Update 2 18:55 Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – US President Barack Obama and Russian President Dmitry Medvedev late Friday 4 December issued this joint statement after a week of high-level negotiations in Geneva:
”Recognizing our mutual determination to support strategic stability between the United States of America and the Russian Federation, we express our commitment, as a matter of principle, to continue to work together in the spirit of the Start Treaty following its expiration, as well as our firm intention to ensure that a new treaty on strategic arms enter into force at the earliest possible date.”
The treaty officially expires Saturday 5 December 2009. The two countries have said in recent weeks that while they were working towards completing a draft for a new treaty by the time the old one ends, it would more likely be the end of 2009 before a draft could be ready. The new statement avoids setting a deadline, but reinforces the commitment of both sides.
A spokesperson for the US Mission in Geneva said that “The US and Russia are continuing to work hard to complete the new Start Treaty and our delegations are making significant progress toward that end, nonetheless, some difficult issues remain.”
Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - Russia and the US are close to signing a new treaty to replace the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (Start), which expires Saturday 5 December, Russian news agency Ria Novosti reports late Friday, although it is unlikely the pact will be signed before the end of the year. The agency sites Russian military sources and says the two sides will meet again Saturday in Geneva. According to Ria Novosti, “The chief of the Russian General Staff said earlier that the ongoing talks had run into disagreements on inspection and verification procedures.”
Zurich, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Football fans the world over are waiting for the 17:00 (local time, South Africa) Final Draw to see which teams play each other in the 2010 World Cup matches in South Africa. Once the draws are made, the mad rush to get tickets will begin. Meanwhile, Zurich-based Fifa (world football federation) announced 3 December that it has signed a media rights agreement with Sony for the latter to provide 3D versions of as many as 25 matches.
Links to other sites: Fifa, TelevisionBroadcast
Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Friday often brings some of the world’s stranger bits of news, from amusing to weird to hard to believe:
- Young people who are not yet of voting age, in Geneva, Switzerland erected the first new and relatively small minaret, defying the 29 November popular vote that bans them: in the Place Neuve, out of cardboard. Institute of Race Relations, UK (Ed. note: here is a design for homemade miniature cardboard minarets, in case they suddenly sell out in Swiss shops)
- Manchester, England: a 29-year-old man was shot dead when he and friends were confronted outside the money exchange where he worked. Police say he was robbed for cash and for his laptop. A 20-year-old is in custody. Guardian, UK
- A heavily drunk man in the Perm Territory, in the Russian Urals, was saved from flames by his cat. He fell asleep with a cigarette in his hand and when the apartment burst into flames his cat leaped onto him, scratching his face until the man came to and phoned the fire department. Ria Novosti, Russia
- Read more…
Switzerland: great trains, great mountains, but fewer visitors in 2009
Neuchatel, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – The Swiss government’s figures for tourism during the summer of 2009, from May to October, show a gloomy picture, with a 4.2 percent drop in the number of overnight stays compared to 2008. Swiss tourists fell by 2.1 percent but a sharp drop in foreign tourism, down 5.8 percent had a significant impact.
Overall, the Swiss tourism industry registered 19.7 million overnight stays for the summer season.
Miami, Florida (GenevaLunch) – Artworks worth some $6 million were confiscated by US federal marshals at Art Basel Miami Beach shortly before the VIP opening Thursday 3 December, to settle an insurance dispute. The paintings, including works by Joan Miro and Edgar Degas, were part of the booth belonging to one of Zurich’s well-known art galleries, Gmurzynska. The art fair told Bloomberg it was the first time artworks have been seized for a court case. By later in the day the two parties said they had settled the dispute and the art would be back on Friday, but no details were provided.
The gallery has been in a dispute with former Wall Street raider Asher Edelman over a painting he loaned the gallery for the 2007 Miami fair, the largest contemporary art show in the US.
Geneva Writers' Group at BooksBooksBooks in Lausanne, for Offshoots readings
Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - The Geneva Writers’ Group is celebrating two major events in the run-up to its annual international writers conference. The 20th anniversary of the group’s Offshoots magazine is out. And Petina Gappah, one of the group’s members, has just won the Guardian First Book Award 2009.
