Child among ski chalet group who came into contact with Briton who had been in Singapore
Five British nationals including a child have been diagnosed with the coronavirus in France, after staying in the same ski chalet and coming into contact with a Briton who had been in Singapore, the French health minister said.
Agnès Buzyn said none of the patients were in a serious condition.
Continue reading...Republican party is hoping poll surge will translate into a parliamentary breakthrough
Voters are going to the polls in Ireland after a tumultuous general election campaign during which Sinn Féin has surged into contention as a potential party of government.
The republican party hopes a rise in popularity among young and urban voters will translate into enough parliamentary gains to make it a kingmaker or participant in Ireland’s next coalition government.
Continue reading...Ousted Credit Suisse chief transformed Prudential before City regulator censured him
Tidjane Thiam is the scion of an influential family whose political connections and history spread across two West African countries: Ivory Coast and Senegal.
The 57-year-old came to prominence in the UK when he was named as the head of Prudential in 2009, making him the first black chief executive of a major British company.
Continue reading...Lighting industry’s exemption from 2011 ban may jeopardise climate goals, says Sweden
A row over lamps is emerging as a first major test of the EU’s commitment to its much-vaunted European Green Deal and the bloc’s target of carbon neutrality by the middle of the century.
A debate over the continued use of mercury in fluorescent lighting has split the 27 member states with Germany’s industrial interests being pitted against the environmental concerns of Sweden, according to leaked correspondence.
Continue reading...Special rapporteur says urgent action is needed to tackle ‘appallingly high’ poverty rates
Spain is abandoning people in poverty and failing to take social rights seriously despite its post-recession recovery, according to a UN expert who has finished a 12-day fact-finding visit to the country.
Philip Alston, the UN’s special rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights, said that while Spain had largely bounced back from the economic crisis of 2008, poverty rates remained “appallingly high” and urgent action was required.
Continue reading...The 57-year-old loses boardroom battle with Thomas Gottstein set to replace him
The Credit Suisse chief executive, Tidjane Thiam, has been ousted in the wake of a saga involving corporate espionage, an alleged car chase and personal vendettas that has sent shockwaves through Switzerland’s famously discreet banking community.
Thiam, widely seen as one of the finance world’s leading lights, resigned after losing a boardroom battle that erupted when the bank admitted to having hired private detectives to spy on former staff.
Continue reading...Eric Eoin Marques, citizen of US and Ireland, faces up to 30 years in prison over web hosting service
A man once described by an FBI agent as the world’s largest “facilitator” of child abuse websites pleaded guilty on Thursday to operating a web hosting service that allowed users to anonymously access hundreds of thousands of images and videos depicting child abuse.
Eric Eoin Marques, 34, faces a mandatory minimum of 15 years in prison and a maximum of 30 years after his guilty plea to one count of conspiracy to advertise child abuse images. A plea agreement will ask the US district judge Theodore Chuang in Maryland to sentence Marques to 15 to 21 years in prison, but the judge is not bound by the recommendation.
Continue reading...Region’s producers were angry that redrawn map would stop them using prestigious name
Furious French winemakers have forced officials to back down over controversial plans to ban a number of prestigious wines from calling themselves “burgundy”.
The region’s producers saw red over proposed changes relating to which bottles can be labelled as coming from the region.
Continue reading...In London for LSE symposium, politicians express confusion at Britain’s post-Brexit stance
A flood of senior German politicians visiting the UK this week have been left confused and unnerved by the hardline rhetoric set out by Boris Johnson on trade talks, prompting warnings that the risk of a breakdown, or a no-deal Brexit, is as high as it has ever been.
Germany takes on the EU presidency in the second half of this year, and will have a crucial role in helping the European commission to steer the talks on a future UK-EU trading relationship to a successful conclusion by the end of the transition period in December.
Continue reading...The German Fernweh translates as a longing to be elsewhere. For Teju Cole this means Switzerland – which he visits ever year to write and photograph the country’s desolate beauty
Continue reading...Mustafa Akıncı says differences between island’s two sides are growing more entrenched
The president of Turkish-occupied northern Cyprus has warned the Mediterranean island faces permanent partition of its Greek and Turkish communities unless an agreement is swiftly reached involving an “equitable” federal solution.
In an interview with the Guardian, Mustafa Akıncı said the differences between the two sides were growing more entrenched every year, diminishing the prospect of reunification. “We need to hurry up. After all these years we have come to a crossroads, a decisive moment,” he said.
