Today in Denmark: A roundup of the news on Friday
No criminal record for man who raised US flag at home, Danes rescued after whale attack on boat and mother and children evacuated from Syrian camp. Here are the leading news stories in Denmark on Friday.
Danes rescued after boat hits whale in Pacific
Eight Danes were rescued after their sailboat capsized due to a collision with at least one whale in the Pacific ocean, authorities said yesterday afternoon.
A girl on the vessel used a satellite phone to call her father, who alerted Denmark's search and rescue authority JRCC, the Danish Defence Ministry said in a statement.
The girl told her father that the 51-foot sailboat "had capsized after colliding with one or two whales", the ministry said, adding that "the eight Danes were safe in the lifeboat".
They were picked up by a fishing vessel between Peru and French Polynesia and later transferred to a container ship.
The ship is scheduled to reach Papeete in French Polynesia on June 26th, according to maritime monitoring site Vessel Finder.
Vocabulary: kæntret – capsized
Mother and two children evacuated from Syrian prison camp
A mother and her two children, all with Danish nationality or nationality claims, have been evacuated from the Kurdish-run camp al-Roj in northeaster Syria, used to house former Islamic State (Isis) militants and their families and sympathisers, the Foreign Ministry said in a statement early this morning.
The three arrived in Denmark late last night, where the mother was arrested on laws related to involvement with a terror organisation and travelling to a conflict zone. The children are now under municipal care and are still with their mother, according to the ministry statement.
In March, the Danish supreme court, Højesteret, overruled a 2020 decision to revoke the citizenship of a Danish-Iranian woman who travelled to Syria in support of Isis, meaning the woman could now be repatriated from al-Roj. However, that woman has since declined to return to Denmark in an apparent change of mind. She is not the same person as the woman evacuated on Thursday.
Vocabulary: evakuering – evacuation
SAS and 16 other airlines accused of greenwashing
Several European airlines, including Scandinavia’s SAS, have been accused of breaking EU rules by presenting themselves as more climate-friendly than they actually are – known as greenwashing.
European consumer organisation BEUC has submitted a complaint to the EU Commission over the airlines.
“Claims that paying extra credits can ‘offset’, ‘neutralise’, or ‘compensate’ the CO2 emissions of a flight are factually incorrect as the climate benefits of offsetting activities are highly uncertain, while the harm caused by the CO2 emissions from air travel is certain,” BEUC said in one of a number of points made in a statement on its website.
“We urge authorities to take the matter into their hands and crack down on this greenwashing practice seriously misleading consumers,” Ursula Pachl, BEUC’s Deputy Director General commented in the statement.
Vocabulary: forbrugerorganisation – consumer rights group
Supreme Court acquits Danish man who raised Stars and Stripes
The Supreme Court has ruled that a man from Kolding did not break the law when he raised the United States national flag, the Stars and Stripes, at his home in April 2018.
Many homes in Denmark have flagpoles but it is generally only permitted to raise the Danish flag, Dannebrog, unless dispensation is given to raise other flags. For example, special permission was given several times last year to raise the Ukrainian flag at private Danish homes and businesses in support of Ukraine.
Laws against flying foreign flags in Denmark go back to a royal order issued by King Frederik VI in 1833. But the Supreme Court found that the law gave no basis for sentencing the man in the case, which has spent several years in the appeal system since an original ruling at the Kolding District Court.
Vocabulary: at hejse flaget – to raise the flag
Comments
See Also
Danes rescued after boat hits whale in Pacific
Eight Danes were rescued after their sailboat capsized due to a collision with at least one whale in the Pacific ocean, authorities said yesterday afternoon.
A girl on the vessel used a satellite phone to call her father, who alerted Denmark's search and rescue authority JRCC, the Danish Defence Ministry said in a statement.
The girl told her father that the 51-foot sailboat "had capsized after colliding with one or two whales", the ministry said, adding that "the eight Danes were safe in the lifeboat".
They were picked up by a fishing vessel between Peru and French Polynesia and later transferred to a container ship.
The ship is scheduled to reach Papeete in French Polynesia on June 26th, according to maritime monitoring site Vessel Finder.
Vocabulary: kæntret – capsized
Mother and two children evacuated from Syrian prison camp
A mother and her two children, all with Danish nationality or nationality claims, have been evacuated from the Kurdish-run camp al-Roj in northeaster Syria, used to house former Islamic State (Isis) militants and their families and sympathisers, the Foreign Ministry said in a statement early this morning.
The three arrived in Denmark late last night, where the mother was arrested on laws related to involvement with a terror organisation and travelling to a conflict zone. The children are now under municipal care and are still with their mother, according to the ministry statement.
In March, the Danish supreme court, Højesteret, overruled a 2020 decision to revoke the citizenship of a Danish-Iranian woman who travelled to Syria in support of Isis, meaning the woman could now be repatriated from al-Roj. However, that woman has since declined to return to Denmark in an apparent change of mind. She is not the same person as the woman evacuated on Thursday.
Vocabulary: evakuering – evacuation
SAS and 16 other airlines accused of greenwashing
Several European airlines, including Scandinavia’s SAS, have been accused of breaking EU rules by presenting themselves as more climate-friendly than they actually are – known as greenwashing.
European consumer organisation BEUC has submitted a complaint to the EU Commission over the airlines.
“Claims that paying extra credits can ‘offset’, ‘neutralise’, or ‘compensate’ the CO2 emissions of a flight are factually incorrect as the climate benefits of offsetting activities are highly uncertain, while the harm caused by the CO2 emissions from air travel is certain,” BEUC said in one of a number of points made in a statement on its website.
“We urge authorities to take the matter into their hands and crack down on this greenwashing practice seriously misleading consumers,” Ursula Pachl, BEUC’s Deputy Director General commented in the statement.
Vocabulary: forbrugerorganisation – consumer rights group
Supreme Court acquits Danish man who raised Stars and Stripes
The Supreme Court has ruled that a man from Kolding did not break the law when he raised the United States national flag, the Stars and Stripes, at his home in April 2018.
Many homes in Denmark have flagpoles but it is generally only permitted to raise the Danish flag, Dannebrog, unless dispensation is given to raise other flags. For example, special permission was given several times last year to raise the Ukrainian flag at private Danish homes and businesses in support of Ukraine.
Laws against flying foreign flags in Denmark go back to a royal order issued by King Frederik VI in 1833. But the Supreme Court found that the law gave no basis for sentencing the man in the case, which has spent several years in the appeal system since an original ruling at the Kolding District Court.
Vocabulary: at hejse flaget – to raise the flag
Join the conversation in our comments section below. Share your own views and experience and if you have a question or suggestion for our journalists then email us at [email protected].
Please keep comments civil, constructive and on topic – and make sure to read our terms of use before getting involved.
Please log in here to leave a comment.