It always appears.

If I would post about russian salad eating competition, it gets that tag too.

I know, that's a bullshit law they passed a few years back through.

Now only foreign press can find about scandals in the banking sector.

Four bankers who helped a close friend of Russian President Vladimir Putin move millions of francs through Swiss bank accounts have been convicted of lacking diligence in financial transactions.

The four were found guilty on Thursday of helping Sergey Roldugin, a concert cellist who has been dubbed “Putin’s wallet” by the Swiss government.

The executives – three Russians and one Swiss – helped Roldugin, who is godfather to Putin’s eldest daughter Maria, deposit millions of francs in Swiss bank accounts between 2014 and 2016.

The men, who cannot be identified under Swiss reporting restrictions, were found guilty at a hearing at Zurich District Court and were given suspended fines.

The case highlights how people like Roldugin were used as “strawmen”, the indictment seen by Reuters said, a way to hide the true owners of money.

In Switzerland, banks are obliged to reject or terminate business relationships if there are doubts about the identity of the contracting party.

The four executives helped Roldugin operate two bank accounts at Gazprombank in Zurich, through which millions of francs flowed, without conducting sufficient checks, the court heard.

The prosecution had alleged the men failed to do enough to determine the identity of the real owner of the funds and it was implausible that Roldugin could be the real owner.

Sums of around CHF30 million ($32.8 million) were involved in the case, said public prosecutor Jan Hoffmann.

This was despite the musician, who appears on Switzerland’s list of sanctioned Russians, having no listed activity as a businessman.

At the time, the musician told the New York Times that he was certainly not a businessman and did not himself own millions, according to the indictment.

Roldugin was among scores of members of Putin’s inner circle sanctioned by the West, including Switzerland, after Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022.

A large share of the $300-500 million that the governor of the central bank of Lebanon is accused of having embezzled ended up on the accounts of 12 Swiss banks, the SonntagsZeitung newspaper reported on Sunday.

These revelations come just three days after Lebanese authorities long-time central bank governor (head of the Banque du Liban (BDL) since 1993) Riad Salameh, his brother Raja and one of his assistants with money laundering, embezzlement and illicit enrichment after months of delay in a high-profile case.

The charges are the product of an 18-month probe by Lebanon into whether Salameh and his brother Raja embezzled millions of dollars from the central bank between 2002 and 2015. Judicial authorities in at least five European countries are investigating the Salameh brothers over the same allegations.

The brothers have denied the charges. The governor has dismissed accusations of illicit enrichment as part of an effort to scapegoat him for Lebanon's financial collapse, which brought new scrutiny of his three decades as governor.

According to SonntagsZeitung, $250 million were deposited in Raja Salameh's personal account at the HSBC branch in Geneva. Other sums were deposited at UBS, Credit Suisse, Julius Baer, EFG and Pictet, the Swiss paper said. It claims the transactions were carried out through an offshore company registered in the British Virgin Islands, named Forry Associates and created in 2001. "Considerable sums" were then purportedly transferred to buy real estate in several European countries.

The Office of the Attorney General of Switzerland initiated criminal proceedings for serious suspicion of money laundering in October 2020 and the procedure is still ongoing. According to SonntagsZeitung, millions of dollars in funds have already been frozen, but the federal prosecutor's office does not provide a figure.

The Swiss Financial Market Supervisory Authority (Finma) has also been conducting preliminary investigations into 12 Swiss banks "for months”, the paper said. A spokesperson confirmed to the SonntagsZeitung that proceedings have been initiated against two financial institutions in the "Lebanese context”. The names of the banks have not been made public.

The Swiss military justice has opened several criminal proceedings against Swiss nationals in connection with the war in Ukraine. The people concerned are suspected of having taken part in the conflict as volunteer fighters or mercenaries.

Seven proceedings are currently underway, a spokesman for the Office of the Attorney General told the Swiss News Agency Keystone-SDA on Thursday, thus confirming a report in newspaper Blick.

All seven proceedings were reportedly initiated after the beginning of the Russian invasion of Ukraine a year ago. They concern the suspicion of performing foreign military service.

Under Swiss military criminal law, foreign service – such as being a mercenary – can be punished with a prison sentence of up to three years or a fine. However, it is uncertain whether the proceedings will ever be concluded. Investigations are very difficult in the case of a country at war, according to the military justice.