Continue reading...Matt Hancock’s comments come as UK seeks tougher sentencing for terrorists
A senior government minister has raised further questions over Britain’s relationship with the European convention on human rights (ECHR) as Boris Johnson scrambles to push through tougher sentencing for terrorists.
Legal experts have suggested the government’s intended plan to extend the time terrorists serve in prison could be in breach of the ECHR, to which Britain has been signed up for decades.
Continue reading...Move will cost €200m over five years but have limited financial impact on UK operations
Vodafone is to remove Huawei equipment from the sensitive, core parts of its mobile networks across Europe at a cost of €200m (£169m) over the next five years.
The group, which has 111 million customers across Europe, has taken the decision after the UK government’s move last week to limit the use of Huawei equipment in the country’s 5G network.
Continue reading...Could this relic of Albanian communist paranoia become the country’s next tourist attraction?
For nearly two decades, Feti Gjici worked on a project that was so secret he was made to lock the plans away in a safe before leaving his office each evening. He never spoke of it to his friends or family.
Gjici was the chief planner of the town of Kukës, in northern Albania, working during the years of the country’s communist regime, led by the Stalinist dictator Enver Hoxha. The paranoid and isolationist leader was terrified of impending war and built hundreds of thousands of concrete bunkers to defend his population against the threat of invasion.
Continue reading...While joining in the congratulations to Costa prize winner Jack Fairweather, I wonder whether the coverage of his book The Volunteer in your pages (for example in G2 on 30 January) might perhaps have led to a couple of misunderstandings, namely that a) Witold Pilecki was an unknown quantity previously and b) his was the only resistance operation in Auschwitz.
In fact, we have known all about Pilecki’s organisational skills since the 1970s thanks to the work of the late writer and historian Józef Garliński. Like Pilecki he had been a Polish officer arrested for underground activities, and he was a prisoner in Auschwitz and other German concentration camps. His bestselling book Fighting Auschwitz (1975) describes other forms of resistance at the camp as well. Whereas Pilecki’s organisation was based entirely on military contacts, there were also political networks, notably the one run by Stanisław Dubois of the Polish Socialist party. Pilecki recognised these other strands and tried to coordinate them. A later communist resistance effort inside the camp was rather ineffectual, since, under orders from Moscow, it was denied support from the communist partisans outside.
Continue reading...Government calls in further reinforcements after teargas fired during island protests
Greece has rushed in extra squads of riot police to Lesbos amid warnings of potentially explosive tensions on the island following clashes between security forces and thousands of migrants and refugees.
As hundreds of mainly Afghan asylum seekers converged on Mytilene, the local capital, on Tuesday to protest against conditions in the island’s vastly overcrowded camp, the government ordered in the reinforcements.
Continue reading...Marc Veyrat, who lost court battle to guide, in defiant mood as he opens new Paris restaurant
Marc Veyrat, the French celebrity chef at the centre of the “Cheddargate” scandal, has declared he never wants a Michelin star for his new Paris restaurant.
The flamboyant cook who took the red guide to court last year after he lost his third Michelin star for his celebrated flagship restaurant in the French Alps, has taken over a historic Parisian dining room previously owned by the equally colourful French actor Gérard Depardieu.
Continue reading...Sophie Grau and Iris Klopfer say they are continuing rather than destroying event’s 200-year-old traditions
The first same-sex couple to dance at Vienna’s Opera Ball say they are continuing rather than destroying the event’s 200-year-old traditions, since they are “good dancers and stick to the dress code”.
Sophie Grau and Iris Klopfer, both students from Germany, have been accepted to join the procession of 288 young “debutantes” who will dance their first waltz at the Viennese society event on 20 February.
Continue reading...The popular HBO series about the aftermath of the Chernobyl nuclear reactor disaster has led to a surge in tourists to the site and nearby town of Pripyat
Continue reading...Victims included billionaire spiritual leader the Aga Khan, who handed over €20m
A group of men accused of using Skype and a silicone mask to extract tens of millions of euros from the rich and famous by impersonating a leading French politician are to go on trial in Paris on Tuesday.
Victims of the fake Jean-Yves Le Drian – now foreign minister but then in charge of defence – included the billionaire spiritual leader the Aga Khan, who parted with €20m (£17m).
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