Greek journalist in court for revealing names of potential tax cheats

This post has been corrected. See the note at the bottom for details.

ATHENS -- A Greek journalist who was arrested after publishing the names of more than 2,000 fellow citizens believed to have stashed about $2 billion in Swiss bank accounts appeared in court Monday to answer charges of breach of privacy.

Kostas Vaxevanis, a prominent investigative journalist and editor of Hot Doc magazine, was arrested Sunday but released hours later pending trial. In an Athens courtroom Monday, his attorney requested a continuance to prepare for a hearing scheduled for Thursday.

"This is a case of utmost public interest, and we want it to be heard," Harris Economopoulos, Vaxevanis' attorney, said in a telephone interview. "We want the truth to come out. Greeks have endured enormous sacrifices, and they are facing yet a new wave of austerity [measures]. They have the right to know whether there is a case of political coverup."

Vaxevanis insists that the published list, which includes the names of high-profile Greek businessmen and politicians -- even the brother of former Prime Minister George Papandreou -- is the same list that former French Finance Minister Christine Lagarde relayed to her Greek counterpart two years ago to help Athens crack down on rampant tax evasion in Greece. His list, however, included more names than Lagarde reportedly handed over.

Since then, successive governments have been accused of trying to cover up the scandal, with two finance ministers and a number of judicial and tax officials shifting responsibility and blame.

Swiss freeze $1 billion tied to leaders targeted in Arab Spring

Switzerland has frozen more than $1 billion connected to leaders who were toppled or are still being battled in Arab Spring uprisings, a top Swiss official told reporters Tuesday.

The bulk of the money -- more than $750 million -- was stashed away by former Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak and his associates, Valentin Zellweger said at a briefing in Geneva. The rest is tied to Syrian President Bashar Assad, former Tunisian leader Zine el Abidine ben Ali and the late Libyan strongman Moammar Kadafi, according to news reports.

Zellweger, who heads the international law department at the Swiss Foreign Ministry, told reporters that the money "is blocked in the framework of Arab Spring," the Associated Press reported. The government reportedly began freezing the funds in early 2011, as protests began to sweep the Middle East.

In times of political upheaval, the Swiss government can freeze the assets of political leaders and their entourages in order to stop money deposited in Switzerland from being shunted elsewhere, according to the Foreign Ministry.

The ultimate goal is to return any pilfered funds to their countries.

Switzerland has sought to shake off its image as the banker to scofflaws. "The Swiss government has made it very clear that funds of illegal origin are not welcome in Switzerland," Zellweger told Reuters television.

Turning the money over to Arab Spring countries could take years, as Swiss authorities pore over evidence that the money was illegally acquired before attempting to return it.

In the past, Switzerland has sent back money from the late leaders Mobutu Sese Seko of the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Ferdinand Marcos of the Philippines, among other cases.

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Photo: Valentin Zellweger, head of the Swiss Foreign Ministry's international law department, speaks at a news conference in Geneva on Tuesday. Credit: Salvatore Di Nolfi / Keystone / Associated Press

Britain's got tennis fever with Scotland's Andy Murray in Wimbledon final

LONDON — Britain was seized by a fever Sunday.

"Murray Mania" spread through the nation as an estimated 20 million people prepared to watch Andy Murray from Scotland fight to become the first British winner of the men’s singles in the Wimbledon lawn tennis championship since 1936.

Murray faces Swiss champion Roger Federer, a six-time winner of the trophy striving to equal the score set by American Pete Sampras, a seven-time Wimbledon winner.

Photos: 'Murray Mania'

Britons woke to newspaper headlines: “Andy we’re praying for you,” on the front of the populist Daily Mail, and “Andy make our day” pleaded the left-wing, more intellectual Observer, and the Wimbledon final dominated TV and radio news.

In Murray’s native Scotland the national paper, the Scotsman, reported Scottish flags flying in his hometown of Dunblane, where both his grandmothers were suffering from pre-match nerves.

