killed extreme athlete Felix Baumgartner in July was caused by human error, an investigating prosecutor said on Tuesday.
Baumgartner, the first skydiver to fall faster than the speed of sound, died in July along Italy’s Adriatic coast. He was 56. Witnesses said the flight appeared normal until Baumgartner’s paraglider started spinning to the ground, crashing near a hotel swimming pool.
Continue reading...Some Nightjet services suspended from mid-December after French withdrawal amid public budget crisis
Night train services linking Paris, Berlin and Vienna are to end from mid-December because of the French government’s withdrawal of funding, the Austrian national rail operator has said, in a blow to sleeper travel on important European routes.
ÖBB, the largest provider of such trains in Europe, has led a drive to revive a once popular form of low-emission transport as an alternative to flying.
Continue reading...Court fines publisher after Milo Rau falsely claimed that far-right former chancellor Heinz-Christian Strache sang a song ridiculing the six million Jews murdered by the Nazis
A Swiss theatre director known for re-enacting landmark trials has been told by a judge in Vienna that his publisher must withdraw a book in which he alleged that a far-right Austrian politician sang a song mocking the victims of the Holocaust.
On Thursday, Vienna’s regional court fined independent German publishing house Verbrecher Verlag €1,500 (£1,300) for publishing a book in which Milo Rau alleged that Heinz-Christian Strache, the former leader of the Freedom party (FPÖ), once sang a song with the line: “We’ll manage the seventh million”, a reference to the approximately 6 million European Jews murdered at the hands of the Nazi regime.
Continue reading...Mohammad A, 16, given 18-month suspended sentence for helping plan foiled attack in Vienna
A Berlin court has convicted a Syrian teenager of contributing to an Islamic State-inspired plot to attack a Taylor Swift concert in Vienna.
Three dates in the US pop star’s record-breaking Eras tour were cancelled last summer after authorities learned of the plot.
Continue reading...Tighter family reunification laws are causing long separations, traumatising children, and can push people towards traffickers, campaigners say
Standing outside Germany’s parliament in June, Ahmad Shikh Ali fought back tears as he held up a blurry photo of his three-year-old son. Since fleeing Aleppo more than two years ago, Shikh Ali had done all he could to secure his son a safe future: moving to Hanover, getting full-time employment and wading through endless paperwork so that his wife and son could join him.
He was close to reuniting with his family, with just two cases in front of his in the queue. That was, until Germany’s lower house of parliament passed a bill in June to suspend family reunifications for migrants like him for at least two years.
Continue reading...Austrian extreme skydiver, 56, lost control of his motorised paraglider while flying over central Italy
The extreme sports pioneer Felix Baumgartner, famed for a record-breaking 2012 skydive from the edge of space, has died in a paragliding accident in central Italy.
The Austrian, 56, lost control of his motorised paraglider while flying over Porto Sant’Elpidio in the Marche region on Thursday and fell to the ground into the swimming pool of a hotel.
Continue reading...Syrian man, 32, was granted asylum in 2014 but lost refugee status because of a criminal conviction
Austria has returned a Syrian with a criminal conviction to his birth country in what it described as the first such deportation since the fall of the Assad regime.
“The deportation carried out today is part of a strict and thus fair asylum policy,” Austria’s interior minister, Gerhard Karner, said in a statement.
Continue reading...Body unveils plans to ban all gas imports from Russia by January 2028 – but faces backlash from Hungary, Slovakia and Austria
The European Commission has insisted there will be no return to Russian gas, as it published plans to phase out fossil fuel imports from its eastern neighbour by 2028.
The EU energy commissioner, Dan Jørgensen, said a proposed ban on Russian gas imports would remain, irrespective of whether there was peace in Ukraine.
Continue reading...Kurier editor says Q&A that was picked up by other outlets contained old quotes from round-table events
One of Austria’s leading newspapers has severed ties with a Hollywood reporter after admitting she repackaged old comments by Clint Eastwood and presented them as a supposedly exclusive interview.
In an apparent journalistic coup, the Vienna-based daily Kurier published a Q&A with Eastwood last Friday and it was picked up around the world over the weekend due to the Oscar-winning actor’s outspoken criticism of Hollywood’s “era of remakes and franchises”.
Continue reading...The actor and director claims that an Austrian newspaper invented a recent interview with him
Clint Eastwood has released a statement to claim a recent interview with him is a fabrication.
Quotes from an alleged interview with the Oscar-winning actor and director had gone viral over the weekend and were picked up by a number of sites. Yet Eastwood has now said that he never spoke to anyone from German-language Austrian newspaper Kurier.
Continue reading...Mussorgsky’s Khovanshchina – set in the troubled 1680s – can almost describe current events, say directors
A Russian political leader sings about war with Ukrainians and the need for a “durable peace”. The fractured political elite argues over whether they should pursue closer ties with Europe or embrace Russian traditions.
The plot of Modest Mussorgsky’s opera Khovanshchina was written in the 1870s and is set in the 1680s. But, as the characters lament the fact that their homeland is mired in an endless cycle of violence and unhappiness, the dark and brooding work can feel alarmingly contemporary.
Continue reading...Villach mayor praises Alaaeddin al-Halabi, who intervened in knife attack that killed 14-year-old and injured five others
A Syrian migrant living in Austria has been hailed as a hero after he rammed his car into an attacker, bringing down a radicalised assailant who had killed one teenager and left five others injured.
The stabbing, described by Austria’s interior minister as having been carried out by a Syrian man who was legally living in the country and who had become radicalised by the Islamic State group, happened on Saturday in the southern Austrian city of Villach.
Continue reading...The suspect was detained in the city of Villach after a 14-year-old boy died
A 14-year-old boy has died and four other people have been injured in a knife attack in southern Austria on Saturday, according to police, who said they had arrested a 23-year-old suspect.
The suspect was detained in the city of Villach, where the attack took place, police said on Saturday. He is a Syrian national with legal residence in Austria, they said.
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