Gappah is a trade lawyer in Geneva who has written a collection of stories about her native Zimbabwe. Her book, An Elegy for Easterly, is only the second collection of short stories to win the award.
Gappah’s story from the collection, “The cracked Pink Lips of Rosie’s…”, was published in the October 2007 edition of Offshoots, the magazine of collected writing published every two years by the group.
Lavaux, canton Vaud, Switzerland
Zurich, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Google and Unesco have agreed to put 19 of the 890 World Heritage sites on Google Street View. Unesco is the United Nations agency behind the collection of sites. The two will be adding other World Heritage sites, mainly those that are less easily accessible, they said in a news release 3 December.
The other sites, such as the Lavaux terraced vineyards in canton Vaud, will be shown on Google Earth View and Google maps.
Links to other sites: Google/Unesco announcement, Unesco World Heritage sites, Lavaux, Switzerland
Solar Impulse getting off the ground during the "flea hop" test 3 December 2009
Zurich, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - Solar Impulse hopped off the ground for the first time Thursday 3 December, flying 350 metres at an altitude of one metre. The team that has been building the plane broke into wild applause at the Duebendorf airport near Zurich.
The airplane, designed to be the first to fly night and day without fuel, was a dream of Bertrand Piccard’s 10 years ago, and has been developed over the past six years under the guidance of Piccard and co-founder André Borschberg. The airplane’s testing in recent weeks has been so positive, according to the men, that the team decided to go ahead with lift-off today, if briefly.
Correction 19:31 Bern, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - Switzerland’s upper house of parliament voted 3 December to transfer to private companies the authority to check cars for valid autoroute stickers and file charges against drivers who do not have them, at Switzerland’s seven motorway border crossings. The lower house of Parliament has opposed this move, saying it is the exclusive purview of the state. The motion now returns to the lower house.
The budget commission of the upper house agrees with the government that customs officials should dedicate themselves to more complex tasks, leaving the job of checking stickers to a private company.
Basel, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - Carl Hirschmann, Zurich club owner and scion of the owners of Basel-based Jet Aviation, has been sentenced to a fine and court costs in Basel, and ordered to undergo therapy. Hirschmann was found guilty 2 December of slapping a young woman at a Basel nightclub and of hitting her boyfriend in the face and breaking his nose.
Hirschmann made headlines in October when he was arrested in broad daylight in Zurich and detained for three days, and accused of indecent assault.
Photo: E Wallace
Bern, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - The upper house of Parliament, the Council of States, voted 2 December to approve the budget for Presence Switzerland, the agency charged with cultivating Switzerland’s image abroad.
The upper house budget committee took note of the lower house’s prior decision to cut the agency’s budget but said that the money would be well-invested to refurbish the country’s image, given the outcome of the past weekend’s vote on minarets.
The lower house had voted to strike CHF2.5 million from the agency’s budget for an advertising campaign in the US, arguing that this was only to polish UBS’s tarnished image there.
Links to other sites: Council of States deliberations (Ger), Presence Switzerland, Romandie News
Lausanne, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - The city of Lausanne made the surprise announcement Wednesday 2 December that the chairman of the foundation behind the Lausanne Chamber Orchestra and the group’s manager have both resigned. The company has been in financial trouble, but concerts scheduled for 2010 are going ahead. Swiss media report that there has been tension between the two men, some of the musicians and city officials.
Patrick Peikert, manager, will leave in May 2010 and Olivier Verrey, chairman, has resigned effectively immediately.
Links to other sites: Lausanne Chamber Orchestra (Fre), TSR (Fre)
WRS news conference
Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - World Radio Switzerland (WRS), public radio in English, moves to 101.7 on the FM band 8 December, in the Geneva region, the station announced 3 December. Change your settings before next Tuesday! The move does not affect listeners who pick up WRS via online streaming, satellite, cable or DAB.