“Andy has worked so hard and he deserves to win… We wish him all the best. We’ll say a wee prayer for him,” said 78-year-old Ellen Murray, who was 2 years old when Fred Perry became Britain's last men’s singles winner at Wimbledon.

Thousands braved rainswept conditions to reach the Wimbledon grounds in southwest London in  time to watch the match.

British Prime Minister David Cameron and Alex Salmond, Scotland’s first minister, were among the spectators along with a huge Scottish crowd ready to cheer from the stands and watch the giant screen from "Murray Mound," the newly christened hill inside the Wimbledon grounds.

Both leaders sent good-luck wishes to Murray.

“It’s a unique moment for any Scot,” said Salmond in media coverage. Over at the prime minister’s residence on Downing Street, the British flag was replaced by Scotland’s blue-and-white national flag for the occasion.

Around the country people spent Sunday afternoon in front of TV screens.

Philip Tomlin, a 35-year-old financier and keen tennis watcher in north London, said he couldn’t join his pals in front of the big screen set up outside London’s riverside Tate Modern art gallery.

“I’ll be watching at home. Murray’s got a good chance, I reckon — he’s got a new coach who's helped him with the mental side of the game, which was his weakness.”

Lilian del Gaudio from Brazil, watching at home in London, is a new tennis aficionado. “I don’t watch tennis, but I realize how important Wimbledon is in this country and how [the final] has changed the atmosphere of the place in the last few days. If he wins it would be a great day for Britain,” said the 31-year-old teacher.

In the Warwickshire village of Long Compton in West England, 82-year-old Susan Gladstone couldn’t wait to settle in front of the TV. “I haven’t got time to see you today,” she told a visitor, “I’ve got to watch the tennis.”

The Daily Telegraphy collected comments from Murray-watchers across the ocean. “We keep in touch with streaming mobile broadband on our Mac and we predict a win for Andy!!!” messaged John Quarterman and family from the Indian Ocean off western Australia.

Murray himself is geared for a challenge, he told interviewers. “The one thing I can guarantee is that I'll fight my absolute heart out. I need to give everything I have from the first point to the last.”

Photos: Serena Williams earns fifth Wimbledon singles title

One of the most coveted prizes of tennis' Grand Slam events, the Wimbledon trophy has long eluded British players. After Fred Perry’s victory of 1936, the next British winner was Virginia Wade in the ladies’ singles in 1977. But this year may be a turning point. Murray’s fight for victory follows the surprise men’s doubles’ win Saturday by unknown Briton Jonathan Marray partnered by Danish Frederik Nielsen.

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Photo: A shop window display in Dunblane, Scotland shows support for Andy Murray ahead of his Wimbledon tennis final against Roger Federer. Credit: Scott Heppell / Associated Press.

Europeans, Canadians baffled by U.S. furor on healthcare

As the news spread that the U.S. Supreme Court had upheld the law and its requirement that most people buy health insurance, some people across Europe took to Twitter to ask: What’s the big deal?

“Dear Americans. Health insurance is very important for your health and life. Don’t forget. We have it in Germany,” one Twitter user from Germany wrote, adding a smiley face to the end.

Rafael Dohms, a computer engineer living in the Netherlands, wrote, “I’m forced to pay health insurance here in the [Netherlands] … not as bad as I would have imagined.”

And Parisian filmmaker Vincent Galiano joked, “At least USA becomes a modern nation! Soon even the education could be good!”

In Europe, where governments take a bigger role in healthcare, many people have been baffled by the political furor over the healthcare law championed by President Obama, which has spawned fervent protests and angry accusations that the government is sliding into socialism. The Supreme Court ruled Thursday that the government may impose tax penalties on people who don't buy insurance, something that opponents argued was an unconstitutionally intrusive step.

“Why object [to] Obamacare?” a French teacher mused online Thursday in Switzerland, where residents must buy insurance in a system similar to the contested American law. “Is it more about *having* to get insurance, or more about poor people getting treated for less?”

