🌐👀 Global Eyes, Winter is Coming edition
Putin cuts off the gas. Chaos in Iraq. China under lockdown. And much, much more.
I have several essays to send you. One treats Peter Zeihan. Another concerns Gorbachev and his era. I became quite melancholy thinking about Gorbachev, the collapse of the Soviet Union, what an optimistic time that was, and how the world has changed.
I’ve been sitting on both of these essays for several days, feeling they need more editing. I should explain that I’m always tormented by this thought. I struggle with it every time I hit the “publish” button. At times, the suspicion that what I’ve written isn’t ready for prime time becomes neurotic and prevents me from sending a newsletter out for days. I need to get over it.
But while I struggle to cure my angst—or perfect my arguments, whichever comes first—here’s a tour of the globe.
🌎 AMERICAS
I’ll skip the news from the United States because it’s been so widely covered elsewhere.
🇦🇷 ARGENTINA
Last week was a dramatic one in the Americas, beginning with the attempted assassination of Argentina’s vice president, Cristina Fernández de Kirchner (Remember her? The one facing corruption charges.) If the gun hadn’t misfired, she’d be dead. It’s unclear what motivated the assailant, a Brazilian national. He reportedly hated communists, to judge from his taste in social media, but so do I, and I don’t go around trying to assassinate politicians. The attempt was captured on video:
How it happened: As Fernández stepped from her car outside her apartment building and began shaking hands with well-wishers, a man came forward with a gun, pointed it inches from her face, and pulled the trigger. The weapon was loaded, but it jammed. Her security detail seized the gunman and took him away. She was unhurt.
Stunned Argentines condemn shocking shooting attempt on vice-president.
“We need to stand against this.” Huge crowds flood Plaza de Mayo to “defend democracy.”
Boxes of ammunition, sex toys found during raid at home of Cristina Fernández de Kirchner’s attacker. (The relevance of the sex toys is unclear.)
Profile of the suspect: He seems to have been a weirdo whose interests on social media included “Satanic communism,” “hermetic occult sciences,” “anti-psychopathic coach,” and “Wicca.”
Former president Mauricio Macri accuses Fernández’s allies of using the attack for political gain and launching “a hunt for symbolic enemies to whom they attribute, without any rationality, the instigation of that attack.”
🦠 Also in Argentina: The Pan American Health Organization believes that the Legionnaires’ disease bacteria caused a mysterious cluster of pneumonia cases in Tucumán. (The most beautiful words in the English language: “It’s bacterial.”)
🇧🇷 BRAZIL
The assassination attempt in Argentina spooked Brazilian presidential candidates, especially because the assailant was Brazilian. Political violence is rare in Argentina these days, but it isn’t in Brazil:
“Although I do not feel any sympathy for her, I do not wish her that,” said a gracious Bolsonaro of Fernández.
The attack on Argentina’s vice-president sent shock waves through the campaigns of Brazil’s presidential front-runners. Security teams for the frontrunners say they’ll be enforcing their protocols with especial vigilance.
Former President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva said politicians should be prepared to face a climate of violence “provoked by those who do not know how to live democratically.”
Polls show that Brazilians’ top priority in the coming election is the economy. “There have never been so many hungry people in Brazil.”
Bolsonaro’s “dystopian” Brazil. The past two years, in particular, have been marked by growing political polarization and a “spiral into disorder led by declining populists.” Brazil’s 685,000 Covid19 deaths have prompted dozens of attempts to impeach Bolsonaro.
The Permanent Peoples’ Tribunal found Bolsonaro guilty of crimes against humanity for his handling of the pandemic. The ruling is purely symbolic, but the tribunal recommended a formal complaint be filed before the International Criminal Court in The Hague.
Brazilian electoral authorities have carried out a search and seizure warrant at the home of Sergio Moro, the former judge and justice minister who made his name leading the massive “Car Wash” corruption probe. He’s now running for a seat in the Senate. Apparently, authorities suspect “irregularities” in his campaign material. If I’ve correctly understood, he used a non-regulation font size? Perhaps a reader more familiar with Brazilian politics can tell me whether it’s common for electoral authorities to react so dramatically to errant fonts—or might this perhaps have something to do with who he is? (In Portuguese.)
🛟🌊 Also in Brazil: Man survives eleven days in ocean floating alone in a freezer.
🇨🇱 CHILE
Chile decisively rejected a new left-wing constitution, with nearly 62 percent of voters casting a ballot against it. The current constitution, which dates from Pinochet dictatorship, will remain in force.
Chile’s rejection of populism is an example for the world:
Voters were, almost literally, promised the earth (the draft would have granted constitutional rights to nature). Attractive-looking carrots abounded among the 388 articles drawn up by a specially elected assembly after a year of sometimes raucous debate. The draft constitution obliged the state not only to provide health, education and housing, but also to ensure the production of healthy food and the promotion of Chilean national cuisine. Bizarrely, in a country where millions still lack broadband internet services, it would have guaranteed a right to “digital disconnection.”
