Seven people were killed by avalanches over the weekend and on Monday in French- and German-speaking ski areas. A Swedish man also died in a separate skiing accident in Verbier on Monday. An avalanche swept away ten skiers in Verbier’s Vacheret of...

The Swiss foreign ministry has expressed concern about the arrest of the Russian opposition politician, Alexei Navalny. “The justice system has to be independent from politics and it has to respect human rights,” the foreign ministry told the Sw...

Swiss watchmaker Tissot has joined calls for the International Ice Hockey Federation (IIHF) to pull the planned world championships from Belarus over a crackdown on opposition groups. The announcement came shortly before the Swiss-based IIHF decided...

Federal asylum centres must do more to protect asylum seekers from violence and improve training for security personnel, says a government advisory group. During monitoring visits in 2019 and 2020, the National Commission for the Prevention of Tort...

Foreign Minister Ignazio Cassis has reaffirmed the government’s aim to re-negotiate controversial points of a planned umbrella accord with the European Union. He said a so-called framework agreement regulating the more than 120 bilateral deals is ...

Franz Blankart, who brokered numerous deals between Switzerland and the European Economic Community (EEC), passed away on Sunday afternoon. The diplomat held senior posts during his more than 30-year career in the foreign and economics ministries an...

Edward McMullen, the United States ambassador to Switzerland, has said farewell to the country, SonntagsBlick has reported. President Trump’s man in Bern is leaving the post after three years in the role. “It has been an incredible three years a...

The Swiss government is considering whether to tighten coronavirus measures for older pupils, according to a report in the NZZ am Sonntag. Meanwhile the debate over school closures continues, as concerns grow over the new virus variants. All schools...

Swiss officials have found around CHF9 billion ($10 billion) linked to Venezuela on hundreds of bank accounts in Switzerland, Le Matin Dimanche reports. It says that this makes Venezuela “the largest source of suspicious funds in Swiss banks”. ...

Switzerland will be affected by the temporary delay to the Pfizer-BioNTech Covid-19 vaccine in Europe, the Swiss health authorities have confirmed. According to the Federal Office of Public Health (FOPH), the delivery expected for this Monday will b...

Some Swiss ski regions have reported a big rush as people headed to the slopes on Saturday after heavy snow in large parts of the country. Ski areas remain open under Swiss Covid-19 rules under strict hygiene and distancing rules. Saturday saw good ...

Banker Benjamin de Rothschild, chairman of Edmond de Rothschild Holding SA, has died at his home in Switzerland, it was announced on Saturday. He was 57. “It is with deep regret and great sadness that Edmond de Rothschild Group announces the passi...

Pfizer-BioNTech has temporarily slowed shipments of its coronavirus vaccine to Europe. The Swiss health authorities say they are looking into the consequences for Switzerland. Several European Union countries have said that they are receiving fewer ...

Switzerland has updated its travel advice for the United States over expected tensions ahead of Joe Biden’s swearing in as the next US president and in the aftermath of the riots in the Capitol on January 6. “In connection with the change in pre...

A French court has sentenced a Swiss man to 15 years in prison for terror-related charges after finding him guilty of recruiting a group of men online to prepare terror attacks in France and Switzerland. The 31-year-old from Yverdon, canton Vaud, wa...

Switzerland’s busiest airport has postponed building a new terminal and frozen investments for three years due to the coronavirus, its chief executive officer Stephan Widrig said on Friday. Zurich and Geneva airports saw huge drops in the number of...

Swiss aircraft manufacturer Pilatus can continue its business activities in Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE), a court has confirmed. The Swiss foreign ministry had banned the company from operating in the Gulf states. In a ruling publ...

More than 60,000 people have been vaccinated in Switzerland against Covid-19 since late December, according to an official initial estimate. The plan is to vaccinate six million people by summer. Swiss cantons started vaccinating the elderly and the...

Authorities in Switzerland have warned of high avalanche risk in mountain regions after heavy snowfall. Some eastern parts of the country experienced up to 80 centimetres of snowfall in 24 hours. Parts of the Goms valley on the border with Italy wer...

Three-quarters of residents of a nursing home in southern Switzerland and half its workers have been infected with the coronavirus variant first found in Britain. Italian-speaking canton Ticino said a series of infections occurred in rapid successio...

German authorities have now handed over all 14 works from the art trove accumulated by Cornelius Gurlitt that are proven to have been looted under Nazi rule, the government said. Piano Playing, a drawing by Carl Spitzweg, was handed over to Christie...

Opponents of new Swiss laws to combat terrorism have gathered enough signatures to challenge the controversial legislation by referendum. They argue that the law violates civil liberties, particularly those of children. The “No to Preventative Pun...

Swiss band Patent Ochsner have been honoured for their work at the Swiss Music Awards. Their hits, always sung in Bernese German, include W Nuss vo Bümpliz, Scharlachrot and Bälpmoos. “The work of the band is characterised by a great diversity a...

Franco-Swiss author and graphic artist Frédéric Pajak has been awarded this year’s Swiss Grand Prix for Literature for his life’s work. Pajak, 65, has edited and contributed to cultural and satirical periodicals and is the editor of the biannu...

Health Minister Alain Berset has defended further Covid-19 restrictions as a preemptive attempt to prevent a third wave of the pandemic. Shops will be closed and gatherings further restricted from Monday. In addition, existing restrictions will be e...

The coronavirus crisis has given a boost to the Swiss motor home market with a 26% increase in new registrations, surpassing a record set in 2019. With international travel restricted over the last year, more people in Switzerland are taking to the ...

The government says there are sufficient measures in place to combat terrorism and violent extremism in Switzerland. However, it pledged to implement recommendations to boost cooperation between national and cantonal units and to improve communicati...

The president of the Swiss-based international ice hockey federation, René Fasel, has apologized for a public embrace with the embattled president of Belarus, Alexander Lukashenko. Fasel, a Swiss national at the helm of the federation since 1994, t...

Campaigners have handed in signatures in a bid to bring two recently passed laws to a national vote: the Covid-19 Act underpinning the government’s pandemic action, and the so-called CO2 law to tackle the climate crisis. The campaigns, which are n...

Health regulator Swissmedic has given the green light for the ‘immediate’ use of the vaccine produced by US company Moderna. The country has already pre-ordered 7.5 million shots, 200,000 of which will be delivered on Wednesday. The vaccine sati...