Austrian Relieved To Only be Dead On Paper

Categories
General News

Austrian man Christian Kozel, 29, discovered he was dead when uniformed police officers turned up at his home in Salzburg at the weekend. He said: “I was pretty shocked when I saw them at my door, and was relieved to find out that although I was dead, at least it was only on paper.” But […]

MP accuses Austrian government of Madoff cover up

Categories
Business

An Austrian MP has filed a series of Parliamentary questions to make public allegations that senior banking officials and others in the Alpine Republic had actively worked with Bernie Madoff to create his global Pyramid scheme. The Parliamentary questions from Freedom Party MP Hans-Joerg Jenewein were filed to make public the claims in a new […]

Debate about new tariff system

Categories
Travel

Wiener Linien is the company that runs the largest part of the transit network of Vienna. They have never had more customers since they introduced the annual ticket for 365 Euros. A traffic expert has now suggested a new tariff system. 907 million passengers used the transit network last year. 32 million of additional passengers […]

Anger over electronic tag for sex offenders

Categories
General News

Campaigners demanding that sex offenders not be allowed out of jail with an electronic tag have stepped up their efforts after it was revealed that a paedophile in Germany had carried out a sex attack on a seven-year-old while wearing an electronic tag. The convicted child sex offender is now back behind bars after he […]

ÖVP head pounces on PPÖ

Categories
Politics

People’s Party (ÖVP) Vice Chancellor Michael Spindelegger has branded the Pirate Party (PPÖ) as a “group of clowns”. The foreign minister said in a speech at Hofburg Palace in Vienna yesterday (Mon) that the increasingly popular party consisted of “political clowns”. Some analysts think that the established parties still fail to realise the threat the […]

Graz gets a city bike rental scheme

Categories
Lifestyle

The city of Graz is planning to invest 350,000 Euros in creating a city wide rental bike system. The rental system will be based around a booking platform known as “Graz Bikes” that will be aimed at tourists and locals keen to try out the cycling possibilities in the region. The council agreed funding of […]

Neusiedler See becomes newest DAC wine region

Categories
Lifestyle

Following on from the regions of Eisenberg, Mittelburgenland and Lethaberg, Neusiedler See has become the most recent DAC labelled wine appellation in the state of Burgenland, Austria. The details were set in stone in the Burgtheater in Vienna yesterday (Thurs). The DAC or “Districtus Austriae Controllatus” which comes from the Latin for “Controlled District of […]

Mikl-Leitner denies lack of reforms

Categories
Politics

Johanna Mikl-Leitner has defended the government’s disputed pension system agenda. The interior minister dismissed accusations that the recently presented budget consolidation agreement featured too many open questions. Mikl-Leitner told Die Presse that substantial structural reforms would be achieved if the average retirement age rises from the current 58 to 61 or 62 in 2020. The […]

Germany aims to overtake Austria in Croatia

Categories
Business

Germany is challenging Austria’s position as a top investor in Croatia. Figures presented by the Croatian National Bank (HNB) today (Fri) reveal that German companies spent 131.8 million Euros in the country in the first quarter of this year, more than any other country. German firms only spent 90.4 million Euros in the same time […]

Export economy is back on track

Categories
Business

The Austrian import and export industry is nearing pre-crisis levels, figures presented today (Fri) confirm. Federal statistics organisation Statistik Austria announced that firms based in the country exported products worth 109.37 billion Euros in 2010, up by 16.7 per cent compared to 2009. The value of exports dropped by nearly 19 per cent from 2008 […]