Switzerland Today
Hello from Bern,
Read on for the latest news and debates doing the rounds in Switzerland on Wednesday.
In the news: Landmine casualties around the world continue to increase, the Geneva-based International Campaign to Ban Landmines (ICBL) said on Wednesday.
- A total of 7,073 people were killed or injured by explosive devices in 2020, a jump of 20% on 2019 and the sixth annual increase in a row, the ICBL said in its yearly report. Conflicts, including in Myanmar, Afghanistan, India, Pakistan, Myanmar, Colombia and Nigeria were found to have used anti-personnel landmines, which were banned in 1997 by the Ottawa Treaty.
- A pair of diamond bracelets belonging to guillotined French Queen Marie-Antoinette has been auctioned in Geneva for CHF7.5 million ($8.2 million). It’s the second big sale of Marie-Antoinette jewellery in a few years, after a CHF50 million haul in 2018. An expert from Sotheby’s – which is selling some Romanov-era jewellery today – said there is big demand for historical items at the moment, with clients keen to identify with illustrious figures from the past.
- Diplomat Christian Dussey has been named as the new head of the Swiss intelligence service. The 55-year-old will take up the post next April and replace Jean-Philipp Gaudin, who stepped down in August. Gaudin had come under criticism for his handling of a scandal around a Swiss manufacturer of cyber-security and encryption equipment, which was apparently jointly owned by the CIA and the German secret service.
Doesn’t anybody want to get vaccinated anymore? Authorities’ week of initiatives meets with some setbacks.
As you’ll remember from Monday’s briefing, this week is not just any week – it’s National Vaccination WeekExternal link (NVW)! And since today is Wednesday, today we are smack in the middle of NVW. Is it going according to plan? Wednesday’s papers suggest some hiccups. In Zurich, the “vaccination village” was overwhelmed on Monday, the NZZ writesExternal link, with a long and eager queue forming. Good! Unfortunately, the wrong people were in the queue: old, already vaccinated people, keen to get a spontaneous “booster” jab without having to go to the bother of booking online. Since the goal of the NVW is to convince sceptics to change their mind, authorities in Zurich have said no more boosters will be offered in vax village – leading to some disgruntled online comments…
More awkward again was a concert in Lausanne last night featuring Stress – a rapper – and singer Sophie Hunger. The concert was one of a series this week to promote, and administer, the Covid-19 vaccine. Unfortunately for the musicians, however, and for authorities, of the 500 tickets snapped up online before the show, only 60 people showed up. It’s not clear exactly how many of these got the jab; the Keystone-SDA news agency mentioned “three people”. What happened? Did the weather prompt people to stay at home rather than freeze at an outdoor concert? Is Sophie Hunger not as famous in French-speaking parts as here in Bern? Do people simply (but understandably) not like rap music?
Not quite: according to various media, including Le CourrierExternal link (who had a journalist on site) the whole thing was likely torpedoed by vaccine sceptics. As they tried in Thun for another recent concert, it’s possible that anti-Covid folk signed up online for the tickets then simply didn’t turn up, in an effort to sabotage the well-meaning – yet increasingly futile – efforts of authorities. Telegram chats reported by the NZZ suggest this was indeed the case, although the exact extent of the “sabotage” can’t be proven. In any case, as a cantonal representative told Le Courrier, “spectators reserved tickets then didn’t come – that’s disrespectful to the artists”. Next stop for Stress and co. is tonight in Sion, canton Valais.
Women’s football breaks records in Geneva, although more for attendance and enthusiasm than for results.
The Covid concert might have struggled to attract crowds in Lausanne, but at the other end of the lake last night there were no such problems in the Stade de Genève. Some 13,000 turned out to watch the Servette women’s football team get walloped 7-0 by Chelsea in the Champions League. And if the defeat was hefty, the turnout was a “record” for women’s football in Switzerland – albeit a slightly engineered record, since 5,000 of the fans were schoolkids invited for the occasion. Be that as it may, Le Temps writes todayExternal link of a good atmosphere, “peaceful” and without “toxic undertones” (a reference to the hooliganism that sometimes affects Swiss club games). The official attendance: 12,782. Maybe they should have sent a few vaccination buses down there…
In case you missed it I: digital bank offers option for Swiss abroad to open an account, without breaking the bank.
If you’re reading this as a Swiss living abroad, you’ll be aware of the difficulty and expense of maintaining a bank account back in the homeland. Due to tight regulations and lack of political will, Swiss expats pay an average of CHF300 more each year compared to people living in Switzerland. But as our finance correspondent reports, a new bank is trying to change this: Yapeal, the first Swiss entity to receive a fintech banking licence last year, is now offering cheaper accounts – at least for those living in the countries neighbouring Switzerland. If you live in the US, this isn’t an option, although Yapeal will consider getting rid of this restriction if there is enough demand. Read the full piece here.
In case you missed it II: stay up to date with the final moments from COP26 with live SWI swissinfo blog from Glasgow.
COP26 is still happening in Glasgow, with a draft version of a final declaration published today. The Swiss environment minister is now also there, and (along with her Rwandan counterpart) is trying to broker a deal around how often countries should update their carbon-cutting pledges – the so-called “common timeframes”. How does Simonetta Sommaruga see the Swiss role at COP26? How damaged is the country’s credibility after voters shot down a new CO2 bill in June? What are the prospects for an ambitious outcome by the end of the conference? SWI swissinfo.ch journalist Paula Dupraz-Dobias is also on site in Glasgow, where she is following things, and has spoken to Sommaruga. Read Paula’s live blog here; it will continue until the end of COP26 on Friday.
In compliance with the JTI standards
More: SWI swissinfo.ch certified by the Journalism Trust Initiative
