BRUSSELS/SION, Switzerland, March 16 (Reuters) -
Belgian military aircraft brought home the bodies of 22
children and six adults killed in a bus crash in Switzerland,
and the country observed a minute’s silence during a national
day of mourning on Friday.

White coffins were loaded into two Hercules transport
aircraft near the Swiss town of Sion and landed at a military
airport near Brussels from where undertakers collected them
after a short ceremony. A third plane returned with their
belongings.

SION, Switzerland/BRUSSELS (Reuters) – Belgian military aircraft began returning home the bodies of 22 children and six adults killed in a bus crash in Switzerland on Friday as the country prepared to observe a minute’s silence to remember the victims.

White coffins were loaded into Hercules transport aircraft near the Swiss town of Sion as police continued to investigate how the coach, carrying 52 passengers, crashed into the wall of a tunnel on Tuesday night.

SION, Switzerland/HEVERLEE, Belgium (Reuters) – Distraught parents flew to Switzerland on Wednesday after a bus carrying a Belgian school group home from a ski trip crashed into the wall of a Swiss tunnel, killing 22 children and six others.

Twenty-four passengers remained in hospital, including three children in Lausanne with critical injuries, but the other survivors were out of danger, officials said.

SIERRE, Switzerland/HEVERLEE, Belgium (Reuters) – Distraught parents flew to Switzerland on Wednesday after a bus carrying a Belgian school party home from a ski trip crashed into the wall of a Swiss tunnel, killing 22 children and six others.

Some of the parents, gathering at the primary schools in Belgium before boarding a military aircraft, did not know whether their children were dead or alive.

HEVERLEE, Belgium, March 14 (Reuters) – At morning
assembly on Wednesday, the children of St Lambertus school in
the Belgian town of Leuven learnt of the bus crash in the Swiss
mountains that killed a teacher and several of their classmates.

The bus, carrying 52 people, hit the side of a tunnel on the
way back from a school ski trip and slammed into a wall,
crushing the front third of the vehicle. Six of the 28 dead were
adults and the rest children, most of them 11 or 12 years old.

SIERRE, Switzerland/HEVERLEE, Belgium, March 14 (Reuters)
- A bus carrying a Belgian school party home from a ski trip
crashed into the wall of a tunnel in Switzerland late on
Tuesday, killing 28 people, including 22 children.

The bus, transporting 52 people, mostly school children aged
about 12 from the towns of Lommel and Heverlee in Belgium’s
Dutch-speaking Flanders region, crashed in the Swiss canton of
Valais, police told a news conference early on Wednesday.

BRUSSELS, March 7 (Reuters) – Belgians have been
seeking to solve a mystery – why do they pay more than their
neighbours in shops and for utilities when the European Union is
meant to be a single market delivering homogeneous pricing?

The central bank and international economic institutes have
warned for years about prices in Belgium, albeit more the price
of labour than of goods, although the two are linked.

BRUSSELS, Feb 22 (Reuters) – Bailed out Franco-Belgian
bank Dexia said it risked going out of business as it
reported a 2011 net loss of 11.6 billion euros ($15.4 billion),
hit by its break-up and exposure to Greek debt and other toxic
assets.

Dexia, the first European banking victim of the euro zone
debt crisis, said its continuation as a ‘going concern’ relied
on several factors – state guarantees of up to 90 billion euros
to allow it to borrow, its ability to pay for those guarantees
and European Commission approval of its restructuring plan.

BRUSSELS/LONDON (Reuters) – Fierce competition and sluggish markets make eastern European brewer StarBev a tough sell for its private-equity owner even if it offers potential long-term growth and a respected beer brand in Straropramen.

CVC Capital Partners wants to sell its brewing assets in nine countries, including the Czech Republic, Hungary and Romania, that it bought from Anheuser-Busch InBev (ABI.BR: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) in 2009, sources told Reuters late on Tuesday.

BRUSSELS/LONDON, Feb 22 (Reuters) – Fierce competition
and sluggish markets make eastern European brewer StarBev a
tough sell for its private-equity owner even if it offers
potential long-term growth and a respected beer brand in
Straropramen.

CVC Capital Partners wants to sell its brewing assets in
nine countries, including the Czech Republic, Hungary and
Romania, that it bought from Anheuser-Busch InBev (ABI.BR: Quote, Profile, Research) in
2009, sources told Reuters late on Tuesday. [ID:nL2E8DLGKQ]