Around a third of respondents to a recent survey want Iceland’s president, Olafur Ragnar Grimsson to resign from his post. Read the full story

The people of Finland seem to be prepared to accept whatever political decisions its government needs to make to fight the growing threat of climate change, according to research conducted over the past year analysing public attitude. The study, conducted by Kuulas Millward Brown, indicates that Finns are more eager to tackle the issue of climate change than ever before. Read the full story

Iceland is among the ten most interesting destinations in the world, according to the charge card company American Express. They put a great deal of emphasis on the comprehensive tourist services Iceland provides.

It was, however, Icelandic music that pushed the country into the top ten. Read the full story

Around six in every ten Icelanders trust Johanna Sigurdardottir, their new Prime Minister, very much, according to a recent poll conducted by the Market and Media Research Group and reported on RUV.is. Read the full story

Icelanders were this morning surprised and somewhat amused to see that their Prime Minister, Geir H. Haarde was included on The Guardian’s list of the top 25 people responsible for the global economic crisis.

Haarde is widely held responsible for Iceland’s crisis, as recent stories on this very website confirm – but that he is responsible for bringing the whole planet to its knees comes as a slight eyebrow-raiser. Read the full story

A scandal involving election campaign funding dispersement has dented the confidence of the electorate, with more than 50 per cent cited in a recent poll as having lost faith in the country’s politicians as a result.

The poll commissioned by the Finnish Broadcasting Company (STT) from research company Taylor Nelson Sofres, also revealed that 30 per cent also had less confidence in the media than before the scandal.

Adding further to the slump, Centre Party supporters at the Joensuu party conference said their confidence in the media had fallen, which is consistent with similar feelings among Left Alliance supporters in a separate snap survey.

According to a recent poll published in the daily newspaper Kaleva last week, the citizens of Finland are highly satisfied with their current President. Tarja Halonen won a clear majority of the votes in a recent popularity poll.

Taylor Nelson Sofres conducted the poll and found that 73 percent of the population were satisfied with Tarja Halonen and her work as the President. Among the satisfied respondents, 23 percent claimed to be very satisfied while half of those surveyed were fairly satisfied. Only 11 per cent of those surveyed claimed to be dissatisfied with President Halonen.

Although the poll indicates a slight drop in the President’s popularity, the numbers of those questioned are increasing slightly: over 900 people were interviewed over two weeks in April and experts believe that there is a three per cent margin for error in the survey in either direction.

President Halonen was elected into her first six year term of office in 2000. She was re-elected in January 2006. She is the first female to be elected to the office in Finland. In December 2003, one poll indicated that she had 88 per cent of the public’s approval, the highest ratings she has achieved in office to date.

President Halonen speaks Finnish, Swedish, English, German, French, Afrikaans, and Estonian.