The journalist, Erna Ýr Öldu­dótt­ir, has landed in Turkey and is going to Ukraine to witness the referendum in Donbas this weekend, where the vote is about whether these Russian occupied areas will be a part of Russia.

Icelanders have been in shock since yesterday when the police arrested four Icelandic men in their twenties under the suspicion of plotting a terrorist attack on the public and state institutions. Two of the men have remained in police custody.

The men who were arrested by the Special Forces yesterday have a role model in extreme nationalists in Scandinavia, such as the notorious Anders Breivik, who killed 77 young people on the 22nd of July in 2011, which to this day remains the biggest mass murder by a lone wolf in recent history.

Iceland's Prime Minister, Katrín Jak­obs­dótt­ir, met with Nancy Pelosi Speaker of the House of Representatives of the US Government in Capitol Hill in Washington. This is reported on the website of the Icelandic Government.

Iranians are now fighting a historical fight for human rights in the wake of the murder of the Iranian woman Mahsa Amini after she was arrested by the notorious “morality police” on September 13th, for not wearing her hijab correctly and showing too much of her face.

“This is a fund that is sponsored by the Russian state. That is all I know about it, but I am in good contact with the fund manager, a woman I have known for years, but she is one of the ministers of the self-governing area of Vasilkiv,” says Konráð Magnússon, but he sent today a letter to ten media companies in Iceland with an invitation to visit the Donbas region in Ukraine, where a referendum will take place next weekend.

The latter wind turbine in Þykkvabær is now down after the staff of Hringrás first cut the foundation with a welding equipment and then jacked up one side of the turbine until it toppled over.

A commercial building in Fiskislóð in Grandi in the western part of Reykjavík caught fire last night. The Fire Department was contacted at 3:22 AM and the building in question houses The Lava Show, but according to Jónas Árnason, warden of the Fire Department, the house is in bad shape and parts of the roof needed to be torn down. The cause of the fire is thought to be a chimney that connects to a furnace that is used in the show.

"This means that the real estate market is cooling down," says Una Jónsdóttir, the Head of Landsbankinn Economical Research, about the 0.4 decrease in the housing price index in the capital region. She says that the decrease will probably lead to the inflation decreasing as well.

"This was an impressive and a historical moment to experience the funeral of Elizabeth II. She was a monarch who has done her duties concientiously, dutifully and diligently for over 70 years," says Guðni Th. Jóhannesson, the President of Iceland to mbl.is.

Þór­dís Kol­brún Reyk­fjörð Gylfa­dótt­ir, Minister of Foreign Affairs, encourages Icelanders to take up the knitting needles and knit warm socks from the warm Icelandic wool for people in Ukraine and document in the website Sendum hlýju which means: Send some warmth.

"I was surprised by how important fish is for Iceland and how excellent the product is and how it is processed," said the Spanish culinary student Alba González. She is one of the winners in a culinary competition amongst South-European culinary students in cooking salted cod, bacalao. She says there is no doubt in her mind that she will visit the country again.

It is not every day that an Icelandic artist gets their new album chosen as a top album in their category by the foreign press. But last Friday, Hekla Magnúsdóttir's new album Xiuxiuejar was chosen the Contemporary album of the month in The Guardian, but the album was released on September 9th 2022 by Phantom Limb in the UK.

The Englishman, Glen Baddeley, ran from the second northernmost tip of Iceland to the southermost tip in ten days. His goal was to raise money for a good cause and attempt to get into the Guinness World Records.

If you walk past the old prison on Skólavörðurstígur 9 you can see pictures in the front windows of the building, of men who have been arrested and made to stayin the building, which was a prison for 144 years. The pictures are a part of the art exhibition "Ljós í steini" which is a series of 24 portraits.

Recently the Coast Guard received satellite images from The European Maritime Safety Agency (EMSA) that seemed to suggest an oil spill coming from the trawler Beitir TFES which was fishing deep east of the country. It turned out to be something completely different.

