Swiss hemp farmer on hunger strike. Force feed him?

A man who has been on a hunger strike since his imprisonment for growing and trading in cannabis continues to confuse the authorities about how they should react.

Bernard Rappaz is now in Bern’s Insel hospital and doctors have been told by Esther Waeber-Kalbermatten, a member of the Valais government who is responsible for the dossier, to force-feed him to keep him alive.

Concern over cannabis cultivator's hunger strike. - swissinfo

Worlds slowest sports car

Is it a Porsche? It's the Ferdinand GT3 RS

It's so light because it does not have an engine. It's quiet. It has lots of cargo room. It's slow. It's beautiful. If you can, watch the video. It's amazingly funny.

Champs Elysées becomes a farm

This past weekend, the Champs Elysées in Paris has become a farm. Here are some images from BBC.

World Press Photo Winners 2010

Just follow this link

Miss Platinum - Marry me (featuring Peter Foxx)

Miss Platinum - Give me the food

Roche and RBC named “most unscrupulous” firms

The Basel-based pharmaceutical giant Roche and the Royal Bank of Canada (RBC) are this year’s recipients of the Public Eye Award in Davos.

Presented on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum (WEF) meeting in the Swiss resort, the annual awards are intended to remind big global players that socially and environmentally destructive business practices have consequences – in this case for the image of the company.

In the words of the organisers, the Berne Declaration and Greenpeace Switzerland, “we present shame-on-you awards to the nastiest corporate players of the year”.

The RBC, described by the organisers as “the world’s filthiest ATM”, won this year’s Global Award for “facilitating the extraction of oil from tar sands in Alberta like no other financial institution”.

Roche picked up this year’s Swiss Award in addition to the People’s Award for its involvement in organ transplantation drugs in China. The Public Eye says some 10,000 organ transplants take place a year in China, with the vast majority of organs coming from executed prisoners.

Roche were not immediately available for comment.

For the first time a “Greenwash” prize was given to firms that use a “social-environmental fig leaf” to make it look greener than it is.

According to the Public Eye judges, companies such as Nestlé, Coca-Cola and Dow Chemical claim to work with the United Nations and aid organisations to combat the water crisis, but in fact further their policy of water privatisation without regard for existing environmental or social standards – only with a UN stamp.

swissinfo.ch and agencies

Calculating your Christmas feast carbon footprint

Christmas feast, and calculating your carbon footprint

Czech photographer: hippos devour a crocodile

“It’s the kind of photograph you get to take once in a lifetime – if you get lucky” that’s how Czech photographer Václav Šilha describes the photo that millions of people admired on the web within hours of it being posted. On a three-day trip around Serengeti National Park in Tanzania Šilha captured a herd of hippos devouring a crocodile. The photographer says that this is something that rarely happens – usually hippos and crocodiles respect each other and seek their prey elsewhere but in this case the crocodile came too close to a mother with young and in the skirmish that ensued climbed onto a hippo’s back. He was immediately attacked and killed by the herd. There are few photos on which the feared crocodile is seen as the prey - Šilha says some of his colleague photographers had seen such a thing happen but had never been lucky enough to snap it.

Link to a photo series

Music competition for European minority languages

Leeuwarden, Netherlands (CNN) — “This is the outfit our parents wore when they used to go out to dance. It’s a traditional outfit,” jokes Riemelmeester Malde.

Malde is addressing a theater audience in Friesland in the northern Netherlands where he and his bandmates are about to perform in their native Low German dialect at Liet International, a song contest for European minority languages.

But Malde’s band is a rap trio rather than a folk troupe and their outfits are anything but traditional: boiler suits adorned with yellow and black hazard tape and garish hip hop baseball caps. Their instruments are laptops, microphones and loudhailers and, as their name suggests, De fofftig Penns owe more to 50 Cent than their Lower Saxony origins.

