GENEVA: Switzerland’s Gotthard road tunnel under the Alps was temporarily blocked by protesters on Friday, worsening the lengthy tailbacks at the start of the Easter holiday.
The 17-kilometer (10.5-mile) tunnel is one of the main routes crossing the Alps from German-speaking Switzerland to the warmer Italian-speaking Ticino region on the south side of the mountains.
Good Friday, the first day of the Easter holiday long weekend, is typically one of the tunnel’s busiest days.
The northern entrance was temporarily blocked by a handful of protesters from Renovate Switzerland, a group that wants the Swiss government to declare a climate emergency and plan for the thermal renovation of every building in the country by 2035.
Switzerland’s ATS news agency reported that the protesters sat on the southbound carriageway at around 10:00 am (0800 GMT) and glued their hands to the road. Some motorists angrily swiped at their banners.
Police removed the activists around 30 minutes later and the tunnel reopened at around 11:00 am.
Renovate Switzerland said six activists aged 19 to 60 were arrested.
They tweeted that “inaction in the face of the climate catastrophe is more disturbing than 15-kilometer tailbacks.”
The Touring Club Suisse drivers’ association said the traffic jam had grown to 19 kilometers, with motorists facing more than a three-hour wait.
Opened in 1980, the road tunnel has one lane in each direction and typically sees traffic jams around the Easter and summer holidays.
The Gotthard Pass has been a key trade route across the Alps since the Middle Ages.
It remains a key transport link between northern and southern Europe with one road and two rail tunnels under the pass. All three were the longest of their kind in the world when they opened.
Gotthard road tunnel in Swiss Alps blocked by protest
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Gotthard road tunnel in Swiss Alps blocked by protest
- The northern entrance was temporarily blocked by a handful of protesters from Renovate Switzerland
- Police removed the activists around 30 minutes later and the tunnel reopened at around 11:00 am
Germany deports 81 Afghans convicted of crimes
- Plane carrying the men had just taken off and added that they were all under expulsion orders and were convicted by the criminal justice system
- Germany stopped deportations to Afghanistan and closed its embassy in Kabul following the Taliban’s return to power in 2021
Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt said the plane carrying the men had just taken off and added that they were all under expulsion orders and were convicted by the criminal justice system.
Germany stopped deportations to Afghanistan and closed its embassy in Kabul following the Taliban’s return to power in 2021.
Berlin has had only indirect contact with the Taliban authorities through third parties.
A debate over resuming expulsions has flared as migration becomes a key issue amid the rise of the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party.
The previous government of Social Democrat chancellor Olaf Scholz expelled a group of 28 Afghans convicted of crimes on August 30, 2024, marking the first such action since the Taliban’s return to power.
Friday’s operation was carried out with the help of Qatar, the German interior ministry said, adding that such expulsions “must be able to continue in the future.”
Germany deports 81 Afghan nationals to their homeland, the 2nd flight since the Taliban’s return
- The Interior Ministry announced the flight on Friday, emphasizing that those deported had prior legal issues
- This is the first deportation under Chancellor Friedrich Merz, who has pledged stricter migration policies since taking office in May
BERLIN: Germany deported dozens of Afghan nationals to their homeland on Friday, the second time it has done so since the Taliban returned to power and the first since a new government pledging a tougher line on migration took office in Berlin.
The Interior Ministry said a flight took off Friday morning carrying 81 Afghans, all of them men who had previously come to judicial authorities’ attention. It said in a statement that the deportation was carried out with the help of Qatar, and said the government aims to deport more people to Afghanistan in the future.
More than 10 months ago, Germany’s previous government deported Afghan nationals to their homeland for the first time since the Taliban returned to power in 2021. Then-Chancellor Olaf Scholz vowed to step up deportations of asylum-seekers.
New Chancellor Friedrich Merz made tougher migration policy a central plank of his campaign for Germany’s election in February.
Just after he took office in early May, the government stationed more police at the border and said some asylum-seekers trying to enter Europe’s biggest economy would be turned away. It also has suspended family reunions for many migrants.
The flight took off hours before German Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt plans to meet his counterparts from five neighboring countries — France, Poland, Austria, Denmark and the Czech Republic — as well as the European Union’s commissioner responsible for migration, Magnus Brunner. Dobrindt is hosting the meeting to discuss migration on the Zugspitze, Germany’s highest peak, on the Austrian border.
Taiwan will not provoke confrontation with China; does not seek conflict says vice president
- Chinese pressure on Taiwan had only escalated over the past few years but that the island’s people were peace-loving
TAIPEI: Taiwan does not seek conflict with China and will not provoke confrontation and Beijing’s “aggressive” military posturing was counterproductive, Vice President Hsiao Bi-khim said on Friday.
