Lufthansa Cargo is flying millions of red roses on fully-laden freighters to Europe in time for bumper sales at high-street florists on Valentine’s Day on 14 February, shipping to the hub in Frankfurt around 1000 tonnes of lovers’ tokens from Africa and South America, and from there onwards to other European destinations. The major countries
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Sales of mobile phones around the world fell last year for the first time since 2009 as consumers shunned cheaper feature phones, research company Gartner said on Wednesday. "Tough economic conditions, shifting consumer preferences, and intense market competition weakened the worldwide mobile phone market," said Gartner analyst Anshul Gupta. Smartphone sales, a category dominated by
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More than four mln euros will be made available for the financing of local researchers and entrepreneurs by Cyprus’ Research Promotion Foundation (RPF), in the framework of common European research programs for the 2013-2014 period. According to an RPF announcement, the Foundation has undertaken relevant initiatives to define common research priorities in various fields, including
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The central bank of Russia, host of this week's meeting of Group of 20 finance officials in Moscow, urged joint action to achieve balanced global growth and called on nations not to resort to trade protectionism and currency devaluations. First Deputy Chairman Alexei Ulyukayev also said he supported the statement issued by the Group of
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The European Commission is not working on any private sector involvement option for Cyprus, Vice-President of the European Commission and member of the Commission responsible for Economic and Monetary Affairs and the Euro, Olli Rehn, has said. Replying to a question, Vice-President Rehn stressed that it’s the Commission’s firm position that Greece was a unique
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The position of the Conservative party that Turkey cannot enter the EU as long as the occupation of the northern part of Cyprus continues, as it had been stated by William Hague before the 2010 election, has not changed, asserted David Lidington during a Tuesday evening gathering of Cypriots in London. Prompted by the audience,
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President Barack Obama's proposal to raise the minimum wage is in sync with his push to grow the economy by bolstering the middle class but it puts him at odds with many small-business owners who see it as a burden. Obama proposed in his State of the Union speech to increase the low end of
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President Barack Obama announced on Tuesday that 34,000 troops – about half the U.S. force in Afghanistan – will withdraw by early 2014, bringing the United States one step closer to wrapping up the costly, unpopular war. Obama announced the withdrawal in his annual State of the Union address, as he renewed his pledge to
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The "ugliest woman in the world" was buried in her native northern Mexico on Tuesday, more than 150 years after her death and a tragic life spent exhibited as a freak of nature at circuses around the world. Born in Mexico in 1834, Julia Pastrana suffered from hypertrichosis and gingival hyperplasia, diseases that gave her
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Chocolate hearts for loved ones on Valentine's Day are so last year – at least in Japan where one Tokyo design firm offered up its 3D scanner to make miniature chocolate replicas of faces. In a one-off celebration for Valentine's Day, KS Design Lab (http://www.ksdl.co.jp ) invited people to be scanned with its 3D body
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