Yet Chileans saw through the utopian vision amid an altogether more prosaic reality of rising inflation, a slowing economy and myriad economic challenges. Nearly 86 per cent turned out to vote, and almost 62 per cent of them voted against the new constitution. Such electoral maturity is highly unusual anywhere, let alone in a middle-income country.
Seven police officers were killed in an explosives attack in western Colombia, probably by the FARC, the deadliest attack on security forces since President Gustavo Petro took office promising to end the country’s nearly 60-year conflict.
President Gabriel Boric Font’s brother was brutally attacked by demonstrators at the University of Chile in Santiago’s Alameda as he tried to prevent them from looting. He’s in stable condition, but badly injured.
Boric Font said he hoped Latin America would stage a “joint reaction” if there’s a coup d’état in Brazil.
🇲🇽 MEXICO
“Vast” methane leak detected at Pemex oil field. Satellites recorded methane plumes at the Ku-Maloob-Zaap oil field cluster in the Gulf of Mexico in August, with 44,064 tons of methane released into the atmosphere in an “ultraemission” equivalent to 3.7 million tons of CO2.
President Andrés Manuel López Obrador submitted a proposal to put the 118,000-strong National Guard under the command of the defense ministry, even though constitutionally, it should be under civilian leadership. Civil society and human rights organizations warn this will hand too much power to the generals.
Seventeen atrocities were reported every day in Mexico during the first six months of 2022, up 18 percent from last year, according Causa en Comun. The NGO defines “atrocity” as the intentional use of force to severely abuse, maim, kill or provoke terror.
🇳🇮 NICARAGUA
Taiwan warns that China is seeking a naval outpost in Nicaragua to threaten the US. “The Chinese could do it and call it the beginning of the Nicaragua Canal if we ticked them off enough about Taiwan … It would symbolically be a big deal, because the Chinese know they could get military access if they asked, and the Russians could operate out of it, too.”
Nicaragua continues crackdown on independent media. Recently, one of the oldest radio stations in the country was shut down alongside an iconic newspaper.
The number of Nicaraguans intercepted at the US border increased from 3,164 in September 2020 to 92,037 in April 2022.
The Biden administration is considering blocking imports from Nicaragua to register its displeasure with President Daniel Ortega’s growing authoritarianism. This would deal a serious blow to Nicaragua’s economy.
Editorial: Pope Francis must do more to condemn human rights abuses in Nicaragua before the Ortega regime exploits papal silence to justify its immoral actions.
🇸🇻 EL SALVADOR
★ The rise of Nayib Bukele, El Salvador’s authoritarian president. The budding strongman has ridden Bitcoin schemes and a repressive crackdown on gangs to become Latin America’s most popular leader.
El Salvador plans 40,000-inmate mega-prison in war against gangs.
War on gangs leaves poor families reeling. Relatives say the innocent are being rounded up.
Will this be the first country bankrupted by crypto? It’s been a year since El Salvador adopted bitcoin as currency. Things are not going well.
The verdict is in for El Salvador’s Bitcoin experiment: It failed.
The government has earmarked US$203 million for infrastructure improvements near the so-called “Bitcoin Beach” in La Libertad:
The news is curious in the context of El Salvador’s plummeting creditworthiness, major delays in bond offerings, sovereign debt at 40 cents on the dollar, repeated warnings from the nation’s largest creditor to reverse its adoption of Bitcoin as legal tender, and escalating gang violence that prompted the country’s president to threaten starvation for gang prisoners.
In 2022, 6,471 Salvadoran migrants returned from the United States and Mexico, an increase of 254 percent over the previous year. There was a 209 percent increase in deportations from the United States and Mexico compared to the same period in 2021.
🇨🇦 CANADA
Ten people were killed and at least 15 were injured in a rash of stabbings that put all of Saskatchewan on alert while police attempted to track down the suspects, Damien Sanderson, 31, and Myles Sanderson, 30. They remain at large. Ghastly. Condolences to our Canadian friends.
🌍 AFRICA
NORTH AFRICA
🇱🇾 Clashes rock western outskirts of Libyan capital. Libyan armed factions fought in the western outskirts of Tripoli late on Friday and early Saturday as forces aligned with Abdulhamid al-Dbeibah’s government further consolidated their control over the capital.
🇱🇾🇹🇷 Turkey hosted two rival Libyan premiers in Istanbul in bid to de-escalate the tension.
🇲🇦 Morocco, which has the world’s largest phosphates reserves, has expanded its market share in the wake of export restrictions on Russia, with sales up more than 80 percent.
🇩🇿 Algeria’s move to English signals erosion of France’s sway: While Macron was in Algeria last week to pursue enhance ties, Algeria announced that from now on, English will be taught in Algerian schools. The French were disturbed to see a sign on Macron’s lectern at the Algerian presidential palace that said, “Presidency of the Republic” instead of “Présidence de la République.”