China considers democratic Taiwan as part of its own territory and calls President Lai Ching-te a “separatist.” Taiwan’s government disputes China’s claim.
Speaking to the Taiwan Foreign Correspondents’ Club in the capital Taipei, Hsiao said that Chinese pressure on Taiwan had only escalated over the past few years but that the island’s people were peace-loving.
“We do not seek conflict; we will not provoke confrontation,” she said, reiterating Lai’s offer of talks between Taipei and Beijing.
For decades, Taiwan’s people and business have contributed to China’s growth and prosperity, which has only been possible under a peaceful and stable environment, Hsiao added.
“Aggressive military posturing is counterproductive and deprives the people on both sides of the Taiwan Strait of opportunities to pursue an agenda of growth and prosperity,” she said.
“Defending the status quo (with China) is our choice, not because it is easy, but because it is responsible and consistent with the interests of our entire region.”
North Korea bars foreign tourists from new seaside resort
- The Wonsan-Kalma Coastal Tourist Zone appears to be lined with high-rise hotels and waterparks
- State media previously said visits to Wonsan by Russian tour groups were expected in the coming months
SEOUL: North Korea has barred foreigners from a newly opened beach resort, the country’s tourism administration said this week, just days after Russia’s top diplomat visited the area.
The sprawling seaside resort on its east coast, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un’s pet project, opened to domestic visitors earlier this month with great fanfare in state-run media.
Dubbed “North Korea’s Waikiki” by South Korean media, the Wonsan-Kalma Coastal Tourist Zone appears to be lined with high-rise hotels and waterparks, and can purportedly accommodate some 20,000 people.
State media previously said visits to Wonsan by Russian tour groups were expected in the coming months.
But following Lavrov’s visit, the North’s National Tourism Administration said “foreign tourists are temporarily not being accepted” without giving further details, in a statement posted on an official website this week.
Kim showed a keen interest in developing North Korea’s tourism industry during his early years in power, analysts have said, and the coastal resort area was a particular focus.
He said ahead of the opening of the beach resort that the construction of the site would go down as “one of the greatest successes this year” and that the North would build more large-scale tourist zones “in the shortest time possible.”
The North last year permitted Russian tourists to return for the first time since the pandemic and Western tour operators briefly returned in February this year.
Seoul’s unification ministry, however, said that it expected international tourism to the new resort was “likely to remain small in scale” given the limited capacity of available flights.
Kim held talks with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov in Wonsan last week where he offered Moscow his full and “unconditional” support for its war in Ukraine, KCNA reported.
Lavrov reportedly hailed the seaside project as a “good tourist attraction,” adding it would become popular among both local and Russian visitors looking for new destinations.
Ahead of Lavrov’s recent visit, Russia announced that it would begin twice-a-week flights between Moscow and Pyongyang.
Myanmar junta offers cash rewards to anti-coup defectors
- The Southeast Asian country has been consumed by civil war since a 2021 coup
- Embattled junta faces an array of pro-democracy guerillas and ethnic armed rebels
YANGON: Myanmar’s junta said Friday it is offering cash rewards to fighters willing to desert armed groups defying its rule and “return to the legal fold” ahead of a slated election.
The Southeast Asian country has been consumed by civil war since a 2021 coup, with the embattled junta facing an array of pro-democracy guerillas and ethnic armed rebels.
After suffering major battlefield reverses, the military has touted elections around the end of the year as a pathway to peace – plans denounced as a sham by opposition groups and international monitors.
State media The Global New Light of Myanmar said Friday “individuals who returned to the legal fold with arms and ammunition are being offered specific cash rewards.”
The junta mouthpiece did not specify how much cash it is offering, but said 14 anti-coup fighters had surrendered since it issued a statement pledging to “welcome” defectors two weeks ago.
“These individuals chose to abandon the path of armed struggle due to their desire to live peacefully within the framework of the law,” the newspaper said.
The surrendered fighters included 12 men and two women, it added.
Nine were members of ethnic armed groups, while five were from the pro-democracy “People’s Defense Forces” – formed after the military ousted Aung San Suu Kyi’s elected civilian government four years ago.
The junta’s offer of a gilded olive branch matches a tactic used by its opponents – who have previously tried to tempt military deserters with cash rewards.
The “National Unity Government,” a self-proclaimed administration in exile dominated by ousted lawmakers, has called the junta’s call for cooperation “a strategy filled with deception aimed at legitimizing their power-consolidating sham election.”
