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Hard Numbers: SpaceX has a rocky reentry, Norway to hit NATO target early, British MPs are OOO, Somalia debt is canceled, Berlin techno is protected
2: Norway announced that the country intends to meet its NATO defense spending target of 2% this year — two years ahead of schedule — citing a “serious” security situation. Sweden, the alliance’s newest member, says it will do the same. The two Nordic states can now rest assured that at least Donald Trump would protect them from a Russian invasion.
49: A new analysis found the workday for members of UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s parliament is 49 minutes shorter than the 1997-2023 average, clocking in at only seven hours and nine minutes long. With all that extra time on their hands, Kate Middleton should be found in no time.
99: This week, 99% of Somalia’s debt was canceled by the Paris Club — a group of officials from major creditor countries including the United States, Japan, and Russia. Somalia’s information minister, Daud Aweis, called the move a “big milestone in the country’s journey to financial recovery.”
150: The number of UNESCO heritage sites in Germany rose to 150, with six entities being added this week. Notably, an Intangible Cultural Heritage designation was given to Berlin’s techno scene for its contribution to German culture. Oonts Oonts.Germany investigates hack of Ukraine weapons aid discussion
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz ordered an inquiry Saturday after a hacked conversation about German military aid to Ukraine was published on Russian state-run media. In a 38-minute exchange on the WebEx platform, German Air Force officers discussed using Taurus missiles against targets in Crimea, including the Kerch Bridge to Russia – despite a recent Bundestag vote against supplying the weapons to Kiev.
Moscow is using the leak to portray Berlin as an aggressor. In a Telegram post, former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, now deputy head of the Security Council, wrote, “Our age-old rivals – the Germans – have again turned into our sworn enemies.”
The military implications
The incident has been labeled a “catastrophe” for German intelligence due to its use of an insecure communications platform, and it has reignited debate about arming Ukraine with long-range weapons. Kiev has received SCALP and Storm Shadow missiles with a range of 250 kilometers, but the Taurus’ 500-kilometer range would allow deep strikes into Russian territory, prompting fears of escalation and retaliation.
Ukraine has been requesting the Taurus since May 2023, and President Volodymyr Zelensky recently told the Munich Security Conference that long-range weapons were urgently needed for his country to win the war. While Scholz had already indicated that Taurus was off the table, German officials say this latest incident was likely intended to cement that decision, to Kiev’s dismay.Powerful guests, packed agenda in Munich
The 60th Munich Security Conference is underway as world leaders gather in Germany to discuss diplomatic and military strategy.
US Vice President Kamala Harris will reaffirm Biden’s support for NATO after Donald Trumpthreatened to not protect members who fail to pay their dues. Recently impeached Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, who may symbolize US dysfunction to allies, will also be on hand.
With the second anniversary of Russia’s invasion looming, debates on the level of continued support for Ukraine will demand attention. Russia was not invited to attend, but President Volodymyr Zelensky will be there to woo allies. He’ll also stop in Paris to sign a security agreement with President Emmanuel Macron for long-term aid, including support for reconstruction and military assistance, but it is expected to stop short of a pledge to send weapons. Zelensky will also meet with Chancellor Olaf Scholz.
China’s top diplomat, Wang Yi, will advocate for a multipolar world before traveling to Spain and France for bilateral meetings.
Israel is sending President Isaac Herzog and three rescued hostages. Herzog is planning a series of cease-fire talks and will face questions about Israel’s attack on a main hospital in Gaza on Thursday amid growing concern for civilians’ safety.
Here are 4 things you need to know about the MSC. Don’t forget to RSVP to GZERO’s Protecting elections in the Age of AI event, live streaming from Munich on Saturday!Why Olaf Scholz smells like toast
When Olaf Scholz replaced Angela Merkel as Germany’s chancellor in 2021, hopes were high, in Germany and beyond, that a shift to new leadership might reinvigorate the nation at the heart of Europe. The remarkable Merkel had led her center-right Christian Democrats, her country, and the EU through a series of crises during her 16 years in power. Scholz rose to the top three years ago by casting himself as both a steady pair of hands in the Merkel mold but also as a center-left leader with a progressive view of Germany’s future. When Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022, Scholz surprised many with the boldness of his response. The “new era” he declared in Germany’s attitude toward Russia and the countries still trapped in its shadow defied his image as a skilled bureaucrat without a strong public voice or vision.
But as Chancellor Scholz prepares to visit Washington this weekend, he faces a rising tide of criticism back home. The German public mood has grown darker over the past year, mainly because the economy is limping, and inflation has taken a bite out of both consumers and industry. Workers are angry. Business leaders are frustrated. And the coalition Scholz formed to win power – an increasingly uneasy partnership of establishment socialists, ambitious Greens, and the fiscally hawkish, pro-business FDP – is wearing badly.