🇩🇿🇪🇹🇪🇬 Algerian-Ethiopian rapprochement is threatening Arab summit in Algiers. The stance of the government of President Abdelmadjib Tebboune on the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam highlights the Egyptian-Algerian crisis.
Why fewer women in North Africa are wearing the veil. I thought this was especially interesting:
Although support for the hijab appear to be waning in the region, especially among the young, the perception that it is inseparable from Muslim identity has become entrenched far and wide. So much so that whenever any government—especially in Europe—introduces restrictions on wearing it in public institutions, that is usually denounced as a war on Islam itself. Merely criticizing the hijab in Western democracies has also become almost synonymous with “Islamophobia” or attacks on minority rights. But in Muslim-majority societies it is still regarded as part of a legitimate campaign for the liberation of women from stifling tradition.
EAST AFRICA
🇰🇪 Kenya’s Supreme Court upholds presidential election results. Rejecting claims that the August 9 vote was rigged, the court confirmed Vice President William Ruto as the country’s fifth president. (NB: “Who’s the new president of Kenya?” is the kind of question I might put on a quiz.)
🇰🇪 “We have taken note of the decision of the Supreme Court on the presidential election held on August 9, 2022. We have always stood for the the rule of law and the constitution. In this regard, we respect the opinion of the court although we vehemently disagree with their decision today,” said Ruto’s rival, Ralia Odinga, showing the world how it’s done. (He had previously pledged to abide by the court’s decision.)
🇰🇪 Kenyan pastoralists helpless as cows die in unending drought. Horn of Africa’s worst drought in 40 years leaves pasture desiccated and cows with nothing to eat.
🇺🇬 Can Uganda meet its 2030 malaria elimination target? Uganda has seen a sustained upsurge in malaria cases in various districts with the current average of 37,600 cases per day, resulting in increased hospitalization and deaths.
🇸🇩🇺🇸 The first US ambassador in 25 years arrived in Khartoum. The US closed its embassy in 1996 in Sudan after charging it with hosting Osama Bin Laden. (This one could show up on a quiz, too.)
🇨🇩 DR Congo auctions thirty oil and gas blocks. The country is opening parts of the world’s second-biggest rainforest to drilling, which makes environmental groups about as happy as you’d expect. The government is acting quickly to cash in on the increased global demand for fossil fuels, selling an area the size of Uganda. When people ask why the conflict in Ukraine gets so much more attention than the much bloodier conflict in Tigray, this is the answer. There’s nothing in the world untouched by it.
🇨🇩🇺🇳 Second UN helicopter crashes in eastern DR Congo in five months. The UN Humanitarian Air Service chopper, managed by the World Food Program, went down near the city of Goma. There were no passengers on board. Three crew members were injured. Another big blow for the UN peacekeepers.
🇨🇩 At least 14 dead in suspected ADF attack in eastern DR Congo. The Allied Democratic Forces—a Ugandan militia that has pledged allegiance to ISIS—frequently stages deadly raids on villages in eastern Congo despite joint operations by the Congolese and Ugandan armies.
🇸🇩 Renewed fighting between Hausa and other ethnic groups broke out in northern Blue Nile state of Sudan, killing at least 21.
🇸🇩 Sudan urged aid agencies to evacuate the Hamdayet border reception center for Ethiopian refugees, fearing for their safety following the intensification of clashes near the Sudanese border.
HORN OF AFRICA
🇪🇹 Gunmen kill more than forty people in Ethiopia’s Oromiya region. Residents of Oromiya describe the attackers as members of a volunteer militia known as Fano, mostly composed of ethnic Amharas.
🇪🇹 An airstrike on a kindergarten and the end to Ethiopia’s uneasy peace. “We cannot keep up,” said the head of a hospital in Tigray that received victims from the school playground.
🇪🇹🇪🇷🇺🇸 The United States dispatched an envoy to Ethiopia to seek an end to renewed fighting and condemned Eritrea for reentering the conflict in Tigray.
🇸🇴 Al-Shabab killed at least 20 people, including women and children, and destroyed desperately needed aid in an attack on a food convoy in Somalia’s central Hiiraan region. The threat from al-Shabab, which wants to overthrow the central government, is growing; the group, linked to al Qaeda, controls much of southern and central Somalia. Two weeks ago its fighters stormed a hotel in Mogadishu, killing more than 20 people. Absolute scum.
🇸🇴 Famine “at the door” in Somalia, UN humanitarian chief says. And Al-Shabab isn’t helping.
SOUTHERN AFRICA
🇦🇴 Angolan opposition files legal challenge, seeks annulment of vote. UNITA leader Adalberto Costa Junior said his party did “not recognize the final results” of the August 24 election.
