The majority of the National Bank of Poland‘s rate-setting panel voted to cut interest rates by 0.25 percentage points for the third time in a row at their January meeting without ruling out further cuts to prop up economic growth, but the more inflation-averse members advocated an end to the easing cycle, as shown by the meeting’s minutes published Thursday.
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Fox Business Headlines
Tag Archives: Poland
Polish prime minister hospitalized with infection
The office of Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk says he has been hospitalized with an acute infection of the respiratory duct.
The office said Thursday via Twitter that Tusk will however be temporarily discharged from the hospital on Friday to attend a voting session in Parliament.
The 55-year-old Tusk is Poland‘s longest serving premier, at the helm of the center-liberal government since 2007. He was re-elected for a second term in 2011.
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Fox World News
Polish unemployment rate rises to 13.4 percent
Poland‘s unemployment rate climbed to 13.4 percent in December, from 12.9 percent the previous month, due to an economic slowdown and a seasonal loss of many outdoor jobs.
The Main Statistical Office said Thursday that some 2.14 million people in this nation of 38 million were without a job at the end of December.
Unemployment usually rises in Poland in winter, when outdoor jobs are lost due to snow and low temperatures. Additionally, Europe‘s economic jitters have affected Poland, where growth is expected to slow to about 1.5 percent this year, from an estimated 2.3 percent in 2012 and 4.3 percent in 2011.
Some industries, such as car manufacturing, have been hit by massive layoffs and more jobs are to be lost this year.
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Fox World News
Former Polish church head, Cardinal Glemp, dies
An official says Cardinal Jozef Glemp, the head of Poland‘s influential Roman Catholic church from 1981 to 2004 — a time when it played a historic role in the fight against communism — has died at the age of 83.
Jozef Kloch, a church spokesman, said in a statement that Glemp died Wednesday evening in Warsaw. Glemp had been ill for many years, and the Polish news agency PAP said he had lung cancer.
Glemp oversaw the church at a critical time in its history and that of Poland.
He was the primate for most of the papacy of the Polish-born Pope John Paul II, a time when the church enjoyed huge influence in Poland.
The church was a lead opponent of communism, which Poland shed in 1989.
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Fox World News
Buoyed by surging demand, Ikea to expand globally
Ikea says it plans to open 25 new outlets this year, recruiting 75,000 workers as its global market share in 2012 increased with annual net profit growing 8 percent to €3.2 billion ($4.3 billion) in 2012.
The world’s largest furniture retailer on Wednesday reported revenue of €27.5 billion for the 2012 fiscal year, up from €26 billion a year earlier. The company does not release quarterly figures.
Ikea Group CEO Mikael Ohlsson said most growth last year was in China, Russia and Poland, closely followed by the United States and Germany.
Ikea said it had “continued lowering prices for customers and further improved product quality.”
The Sweden-based company has 338 stores employing some 154,000 people in more than 40 countries. The new outlets will mainly be in Asia.
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Fox World News
Oracle's Java patch contains new holes, researchers warn
Researchers from Security Explorations, a Poland-based vulnerability research firm, claim to have found two new vulnerabilities in Java 7 Update 11 that can be exploited to bypass the software’s security sandbox and execute arbitrary code on computers.
Oracle released Java 7 Update 11 last Sunday as an emergency security update in order to block a zero-day exploit used by cybercriminals to infect computers with malware.
Security Explorations successfully confirmed that a complete Java security sandbox bypass can be still be achieved under Java 7 Update 11 (JRE version 1.7.0_11-b21) by exploiting two new vulnerabilities discovered by the company’s researchers, Adam Gowdiak, the company’s founder, said Friday in a message sent to the Full Disclosure mailing list. The vulnerabilities were reported to Oracle on Friday, together with working proof-of-concept exploit code, he said.
According to Security Explorations‘ disclosure policy, technical details about the vulnerabilities will not be publicly disclosed until the vendor issues a patch.
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Source: FULL ARTICLE at PCWorld
Researchers find critical vulnerabilities in Java 7 Update 11
Researchers from Security Explorations, a Poland-based vulnerability research firm, claim to have found two new vulnerabilities in Java 7 Update 11 that can be exploited to bypass the software's security sandbox and execute arbitrary code on computers.