Another hurdle is that the people concerned must be granted the right to be heard, said spokesman Florian Menzi. “Somehow, a person must be able to defend themself.” If the suspects do not return to Switzerland or at least the EU, it will be difficult, he said.

Even before the Russian invasion in February 2022, the military justice system had initiated three proceedings in connection with Ukraine. A young man from Ticino was fined and given an additional conditional fine. He had joined pro-Russian separatists in the Donetsk region in 2015. Another case was dropped; one is pending.

The number of mushroom poisonings increased by 25% in Switzerland last year compared with 2021. However, the national poison hotline dealt with fewer suicide attempts.

The increase in mushroom poisonings was due to the good mushroom year of 2022, Tox Info SuisseExternal link said on Monday. Looking back over the past 20 years, it was the year with the second-largest number of consultations in which mushroom poisoning was present or suspected, after 2019.

The increase in mushroom poisonings was due to the good mushroom year of 2022, Tox Info SuisseExternal link said on Monday. Looking back over the past 20 years, it was the year with the second-largest number of consultations in which mushroom poisoning was present or suspected, after 2019.

On the other hand, the number of calls about suicide attempts (4,486) decreased by 4%. In 2021, during the Covid-19 pandemic, the number of suicide calls had risen significantly, especially among young people.

The total number of consultations at Tox Info Suisse increased by 2.5% last year to 40,582. Poisoning with medicines and household products were the most common. Notable increases were seen in poisoning with plants (9%) and food and beverages (11%).

As every year, some 40% of calls concerned pre-school children, typically accidents. In the case of adolescents, who accounted for about 10% of calls, the focus was on intentional poisoning, especially suicide attempts and, to a lesser extent, substance abuse.

In Switzerland the emergency number for poisoning is 145. Specially trained physicians will give advice 24/7 in cases of poisoning with, for example, chemicals, pharmaceuticals, other drugs, poisonous plants, mushrooms or venomous animals.

You read the article?

Zapp: "I hate these filthy Neutrals, Kif. With enemies you know where they stand but with Neutrals, who knows? It sickens me."

That's not how it works for us.

We will all talk to each other first and in the future a committee of several parties or even possibly the voters will have to decide.

It was the same with Corona.

Well, it will take some time and we have a right-wing party, the green party and an association that is completely against the army and they are against it.

As always, we will find ourselves somewhere in the middle, probably as a temporary law to keep everyone happy.

Perhaps the citizens will also vote on it.

It is a start.

Germany is not angry over Bern’s refusal to allow Berlin to re-export Swiss-made ammunition to Ukraine, says the German ambassador to Switzerland.

But Switzerland "also benefits from the security that its neighbours provide with NATO," Michael Flügger said in an interview published on Friday by newspapers ArcInfo, Le Nouvelliste and La Liberté.

Switzerland has previously rejected appeals from Germany to allow it to re-export Swiss-made ammunition to Ukraine, saying such a move would violate its neutrality. On January 11 Spain also said Switzerland was refusing to allow it to re-export war materiel to Ukraine. But pressure has been rising for Bern to review its policies, including at the annual gathering of the World Economic Forum (WEF) it recently hosted in Davos.

"We are only talking about re-exports of ammunition produced in Switzerland and bought by Germany 20 years ago, for anti-aircraft and therefore defensive systems,” ambassador Flügger told the Swiss newspapers. "Nobody was asking Switzerland to deliver arms to Ukraine."

He also notes that Switzerland is contributing to the reconstruction of Ukraine. "But is it really logical to wait until the infrastructure is destroyed before acting?” he asks. The ambassador warned that if ever Germany had to enter a conflict, it would have “no time to lose in negotiating authorisations from Switzerland for the ammunition it has already bought”.

A Swiss parliamentary committee on Tuesday proposed waiving the controversial re-export ban that prevents Swiss-made ammunition from being re-exported from another country to Ukraine. The recommendation passed with 14 in favour and 11 against and will require approval from parliament.

Yes, it matters. It always does.

If not we're not better, as those who wage this war.

I wish you a good day, wherever you are.

Fritz is a German name.

Medicine are not included in the EU-sanctions.

Thanks for condemning people for past things, I wish you a good day in your country with no faults in history.

Edit: ah I see your canadian, well...

Medical products are not on the sanctions list of the EU as prescribed in order not to harm the average citizen in Russia.

Other western pharmaceutical companies also still trade with Russia.