🇿🇼 Zimbabwe measles outbreak death toll rises to 685, more than four times the cases reported almost a fortnight ago. A nationwide vaccination program continues:
Primarily children aged between six months and 15 years were succumbing to the disease, especially those from religious sects who do not believe in vaccination, the country’s information minister Monica Mutsvangwa said last month. According to government claims, apostolic sects do not believe in vaccination and rely on prayers. The apostolic church leaders have not reacted to government claims that their beliefs are responsible for a higher spread of measles.
WEST AFRICA
🇳🇬 Nigerian congregants attending mosque prayers kidnapped by gunmen:
According to police and witnesses, gunmen seized hundreds of worshipers attending Friday afternoon prayers at a mosque in Nigeria's northern state of Zamfara. Armed gangs are common in Nigeria's northwest, where they loot or kidnap for ransom, and violence has been on the rise, with security authorities frequently unable to halt the crimes.
🇬🇲 Dealing with the trauma of displacement in The Gambia. Thousands of Senegalese have been forced to flee their homes and seek refuge in The Gambia after clashes broke out earlier this year in parts of Senegal occupied by separatists.
🇬🇲 Government stalls on implementing Gambian Truth Commission recommendations. The commission recommended that some 90 officials, largely in the security sector, be banned from public office or prosecuted. The government committed itself to fully implement the recommendations of the commission, but its actions have so far fallen short of its promises.
🇧🇫🇺🇸 American nun held hostage in Burkina Faso is released with help of US forces. Sister Suellen Tennyson, age 83, was released from the custody of terrorists to Niger and then turned over to US officials.
🌏 ASIA
NORTH ASIA
🇰🇷 South Korea’s national security adviser said he and his counterparts from the US and Japan have agreed there will be “no soft response” if North Korea conducts a nuclear test.
🇰🇷🇺🇸 South Korea views new US rules that favor American-made electric vehicles and batteries as a “betrayal,” a senior official in Seoul said, which threatens to complicate economic and security cooperation. (Paywalled.)
🇰🇷 K-everything: the rise and rise of Korean culture. Music, movies, technology, food: The world has fallen in love with South Korea. (May I take this opportunity to recommend lamellar water, the most astonishing beauty product I’ve ever tried? It’s for your hair. I swear, it’s some kind of black magic.)
🇯🇵 Japan doubles down in defense of post-war order. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has expedited a debate about pacifist Japan’s military preparedness and strategy.
🇯🇵 The yen is now below 140 to the dollar for the first time in almost a quarter century.
SOUTH ASIA
🇦🇫🇷🇺 Explosion outside Russian embassy in Kabul; two staff members dead. Four others were killed. No group has claimed responsibility yet.
🇦🇫 Afghan mosque blast kills 18, including pro-Taliban cleric. The explosion in the city of Herat left the courtyard of the Guzargah Mosque littered with bodies and the ground stained with blood.
🇵🇰 Pakistan calls for more aid as flood death toll goes over 1,250. The toll from floods that started in mid-June continue to climb, with 57 more deaths reported, 25 of them children. “The scale of devastation is massive and requires an immense humanitarian response for 33 million people,” Pakistan’s federal planning minister Ahsan Iqbal said.
🇵🇰 Pakistan’s flooding underscores climate risks in South Asia. Devastating floods have placed a third of the country underwater, underscoring significant climate risks in South Asia.
🇮🇳 Modi commissions India’s first indigenous aircraft carrier in defense push. The warship commissioning puts India among half a dozen countries with the ability to develop such large vessels.
🇮🇳 India’s sex ratio at birth begins to normalize. The bias in favor of sons declined sharply among Sikhs. Christians continue to have a normal balance of sons and daughters.
🇱🇰 Sri Lanka’s deposed ex-leader returns from exile. Rajapaksa’s resignation ended his presidential immunity, which means stalled corruption cases against him can now proceed.
SOUTHEAST ASIA
🇮🇩 Indonesia raises fuel prices: The government raised subsidized fuel prices by about 30 percent, trying to rein in ballooning subsidies despite a risk of mass protests. The changes will have major implications for households and small businesse. Subsidized fuel makes up more than 80 percent of state-owned oil giant Pertamina’s sales.
🇪🇺🇹🇭 EU and Thailand end turbulent decade with a partnership agreement. The deal serves the EU’s ambitions to increase its influence in Southeast Asia as Thailand seeks out diverse trade links. The deal was delayed by almost a decade in the wake of a military coup.
🇲🇲 The UK’s former ambassador and her husband have been jailed for a year in Myanmar, ostensibly for violating immigration laws.
PACIFIC
🇸🇧 Unpredictable Solomon Islands fuels US concerns about China’s influence. To counter China’s influence, the Biden administration plans to open an embassy in Solomon Islands for the first time in three decades. (“Where has the US recently opened embassies for the first time in 25 years or more” could be a good question.)
🇸🇧🇦🇺🇳🇿 Navy vessels from Australia and New Zealand will be exempt from a temporary ban on foreign ships entering the ports of the Solomon Islands.
