Nigerian €300,000 drug smugglers caught at VIA

Categories
General News

Custom officials have arrested two drug couriers trying to smuggle illegal substances worth 300,000 into Austria.Police said today (Tues) that two Nigerians were arrested after Vienna International Airport (VIA) officers discovered 2.7 kilograms of heroin and cocaine inside their bodies and weaved into their underwear.The men aged 37 and 35 arrived at Austria’s biggest airport […]

More fare dodgers caught in Vienna

Categories
General News

The number of public transport fare dodgers caught this year has risen sharply in Vienna, new figures show.The city’s public transport operator Wiener Linien announced today (Mon) around 165,000 people were fined for using trams, buses and underground trains without valid tickets during the first 10 months of this year. Around 270 staff carried out […]

Vienna panda named by fans

Categories
Lifestyle

A panda born in at Vienna’s Schönbrunn Zoo this summer has been named in an online vote.The animal, which tipped the scales at 4.5 kilograms earlier this month, is now called Fu Hu after 50.1 per cent of people participating in a poll picked the name which means “happy tiger”.Around 40.8 per cent wanted the […]

Human trafficker arrested in Tyrol

Categories
General News

An Indian man has been put in custody for transporting 19 Afghans in his van.The human trafficking suspect was arrested near Radfeld in Tyrol’s Kufstein district last night (Thurs), immigration authorities announced today.Police found 19 refugees from Afghanistan squeezed in the man’s Ford Transit van during a traffic check around 11.30pm. The group included one […]

Rosenbauer targets €600mn turnover

Categories
Business

Fire truck and fire-fighting equipment maker Rosenbauer International AG has said it expected to achieve a turnover higher than 600 million Euros this year.The Leonding-based company, which serves customers across the globe, announced today (Fri) its turnover increased by 12.5 per cent year on year to 421 million Euros in the first nine months of […]

OECD forecasts economic recovery

Categories
Business

The Austrian economy will develop better than the Eurozone average, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) has predicted.The international organisation said today (Fri) that the Austrian gross domestic product (GDP) will grow by two per cent annually between this year and 2012.The OECD added it expected the Eurozone’s economy to grow by just […]

Wide support for car-free Mariahilfer Straße

Categories
Politics

Plans to turn Mariahilfer Straße, one of Vienna’s most popular shopping streets, into a pedestrian area would be well received, a poll has shown.More than six in 10 (60.3 per cent) readers of the Austrian broadcaster ORF’s news website back such an idea, whereas around 35 per cent oppose it. Votes are still coming in […]

FPÖ official sentenced over rifle threat

Categories
General News

A rightist politician has been given a suspended prison sentence for threatening his son with a rifle.Valentin Silberstein, who heads the Freedom Party’s (FPÖ) branch in the Lower Austrian town of Traismauer, fired a shot with his Winchester rifle at a company estate in Grafenwörth in the presence of his 19-year-old son last month.The teenager, […]

Afghan walks through motorway tunnel

Categories
General News

An Afghan who stopped while walking through a busy motorway tunnel has applied for asylum in Austria, it has been reported.Officials in the province of Salzburg said today (Thurs) the man was spotted strolling in the A10 Tauern motorway’s 6.4-kilometre Tauern tunnel yesterday.The man failed to present an ID but applied for political asylum in […]

Roche Graz staff face the axe

Categories
Business

Hundreds of jobs in Austria are at risk as Swiss healthcare company F. Hoffmann-La Roche Ltd. (Roche) plans to drastically reduce its costs.The internationally operating company said today (Weds) it planned to reduce its global staff figure by 4,800 or six per cent, adding that its target was to spend 1.8 billion Euros less a […]