“We try not to have anything too middle of the road. Our contest is about new songs. The variety and originality are important,” Liet coordinator Onno Falkena told CNN ahead of Saturday night’s final in Leeuwarden, the Frisian capital.

read more at liet.nl

Swiss to vote on constitutional ban on building minarets

Are soaring towers on mosques a threat to Swiss culture or a sign of tolerance and democracy? Currently there are only four minarets in the whole country.

This election poster has been banned in several cities because it was deemed to be racist.

On November 29, the Swiss will decide on whether to ban the construction of minarets. As the debate heats up, swissinfo.ch explores the issues behind the vote.

Kim Kelly and Kim Nelson are modeling the handknit scarves from Switzerland. Eurobureau host Simon received the scarves from his cousins who knit and knit and knit some more. Last year it was socks for the pledge drive, this year it's two scarves. They're over 6 feet long and about 10 inches wide, and were knit during the first part of 2009.

A sustaining membership of $120 or more will make one of these scarves yours. Call (707) 923-3911 if you're interested.

Merci!

Schnitzer, a band from Zuerich

I'm excited to present you with the new album by Schnitzer. Very catchy, cool guitar work. There's only one song I can't play on the radio due to some f-words. Check 'em out on their Myspace page.

Solar Impulse has been unveiled

Bertrand Piccard's latest venture, a solar plane to circle the globe with, has been unveiled.

Find out much more on the website solarimpulse.com

Phenomden music video

A simple, cool video by Swiss reggae artist Phenomden:

More new music on Eurobureau May 13

Haydamaky from Ukraine, currently on a tour of Europe. I just listened to their album "Kobzar" and I'm impressed with their blend of traditional and modern sounds.

Here's some text from their myspace page, where you can hear a bunch of their tunes:

HAYDAMAKY – well known Ukrainian band through whose artwork you can hear and feel the great mixture of traditional motives and modern musical tendencies.

“Our destination is to make contemporary Ukrainian culture “cool”, trendy, fashioned, adopted into other world cultures and to gain for young Ukraine as widest as possible recognition throughout the world.” - O. Yarmola, Haydamaky

With the name HAYDAMAKY they are on stage since 2001. Starting from early ‘90ies till present HAYDAMAKY are touring Europe. Quite different from other popular Ukrainian musicians who are mostly working under cliché of soviet style or just copy/pasting western and American stars HAYDAMAKY are trying to show the elements of traditional Ukrainian music through mixture influenced and made of different cultures joint with modern musical styles.

Music of HAYDAMAKY is inspired by ethnic sounds from all around the world, especially from different regions of Ukraine such as Polissya, Bukovyna and Carpathian mountains so as the sounds of Jamaica, Ireland ethno-rock and hot sounds of Balkans and Moldova.

HAYDAMAKY are well known around Europe, so they are welcome guests in countries like Estonia, Poland, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Romania, Germany, Netherlands, Belgium, Austria, Slovenia, Switzerland, Spain, Portugal and of course – Ukraine. Geography of HAYDAMAKY is growing on and on.

Bligg,

a Swiss hip-hop artist, also blends traditional sounds with modern styles. Hackbrett (a hammered dulcimer) and accordion meets hip-hop beat. He has expanded his repertoire, very catchy tunes, highly produced, sounds like a large band. Some songs are very funny, others have more serious themes, like the song "Secondos" about immigrants and how much they have done for Switzerland.

His website is bligg.ch, and you can find him on myspace as well.

more coming...

Outcry from Inuits as EU bans seal products - Radio Netherlands Worldwide

Read the story on Radio Netherlands website

Most European countries back seal products embargo

At a meeting of ambassadors of the 27 European Union states, most countries came out in favour of a total ban on importing seal-related products because of Canada's controversial slaughtering methods. Click below for the article on France24.

And to read the rest for the story, get more here now.

Swine Flu Humor

One of these women returned from vacation in Mexico. Which one?

from Cyberpresse.ca

Danish police hug cyclists and hand out helmets

found on boingboing.net

Video of police in Denmark stopping bicyclists, hugging them, and giving them helmets. Happiness all around.