Switzerland Today
Dear Swiss Abroad,
What keeps you awake at night? The results of the latest Swiss Worry Barometer are in.
Here’s more on that and other news and stories from Switzerland on Wednesday.
In the news: The issues that vex the Swiss, possible progress in Swiss-EU relations, the export of tanks to Germany, and an expanded e-voting trial.
- Health and health insurance are the Swiss population’s biggest concerns, according to the Credit Suisse Worry Barometer. Environmental protection and pensions follow, while the war in Ukraine is no longer one of the main concerns.
- The EU Commission has approved the joint declaration drawn up with Switzerland. It is also prepared to hold technical talks with Switzerland on the EU research programme Horizon Europe.
- The Swiss government has approved the export of 25 main battle tanks to their German manufacturer, Rheinmetall Landsysteme GmbH, it said today. “Germany has given assurances that the tanks will remain either in Germany, with NATO or with its EU partners,” it said.
- The Swiss government has granted canton Graubünden a basic licence for trials with electronic voting in federal votes. The authorisation is valid until the vote on March 8, 2026. At the same time, the Federal Chancellery said it had approved e-voting trials for the vote on March 3, 2024.
Sometimes people look as though they really don’t want to be doing what they’re doing. Photos of Swiss President Alain Berset meeting Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán in Bern yesterday certainly give that impression.
Orbán, considered a close confidant of Russian President Vladimir Putin, has travelled to Switzerland at the invitation of politician Roger Köppel, editor of the right-leaning Die Weltwoche. He is set to give a speech in Zurich today.
According to reports in the local media, the trip to the Swiss capital was initiated by the Hungarians. The visit was categorised as a “courtesy visit” so Orbán had to cater for himself, the Neue Zürcher Zeitung (NZZ) reportedExternal link, explaining that the prime minister and his delegation ended up in Café Fédéral just across the square from parliament. (Nothing wrong with that: I go there regularly for a steak frites.)
“There was no red carpet, no flowers, no fanfare in front of the Federal Palace West, and later no smileExternal link (not even a tired one) from Berset,” the paper noted. “He looked very serious in the official photos.”
The NZZ reckoned it knew the reason. “Obviously, he has just exhausted his charisma. This is probably due to the two-day state visit by French President Emmanuel Macron last week. It’s certainly got nothing to do with the parliamentary report on the Covid leaks [in which Berset got caught up] published the following day…”
Exactly 60 years after the murder of US President John F Kennedy, we look back at how Swiss media covered the event – and to what extent their coverage was influenced by the two countries’ relationship.
“Like wildfire, the terrible news – simply unbelievable – spread on Friday evening, also through Basel,” wrote the Basler Nachrichten, which in 1977 became the Basler Zeitung. “Hundreds of people went into town in search of reliable news, forming crowds in front of shops with televisions in the windows. Newspaper editors were bombarded with phone calls, and early on Saturday morning the weekend papers with the first reliable reports were grabbed from vendors’ hands.”
Kennedy was shot at 12.30pm (7.30pm Swiss time) on Friday, November 22, 1963. This meant almost all Swiss newspapers had to wait until the following morning to go to press, letting the whirlwind of conflicting reports and speculation settle somewhat. Things would certainly be very different today, with misinformation and disinformation no doubt flooding social media.
To write the article I headed to the archives of the Swiss National Library in Bern and worked my way through its massive collection of newspapers. You can see several of the front pages in the accompanying gallery.
Although Kennedy never made it to Switzerland as president – the nearest he got was Frankfurt in June 1963 (the same trip during which he made his “Ich bin ein Berliner” speech) – his death was felt across the country and across all ages. “I was appalled to see that a man had been killed who had only ever tried to do good,” said one visibly upset old man in a video. “He worked for peace.”
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