Switzerland Today

Greetings from Bern,

For most people in Switzerland it is the first day at work after Christmas and New Year. It can be tough getting back to the daily routine after several days of feasting and festivities. Not to mention starting to put into practice any New Year’s resolutions made in the giddy last days of 2022.

Bon courage and happy 2023 dear readers!

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In the news: Russian critic, super cop and rescuing revellers 

• Mikhail Shishkin, a Russian author who lives in Switzerland, has accused the Alpine nation of emboldening the Russian dictatorship by supporting Russian sporting events. In an interviewExternal link published in the Tamedia Group on Tuesday, Shishkin held Switzerland indirectly responsible for the war in Ukraine for supporting Russia as host of the 2014 Olympics and 2018 football World Cup.
• Potential criminals beware! For the first time in Switzerland, the police are getting a “super-recogniserExternal link“, someone who can compare and memorise unknown faces in a very short time. The Winterthur municipal police hired one at the beginning of the year, according to the Neue Zürcher Zeitung. Super recognisers can even identify people who are masked or in blurred images. 
• Swiss mountain rescue services Rega were pressed into action External linkover 170 times between December 31 and Jan 2. A Rega spokesperson reported that the busy weekend was on a par with recent years. According to him, the partly favourable weather conditions encouraged people to explore the great outdoors. 

Wolfgang Hock

Animal of the Year: High-jumping insect

Swiss environmental NGO Pro Natura has chosen its traditional “Animal of the YearExternal link”. This time it is the humble blue-winged grasshopper (Oedipoda caerulescens). The insect favours patchy dry meadows, gravel banks with sparse vegetation in floodplains or slightly overgrown railway and industrial areas.

“Among the insects, the blue-winged grasshopper is regarded as an indicator species. This means that where it lives, biodiversity is high and there are many other species,” says Pro Natura.