Astthor odinn, the Reykjavik-based hip hop/experimental artist, has been shortlisted for the i-Mego TopTrakz Challenge; a new European competition designed to showcase the best talent amongst European unsigned bands. Read the full story

The former managers of the Icelandic commercial banks and the Central Bank of Iceland were yesterday awarded the Ig Nobel Prize for Economics at Harvard University in the USA. Read the full story

British rock legends Pink Floyd and American soprano Renee Fleming were honoured at this year’s Polar Music Prize in Stockholm. The musicians received their prizes from Sweden’s King Carl XVI Gustaf, according to cfrb.com.

The music award, which was created by ABBA manager Stig Anderson in 1989, pays homage to the world’s greatest pop and classical musicians. This year, Roger Waters and Nick Mason of Pink Floyd accepted the USD 157,000 award at the Stockholm Concert Hall. Swedish Prime Minister Fredrick Reinfeldt commented on the pioneering rock bank, “[their work was] a monumental contribution … and captured the mood and spirit of a whole generation in their reflections and attitudes.”

Read the full story

Knocking off the two-time reigning title holder from Japan, Ochi (Dainoji) Yosuke, an American named Hot Lixx Hulahan strutted his stuff and won the 2008 Air Guitar Championships in Oulu, Finland, TodayOnline reports. Hot Lixx’s prize for ripping solos on an imaginary guitar was a genuine Finnish-made Flying Finn electric guitar.

Hot Lixx, whose real name is Craig Billmeier, adapted his stage name from the television series M.A.S.H. and its character Hot Lips Hulahan, the sexy co-star head nurse. Sporting shockingly tight black pants, satin shirt and a red tie, Hot Lixx destroyed the competition with an air guitar performance that seemed to summon the spirit of Eddie Van Halen himself.

Read the full story

Omar Ragnarsson, Icelandic documentary filmmaker and former national television journalist, has been named as the winner of the Seacology Environmental Prize 2008 for his campaign to save Iceland’s wild highlands from the recently completed Karahnjukar hydroelectric project.

The prize has been awarded since 1992 to individuals making a great personal contribution to the preservation of landscapes and species in island environments around the world.

Seacology has awarded the prize to activists from Indonesia, Papua New Guinea and Hawaii, among others, but this is the first time the prize has been awarded for work in Europe.

Omar Ragnarsson will formally receive the prize at a ceremony in San Francisco on 2 October.

Grimur Hakonarson’s celebrated short film, Braedrabylta, picked up three more film awards recently bringing to a total of 14 awards this film has collected so far.

On the weekend of the 14th and 15th of June the director received three awards in three different countries while he was in Spain to witness his masterpiece collecting the youth jury prize at the Huesca short film festival.

At the same time he received news that the film had also won the grand prize at the Kartkofil Short Film Festival in Bosnia, and was later informed it had also won the Grand Prize at the Milan Gay & Lesbian Film Festival in Italy.

It all came as a surprise for Hakonarson who was apparently unaware that the film had been entered into the latter two competitions.

“When I got the phone call from Bosnia it stopped being funny. I had no idea that my film even was at those festivals in Bosnia and Milan” Hakonarson said, obviously very surprised.

Braedrabylta follow the story of two gay men in rural Iceland, reluctant to admit they are attracted to each other, and embroiled in a competition of glima, the unique Icelandic wrestling sport, to cover their affection. “Braedrabylta” (literally, brother tumble) is part of the wrestling vocabulary where both contenders fall to the ground and no one wins.

Generic drug manufacturer Actavis in Serbia has been awarded a number of certificates for product quality, the environment and occupational health and safety.

The Iceland-based generic drug manufacturer received the ISO and OHSAS awards at a recent presentation ceremony in Belgrade. The certificates were issued by SGS, an international inspection, testing and certification company.

Actavis received certificates for the international standards ISO 9001:2000 (quality) and ISO 14001 (environment), as well as OHSAS 18001 (occupational health and safety).

“Great teamwork and the efforts of all our employees have brought our company to the highest European quality, environmental and health and safety standards,” said Goran Stojilkovic, Managing Director of Actavis in Serbia. “We are proud of our company’s commitment to developing environmental awareness in the local community,” he added.

Actavis is a leading generic drugs manufacturer which specialises in the development, production and sale of generic pharmaceuticals. Based in Iceland, the company has operations in 40 countries and 11,000 employees.

For more information on Actavis visit www.actavis.com

Nordic bank Glitnir has announced that its CEO Larus Welding has been named Person of the Year 2008 by the readers of Intrafish, the world’s largest seafood publication.
In their reasoning for the nomination, Intrafish highlighted Glitnir‘s extensive expertise in the seafood industy. The bank has formed a team of specialist bankers who provide financial solutions to seafood clients all around the world.
The editors at IntraFish narrowed the Person of the Year nominees down to eight, but then left it up to readers to decide the final winners.
Having lent more than USD 3 billion (EUR 1.9 billion) to the seafood sector in recent years, it is expected that Glitnir will continue to increase lending in accordance with the pace of consolidation in the seafood sector.
Larus Welding is head of the growing Icelandic / Norwegian bank at a time when the group is earning a reputation for being “the seafood industry’s bank,” according to Intrafish.
The newspaper formally announced the results at the European Seafood Exposition in Brussels at the end of April.
For further information, visit the Glitnir Seafood website.

The Hindu News Update Service recently reported that Iceland’s President, Dr Olafur Ragnar Grimsson, will soon be the recipient of the 2007 Jawaharlal Nehru Award for International Understanding.

The award will be presented to the President along with a trophy, a citation and prize money worth 5 million Rupees.

Grimsson was chosen by a jury led by Vice President Hamid Ansari.

For the past 25 years, Iceland’s current president has worked closely with India, first visiting the country as a Member of Parliament in 1983. He is currently serving his third term as Iceland’s head of state.

Grimsson’s important international work includes serving as chairman and international president of the International Association of Parliamentarians for Global Action (PGA).

The PGA was responsible for the “Six Nations Peace Initiative” which lasted for five years beginning in 1984 and in which prominent politicians such as the late Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi participated.

The Jawaharlal Nehru Award for International Understanding was founded in 1965 and has been given annually by the Government of India since that time to people “for their outstanding contribution to the promotion of international understanding, goodwill and friendship among peoples of the world”.

Martin Luther King Junior was the second ever recipient of the award, which was given in his name posthumously. Other famous recipients include Mother Teresa, in 1969, Nelson Mandela, in 1979, and Aung San Suu Kyi in 1993.