India's tricky balancing act over Ukraine dominates foreign ministers' summit
Good evening,
The G20 was formed at the end of the last century to enable the world's largest economies to coordinate international policy. But Russia's invasion of Ukraine has deepened divisions between countries at a pivotal moment for the global economy.
This poses a challenge for the current host, India's Narendra Modi, who some say wants to be cast "as a vishwaguru, or universal mentor".
| Hollie Clemence
Executive Editor |
|
|
| TODAY'S BIG QUESTION | | Russia's invasion of Ukraine dominated one of the first meetings of the G20 under India's presidency.
India's "longstanding security ties with Moscow have put the host of Thursday's meeting in an awkward position", said Al Jazeera. As a major buyer of Russian weapons and energy, India "has not directly condemned Russia's invasion of Ukraine", and the country had been "keen to steer the talks towards issues affecting the Global South, such as poverty eradication and climate change".
India's G20 presidency comes at a crucial time for the prime minister, Narendra Modi, who is "keen to promote the G20 as a forum for solving big problems", said The Economist. Modi is facing a tricky re-election campaign next year and his hope is the G20 meetings will allow him "to show off the strides India has made to visiting bigwigs and Indian voters", added the paper.
India "wants the G20 to cast Modi as a vishwaguru, or universal mentor", said The Independent and in his opening address to the meeting in Delhi, Modi claimed the country's presidency has "tried to give a voice to the global south". |
|
|
TALKING POINT | | The battle lines for next year's general election are being drawn, said Andrew Grice in The Independent. In January, Rishi Sunak published his five pledges (halving inflation, growing the economy, reducing public debt, cutting NHS waiting lists and stopping the Channel migrants).
Last week, Keir Starmer followed suit with a speech in Manchester in which he set out Labour's "five missions".
Starmer "hates" being in opposition, said Ben Nunn in The i Paper. "He finds it painfully frustrating." He's impatient for power, and he has a very clear idea of what he'd do with it. He "knows from history that the most transformative governments are in it for the long haul". This is what we saw last week, a two-term plan focused on missions: he wants Britain to have the highest sustained economic growth of any G7 nation; he wants it to be a "clean energy superpower". |
|
|
PROFILE | | The Tesla CEO has been causing yet more controversy since buying Twitter |
|
|
More from TheWeek.co.uk today | Greek rail workers strike as anger grows over deadly crash
Protests erupt in Athens as death toll from train collision rises to 57
Read more Speed Reads
The court case that could bring down Fox News
Litigation has revealed Fox News knew voter fraud claims were 'bogus' but didn't want to lose viewers
Read more Global Lens articles
Prime time: the rise and rise of energy drinks
The YouTuber-backed drink Prime is in such demand it is being resold by eager schoolchildren
Read more Getting to Grips With... articles
Remortgaging: should you stick with your lender or switch?
There are benefits to staying with your current provider, but it might not be the cheapest option
Read more Money File articles | |
|
|
T H E W E E K M A G A Z I N E |
|
| Try The Week magazine today to get straight to the heart of the issues that matter, without angle or agenda. Our easily digestible format gives you the clarity and space to step away from the noise of the news. |
|
|
WHAT THE SCIENTISTS ARE SAYING… | | Many of us find the winter months rather exhausting, says The Daily Telegraph. Now scientists have found evidence that humans do actually need more sleep at this time of year. The finding was based on data on 188 patients with various sleep conditions who had visited a sleep clinic in Berlin. The researchers did not find that the disorders had seasonal variations, except that insomnia was more common towards the end of the year; however, they did note that the patients slept, on average, 60 minutes longer in the winter than in the summer, and spent more time in rapid eye-movement sleep. They suggest that even people in areas of high light pollution, winter sends humans into an energy-saving mode, which triggers a need for more sleep. |
|
|
IT WASN'T ALL BAD | | Good news stories from the past seven days |
|
|
| PICTURE OF THE DAY | | Photographer Ed Hasler won the best wildlife category in the National Geographic Traveller photography awards with this picture of a stag during the rutting season, taken in Richmond Park, London.
Ed Hasler |
|
|
Good week for... | Roald Dahl, as Puffin Books rowed back on its plans to amend his children's stories following a storm of criticism. Under the new plan, the original texts will be published by Penguin as a "classic collection"; while the amended texts, excised of references to fat children, ugly women and black tractors, will be issued under the Puffin imprint aimed at younger children. | |
|
|
Bad week for... | The Duke and Duchess of Sussex, with reports that they've been asked to give up Frogmore Cottage – their ten-bedroom home in the grounds of Windsor Castle – so that it can be offered to Prince Andrew instead. The King is reported to be planning to cut his brother's grant, leaving Prince Andrew unable to afford his current 30-room home near Windsor. | |
|
|
Puzzles | | Test your general knowledge with The Week's daily crossword, part of our puzzles section |
|
|
instant opinion | | Your digest of analysis from the British and international press from the past seven days
The Nigerian election "was badly mismanaged at best", says the Financial Times's editorial board. "It failed to set the example needed for west Africa, a region where too many national leaders have extended term limits or resorted to seizing power at gunpoint." Nigeria's Independent National Electoral Commission promised a fair and truly democratic contest, but the watchdog's plans "badly misfired". Amid "troubling" violence, delays and technical failures triggered "legitimate concerns of vote tampering", and "some individual results do not pass the smell test", the paper reports. "More worrying still" was voter turnout, which was "pitifully low" at 27%. "What Nigeria needed above all was a clean election to reiterate the basic message of democracy: that a sovereign people can choose its leaders," the editorial board concludes. "Sadly, it did not happen." |
|
|
| TV REVIEW | | Jesse Eisenberg and Claire Danes excel in this Disney+ adaptation |
|
|
DOWN TO BUSINESS | Thursday afternoon markets | The FTSE 100 closed out the session up 29 points. Bank of England chief economist Huw Pill said Britain's economy was showing slightly more momentum than expected.
FTSE 100: 7,944.04, up 0.37%
Dax: 15,327.64, up 0.15%
Dow: 32,741.36, up 0.24%
Dollar: £1 = $1.1941, down 0.76%
Euro: £1 = €1.1270, down 0.04%
Brent crude: $84.25, down 0.07%
Gold: $1,836.30, down 0.08% | |
|
|
WIT & WISDOM | "Happiness is the absence of striving for happiness." | Zhuang Zhou, quoted on CNN | |
|
|
The Week is published by Future Publishing Limited, registered in England and Wales no. 2008885. Registered address: Quay House, The Ambury, Bath, BA1 1UA. VAT number 713111493. |
|
No comments:
Post a Comment