🇦🇺🇨🇳 Two prime ministers on Australia’s China challenge. For John Howard, Australia’s second-longest-serving prime minister, it’s the perplexing “China dilemma.” For Kevin Rudd, Howard’s successor in 2007, it’s the “avoidable war”—what would be a “catastrophic conflict between the US and Xi Jinping’s China.”
CHINA-TAIWAN
🇨🇳 China earthquake kills 21 as tremors shake locked-down Chengdu. The 6.6-magnitude quake hit about 26 miles southeast of the city of Kangding at a depth of about six miles.
🇨🇳 Potential crimes against humanity in China’s Xinjiang, UN says. A long-delayed report from UN human rights office says abuses against Uighurs stem from “anti-terrorism law systems.”
The 45-page report called on Beijing to immediately release “all individuals arbitrarily deprived of their liberty,” clarify the whereabouts of those whose families have been unable to locate them and undertake a “full review” of its laws on domestic security and repeal all discriminatory laws.
The document, published 13 minutes before UN Human Rights Chief Michelle Bachelet’s term ended, came four years after a ground-breaking report from the UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination that revealed that more than one million people were being held in a network of detention centers across Xinjiang.
🇨🇳★ OHCHR Assessment of human rights concerns in the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, People’s Republic of China. Read the full report.
UN Uyghur report leaves no room for denial and no excuse for inaction.
🇨🇳 Shenzhen districts locked down as China battles Covid outbreaks:
Most residents of the Chinese tech hub of Shenzhen went into a weekend lockdown on Saturday as mass testing kicked off in much of the city of 18 million people. The lockdown, and the suspension of bus and subway services, came into effect two days after city authorities said rumors about a lockdown were based on a “misinterpretation” of the latest Covid19 prevention and control measures.
🇨🇳 China locks down 21 million in Chengdu:
Residents have been ordered to stay home, and about 70 percent of the flights have been suspended to and from the city, which is a major transit hub in Sichuan province and a governmental and economic center. The start of the new school term has been delayed, although public transport continues to operate and citizens are permitted to leave the city if they can show a special need. Under the rules announced Thursday, just one member of each family who can show a negative virus test within the past 24 hours is allowed out per day to buy necessities.
🇨🇳 Chinese cities rush to lockdown in show of loyalty to Xi’s zero-Covid strategy. More than 70 Chinese cities have been placed under full or partial Covid lockdowns since late August, affecting more than 300 million people.
🇨🇳 CanSino’s inhaled adenovirus-vectored Covid19 vaccine receives emergency use approval in China.
🇨🇳 China’s top legislator to visit Russia, attend Eastern Economic Forum: Li Zhanshu will attend the seventh Eastern Economic Forum in Vladivostok this week, becoming the most senior Chinese official to visit Russia since the Ukraine war began.
🇨🇳 China launches campaign against online rumors ahead of party congress:
China’s cyberspace watchdog has vowed to crackdown on fake news before a key summit where President Xi Jinping is set to take a precedent-defying third term in power. The Cyberspace Administration of China launched a three-month campaign targeting “online rumors and fake information about major meetings, important events and policies,” starting Friday, it said in a statement. Offenders should be handled “strictly, quickly and severely,” the agency added, without specifying punishments.
🇨🇳🇹🇼 Taiwan says two Chinese fighters crossed Taiwan Strait median line.
🇨🇳🇹🇼🇺🇸 Chinese military says it’s monitoring US Navy in Taiwan Strait. The US Navy said the guided-missile cruisers USS Antietam and USS Chancellorsville conducted a “routine Taiwan Strait transit” on Sunday, in accordance with international law.
🇨🇳🇹🇼🇺🇸 China infuriated by proposed US$1.1 billion arms sale to Taiwan:
The US State Department has approved a potential US$1.1 billion sale of military equipment to Taiwan, including 60 anti-ship missiles and 100 air-to-air missiles, with China threatening to take countermeasures. … The sale includes Sidewinder missiles, which can be used for air-to-air and surface-attack missions, at a cost of some US$85.6 million, Harpoon anti-ship missiles at an estimated US$355 million cost and support for Taiwan’s surveillance radar program for an estimated US$665.4 million, the Pentagon’s Defense Security Cooperation Agency said.
Liu Pengyu, a spokesperson for the Chinese Embassy in Washington, said in a statement the possible arms sale “severely jeopardizes China-US relations and peace and stability across the Taiwan Strait.”
🌍 MIDDLE EAST
🇮🇶 IRAQ
Violence re-erupted in Iraq this week as armed supporters of Sadr fought with security forces and Iran-aligned gunmen in Baghdad in the fiercest street battles the capital has seen for years.
Latest outbreak of violence in Iraqi city of Basra leaves four dead. Fighting earlier this week between rival Shia forces killed at least 30 people in Baghdad.
After years of war and unrest, Iraq is flaring up again—here’s why.
Sadr, coordination framework in Iraq may collapse at any moment. Calm prevailed in Baghdad for a fourth consecutive day following the bloody clashes between the Shiite Sadrist movement and Asaib Ahl al-Haq that swept the Iraqi capital.