Swiss long required to buy health insurance -- without the furor

This post has been corrected. See the note at the bottom for details.

The linchpin of the healthcare reforms championed by President Obama is the requirement that most Americans buy health insurance,  a rule that could be overturned by the Supreme Court.

The Supreme Court ruling, expected Thursday, will decide whether requiring people to buy health insurance is unconstitutional, as critics claim. The rule has been fiercely debated in the United States, but a similar rule requiring people to be insured has long been in place in Switzerland without the furor.

The Swiss government started requiring residents to buy health insurance from competing providers in 1996, as part of a federal law aimed at controlling costs and ensuring equitable coverage. Switzerland feared that under its old system, tied to employers, people were staying with jobs they didn’t want just for the health coverage, holding its economy back.

The Swiss system is seen as the closest analogue internationally to the Affordable Care Act. (Within the U.S., Massachusetts also has an individual mandate, successfully pushed into law by then-Gov. Mitt Romney, now Obama's Republican election foe.)

Whereas many countries tax their citizens to ensure that as many people as possible have healthcare, the Swiss system is more like a private market.

That made the Swiss system more appealing to Americans who are wary of turning over health insurance to the government, such as conservative talk show host Bill O’Reilly, who plugged the Swiss model on his show. As “Obamacare” was debated, Switzerland was often invoked as a promising model.

“The results in Switzerland are just spectacular,” said Regina Herzlinger, professor of business administration at the Harvard Business School. In a recent analysis, she found that healthcare costs there have increased less than in other countries, such as Germany and the United States, when compared to GDP growth.

Swiss patients are highly satisfied with the system, though costs have been higher than in other wealthy, industrialized countries. (The U.S. is still more expensive.) Insurance analysts debate the reasons behind those higher costs, which have been chalked up to various things, such as the Swiss simply opting to spend more on plusher plans or the localized system that puts people into smaller insurance pools.

Myanmar's Aung San Suu Kyi on historic European visit

NEW DELHI -- Pro-democracy leader Aung San Suu Kyi of Myanmar enjoyed her first full day on European soil in 24 years on Thursday, the beginning of a 17-day visit that includes stops in Switzerland, Norway, Britain, Ireland and France.

In addition to her address Thursday to the U.N. International Labor Organization in Geneva, highlights will include a long-delayed acceptance speech Saturday in Oslo for the Nobel Peace Prize she received in absentia in 1991.

"I'm excited about each country in a different way," Suu Kyi, 66, said on Wednesday before her departure from Yangon airport in her homeland. "I'll get to know this only when I get there."

The Myanmar parliamentarian, who spent 15 years in detention or under house arrest before her by-election win in April, had repeated opportunities over the past quarter century to leave Myanmar. In fact, the brutal military regime that long ruled the country would have welcomed her departure. The problem was always getting permission to return and continue her fight for more political and social rights in the long-isolated country, which is also known as Burma.

“Symbolically, the trip is deeply significant,” said Sean Turnell, a professor at Australia’s Macquarie University and editor of the Burma Economic Watch blog. “And it’s a nice moment of fulfillment personally, finally getting the Nobel prize.”

Bodies of young bus crash victims return home to Belgium

This post has been updated. See the note below for details.

REPORTING FROM LONDON -- Belgian and Dutch victims of a fatal bus crash in Switzerland that killed 22 schoolchildren and six adults returned home Friday in coffins borne by military aircraft.

Belgium largely came to a halt for a minute's silence at 11 a.m. in remembrance of the victims, young students and teachers from schools in Haverlee, near Brussels, and Lommel, close to the Dutch border. Flowers, messages and soft toys covered the walls and gates of St. Lambertus School in Haverlee and Stekske School in Lommel, where people continued to arrive and leave tokens of sympathy.

