Icelandic fishing company playing towns off against each other?

People’s interest was piqued in the north-western Icelandic town of Isafjordur this morning when one of its biggest and best-known fishing trawlers unloaded its catch in neighbouring Bolungarvik following a decision by Isafjordur town that the fishing company opposed.

The ship, Pall Palsson (IS 102), is owned and operated by Hradfrystihusid Gunnvor (also known as HG); which is the Westfjords region’s biggest company.

When the ship failed to turn up at Isafjordur harbour this morning, instead offloading in Bolungarvik, rumours quickly started that the company was trying to punish the Isafjardarbaer municipality for throwing its support behind a proposal from

Taxi boss spanked for Christmas bottom teaser

A Swedish taxi firm is being investigated for sexism after its CEO asked staff to indentify the company's telephonists by their bare bottoms. According to local newspaper Nerikes Allehanda, the boss of what has been described as a "well known" cab company in Orebro, central Sweden, sent his staff a Christmas email greeting, challenging them to match photographs of rumps to the right receptionists.

The multiple choice brain-teaser was apparently set up after the CEO managed to persuade female staff members to bend over a desk provocatively while wearing nothing but a G-string.

The unorthodox festive greeting was not,

To Be Or Not To Be

Will October 6th, 2008 (the day Iceland's luckless PM Mr. Haarde, asked God to help his poor nation since he himself could not) live on in our collective memory as a "day of infamy"—a sort of Icelandic Pearl Harbour?

Pearl Harbour is today remembered by Americans because of Japan's aerial bombardment on the US naval station. And because it led to the Americans' involvement in the Second World War. Wars are inevitably both destabilising and devastating. People not only lose their property—but their lives.

In our case, Iceland's economic collapse ("hrunið") may yet claim a few lives, but in most cases the losses are less tangible. Many have lost their jobs, their property, their savings. Some have even lost their hope. Then there are those who have already voted with their feet—and emigrated.

Some say our greatest loss is our reputation as an honest and trustworthy people. Because in our case, we did not suffer an attack from an outside enemy. In our case the enemy came from within. That is what makes it all the more painful. And it explains, partly at least, why so many find it almost unbearable to face the truth: We have only ourselves to blame—and no one else.

'THE THREE WISE MEN'

The best thing that has happened to us after the crash is the truth-com- mission-report by 'the three wise men'. Nine volumes and almost three thousand pages, including appended documents on the web. The truth and nothing but the truth. They were asked to tell us the truth about the causes of the collapse and to find out who was responsible. And they did just that— fairly and squarely. They spelled it all out in painstaking detail.

The collapse was caused by a combination of fraudulent business schemes and irresponsible politicians. And by the way: the majority of Icelandic voters cannot be acquitted either. Time and again they voted for parties and politicians who did not deserve the trust put in them. Again and again. And the nouveaux riche buffoons—flaunting their ill-begotten wealth—were extolled as the nation's best sons. How many times did the President of Iceland, Mr. Grímsson—the hyper-active chef-de-protocol of the plutocrats—ceremoniously accord them the highest decorations of state, making it impossible for honest people to accept such commendations in the future? The critics' voices were simply drowned, and the warning signals—and there were plenty of them— were ignored.

No wonder how many are simply unable to face the truth: Out of 147 individuals in leading positions in government, political parties, the Central Bank, the civil service and banks and business corporations etc., questioned by the truth-commission, not a single one admitted any responsibility at all, not to mention expressing a sense of guilt or regret. "Not my department" was the standard refrain of those haughty elitists. This seems to be a nation where the blind lead the deaf.

But ours was not only the lethal cocktail of dishonest business and incompetent politics. Iceland was by design meant to become a shining example of the neo-conservative utopia; a tax haven for the super-rich with minimum government interference in the free play of market forces. If something were to go astray, the market forces could be trusted to correct it by themselves—or so they believed. This was not only the professed ideology of the Independence Party leadership; it was the declared policy of the IP-led governments that steered us, slowly but surely, into the crash.

Iceland's fall in 2008 was the direct consequence of this pre-meditated policy. It was not the failure of capital- ism as such. Capitalism cannot function at all without direction, legislation and constant supervision by

Scrapbook killer pictured Danish girls

Two young women who featured in the scrapbook of notorious American serial killer, Rodney Alcala, were Danish but did not become his victims, it has emerged. The two women, who were teenagers at the time, were photographed by the killer outside Copenhagen's Central Station when he visited Denmark in the 1970s.

Also known as the 'Dating Game killer' due to an appearance he made on a TV show of the same name, Alcala, 66, is currently awaiting execution on Death Row in California after being found guilty of murdering a 12 year-old girl and four young women between 1977

Bright Icelandic MP requests end to gloom

Why is it that the curtains are always closed in the debating chamber of Iceland’s Althingi parliament? This was one of the questions asked during debating yesterday; and the question was followed with a poem.

It was one of the longest serving parliamentarians, Arni Johnsen, who directly asked the president of Althingi why it is that the curtains are always kept closed.

“It makes a difference for people to feel good in this chamber; there is already enough heavy air,” he said, before going on to answer his own question.

“I know full well that the explanation is that the

UK court charges Iceland’s first lady

Dorrit Moussaieff; jewellery designer, socialite and wife of the Icelandic president; has been ordered to pay GBP 1,000 and been banned from entering her London neighbour’s home for two years due to an argument over a broken water pipe.

Tiggy Butler took Moussaieff to court over water damage in her flat, which is directly below Moussaieff’s — where the leak took place. The Daily Mail reports that the first lady intends to appeal the judgement.

Tiggy Butler is a former lover of Ryanair founder Tony Ryan, and the court case is the latest chapter in a difficult relationship between the

Swedish Police shoot suspected murderer to death

Police in the Swedish city of Eskilstuna opened fire on a suspected murderer last night, according to Dagens Nyheter.

Neighbours called the police after having heard a violent struggle in an apartment belonging to a 51 year-old woman in the neighbourhood of Froslunda.

Upon arrival, the dispatched police patrol found the 51 year-old woman dead and her 26 year-old son armed with knives. The man was repeatedly ordered to surrender the knives but reportedly refused to obey. Police then opened fire on him and he fell to the ground. He was rushed to hospital with severe injuries but was declared