الجمعة, أغسطس 26th 2022
Novartis begins heavy layoffs in Zürich, suspect goes on trial for Swiss terrorism attack and more in our roundup of Swiss news from August 22 -26.
At least 30 masked men threw furniture through the historic facade of Brussels’ restaurant Le Falstaff.
Swiss football ‘hooligans’ arrested in Brussels
About 30 masked men – presumably Swiss fans of the Young Boys Bern football team – attacked and vandalized a restaurant in Brussels Wednesday, just 24 hours before their team and the RSC Anderlecht faced off in the European Conference League. A bystander was able to capture a video of the incident (here) which shows the men throwing tables and chairs through the restaurant’s historic stained glass windows at the peak of the dinner rush. After last week’s game between the two teams, a fight broke out among fans; the incident appears to be “some kind of revenge,” according to Ilse Van de keere, of the Brussels-Capital/Ixelles police. Twenty-three Swiss nationals have been identified and arrested since then. Some of the men arrested had weapons on them such as brass knuckles. “In the meantime, we are looking at whether we can expel the 23 Swiss hooligans from the country so that they will not be able to follow any football matches in Belgium tonight or in the future,” Van de keere said. The Swiss football club did defeat Brussels’ team 1-0 on Thursday night. اقرأ المزيد.
Woman on trial for Manor terrorism attack
A woman will stand trial in Bellinzona next week for attempted murder over an alleged Islamist terrorist attack – an event that is almost never heard of in the Alpine nation, according to local police. The woman, whose name and nationality remains anonymous for now, attacked two women shopping at Manor department store in Lugano with a knife in November 2020. During the attack, the woman picked up a large bread knife in the home goods section of the store and plunged it into the throat of one shopper while shouting “Allahu akbar.” She then attacked a second shopper, who suffered defensive wounds to her hands. Both women survived. Police say the woman appears to have fallen in love over social media with a jihadist fighter in Syria and attempted to meet him there in 2017, but was sent back to Switzerland by Turkish authorities. She was then admitted to a psychiatric clinic, but fell off the radar. “In Switzerland, it’s been very random and very rare that we have people that conduct terrorist attacks,” Christina Schori Liang, a terrorism expert at the Geneva Centre for Security Policy, told AFP. The trial is expected to last through September 5 with a verdict two weeks following. اقرأ المزيد.
Novartis ‘trims the fat’ in Swiss headquarters
Of the 1,400 jobs Swiss pharmaceutical giant plans to eliminate, up to half will be leadership positions, such as C-suite executives, the company announced this week in Zürich. In June, Novartis announced it would cut 8,000 jobs globally with the goal to save $1 billion. A bulk of those positions will be in its home country of Switzerland. Many lay-offs will be made before the end of August with the remainder completed over the next year, according to Novartis director Matthias Leuenberger. And fewer employees will have the option to take early retirement, Leuenberger added. اقرأ المزيد.
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