Iraq’s Shi’ite power struggle could drag it back into civil war. The retirement of an influential Shi'ite cleric is another stage in the arm-wrestling competition with Iran, whose ability to dictate events in Iraq has been undermined and whose political weakness has been exposed
Grand Ayatollah Ali Al-Sistani said nothing in public about the unrest that erupted on Iraq's streets. But government officials and Shi'ite insiders say it was only Sistani's stance behind the scenes that halted a meltdown.
A pen-friend of mine in Baghdad sent me this note:
How are you, Madam, last week was a nightmare for us, as a street war erupted between the militias and rockets were fired from our area into the Green Zone. We can’t leave the house, the situation with the militias in Iraq is like the situation with the Taliban in Afghanistan. We want to live in peace and security. I want a future for my daughters. There is no safety, there are no health services, there is no education, and there is no future. I know that I bother you, Madam, because you are the only one who hears me and you are the only one who delivers my voice to the world.
After the fall of the previous regime, we hoped for the best, imagining improvements in health care and the education system, but instead, things turned upside down. The security, health, and education systems have deteriorated and Iranian militias have taken charge of the country. I’ve been threatened in many ways. Due to this harassment, I left my home and rented it out. I lost a lot of money.
I am married and I have five daughters. The eldest is 21 years old, and I can’t send her to college because of the security risk and the economic situation. The next daughter is 17 years old, the third is 15, the fourth is 13, and the fifth is 11. My wife and my wife’s brother-in-law worked with with the Army Corps of Engineers. He’s now in America, working for the US Army.
Since 2003, we’ve been in danger because everyone who opposes the militias is destined for displacement or death. They consider us Baathists—this is the justification for killing us; in reality it’s because we reject their presence and the presence of the Popular Mobilization Forces.
After the elections in October last year, fighting broke out between the Sadr militias and the Popular Mobilization militias. It reached a climax a week ago. A battle erupted in al Khadra and the government announced the imposition of a curfew. We had a terrifying night because there’s a media center for the Popular Mobilization Forces near our area. They fired missiles from eleven at night to five in the morning.
The Iraqi government is unable to deter the militias because they’re too afraid of them, so how am I, an ordinary citizen who has no power or strength, supposed to do it? The fighting continued until noon the next day, when Muqtada al-Sadr ordered his supporters to withdraw. Muqtada al-Sadr and his supporters, the Popular Mobilization Forces, and ISIS—they are all the same.
I appeal to everyone, from NGOs to governments to humanity, get us out of Iraq—because it’s going to be worse than Afghanistan. Please, help, because the situation is going from bad to worse. There is no future here. Just a corrupt government that steals from the country and militias that kill us. Life is on hold. This country is dominated by backwardness, ignorance, and crime.
Thank you very much.
(He has been appealing for years to emigrate to the US, based on the assistance his family offered to the US military. He’s had no success. If you know any way to help him and his family, let me know—Claire.)
🇮🇷 IRAN
The US rejected linking a revival of the Iran nuclear deal with the closure of probes by the UN nuclear watchdog a day after Iran reopened the issue.
“Iran is buying time to get more concessions in nuclear deal.” Washington says it will not accept Tehran’s latest response in negotiations over a final draft of a roadmap for parties to return to the 2015 agreement. Israeli officials believe the matter might delay the deal, but not prevent it.
Iran sentences two activists to death for “promoting homosexuality.” A rights group says the Islamic Republic has sentenced two LGBTQ activists to death on charges of “corruption on the earth through the promotion of homosexuality.”
Hengaw Organization for Human Rights said on Sunday that the verdict was issued by the Revolutionary Court of the city of Orumiyeh (Urmia), in West Azarbaijan province against Zahra Sedighi-Hamedani, 31, known as Sareh, and Elham Choubdar, 24. Another woman, Soheila Ashrafi, 52, was involved in the joint case, but her verdict has not been issued yet.
🇹🇷 TURKEY
Turkish court orders pro-Kurdish politician jailed on terrorism charge:
A member of the Peoples’ Democratic Party, or HDP, Semra Güzel, had her parliamentary immunity withdrawn in March after images of her posing with a PKK militant in the past went viral in Turkish media. Subsequently, a warrant for his arrest was issued after he was accused of belonging to a terrorist group. Güzel was detained in Istanbul on Friday and a court ruled late on Saturday to jail her pending trial, Istanbul police said, in line with a prosecutor’s request.
Turkish warship docks in Israel as bilateral ties warm. A Haifa port official said it was the first time a Turkish naval vessel had visited since at least 2010, when bilateral ties were shattered by Israel’s storming of a pro-Palestinian aid convoy that tried to breach its blockade of the Gaza Strip.
🇮🇱 ISRAEL-PALESTINE
Hamas executes five Palestinians, including two for “collaboration” with Israel.