In official mourning, flags flew at half-staff in Belgium and the Netherlands, home to six of the children who died Tuesday night in the Valais region of Switzerland. Planes carrying the bodies of victims landed Friday morning at an airport in Melsbroek, Belgium.

On Thursday night, a convoy of buses brought eight of 24 injured children home to Belgium. Others remain in a hospital in Switzerland.

Since the crash, condolences for the victims have arrived from people all over the world, including messages from President Obama and Pope Benedict XVI.

Swiss police are still seeking to determine the cause of the crash. According to official reconstructions of the accident, the bus had entered a tunnel on Swiss Highway A9 near the Italian border when it clipped a curbstone. The vehicle catapulted across the two-lane highway and slammed into a concrete wall of an emergency parking bay. The front of the vehicle was completely demolished; the driver died in the crash.

No other vehicles were involved in the accident, which reportedly traumatized several of the first responders who arrived to find children still trapped inside the wreckage.

[Updated, 9:17 a.m. March 16 : During a news conference Friday by the investigative and medical teams in the case, Swiss prosecutor Olivier Elsig confirmed that the bus was not speeding at the moment of the accident and that interviews with surviving children and adults did not support a theory mentioned in news reports that the driver might have been distracted by operating a DVD player.

While awaiting final autopsy results on the driver, initial examinations showed no signs of alcohol use or a heart attack, officials said, but analyses were still ongoing. The remaining hypotheses include the possibilities of a technical fault, human error or some kind of illness. officials said.]

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Photo: A girl, flanked by two adults, looks at flowers, drawings and candles on Friday at a primary school in Lommel, Belgium, displayed for the victims of Tuesday's bus crash in Switzerland. Credit: Yorick Jansens / AFP/Getty Images

Belgium mourns 28 dead in school bus crash

REPORTING FROM LONDON -- Belgium observed a day of mourning Wednesday as investigators sought to determine the cause of a bush crash in a Swiss highway tunnel in which 28 people, most of them 12-year-old Belgian schoolchildren, were killed Tuesday night while returning home from a ski holiday.

Despite some news reports that the victims had not been wearing their seat belts, Chief Attorney Olivier Elsig told reporters that the children were wearing them “but the shock was too strong.”  Swiss police confirmed that the bus hit the wall of an emergency parking bay after entering the tunnel on the A9 highway in southern Switzerland.

 Elsig also confirmed that no other vehicle was involved and the road was in good condition.  He said possible causes being examined were a technical problem, sudden illness and human error.

Of the 28 who died, 22 were children; teachers and the two drivers also died. Emergency rescue teams transported 24 injured passengers, most of them children, to hospitals around the country. At least three children were critically injured, a medical official said.

Bus crash in Switzerland kills 22 children, 6 adults

 

REPORTING FROM LONDON -- A bus carrying 53 Belgians, most of them children returning from a skiing holiday, crashed Tuesday night inside a tunnel on a highway in Switzerland, killing 22 children and six adults, authorities said.

Twenty-four children were injured in the crash and airlifted to a hospital, officials said.

No other vehicle was involved in the accident in southern Switzerland. A police report said the bus hit a concrete wall of an emergency parking bay in the A9 Highway tunnel.

"The frontal impact was extremely violent. The front of the bus was heavily damaged, blocking the occupants," the report said. Pictures from Belgian TV showed the front of the bus demolished.

The bus was reported to be one of three carrying students, all about 12 years old, from two schools in Belgium. They were returning from a week's skiing in the Swiss Alps in the Val d’Anniviers near the Italian border.

In a statement, Belgian Prime Minister Elio Di Rupo called it "a tragic day for Belgium" and offered condolences to the families of the victims. He visited the scene of the accident Wednesday morning.

Belgium's ambassador to Switzerland, Jan Luykx, who also visited the site, told the BBC: "It is ... a very emotional situation. For the moment, no specific reason for the accident has been given."

As Belgium mourns, Swiss police are investigating how the crash, one of the worst on the country's roads, could have happened.

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