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Computerworld Latest
Mother of Poland's Kaczynski twins dies at 86
Jadwiga Kaczynska, the mother of the identical twin brothers who shaped public life in Poland for many years, has died. She was 86.
Kaczynska’s death Thursday was announced by Law and Justice, the conservative party led by her surviving son, Jaroslaw Kaczynski.
Lech and Jaroslaw Kaczynski were activists in the democracy struggle that helped topple communism in 1989. They eventually formed Law and Justice, which represents conservative and patriotic values.
From 2006-2007 the two simultaneously held the country’s two top political jobs, with Lech as president and Jaroslaw as prime minister.
When Lech Kaczynski died in the crash of the presidential plane in Russia in 2010, Kaczynska was critically ill in a hospital and wasn’t given the devastating news for six weeks.
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Fox World News
Poland fires Warsaw stock exchange chief
The governing body of the Warsaw Stock Exchange has fired the company’s chief, Ludwik Sobolewski, and appointed his successor.
Sobolewski was suspended in December following reports that he and a subordinate were involved in soliciting funds from companies listed on the stock exchange for a commercial movie featuring Sobolewski’s girlfriend.
Poland‘s Treasury Ministry, the majority owner of the exchange, suspected Sobolewski had abused his position in business unrelated to the stock exchange. Minister Mikolaj Budzanowski has asked the state Anti-Corruption Office to investigate.
On Thursday, an Extraordinary Assembly of the Warsaw Stock Exchange shareholders fired Sobolewski and appointed Adam Maciejewski as the new president.
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Fox World News
Report: 13-year-old boy swipes dad's Mercedes, drives across Europe
Filed under: Etc., Europe, Mercedes-Benz
After an argument with his adoptive parents that resulted in them taking away his mobile phone, an angry 13-year-old boy ran away from his home in Italy and headed straight to Poland to meet his biological sister. But instead of taking the train or hitching a ride, like most on the run, the young man (an accomplished go-kart racer and car enthusiast) grabbed the keys to his father’s Mercedes-Benz and jumped behind the wheel for an impromptu road trip.
With less than 200 euros (about $270) in his wallet and a passport in his pocket, the youngster managed to put more than 500 miles between himself and his distraught parents, crossing two international borders in the process, before German police nabbed him just shy of the Polish border. According to reports, the vehicle was tracked – it wasn’t his driving that alerted authorities to his location.
Reunited with his mother and father, who traveled to Germany to retrieve both their son and the vehicle, the young man apologized and acknowledged his error. As a result of his actions, social workers will increase checks on the family and we can be sure his parents are now hiding the keys.
13-year-old boy swipes dad’s Mercedes, drives across Europe originally appeared on Autoblog on Wed, 16 Jan 2013 19:34:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Source: FULL ARTICLE at Autoblog
Youngest 'Schindler's List' survivor dies at 83
Leon Leyson, who was the youngest of 1,100 Jews saved from the Nazis by Oscar Schindler, has died in Southern California at 83.
His daughter, Stacy Wilfong, tells the Los Angeles Times (http://lat.ms/WUllpf ) that Leyson died Saturday in Whittier from lymphoma.
Leyson was nearly 10 when Germany invaded Poland in 1939. He lost two brothers during the Holocaust but was protected by Schindler and at 13 worked in his factory. Dubbed “Little Leyson,” he was so short that he stood on a box to operate machinery.
He later moved to the U.S. and taught at Huntington Park High School for 39 years.
Leyson rarely spoke of his experiences until the 1993 movie “Schindler’s List” sparked renewed interest. He then embarked on a public speaking career to share his story.
___
Information from: Los Angeles Times, http://www.latimes.com
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Fox US News
AP Interview: Poland to have shale gas law in 2013
Poland‘s Treasury Minister Mikolaj Budzanowski says a much-awaited law that will regulate shale gas production should be adopted this year, helping to develop the potentially lucrative sector.
Poland has been the most aggressive in Europe in pursuing shale gas, a form of natural gas that is trapped in rock and requires new technologies to extract. Environmental activists say the extraction process is highly polluting.