Shooting of the second series of Halo is now in process here in Icaland. The shooting locations are in the Reykjanes peninsula and also by Kvernufoss in the South of Iceland, as can be seen in the picture that was published on the Twitter page of the series yesterday.

Around 71% of Icelanders are in favour or mostly in favour of a rent ceiling being used as a measure in the rental market. A rent ceiling is a maximum price for a given property based on size, quality and location.

Bjarni Bene­dikts­son, Minister of Finance and Economic Affairs, says it is obvious that the government needs to sell their remaining shares in Íslandsbanki and use that money to strenghthen infrastructure for the estimated 100 bn ISK sale.

Áslaug Arna Sig­ur­björns­dótt­ir, the Minister of Higher Education, Science and Innovation has founded a two billion ISK fund which in order to encourage more cooperation between Icelandic universities. Up to a billion ISK will be donated this year and a similar amount next year.

Misguided yearning for the past, the death of Queen Elizabeth II, the war in Ukraine, the digital assistant Siri and the Icelandic language were all topics that the President of Iceland, Guðni Th. Jóhannesson touched upon in his speech at the opening of Parliament earlier today.

Morgunblaðið published yesterday the story of a woman who had the misfortune of breaking her leg badly last Saturday. Líney Sigurðardóttir lives in Þórshöfn up north and she says that she got a lot of reactions to her story in the paper. She says she is not the only one who has been sent away in dire need from the hospital in Akureyri.

The Ministry of Education and Children Mennta- og barna­málaráðuneytið assigned grants today to municipalities that are meant to assist in welcoming refugee children in their care. This was reported on the website of the Icelandic Government today.

In the fiscal budget proposal for 2023 the treasury revenues are estimated to be 79 billion ISK more than in the budget for 2022. Bjarni Benediktsson Minister of Finance and Economic Affairs introduced the fiscal budget proposal this morning.

It cannot be common that a sitting Prime Minister publishes a novel, although there are some examples of that.

A lot of people couldn't believe their eyes yesterday when they noticed a pole dancer on the top of the roof of the Nordic House in the University area in Reykjavík.

„This started really early. I remember walking to school when I was six years old in Hafnarfjörður and I was watching the stars in the sky,“ says Sævar Helgi Bragason, a science aficionado, journalist, writer, geologist and a resident of Planet Earth.

The annual Seafood Festival MATEY ends today in the Westman Islands. The festival has been a great success and four restaurants had guests chefs who put their spin on the excellent local seafood and produce and the menus for the festival showcased new and exciting flavours in their culinary creations.

Yesterday Guðni Th. Jó­hann­ess­son, the President of Iceland, og Katrín Jak­obs­dótt­ir, the Prime Minister of Iceland, were among the world leaders sending their condolences to the British nation and remembering Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II after her passing yesterday afternoon at 96 of age.

"She was a wonderful person and I really cared for her. I will miss her a lot," said Vigdís Finnbogadóttir, the former President of Iceland yesterday.

The island Hrísey in Eyjafjörður up north in Iceland gets great reviews in an article in The Guardian. In the article is a list of destinations that stood out to the readers of the paper in this year.

The Food Festival Mat­ey starts today in the Westman Islands and ends next Saturday and there will be a big seafood feast in the islands. The Westman Islands already house some of the best restaurants in the country and more people are making a point of going there to have a culinary adventure in the great setting of the islands. The Westman Islands were nominated to the nordic Embla awards as The best culinary destination in Scandinavia.

Áslaug Arna Sig­ur­björns­dótt­ir, the Minister of Higher Education, Science and Innovation, received yesterday the Politician of the year 2022 awards at the One Young World conference in Manchester in England.

The condition of the angler who had an electric shock while fly fishingin East-Rangá yesterday is considered quite good and much better than was expected yesterday. This information comes from Gunnar Guðjónsson, the head tourist guide in the area.

The President of Iceland, Guðni Th. Jó­hann­es­son, has weighed in on the chocolate covered liquorice drama and tweets that chocolate covered liquorice is "as Icelandic as glaciers and elves, volcanoes and waterfalls. Nothing Danish there, with all due respect."