A man suspected of being a member of the notorious gang of jewel thieves has been arrested in Spain.
The group has carried out raids on many high end jewellery shops, including a number on the French Riviera as well as London, Tokyo and Dubai, robbing some £100 million worth of gems.
The next tranche of money from the EC’s Community Support Framework heading to the Algarve aims to support people and businesses rather than to shovel money at infrastructure projects and buildings.
The Chairman of the Committee for Coordination and Regional Development in the Algarve (CCDR) David Santos today revealed how these new EU funds will be used in the Algarve in the 2014 to 2020 period, but declined to specify projects until after a meeting of the Regional Council on February 17th.
A study analysing over 11,000 appointments in Portugal’s public administration has concluded that it is still a case of 'jobs for the boys' for the ruling classes with posts being handed out in order to control public administration, and as rewards.
The study coordinator, Patricia Silva from Aveiro University said that the 'jobs for the boys' problem stems from two motivations in central government. Firstly a desire to control and execute government policy, and secondly in reward for past services or to ensure services will be rendered in the future.
Two more churches in Faro and Tavira have been classified as monuments of public interest, according to a notice published in the Official Gazette.
One is the church of São Pedro in Faro, dating back to 1518 "then consisting of a small chapel founded by fishermen living in the Ribeira district," and was rebuilt by the Order of Santiago in the second half of the sixteenth century.
The other is the Church of São José do Hospital (or of the Espírito Santo) in Tavira, "a rare specimen in the Algarve of a baroque octagonal church."
Publishing group Open Media, the company behind the Algarve Resident newspaper and the Essential group of magazines, now has a 90% share in Editurismo Lda, the company that publishes the monthly German magazine Entdecken Sie Algarve (Discover the Algarve).
The deal includes the monthly bilingual English/German language magazine Algarve Vida, which merged with Entdecken Sie Algarve last year. Arne Steingräber, former managing director and one of the previous owners, retains a 10% shareholding in Editurismo.
The state prosecutor in the judicial district of Lisbon claims that in 2013 a conviction rate of 68.82% was achieved in cases of corruption and related crimes, according to a report released today .
The activity report from the Attorney General for the Lisbon district states that in the last four years, there have been 402 charges of corruption and similar financial crimes, and in completed cases, 71.87% of them have resulted in convictions. The acquittal rate was 28.13% .
The UK government is set to clamp down on free access for some expats to local health care.
As part of its cost-savings initiatives, the UK may end the facility which allows UK expats under the state retirement age and not in employment to obtain free treatment in a number of their European countries of residence.
The EU is likely to approve a genetically modified maize variety for cultivation.
The approval will come after years have passed since its previous sanction of another type of maize, the only GM crop grown in the EU.
