Author: DW

Drained peatlands today cause more CO2 emissions than all global air travel combined — which is why  some farmers in Germany are experimenting with rewetting these areas. But so far, it remains a risky business model. Anyone visiting farmer Henning Voigt’s operation near Germany’s Baltic Sea coast stands a good chance of getting their feet wet. About 25 years ago, his father began rewetting a once-drained peatland. “We’ve been an organic farm since 1996 and currently manage 350 hectares (864 acres) of grassland. Most of it is very wet,” Voigt says. Speaking with DW, Voigt explains that the hay they…

“All roads lead to Rome!” Roads were the lifeline of the Roman Empire, stretching from Britannia to North Africa — people settled along those roads; armies, travelers, goods, knowledge and power passed along them — into the furthest corners of the empire. To this day, the Roman road network continues to shape large parts of Europe, the Middle East and North Africa. Now, an enormous new digital research project is fundamentally changing the way we look at that antique infrastructure. The international academic team behind Itiner-e has created the first high-resolution open-data set mapping the entirety of the Roman Empire’s road network. In…

US President Donald Trump said Republicans in the House of Representatives should vote to release all  documents relating to the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. It is a rare example of Trump backtracking because of opposition within his own Republican Party. “House Republicans should vote to release the Epstein files, because we have nothing to hide,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform late on Sunday. “[I]t’s time to move on from this Democrat hoax perpetrated by radical left lunatics in order to deflect from the great success of the Republican Party,” he wrote. House to vote on Epstein files Congress is…

Ecuador’s voters have seemly rejected a proposal to allow the return of foreign military bases to help the South American nation combat drug cartels. Just over 60% of voters said “no” to the measure, according to a partial count with 80% of votes counted. “We respect the will of the Ecuadoran people,” President Daniel Noboa said in a short statement on X after the vote count showed the referendum was on track to fail. The question about foreign military bases was one of four posed in a referendum on Sunday. Other questions posed to voters concern ending public funding for political…

Beverages bearing the name “gin” must contain alcohol, Europe’s top court declared on Thursday.  The VSW German business association had appealed to the court, saying that a product sold by PB VI Goods and called “Virgin Gin Alkoholfrei” (“Non-alcoholic Virgin Gin”) was in breach of a 2019 EU definition of gin.  This states that “gin should be produced by flavouring ethyl alcohol of agricultural origin with juniper berries, and the minimum alcoholic strength by volume of that ethyl alcohol must be 37.5%,” as the court put it in a press release.Juniper berries and 37.5% alcohol content are needed to meet the…

Eighty years after Adolf Hitler’s death, a new documentary by British public broadcaster Channel 4 claims to reveal medical facts about the dictator. “Hitler’s DNA: Blueprint of a Dictator” also attempts to explain his behavior based on genetic analysis. But from a scientific point of view, this is a highly questionable endeavor. Kallmann syndrome: The dictator’s rare disorder According to DNA sequencing, Hitler suffered from Kallmann syndrome, a rare genetic disorder that leads to lower production of sex hormones. This prevents or significantly delays puberty, in addition to causing low testosterone levels, an underdeveloped sense of smell (anosmia), undescended testicles, and…

The British government on Saturday announced far-reaching changes to the United Kingdom’s asylum policy in an attempt to reduce irregular immigration and counter the growing popularity of the far-right. Under the new plans, which are modelled on Denmark’s strict asylum system, refugee status for asylum-seekers arriving in the UK will be cut from five years to 30 months, while those granted asylum will have to wait 20 years to apply for permanent residency rather than the current five years. Those protections will be “regularly reviewed” and refugees will be encouraged to return to their home countries, once they are deemed…

Thousands of people took to the streets of cities across Mexico on Saturday to protest against government security policies which they say have failed to curb increasing violence in the country. The protests, which took place under the banner of “Generation Z” in the style of other such youth movements around the world, were prompted in particular by the murder of an anti-crime mayor earlier this month. “Carlos did not die; the government killed him,” chanted demonstrators in Mexico City, referring to the late mayor of Uruapan in the western state of Michoacan, who was shot dead at a public Day…

Prague is inextricably linked to Franz Kafka, one of the best-known German-language authors in the world. Born in the Czech capital in 1883, Kafka attracts many visitors to Prague even 100 years after his death. Kafka was part of the city’s German-speaking Jewish minority and wrote novels, short stories and letters in German, including the world-famous “The Metamorphosis” and “The Trial.” Fans of the author can go on Kafka-related tours that take in the various stations of his life or visit sights such as the Statue of Franz Kafka, the house where he was born or the Franz Kafka Museum.The Statue of…

When Starbucks opened its first store in Beijing in 1999, it wasn’t just selling coffee; it was selling Western aspirations to China’s rising middle class. The Seattle-based giant expanded rapidly to dominate China’s premium coffee scene. That early-mover advantage has, however, since eroded. Chinese competitors like Luckin Coffee and Manner have overtaken Starbucks in store count and captured market share, thanks to aggressive pricing, mobile integration and a sharper understanding of Chinese consumer habits. Luckin drives more than 90% of sales via its app, while Starbucks still relies on in-store traffic. The Financial Times reported recently that Starbucks’ China revenues plunged nearly 19% from 2021 to 2024 to $3 billion (€2.58 billion). The coffee retailer’s market…