Greece’s February unemployment for young persons rose to 64 percent in February. In the early stage of their working lives, unemployed youths are limited by a recession which will take years to recover from. The average unemployment in Greece, of all ages, is around 27 percent.
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Photo: REUTERS/John Kolesidis
The weekend announcement that Cyprus would impose a tax on bank accounts as part of a 10 billion euro ($13 billion) bailout by the European Union broke with previous practice that depositors’ savings were sacrosanct. The euro and stock markets fell on concern the euro zone crisis was returning.
Before the vote, which is too close to call, the government was working to soften the blow to smaller savers by tilting more of the tax towards those with deposits greater than 100,000 euros ($130,700. Many of these depositors Russians and the planned levy has already elicited an angry reaction from President Vladimir Putin.
The government says Cyprus has no choice but to accept the bailout with the tax on deposits, or go bankrupt.
A Cypriot source told Reuters the introduction of a tax-free threshold for smaller bank deposits - maybe up to 20,000 euros - was under discussion but not yet agreed.
Live updates: Cypriot ministers rush to revise plane to seize money from bank deposits
Secretary of State John Kerry offered a defense of freedom of speech, religion and thought in the United States on Tuesday telling German students that in America “you have a right to be stupid if you want to be.”
“As a country, as a society, we live and breathe the idea of religious freedom and religious tolerance, whatever the religion, and political freedom and political tolerance, whatever the point of view,” Kerry told the students in Berlin, the second stop on his inaugural trip as secretary of state.
“People have sometimes wondered about why our Supreme Court allows one group or another to march in a parade even though it’s the most provocative thing in the world and they carry signs that are an insult to one group or another,” he added.
“The reason is, that’s freedom, freedom of speech. In American you have a right to be stupid - if you want to be,” he said, prompting laughter. “And you have a right to be disconnected to somebody else if you want to be.”
Norwegian public television plans to broadcast a burning fireplace for 12 straight hours from Friday evening, with firewood specialists providing color commentary, expert advice and a bit of cultural tutoring.
“We’ll talk about the very nerdy subjects like burning, slicing and stacking the wood, but we’ll also have cultural segments with music and poems,” Rune Moeklebust, a producer for state broadcaster NRK.
“It will be very slow but noble television.”
READ ON: Norway plans 12-hour prime-time TV show of a fireplace
Britain’s European partners told David Cameron on Wednesday his demand for radical reform of the EU and an “in-out” referendum on UK membership showed a selfish and ignorant attitude.
France went so far as to call Britain’s bluff and say it was free to leave. Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said he had told a recent meeting with British businessmen: “If Britain wants to leave Europe we will roll out the red carpet for you.”
READ ON: Selfish, ignorant, dangerous: Europe’s verdict on Cameron speech
A cleaning lady stole a train and drove it off the end of the tracks and smashed into a house in Sweden on Tuesday, injuring only herself in an incident police are investigating.
It was not clear how the woman, around 20, got access to the key needed to start the train. She was taken to hospital with serious injuries, but the train was carrying no other passengers as it was in the early hours and no one in the house was hurt.
On March 9, 2010 – the day U.S. authorities announced terrorism charges against a blonde, white American woman who called herself Jihad Jane – senior government officials repeatedly described the arrest as a seminal event in the war on terror. The case was so serious, authorities said, that they charged the woman, Colleen LaRose, with crimes that could keep her in prison for the rest of her life.
Now, as she awaits sentencing, a months-long Reuters review of confidential documents and interviews with sources in Europe and the United States — including the first and only interview with Jihad Jane herself — reveals a far less menacing and, in some ways, more preposterous undertaking than what the U.S. government asserted.
SPECIAL REPORT - Jane’s Jihad: the new face of terrorism
A German Catholic Church study showed most priests found guilty of sexually abusing minors were psychologically normal, according to survey results presented on Friday.
Only 12 percent of those surveyed were diagnosed as pedophiles, said the report released by Trier Bishop Stephan Ackermann, the church’s spokesman on abuse cases.
Psychological tests commissioned by priests’ dioceses around Germany found only five percent could be classified as ephebophiles - attracted to teenagers, it said.
“There are no significant differences to results found in the general population in Germany,” said Dr Norbert Leygraf, one of the experts reviewing reports on predator priests found out in the past decade.
READ ON: German church: most sex abuser priests are psychologically normal
Danish toy maker Lego will move deeper into the digital world, with more computer games and tie-ups with popular movie franchises, as it battles to grow in a shrinking toy market, its chief executive told Reuters.
Jorgen Vig Knudstorp said on Friday growth in sales of the group’s trademark colorful plastic building bricks was likely to slow in the coming years as sluggish economies in its main European market take their toll.
But he was optimistic the world’s third-largest manufacturer of play materials would outperform the broader toy market, helped by growing demand in Asia, as well as its drive to combine the worlds of physical and virtual play.
“My aim is to continue to reinvent Lego,” Knudstorp said in an interview in his bright corner office, surrounded by Lego boxes, bricks and toys.
“To seize the digital revolution and make it our advantage is vital,” he said, adding he personally spends on average two hours a week playing with Lego.
READ ON: Lego goes digital to keep building
Ireland’s government pledged on Thursday to clarify its abortion laws after an Indian woman who was refused a termination died from blood poisoning in an Irish hospital.
Thousands took to the streets to protest on Wednesday after news broke of the death of Savita Halappanavar of septicemia following a miscarriage 17 weeks into her pregnancy.
Activists in the overwhelmingly Roman Catholic country, which has some of the world’s most restrictive laws on abortion, say the refusal by doctors to terminate the pregnancy earlier may have contributed to her death.
“I was deeply disturbed yesterday by what Savita’s husband said. I don’t think as a country we should allow a situation where women’s rights are put at risk in this way,” Deputy Prime Minister Eamon Gilmore told parliament on Thursday.
“There is no question of equivocation. We need to bring legal clarity to this issue and that is what we are going to do.”
READ ON: Ireland to clarify abortion rules after woman’s death
