5:
Zero-COVID
in China until 2027? A senior Communist Party official, in a notice published on Monday, said the policy would remain in place for the next five years. He probably didn’t run his statement by Xi Jinping, since Chinese censors immediately
scrubbed it
from news sites and social media.
100 million:
About $100 million worth of interest on Russian government bonds was unpaid after the grace expired on Sunday night, marking the first
technical default
on its sovereign debt since the Bolshevik Revolution in 1918. Still, the effect on the economy will be limited by the reality that
Western sanctions
have already made it extremely hard for Russia to borrow money anyway.
300,000:
NATO
plans
to beef up its high-readiness forces to over 300,000 troops to counter big threats like Russia. The alliance’s leaders are gathering this week in Madrid for their
first summit
since the war in Ukraine began.
40:
Maharashtra — India's richest state and home to Mumbai — is now effectively run by ... no one. Most of the cabinet is now in a hotel thousands of miles away in Assam state, talking to 40 rebel lawmakers from the “ruling” Shiv Shena party
holed up there
to demand the chief minister step down. They're rumored to be seeking to jump ship and form an alliance with their Hindu nationalist pals from PM Narendra Modi's BJP party.