WorldRadio Switzerland, 101.7FM
The move is the result of musical chairs, or in this case FM slots, ordered by Ofcom, the federal telecommunications regulatory body. Radio Lausanne FM was awarded a license to start broadcasting in the Geneva area, but since it currently broadcasts on 88.4 in Lausanne a new slot had to be found for it: 88.4FM in Geneva, which WRS currently uses. WRS moves up as a result, to 101.7FM, currently used by Espace 2, also a member of the RSR public radio group in the region.
The changes for the three stations, in the Geneva area, will not occur at the same time:
- Thursday 3 December, Espace 2 stops using 101.7 and moves to 100.7FM
- Tuesday 8 December at midnight, WRS stops using 88.4 and moves to 101.7FM
- Tuesday 15 December, Lausanne FM starts broadcasting in the Geneva area on 88.4FM
WorldRadio Switzerland provides a mix of locally-produced news, information, entertainment and music to people who live in Switzerland. The BBC is its partner for international news and some additional programming.
Links to stations’ sites: Espace 2, Lausanne FM, WRS
Swiss army knives and more, still selling
Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - The canton of Geneva moved out of its recession and into growth by the second quarter of 2009, six months ahead of the rest of Switzerland, and it now looks set to have a GDP (gross domestic product) of CHF45 million, growth of 0.5-1 percent in 2010, predicts the BCGE (Banque Cantonale de Geneve). The growth is closely linked to Geneva’s strong ties with Asian trading partners, but retail businesses have remained strong throughout the recession, and consumers are expected to lead the way with 3.5 percent growth in this area, followed by services (health, education, government and semi-public business), which account for 20 percent of cantonal GDP.
Banks are expected to show zero growth and therefore have a neutral impact on the canton’s GDP growth figures next year.
Links to other sites: BCGE, Tribune de Geneve
Photo: World Trade Organizaion 2 December 2009
Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - In a highly publicized event, its opening marred by street violence, the Seventh Ministerial Conference of the World Trade Organization (WTO) has brought together government officials from 153 countries in Geneva for three days to discuss trade.
On the other side of town, delegations of experts on foreign policy, military affairs and arms control from Russia and the US are meeting to hammer out the details of a treaty that will reduce their countries’ nuclear arsenals.
For a world with more trade
Trade ministers from the WTO’s 153 member countries have been meeting in Geneva for their biennial conference amidst the worst recession in 80 years, with trade volumes down more than 10 percent in 2009 compared to last year, according to WTO figures.
Remember Swissair?
Zurich, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - The old Swissair logo, once estimated to be worth CHF700 million before the airline collapsed in 2002, could now be bought by airline Swiss for CHF7 million, the SAirGroup, which is settling the old airline’s debts, says. Lufthansa, which owns Swiss, has said it is not interested in reviving the logo, but the company wants to ensure no one else is able to buy and use it.
Update 21:15 Zurich, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - The world football federation Wednesday 2 December approved the Final Draw procedure, publishing the “pots” of teams. The draw takes place in South Africa Friday 4 and will determine who plays whom, when.
The Irish will not play in South Africa in the 2010 World Cup: that is the final answer to their request to Fifa, the world football federation, to reconsider. Ireland lost to France in a headline-making qualifying game after French player Thierry Henry’s illegal handball move that was not spotted by game officials. The Irish had asked to be an extra team for the World Cup but Monday Fifa said no.
CNN points out that France, unseeded, would have been seeded had November rankings been used instead of October’s.
The pots for Friday’s draw:
Doris Leuthard, Swiss president in 2010
Bern, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - Doris Leuthard becomes president of Switzerland in 2010. The 46-year-old PDC (Christian Democrat) member was elected comfortably (153 of 187 votes) by parliament for the top job, a one-year post that is rotated among the seven cabinet members, the Swiss Federal Council. She is the only member of the council not to have yet held the post. She was in line for the job, as vice-president in 2009, but nevertheless needed the approval of the Federal Assembly, parliament’s two houses. Leuthard becomes the youngest president since 1934.
Leuthard is the third woman to serve as president of Switzerland: Ruth Dreifuss was the first, in 1999 and Micheline Calmy-Rey the second, in 2007.
