Harvard to host Stieg Larsson lectures
Students at the prestigious Harvard University will soon have the chance to study Stieg Larsson and heroine Lisbeth Salander when an expert on Swedish crime fiction joins the faculty for a guest lectureship.
Day: July 19, 2011
Sweden
France
Israel navy intercepts Gaza-bound French yacht
Israel commandos on Tuesday boarded a French yacht heading for Gaza in defiance of its naval blockade, and were bringing it to shore after what the military said was an uneventful takeover.
Germany
Merkel expects no breakthrough at eurozone crisis summit
German Chancellor Angela Merkel said on Tuesday that the eurozone summit on a second Greek rescue would not produce a "spectacular" knock-out blow to the bloc's sovereign debt crisis.
Switzerland
Eco-terrorism trial begins in Switzerland
Two Italian environmental activists and a Swiss colleague went on trial on Tuesday for planning a bomb attack against an IBM research centre which was being built near Zurich.
Germany
Betraying Berlin
Roger Boyes, the Berlin correspondent for the British daily The Times, is going back to London. In his last column for The Local, he explains why he had to end his stay in the ‘narcoleptic’ German capital.
Germany
Raid targets suspected Islamist fund-raisers
German police raided eight apartments and an office in the Stuttgart area on Tuesday in an operation aimed at cracking down on fund-raising for Islamic extremists abroad, although no one was arrested, authorities said.
France
Police interview DSK’s ex-wife in Banon case
Police have questioned Dominique Strauss-Kahn's ex-wife, Brigitte Guillemette, as part of an investigation into a French writer's claims he tried to rape her in 2003, a judicial source said Monday.
France
‘I slept with Strauss-Kahn’: accuser’s mother
The mother of a French journalist who claims Dominique Strauss-Kahn tried to rape her says she had a consensual but "brutal" sexual encounter with the former IMF chief before the alleged attack on her daughter.
Sweden
Men jailed for shooting each other in duel
Two men in Kalmar, in the south of Sweden, who had met up to settle a score between them through a game of “ last man standing” were sentenced to five years in prison by a court on Tuesday for attempting to murder each other.
Sweden
Nordea reports fall in profits
Swedish-Finnish bank Nordea on Tuesday reported a 6 percent drop in net profits for the second quarter 2011, saying that improvements in banking activity had not compensated for a drop off in investments.
Germany
Duden publishes special ‘new German’ dictionary
The famous Duden German dictionary publisher has gathered a selection of new words to enter the language over the last decade and put them into a special edition book to mark the 100th anniversary of its founder’s death.
Sweden
Swedish librarians find stolen atlas in New York
One of the books stolen from the Swedish National Library in the beginning of the 2000s has been discovered with a collector in New York. This is the first of the books stolen in the by now infamous book thefts to have been tracked down.
Switzerland
Swiss road accidents drop to 1950 levels
The number of road accidents leading to personal injuries fell below 20,000 last year for the first time since the 1950s.
Germany
Cops losing tobacco smuggling battle
Untaxed cigarettes and tobacco are costing the German government an untold amount of money in lost tax revenue each year, and as new fronts in tobacco smuggling open, authorities seem powerless to stem their market penetration.
Germany
Merkel plays down future Russian gas dependence
Chancellor Angela Merkel played down Germany's future energy dependence on Russia as a flap over a cancelled democracy prize for Prime Minister Vladimir Putin erupted at talks Tuesday.
Sweden
Electrolux reports steep earnings drop
Swedish household appliance-maker Electrolux on Tuesday reported a profit slump because of high materials prices and weak demand, and warned of difficult trading conditions for the rest of the year.
Sweden
Swedish World Cup stars given heroes’ welcome
Götaplatsen in Gothenburg in western Sweden was teeming with exulted football fans on Monday evening, gathered to give the bronze-medal winning women's World Cup team a jubilant welcome back from Germany.
Sweden
Stockholm cafés: a Södermalm selection
The Brooklyn-esque island of Södermalm offers countless cozy café options for its young and trendy dwellers. Here’s The Local’s list of five hotspots to have a "fika" (coffee break), lounge, and bask in the buzz of this hip neighborhood.
Sweden
Louise, 34, loses breast ‘by mistake’
When Louise, 34, from Gävle, in central Sweden found a lump in her breast last autumn she turned to her local hospital to have it examined.
Switzerland
Swiss send millions in aid to Horn of Africa
Switzerland is devoting an additional 4.5 million francs ($4.9 million) to support humanitarian efforts in the Horn of Africa, the Foreign Ministry said.
France
Israeli ships surround French boat: organiser
At least three Israeli military ships surrounded a French-flagged yacht as it neared Gaza, seeking to breach Israel's blockade on the territory, an organiser told AFP on Tuesday.
Germany
Economy primed for next decade but poor lose out
Germany is in a better situation to cope with the next decade than any other major industrial nation, but the gap between rich and poor is increasing, according to studies published this week.
Switzerland
Suicide suspected as pilot rams mum’s house
A Swiss pilot has flown his small airplane into his mother’s house near Schaffhausen, northern Switzerland, in what reports say appears to have been a suicide.
France
Girl loses nose and ear in bull terrier attack
A 4-year-old girl lost an ear and her nose in a horrifying attack by a dog in the northern coastal town of Boulogne on Saturday evening.
France
Air France set for holiday season strike
Air passengers in France have been warned to brace themselves for a summer of disruption as cabin crew and pilots plan industrial action.
France
‘Catwoman’ wife planned to murder politician
The wife of a French politician has admitted she planned to kill her husband but lost her nerve at the last minute.
Germany
Notorious Nazi’s diaries to be auctioned
A US auction house has announced it will put under the hammer the journals of Nazi war criminal Josef Mengele, the so-called "Angel of Death" who decided life or death and directed gruesome medical experiments in concentration camps.
Germany
MP calls for holiday brochures to contain human rights info
The head of the German parliament's tourism committee has called for holiday brochures to contain information about the human rights situation in the countries being advertised, although he rejected the idea of boycotts.
Sweden
‘Nothing wrong’ with bus in Stockholm crash
No technical fault has been found with the bus that drove into a crowd of people on a busy pedestrian square in central Stockholm at the end of May, according to a police investigation.
Germany
Interior Ministry denies training Saudi spooks
The German Interior Ministry has denied that federal police officers on duty in Saudi Arabia have been training secret service officers there, after a television magazine claimed this was the case.
Sweden
Slain Swede’s husband ‘too ill’ for court
A British businessman wanted in South Africa on charges of ordering his wife's murder while on honeymoon in Cape Town was deemed too ill to attend his extradition hearing at a London court on Monday.
Sweden
Google doodle returns for Sweden’s Gothia Cup
Google's competition Doodle 4 Google, where contributors are invited to design an alternative Google logo, is coming to Sweden's youth football tournament Gothia Cup.
Germany
Discovering Munich’s best summer beer locations
Summer in Munich means one thing: drinking beer outdoors. Chris Cottrell discovers five of the best places to knock back a cold Maß in the Bavarian capital.