Every year on 1 August, Swiss celebrate the founding of their nation with barbecues, friends, town celebrations and a lot of fireworks. But what is it all about? 1. The Federal Charter of 1291 Switzerland’s national celebration, held every year on 1 August, celebrates the signing of the Federal Charter of 1291 in early August […]
Swiss military may tighten rules on conscientious objection
Switzerland’s military conscription currently offers young men an alternative: civilian service for those unwilling to bear arms. Yet this freedom of choice is now under political scrutiny. Several legislative proposals under discussion in parliament aim to make civilian service less appealing, according to Swiss public broadcaster SRF. Among them is a call to reinstate the […]
Switzerland slides in happiness ranking in 2025
In 2012, Switzerland was ranked the happiest nation on Earth. However, since then it has sadly slid from the top spot to 13th. While Switzerland continues to score well on GDP (3rd), healthy life expectancy, generosity (12th) and low perception of corruption (3rd), it has lost ground on social support (20th) and freedom (20th). The […]
Swiss sirens pass this year’s tests
Every year, Switzerland tests its apocalyptic-sounding sirens on the first Wednesday of February. This year it was done on 7 February 2024 at 13:30. Around 5,000 sirens across the country were sounded and 14 millions alerts were sent out on the Alertswiss app. The same day Switzerland’s Federal Department of Defence, Civil Protection and Sport […]
Afrik Rire – live English comedy comes to Geneva
The sixth edition of the Geneva comedy festival aims to make Geneva’s cultural diversity resonate through laughter. This year it presents comedy in English which includes well-established comedians from across the english-speaking world. The 10 first readers to email: info@lenews.ch with their names and email addresses will get FREE TICKETS. Here’s Aisha Alfa one of […]
A personal expat encounter with bees and what it says about the Swiss
Award winning Swiss-based Afghan poet and author Bashir Sakhawarz describes his encounter with bees and what it taught him about Swiss culture. This article was originally published on 3 June 2015. While we kill each other in Afghanistan, here people take care of bees making sure that not even a single one is lost. That is […]
1 in 20 suffer material deprivation in Switzerland
On 2 May 2023, Switzerland’s Federal Statistical Office published its annual report on income, poverty and living conditions. In 2021, 448,000 people, 5.2% of the population, refrained from buying goods, services and social activities for financial reasons, something described as material and social deprivation. And Switzerland’s poverty rate was 8.7%. At the same time, the […]
Only 19% of Swiss youth positive about future
After taking a dive during the pandemic, life satisfaction bounced back in Switzerland, according to a recent survey. However, among those aged 18 to 25 life satisfaction has continued to decline, falling from 43% in 2021 to 19% in 2022. The aim of the annual survey is to assess the generation gap in Switzerland. Overall, […]
2022 a good year for most Swiss
More than half of the Swiss surveyed recently described 2022 and good or fairly good, reported RTS. At the same time, 15% described the year as bad or very bad. The remaining 26% were neutral. The survey, run by Link, interviewed 1,238 people of all ages across Switzerland. In addition to questions on views of […]
99 percent of Swiss sirens pass this year’s tests
Every year, Switzerland tests its apocalyptic-sounding sirens on the first Wednesday of February. This year it was done on 1 February 2021 at 13:30. The same day Switzerland’s Federal Department of Defence, Civil Protection and Sport (DDPS) announced that 99% of fixed sirens were functioning. Cantons and municipalities are required to fix or replace the […]
