Europe

A Ukrainian athlete was disqualified from the Winter Olympics upon IOC decision over his plans to wear a helmet honoring countrymen killed in the war with Russia

Summer season 2025 tourism data, newly released, show a 10,8% decline in overnight stays in Liechtenstein, with 89.977 overnight stays in hotels in the May-October period, with the Rhine Valley accounting for 75.477 overnight stays

Skiers Ariane Rädler and Katharina Huber won the alpine team combination, the first Olympic victory for the ÖSV women in over ten years; the first gold at Milano-Cortina Winter Games came with snowboarder Benjamin Karl in the men's parallel giant slalom

Bosnian Serb Leader Milorad Dodik has been criticised for making derogatory comments and using racist rhetoric about Bosniaks at a press conference following the presidential election in Bosnia’s mainly Serb Republika Srpska won by his ally Sinisa Karan

Slovenia's last remaining operational coal mine, Velenje will be wound down over the next twenty years at the cost of over €1.1 billion; commercial mining is scheduled to stop in 2033, the target year for the country to phase out coal

Health workers in Kemerovo are reporting delayed and reduced salaries as the region registers record-breaking budget deficit due to coal industry crisis; delayed payments have been recurrent across Russia, particularly in areas reliant on state funding

Public attention in Bulgaria has been focused on an opaque criminal case, made more disturbing by lack of official information: in a week six people were found dead in Western Stara Planina, all linked to NGO National Agency for Control of Protected Areas

88% of Lithuanians oppose raising the retirement age, latest survey shows; Minister of Social Security and Labour underlines there are no plans to make people retire later and the currently existing retirement age for women and men, 65 years, is optimal

Madeleine Beck is the only female athlete in the 8-people strong team Liechtenstein; she is an alpine skier who hasn't yet declared in which race she will compete at Milano-Cortina 2026, and never finished or qualified in the last two seasons

Shuttle ships on the Tallinn–Helsinki route are increasing the use of cleaner fuel and will soon be fully powered by renewable energy: in January, 74% of the fuel used was liquefied biomethane and Tallink is set abandon LNG for liquefied biomethane

The number of foreign nationals working in Montenegro has almost doubled since 2017 in response to a widening shortage of labour in the country; authorities and employers intensity efforts to fill gaps in the legal framework and the jobs market

17 of the 114 films and documentaries released in Catalan throughout 2025 were screened in Andorra, 15% of the total says report by Plataforma per la Llengua on the presence of cinema in Catalan