Switzerland Today

Hello from Bern!

Rösti is a traditional Swiss dish consisting mainly of potatoes, sautéed or shallow-fried in a pan. It’s best roasted crispy. But what’s this got to do with a Swiss politician hoping to join the Swiss government in December?

Meanwhile here’s some other news and stories from Switzerland on Tuesday.

Keystone / Christian Bruna

In the news: Opposition against a climate protection law, discrimination of widowers’ financial entitlements and Swiss reaction to the war in Ukraine.

• Swiss President Ignazio Cassis has condemned Russia and called on it to immediately stop its “indiscriminate attacks.” In a tweet posted on Monday he launched an urgent appeal: “Civilians must be protected under international humanitarian law!” Cassis also referred to the war in Ukraine during his speech to the parliamentary assembly of the Council of Europe.
• The European Court of Human Rights has upheld a complaint made by a Swiss widower alleging discrimination when it comes to survivor’s pension entitlement. Judges found Switzerland guilty of unequal treatment of widowers compared to widows. The former are no longer entitled to a pension when their youngest child reaches adulthood as Swiss law doesn’t consider them as the main breadwinners.
• The right-wing Swiss People’s PartyExternal link is challenging a new law on climate protection to a nationwide vote. It has until mid-January to collect at least 50,000 signatures. Campaigners denounced the law as “leftist-green ideology”, saying the law was tantamount to a ban on heating oil, petrol, diesel and gas to achieve the net zero target by 2050. The law is parliament’s compromise response to counter the stricter ‘glacier initiative’.

Keystone / Peter Schneider

Man of the moment

A politician whose name is similar to the name of a traditional dish in German-speaking Switzerland takes up considerable space in the media these days. He is Albert Rösti and he said he is willing and ready to follow Ueli Maurer in the Swiss government.

Rösti is the second contender for a seat in the seven-member government. It’s early days still with the election by parliament due in December. More candidates will possibly come out to enter the race.

But Rösti is seen as frontrunner at this stage, given his political track record and his reputation as amenable parliamentarian. Some commentators even predict it will be easy sailing for the trained agronomist and member of the Swiss People’s Party.

And by the way, his name has nothing in common with the Swiss dish. Rösti is an old dialect word and refers to farmers who live on particularly steep mountain sides.

Keystone / Boris Roessler

Good news for biodiversity

Switzerland appears to have succeeded in reversing the decline of more than half of endangered frogs, toads, newts and salamanders, according to researchers.

The population of amphibians, notably of the European tree frog, “exploded” as scientists say who studied data from a long-running amphibian monitoring programme in a region west of Zurich.

The project included digging new ponds in the proximity to forests and other ponds.

The story made it even onto the news site of the BBC in London which quotes the lead author, Helen MoorExternal link, as saying: “The key message [of the study] is that it pays to do something, even if it feels overwhelming.”

More than 400 new water habitats were built with volunteers working for 20 years. It resulted with the populations of ten of the 12 species increasing by 2019.