An Israeli bus came under fire in the Jordan valley, with initial reports saying there were several injured in what appeared to be a terrorist attack. The bus, which belonged to the Jordan Valley Regional Council, was hit not far from the town of Bkaot. Two perpetrators were captured about 20 minutes later.
Israeli investigations into the killing of Al Jazeera journalist Shireen Abu Akleh in May concluded that she was likely to have been unintentionally shot by an Israeli soldier but was not deliberately targeted.
🇸🇾 SYRIA
Israeli attacks squeeze Iranian aerial supplies to Syria: Israel has intensified strikes on Syrian airports to disrupt Tehran’s increasing use of aerial supply lines to deliver arms to allies in Syria and Lebanon including Hezbollah.
Russia calls on Iran to evacuate military positions in central, western Syria to avoid its militias being targeted by Israeli raids, which have stepped up in recent days. Regime loyalists have accused Russia of being a weak ally over its inability to break its silence on repeated Israeli violations of Syrian sovereignty.
🌍 EUROPE
UK
🇬🇧 Liz Truss to succeed Boris Johnson as British prime minister. Truss defeated rival Rishi Sunak with 81,326 votes to 60,399 among party members and will take over as leader on Tuesday. Good luck, Liz.
🇬🇧 How Johnson loyalist Liz Truss bagged the top job in British politics.
🇬🇧 Boris Johnson’s dreams of a comeback will be a nightmare for Liz Truss:
The rear-view mirror of the next prime minister will be filled with a juggernaut-shaped, road-hogging, attention-craving, angry, bitter and menacing presence. Mr Johnson himself will be breathing down her neck. We know from every unrepentant word he has uttered since Tory MPs acted to evict him that he burns with vengeful resentment. We know that he sees himself not as the architect of his own downfall, but as the victim of ungrateful rats. “I won these fuckers the election,” he raged within his bunker when they moved against him.
GAS WARS
🇷🇺🛢 Russia switches off Europe’s main gas pipeline until sanctions are lifted. Gazprom had previously said it was halting flows through Nord Stream 1 because of a technical fault. No more pretense about “technical problems.” It’s now a full scale gas war with the West. And what a surprise! Who could have imagined that Russia—of all countries!—would attempt to take advantage of the winter to freeze its enemies?
🇺🇦 Zelensky warns Europeans to brace for bleak winter. “Russia is preparing a decisive energy blow on all Europeans for this winter,” he said.
🇩🇪 Germany’s government will use income from windfall taxes to lower end-consumer prices for gas, oil and coal, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said, announcing measures to mitigate the impact of rising energy prices on its population.
🇩🇪 Germany’s gas supply situation is currently guaranteed, but the situation is tense and further deterioration cannot be ruled out, the country’s network regulator said.
🇩🇪 A power grid stress test has shown that extending the lifespan of two of Germany’s nuclear power plants would be sufficient to avert an energy shortage this winter.
🇬🇧 Liz Truss pledged to have an energy plan within a week. She offered no details, saying she would need time in office first.
🇭🇺 Hungary calls Gazprom “a reliable partner.” Hungary recently approved the construction of two nuclear energy reactors from Russia along with raising its Gazprom imports.
🇮🇹 Italy’s Lega Nord leader Matteo Salvini attacked sanctions against Russia as “ineffective.”
🇪🇺 European Council President Charles Michel will hold talks with major gas producer Qatar on Europe’s energy crisis during a visit to Doha this week.
🇨🇿 Massive anti-EU, NATO demonstration in Prague:
An estimated 70,000 people protested in Prague against the Czech government, calling on the ruling coalition to do more to control soaring energy prices and voicing opposition to the European Union and NATO. Organizers of the demonstration from a number of far-right and fringe political groups including the Communist party, said the central European nation should be neutral militarily and ensure direct contracts with gas suppliers, including Russia. …
The protest at Wenceslas Square in the city center was held a day after the government survived a no-confidence vote amid opposition claims of inaction against inflation and energy prices. The vote showed how Europe’s energy crisis is fuelling political instability as soaring power prices stoke inflation, already at levels unseen in three decades.
🇹🇷🇬🇷 Erdoğan accuses Greece of “occupying” demilitarized islands:
Turkey and Greece have been at odds over issues ranging from overflights and the status of Aegean islands to maritime boundaries and hydrocarbon resources in the Mediterranean, as well as ethnically split Cyprus. Ankara has recently accused Athens of arming the demilitarized Aegean islands—something Athens rejects, but Erdoğan had not previously accused Greece of occupying them. “Your occupying the islands does not bind us. When the time, the hour, comes, we will do what is necessary,” Erdoğan said.
🇱🇻🇷🇺☦️ Latvia’s government has come out in favor of amendments to separate the Latvian Orthodox Church from the Russian Orthodox Church. Keep an eye on this: There will be a clash between Russia and Latvia about this, just as there was when the Ukrainian Orthodox Church separated from the Russian one in 2018.
