News in English

8. April 2017, 21:58

Arrests in connection with Istanbul nightclub massacre

Turkish police have carried out a dawn raid and detained a number of people suspected of having links to the Istanbul nightclub attack on New Year's Day. Islamic State has claimed responsibility for the massacre in which 39 people were killed. Today’s arrests in the town of Selimpasa follow reports that the Turkish authorities now believe the gunman to be an ethnic Uighur from central Asia.

EU financial losses due to sanctions against Russia

A study commissioned by the Austrian economics ministry has found that the EU’s sanctions on Russia... and counter measures imposed by Moscow... cost European nations 17.6 billion euros in 2015. The study by the Austrian Institute of Economic Research also found that 40,000 jobs had been lost as a result of the measures - 7,000 of them in Austria. Trade with Russia was also hit hard by lower oil prices and the decline in the value of the ruble.

Sanders attacks Republicans over healthcare plans

President Obama has urged his fellow Democrats in the United States to fight to preserve his signature health care law, which the incoming Trump administration has vowed to dismantle immediately. The Republicans say they will repeal and replace so-called “Obamacare”, which they describe as a broken system. But the prominent Democratic senator Bernie Sanders says the Republicans are about to throw the U.S. healthcare system into chaos: “They have no ideas. Their theme is to repeal and then delay. Or someday they’re going to come up with a new plan. You don’t throw 30 million people off of healthcare without having a plan to provide healthcare to those people.”

Dementia rates “higher nears busy roads”

Scientists in Canada have concluded that living near a busy road increases the risk of developing dementia. The study, published in The Lancet Journal, says as many as 11% of dementia cases in people living within 50 meters of a major road could be down to air pollution or noisy traffic. Professor Martin Rossor from the National Dementia Research Centre at University College London says the findings are plausible but he warns people that there are many more factors which are much easier to resolve: “Midlife obesity, high blood pressure (and) smoking have a greater association with later dementia than living near a busy road. But those things that we do have some personal control over. It’s quite difficult to decide you’re suddenly going to move your house.”

Former Kosovo PM arrested in France

French police have arrested the former prime minister of Kosovo, Ramush Haradinaj, based on a Serbian arrest warrant for alleged war crimes. Haradinaj was a rebel commander during the Kosovo conflict in the late 1990s. Serbia accuses him of overseeing a campaign of torture and murder against ethnic Serbs.

The weather

This afternoon’s weather. Occasional snowfall from Vorarlberg through to Upper Styria. Mainly sunny in the south-east. Top temperatures are ranging from -7C to +2C.

Übersicht

• News In English