German president calls upon UK to stay in EU
BERLIN: Germany’s president called for English to be made the language of the EU as he appealed to the UK to stay in the European Union. Joachim Gauck earned applause for his remarks made in Berlin on Friday during

‘Cold War’-type spies on trial
THE neighbours had always considered their names odd — Mr and Mrs Anschlag, meaning ‘attack’ — and the fact that she was often seen in the garden of their whitewashed, detached house making phone calls in the

Lesson for Catalonia from Czechoslovakia
LONDON: Secession can be a bit like breaking a biscuit: crumbs everywhere and two pieces that don’t seem quite as appealing as the original

World’s narrowest street
YOU might well call it a fissure, a gap or a chink. But the folks of Reutlingen in Baden-Wurttemberg, western Germany, are adamant that a 31cm divide between two houses is in fact a street.

Animal punditry out of control
IT started with Paul, an ordinary octopus who garnered worldwide attention after spending the summer of 2010 correctly predicting the results of Germany’s eight World Cup matches.