VIENNA: Vienna has dislodged Melbourne for the first time at the top of the Economist Intelligence Unit’s Global Liveability Index, strengthening the Austrian capital’s claim to being the world’s most pleasant city to live in.
The two metropolizes have been neck and neck in the annual survey of 140 urban centers for years, with Melbourne clinching the title for the past seven editions. This year, a downgraded threat of militant attacks in western Europe as well as the city’s low crime rate helped nudge Vienna into first place.
Vienna regularly tops a larger ranking of cities by quality of life compiled by consulting firm Mercer. It is the first time it has topped the EIU survey, which began in its current form in 2004.
At the other end of the table, Damascus retained last place, followed by the Bangladeshi capital Dhaka, and Lagos in Nigeria. The survey does not include several of the world’s most dangerous capitals, such as Baghdad and Kabul.
“While in the past couple of years cities in Europe were affected by the spreading perceived threat of terrorism in the region, which caused heightened security measures, the past year has seen a return to normalcy,” the EIU said in a statement about the report published on Tuesday.
“A long-running contender to the title, Vienna has succeeded in displacing Melbourne from the top spot due to increases in the Austrian capital’s stability category ratings,” it said, referring to one of the index’s five headline components.
Vienna and Melbourne scored maximum points in the health care, education and infrastructure categories. But while Melbourne extended its lead in the culture and environment component, that was outweighed by Vienna’s improved stability ranking.
Osaka, Calgary and Sydney completed the top five in the survey, which the EIU says tends to favor medium-sized cities in wealthy countries, often with relatively low population densities. Much larger and more crowded cities tend to have higher crime rates and more strained infrastructure, it said.
London for instance ranks 48th.
Vienna, once the capital of a large empire rather than today’s small Alpine republic, has yet to match its pre-World War One population of 2.1 million. Its many green spaces include lakes with popular beaches and vineyards with sweeping views of the capital. Public transport is cheap and efficient.
In addition to the generally improved security outlook for western Europe, Vienna benefited from its low crime rate, the survey’s editor Roxana Slavcheva said.
“One of the sub-categories that Vienna does really well in is the prevalence of petty crime ... It’s proven to be one of the safest cities in Europe,” she said.
Vienna tops Melbourne as world’s most liveable city — Economist survey
Vienna tops Melbourne as world’s most liveable city — Economist survey
- Vienna and Melbourne scored maximum points in the health care, education and infrastructure categories
- Much larger and more crowded cities tend to have higher crime rates and more strained infrastructure
Rubio says technical talks with Denmark, Greenland officials over Arctic security have begun
- US Secretary of State on Wednesday appeared eager to downplay Trump’s rift with Europe over Greenland
WASHINGTON: Technical talks between the US, Denmark and Greenland over hatching an Arctic security deal are now underway, Secretary of State Marco Rubio said on Wednesday.
The foreign ministers of Denmark and Greenland agreed to create a working group aimed at addressing differences with the US during a Washington meeting earlier this month with Vice President JD Vance and Rubio.
The group was created after President Donald Trump’s repeated calls for the US to take over Greenland, a Danish territory, in the name of countering threats from Russia and China — calls that Greenland, Denmark and European allies forcefully rejected.
“It begins today and it will be a regular process,” Rubio said of the working group, as he testified before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. “We’re going to try to do it in a way that isn’t like a media circus every time these conversations happen, because we think that creates more flexibility on both sides to arrive at a positive outcome.”
The Danish Foreign Ministry said Wednesday’s talks focused on “how we can address US concerns about security in the Arctic while respecting the red lines of the Kingdom.” Red lines refers to the sovereignty of Greenland.
Trump’s renewed threats in recent weeks to annex Greenland, which is a semiautonomous territory of a NATO ally, has roiled US-European relations.
Trump this month announced he would slap new tariffs on Denmark and seven other European countries that opposed his takeover calls, only to abruptly drop his threats after a “framework” for a deal over access to the mineral-rich island was reached, with NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte’s help. Few details of the agreement have emerged.
After stiff pushback from European allies to his Greenland rhetoric, Trump also announced at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, last week that he would take off the table the possibility of using American military force to acquire Greenland.
The president backed off his tariff threats and softened his language after Wall Street suffered its biggest losses in months over concerns that Trump’s Greenland ambitions could spur a trade war and fundamentally rupture NATO, a 32-member transatlantic military alliance that’s been a linchpin of post-World War II security.
Rubio on Wednesday appeared eager to downplay Trump’s rift with Europe over Greenland.
“We’ve got a little bit of work to do, but I think we’re going to wind up in a good place, and I think you’ll hear the same from our colleagues in Europe very shortly,” Rubio said.
Rubio during Wednesday’s hearing also had a pointed exchange with Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Virginia, about Trump repeatedly referring to Greenland as Iceland while at Davos.
“Yeah, he meant to say Greenland, but I think we’re all familiar with presidents that have verbal stumbles,” Rubio said in responding to Kaine’s questions about Trump’s flub — taking a veiled dig at former President Joe Biden. “We’ve had presidents like that before. Some made a lot more than this one.”