🇲🇩🇷🇺 Moldova’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs summoned the interim chargé d’affaires of the Russian Federation to explain Sergei Lavrov’s remark that Moscow “will do everything to protect the interests of the Russian-speaking population of the Republic of Moldova.”
🇧🇾 Five Belarusian activists, including US citizen, convicted of plotting coup.
🇺🇦 UKRAINE
I need to devote a whole day to making sense of the claims about Ukraine’s counteroffensive, but here are a few highlights.
Ukraine claims gains in a counter-offensive against the Russian army in southern Ukraine, saying they have re-captured several areas and destroyed targets including a pontoon bridge. Twitter is alive with reports of town captured and Russians killed.
Nuclear plant loses power line as Moscow, West energy row escalates. Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia plant saw its last remaining main external power line cut open as a reserve line was able to continue supplying electricity to the grid, the International Atomic Energy Agency said. Only one of the six reactors remained in operation at the station.
Update:
UN inspectors head to Ukraine nuclear plant despite fighting.
EU to disburse five billion euros in aid to Kyiv this week. The funds will support the economy and army and help Ukraine prepare for the winter, Ukrainian Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal said.
A top pro-Russian official says the planned referendum on Kherson’s accession to Russia has been stalled due to the “security situation.” Russian analysts say that Ukraine’s counter-offensive’s goal is preventing a referendum from taking place. Ukrainian officials, including Zelensky, view this referendum in Kherson as a step that would close all doors for diplomacy with Russia.
Russia struck a grain depot in Ochakiv in Mykolaiv, which resulted in the destruction of thousands of tons of grain.
Russian Telegram channels are alluding to “tactical successes” for Ukraine in Kherson. (In Russian.)
Igor Girkin—who played a key role in the annexation of Crimea—is warning of “strategic defeats” at Ukraine’s hands in two to three months unless Russia transitions to a war economy and total mobilization. (In Russian.)
Russian drone captured by Ukraine with slogans indicating their dream of reconquering Berlin and creating the USSR 2. The Russian army is clearly maintaining supplies of crack and crystal meth to its troops.
Unconfirmed:
🇷🇺 RUSSIA
Yet another Russian oil chief falls to death from hospital window in Moscow.
Mikhail Gorbachev helped create the liberal Russian news outlet Novaya Gazeta in 1993. In a symbolic blow to Gorbachev’s legacy, Novaya Gazeta’s media license was formally revoked today by Russian court order
Russia’s ambassador to the United Nations has said it’s “alarming” that no one from the 56-member Russian advance team and delegation headed by Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has received a US entry visa to attend a UN General Assembly debate in New York later this month.
Team Putin whines about all the Western things they miss. Putin’s propagandists claim to hate the decadent West, but prefer to live, study, shop, retire and send their offspring there.
Ramzan Kadyrov said he deserves to take an “indefinite and long” break. No one is quite sure what this means.
GLOBAL
Is the world’s financial firefighter ready?
The world needs to prepare for a cascade of financial crises across emerging and developing economies. The writing is already on the wall, with Bangladesh, Ghana, Pakistan and Sri Lanka currently queuing at the International Monetary Fund’s door. Wealthier countries must now equip the IMF—the world’s financial firefighter-in-chief—to prevent and manage the spread of crises. They could start by ensuring that the fund has the resources to stop lower-income economies adopting beggar-thy-neighbor policies that destroy other countries’ livelihoods and threaten political and economic stability.
THE DAILY BAT
This is such pure Solovyov that watching it is like drinking Everclear:
🥢 The CCP salutes the traditional moral courage of the German industrialist
VW CEO shows courage in rejecting political pressure on Xinjiang plant
German carmaker Volkswagen’s new CEO Oliver Blume said he wants to keep the company’s plant in Northwest China's Xinjiang region, AFP reported on Sunday. Blume further stressed that the company offers “secure, well-paid jobs” to the people of Xinjiang.
The remarks came at a time when the German carmaker and many other multinationals have been under increased scrutiny from Western media outlets, industry groups and politicians over their operations in Xinjiang. For example, the leader of Germany's powerful IG Metall trade union, who sits on the supervisory board of Volkswagen, questioned in June whether it is in the carmaker’s interests to continue to operate a plant in China’s Xinjiang region, according to Reuters. Given such political pressure, it shows great courage on the part of the new Volkswagen boss to insist on keeping its plant in Xinjiang, which essentially rejected the politically charged claims made by anti-China forces.
Today’s animal
Nothing better than an emu playing in the sprinkler …
And some good news:
Save the date
It’s sad that we don’t have the capability to build a floating LNG reception facility that we could park off Kiel or in the Scheldt estuary. We should be working around the clock to build LNG export facilities and overriding EPA and legal injunctions that have blocked natural gas pipelines in the States. We’re in a war, for God’s sake! That’s something we could have done during the Second World War.
70,000 Czechs is a LOT for such a modestly-sized country. That's alarming.