The government hopes shale gas will boost the economy, reduce dependence on Russian gas imports and cut energy prices. It estimates Poland‘s shale gas deposits may secure production for at least 25 years.
International companies are exploring for the gas but are waiting for the new law, which will regulate tax on production and terms of distribution, before they commit to a longer-term strategy.
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Fox World News
If Austerity Is So Awesome Why Hasn't Poland Tried It?
By Mark Adomanis, Contributor There are plenty of lessons from Poland‘s economic success, including the need for effective government regulation (Poland never had an out-of-control bubble like Lativa), the need for exchange rate flexibility, and the extreme importance of a country having its own central bank. These lessons are neither left wing nor right wing, Poland‘s government is actually quite conservative, they just aren’t the lessons that Aslund is interested in. Economics just isn’t a morality play, and no matter how often the Latvians cast themselves as the diligent and upstanding enforcers of austerity their economic performance over the past five years has still been lousy.
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Forbes Latest
Poland investigates artist's claim he used Holocaust ash to make painting
Polish prosecutors are investigating a Swedish artist’s claim that he used the ashes of Holocaust victims to make a painting, an act that could carry a prison term.
The artist, Carl Michael von Hausswolff, wrote on the website of the Bryder Gallery in Lund, Sweden, last year that he made a painting using ashes that he took from crematorium furnaces in Majdanek, a former Nazi German death camp located in eastern Poland, on a visit there in 1989.
Spokeswoman Beata Syk-Jankowska said Tuesday that prosecutors in the eastern city of Lublin have opened an investigation to check whether there is truth to the artist’s claim. She said there is no evidence and prosecutors are acting on media reports.
Swedish investigators will be asked for assistance in gathering evidence and questioning the artist, she said.
The small painting, named “Memory Works,” is made of broad vertical brown and gray strokes of brush that leave an impression of a tight group of people. It could prove very difficult to determine whether von Hausswolff used victims’ ashes in the painting or is staging a publicity stunt.
If he did use the ashes, it would likely be extremely offensive to Holocaust survivors and many others, including the Poles who were also targeted during World War II and are now preserving the memory of the victims. He also could be charged in Poland with desecrating human ashes and their resting place and face up to eight years in prison.
Between 1941 and 1944, some 150,000 people were held at the Majdanek camp. An estimated 80,000 of them died, most of whom were Jewish.
In 1989, there were still some human ashes remaining in furnaces from the war from the burning of the Nazi’s victims. Removing any ash would be a crime, but there were no security cameras on the site at the time to register such an action, Agnieszka Kowalczyk, a spokeswoman for the museum at the site, told The Associated Press.
The Majdanek museum and the Jewish community in Sweden have condemned von Hausswolff’s claim.
Martin Bryder, owner of the Bryder Gallery in Lund, confirmed to the AP on Tuesday that the painting was exhibited there for some three weeks in November and December. He declined to say anything about the artist, the painting or the scandal.
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Fox World News
Poland launches program to reduce traffic deaths
Poland is launching a government program to reduce traffic fatalities and improve its horrible road safety record.
In 2011, Poland had Europe‘s worst road safety statistics, with 110 deaths per 1 million citizens, or almost 4,200 people killed, Interior Minister Jacek Cichocki said Wednesday at the launch of the program. Traffic accidents cost Poland about $6.5 billion in 2012, including medical costs, pensions for families of victims and lost workers.
The program aims to toughen the country’s driving regulations, upgrade roads and increase the penalties for speeding to raise road safety to European Union standards. About 43 percent of accidents in Poland are caused by speeding, according to government figures.
The government wants to cut the number of deaths in half and the number of seriously injured 40 percent by the year 2020. Some 500,000 zlotys ($ 165,000) will be invested in road renovations this year.
The announcement came days after a journalist received a three-year prison term — subject to appeal — for causing the death of a colleague when he speeded and crashed a borrowed Ferrari in Warsaw in 2008. Many Poles believe that punishment was too lenient. Footage of the burning Ferrari aired on all news TV stations in Poland last week.
While traffic has rapidly increased in recent years, Poland has been slow in building highways and upgrading its narrow roads, a legacy of decades of communism, which did not encourage travel.