Discreet Swiss hotel windows are sometimes a good minibar substitute
Bern, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – The 55,000 mini-bars in Swiss hotels consume far more energy than the average home refrigerator for a family of four, some 24 million kW hours in a year. The heart of the problem is the sad news for hotel clients who love drinks in their rooms that a 40-litre minibar consumes 0.9 kW/h versus the 0.24 that a 150-litre refrigerator uses.
Finges/Pfyn forest, above Miege, canton Valais
Bern, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - Seven new regional nature parks in Switzerland, five of which are in French-speaking areas, now have federal funding that will allow their development to go ahead. The parks cover some of Switzerland’s most beautiful semi-wilderness areas. Le Doubs, for example, has magnificent rivers, canyons, forest and waterfalls but tourism is little developed in the area. The regional park’s fund go to building an infrastructure that adds to the regional economy while protecting the natural environment.
The funding follows the approval of plans earlier in 2009 and negotiations between the cantons and the Federal Office of the Environment (FOEN), Bern announced 1 December.
The parks will receive federal funds worth almost CHF5 million until end 2011.
A regional nature park is one of several categories of park in Switzerland and is defined as “a partly populated rural area, characterized by high nature and landscape values, with buildings and installations that fit harmoniously into the landscape and sites of local character”.
The new parks in the Lake Geneva region include:
Lausanne, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Lausanne-based Tetra Pak, the world’s largest food packaging company, has signed a contract with Brazilian company Braksem for plastic packaging that will be made from sugar cane. Tetra Pak says “the agreement represents the first move toward using green polyethylene in the carton packaging industry.” Braksem, Brazil’s largest petrochemical company, will use ethanol derived from sugar cane to produce ethylene, which will then be converted into polyethylene, the world’s most commonly used plastic.
First deliveries to Tetra Pak are expected in the first half of 2011. The companies say they expect the process to result in a reduction of CO2 emissions compared to traditional methods of making polyethylene. The contract calls for Braksem to deliver 5,000 tons a year, which Tetra Pak will use mainly for plastic caps and seals. The order represents about 1 percent of the company’s plastic purchases.
One ticket fits all at Mobilis
Lausanne, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Canton Vaud’s common transportation agreement, Mobilis, which allows passengers to use multiple forms of public transport with a single ticket, is to be extended end 2010, Lausanne newspaper 24 Heures reports 1 December.
Mobilis currently joins five separate transport companies – tl, MBC, CFF, LEB, CarPostal – over almost 870km of railway lines, bus routes and metros. But most of the canton is not covered by the Mobilis agreement. This will change in December 2010 when additional agreements and technical solutions will extend network coverage by almost 80 percent throughout the canton.
Gold Disc Swiss artist Shana P singing her latest single “Regarde moi.” Students at Webster afterwards released 250 red and white bio balloons, as a symbol of solidarity and support to those living with HIV/Aids. Members of the Student Government Association handed out free condoms and information about HIV testing services in Geneva and nearby France.
(Video) Geneva, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – World Aids Day 1 December brought some good news, starting with a change of policy in South Africa, whose president said the country will now start treating all children with Aids. South Africa for several years denied the extent of its Aids problem and Tuesday’s announcement by President Jacob Zuma was greeted positively by Aids groups around the world.
Geneva is home to several organizations that work closely with Aids/HIV projects, from research to financing programmes, developing treatments and humanitarian assistance. World Aids Day Tuesday was observed in a variety of ways, from students at Webster University setting off balloons and attending a charity concert to the Global Fund for Aids, Malaria and Tuberculosis publishing its latest figures.
Zurich to San Francisco non-stop, from June 2010
Zurich, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) - Swiss International Airlines will fly non-stop six days a week from Zurich to San Francisco starting in June 2010, the airline announced 1 December. San Francisco is already the USA’s third biggest air travel market, and the regional headquarters of several major Swiss corporations.
Swiss says that it will use existing airplane capacity to cover the new routes. It is also increasing the frequency of flights to India, Brazil and Canada.
Timetable details:
Zurich – San Francisco LX 38 dep 13:15 arr 16:30
San Francisco – Zurich LX 39 dep 19:25 arr 15:40 + the following day
