The Icelandic government met yesterday about a Supreme Court decision that foreign currency car loans are illegal. Read the full story

Jonas Moody, an American who has lived and worked in Iceland for six years, has been told he is not entitled to unemployment benefit now that he has lost his job. His story has been featured on RUV television and mbl.is. Read the full story

The president of Iceland, Olafur Ragnar Grimsson will visit Bangladesh from 26 to 30 August to attend a climate change conference at Dhaka University.

Grimsson’s visit will be the first time a serving Icelandic president has visited Bangladesh, but will be considered a personal visit rather than an official state visit.

“Iceland’s president will arrive on the night of August 26. It is a private visit rather than an official tour,” foreign adviser Iftekhar Ahmed Chowdhury told bdnews24.com.

The six-day conference on climate change and food security in South Asia is jointly organised by Dhaka University and the Ohio State University and will take place between 25 and 30 August.

“The president will be provided the security which a head of state enjoys,” foreign secretary Md Touhid Hossain told bdnews24.com, going on to state that foreign and home ministry officials had met to discuss security arrangements for the visit.

Bradford & Bingley International, a specialist provider of offshore savings accounts for British expats, has announced it will leave the interest rate of its top online savings account unchanged, despite two recent cuts in the Bank of England base rate.

The online eSaver account will retain its 6.40 percent interest rate for expatriate savers investing from GBP 1,000. The high rate is available on savings accounts for British expats who do not exceed three withdrawals during each tax year. Those making four or more withdrawals are offered interest at 5.90 percent, which remains 0.90 percent above the current Bank of England base rate.

“The offshore market has become very competitive and we are proud to be able to offer our customers one of the best rates available for easy access savings,” said Lynette Byrne, Acting Managing Director of Bradford & Bingley International.

“The added convenience of being able to operate this account online 24 hours a day makes it an exciting proposition that we are delighted to be able to offer British Expatriates and increasingly customers from the Isle of Man and Channel Islands,” she added.

Bradford & Bingley International is based on the Isle of Man and specialises in savings accounts for the British expatriate community. More information on BBI and its eSaver online savings account is available at www.bbi.co.im.

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Dream Homes WorldWide recently announced it would be expanding its business into Scandinavia in 2008. The international off-plan real estate services are now offered through domain extensions in Denmark and Norway. In addition, the company recently opened an office in Copenhagen.

The Managing Director of Dream Homes WorldWide Scandinavia is Swedish-born Johan Lindgren. He said: “Scandinavians are making a switch from lifestyle purchases to becoming very investment focused when it comes to buying property overseas and for this reason they are finding markets such as Dubai particularly interesting over-and-above more holiday-orientated countries such as Turkey and Spain.”

According to Lindgren, the vast majority of the leads handled by the office in Copenhagen are for properties in Dubai. Lindgren affirmed that Dubai was one of the safest places in the world to invest.

Dream Homes has several services which it has specifically developed which set it apart from its competition. The company’s Securinvest policy protects customers by requiring all relevant paperwork, including documentation, licenses and bank guarantees to be in place and verified before they have access to the project.

“Dream Homes WorldWide Scandinavia covers a spectrum from Germany to Turkey, Dubai and Brazil, and of course brings several years of successful trading to the table. It will not be long before our business becomes a byword for off-plan real estate for the Scandinavian people,” said Lindgren.

Further satellite offices are planned in Oslo, Stockholm and Helsinki.