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Fox World News
Phone company pulls Lenin cartoon ads after Poles react with anger
By hnn
WARSAW, Poland — Vladimir Lenin is not considered funny in Poland.
A Polish mobile phone operator that used a cartoon image of the Russian communist revolutionary found itself barraged by angry feedback and responded this week by stopping its advertising campaign.
Older Poles remember the late Soviet leader for shaping a communist regime that killed millions and imposed mass terror in the Soviet Union. A communist regime was later imposed on Poles against their will by the Soviets after World War II…. [HNN editor’s note: The AP neglected to mention the Soviet-Polish War of 1919-1921, which Lenin was more directly involved in, as he had the distinct advantage of being alive when it broke out.]
Source:
AP
Source URL:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/mobile-phone-company-pulls-ads-using-lenin-cartoon-after-poles-react-with-anger/2013/01/08/bf69a678-599d-11e2-b8b2-0d18a64c8dfa_story.html
Date:
1-8-13
Source: FULL ARTICLE at History News Network – George Mason University
Poland investigating artist's claim he used Holocaust ashes in painting
Polish prosecutors have opened an investigation into a Swedish artist’s claim that he used the ashes of Holocaust victims to make a painting.
The artist, Carl Michael Hausswolf, wrote on the website of a gallery in Lund, Sweden, last year that he made a painting using ashes that he took from crematorium furnaces in Majdanek, a former Nazi German death camp located in eastern Poland, on a visit there in 1989.
Spokeswoman Beata Syk-Jankowska said Tuesday that local prosecutors have opened an investigation to check whether there is truth to his claim. She said there is no evidence and prosecutors are acting on media reports. Swedish investigators will be asked for assistance.
If found true, he could be charged in Poland with desecrating human ash or a resting place.
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Fox World News
Mobile phone ads with Lenin spark anger in Poland
Vladimir Lenin is not considered funny in Poland.
A Polish mobile phone operator that used a cartoon image of the Russian communist revolutionary found itself barraged by angry feedback and responded this week by stopping its advertising campaign.
Older Poles remember the late Soviet leader for shaping a communist regime that killed millions and imposed mass terror in the Soviet Union. A communist regime was later imposed on Poles against their will by the Soviets after World War II.
The company, Polska Telefonia Cyfrowa S.A., counted on younger Poles having shaken such associations, and recently started using a drawing of Lenin in the style of Soviet propaganda in poster and TV ads, with the command “Keep Talking!”
Heyah said late Monday on its Facebook page that it would pull the ads due to the outcry. It also said it had never intended offense.
Among those who protested was the Institute of National Remembrance, a state body that investigates communist-era crimes. Its director, Lukasz Kaminski, wrote in an open letter to the mobile operator that Lenin was “one of the biggest criminals” of the 20th century.
He said he was outraged that the company used the image of a man who was directly responsible for millions of deaths, including that of hundreds of thousands of Poles.
“It is irresponsible to trivialize mass crimes and their victims,” Kaminski said. “The social effects of this campaign could also be more dangerous because it is addressed to young people, among whom it builds positive associations with Lenin.”
A consumer rights group also urged people to complain to the company, a campaign it said resulted in about 1,000 letters. The Your Cause Association said using a “communist criminal” in marketing amounted to a bad joke.
It also said it would also gladly pay for history lessons for the members of the board of the phone company and the advertising agency that it used.
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Fox World News
Ireland Returns to Bond Market; Spanish, Portuguese Banks Sell Debt
Ireland tapped bond markets for the first time Tuesday since its bailout in November 2010, and Poland became the first government from continental Europe to issue debt in 2013.
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Fox Business Headlines
How do you know if you ran through a wall? Testing the nature of dark energy and dark matter
(Phys.org)—Researchers from Canada, California, and Poland have devised a straightforward way to test an intriguing idea about the nature of dark energy and dark matter. A global array of atomic magnetometers – small laboratory devices that can sense minute changes in magnetic fields – could signal when Earth passes through fractures in space known as domain walls. These structures could be the answer to the universe’s darkest mysteries.
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Phys.org