The poll numbers speak for themselves. In January, the government’s approval rating hit 17%, a record low. Scholz’s personal popularity hovered at 19%, the lowest mark for any chancellor in a quarter century. Finance Minister Christian Lindner (FDP) and Economics Minister Robert Habeck (Greens) aren’t faring much better. Recent polls show the current three-party coalition’s expected vote total has dropped from a combined 52% in 2021 to just 32%. By itself, Scholz’s SPD is attracting just 15% support.
The center-right opposition, the CDU-CSU alliance, now leads the polls with 30%-34% of support. But Friedrich Merz, Angela Merkel’s successor as CDU chairman, isn’t much more popular than Scholz. Instead, it’s the far-right Alternative for Germany party, or AfD, that’s making headlines. Noisy recent protests in dozens of German cities make clear that the popularity of the AfD’s increasingly radical, openly xenophobic, anti-European, and pro-Russian platform has its limits, and all other parties now represented in parliament have pledged never to partner with them. But nationwide polls show the AfD’s support has grown from just 10.3% at the 2021 election to between 19% and 22% today.
The state of play
Now come the elections. First, the SPD expects a beating in June’s European Parliament elections and a humiliation this fall in eastern German states considered strongholds of the populist right. Germany’s next national elections (for the Bundestag, parliament’s lower house) must be held no later than Oct. 26, 2025, and will most likely occur in September next year.
Perhaps Scholz’s biggest challenge will be managing his increasingly unwieldy coalition with the Greens and FDP through this gauntlet of political tests. Much of Scholz’s weak image comes down to open public criticism from his own finance minister, the FDP’s Lindner, who has accused Scholz of creating a dysfunctional welfare state. The Greens, unsympathetic to Scholz’s need to carefully manage the country’s energy transition as Germany moved to halt hydrocarbon energy imports from Russia, have accused Scholz of being soft on the fight against climate change. The Greens’ insistence on shutting down the last of Germany’s nuclear power plants last year made matters worse.
And if the SPD takes the expected beatdown in European elections in June, some within the SPD may begin pushing for a change in party leadership to rescue its chances of survival in power.
What might save Scholz?
Scholz and his coalition smell like toast. But 19 months is a long time, and much will happen between now and the next national elections in fall 2025. A return of Donald Trump to power and/or shifts on the battlefield in Ukraine could offer Scholz opportunities to rally Germans to their flag – and, by extension, to the incumbent government.
Scholz’s best hope lies not in some newfound strength or a new harmony within his coalition. It’s the weakness of others that might still save him. In particular, the establishment center-right CDU/CSU faces its own tough challenge. While offering a vision of a stronger and more self-confident Germany, the party must distance itself from the AfD, which remains anathema to many German voters, and Merz may not be the man for the job. He has already pandered to AfD voters with comments about Muslims, migrants, homosexuals, and the Green Party that were ham-handed at best and deeply offensive to many Germans, and he’s not immune to an internal party leadership challenge either.
The longer-term challenge
The biggest challenge for the SPD in coming years will be similar to the one faced by center-left parties across Europe: Voters are drifting away in all directions. Some of the party’s working-class voters have moved from blue- to white-collar jobs and now see their interests differently than they did a decade ago. Others have moved to the right in the face of rising numbers of foreign migrants. Many younger voters are moving toward the Greens or even to the populist left Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance, which represents a mix of welfare state generosity and sharp limits on immigration. The SPD has seen its party membership rolls cut nearly in half since the year 2000.
It’s a complex problem for even a skilled political leader, and Olaf Scholz has yet to prove he’s up to the task.
Brussels bows to farmers on green goals
On Tuesday, the European Commission scrapped a plan to limit pesticide use and excluded agriculture from its roadmap to cut greenhouse gasses as the ruling coalition attempts to quell bloc-wide protests by farmers.
The concessions follow pledges last week to reduce the burden of environmental policy on farmers after protests erupted in France, Belgium, Germany, and other countries last month. Farmers say they can’t get a decent price for their produce thanks to strict environmental regulations, competition from cheap Ukrainian imports, and insufficient government support.
The EU did limit Ukrainian imports last week and loosened rules on how much land farmers have to leave fallow, but no dice. The protests only grew with farmers in Italy, Spain, Bulgaria, and Greece all turning out on Monday and Tuesday.
Why is Brussels being flexible? European parliamentary elections are looming in June, and the ruling centrist coalition is sweating the populist surge on the continent.
Knowing they need to keep farmers on their side to retain power, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen pledged last week to rethink a series of climate-related laws.Hard Numbers: Imran Khan faces new sentence, Russia gets economic upgrade, Philippines and Vietnam join hands in South China Sea, Germany makes big Bitcoin seizure
10: Pakistan’s former Prime Minister Imran Khan and former Foreign Minister ShahMahmood Qureshi were sentenced Tuesday to 10 years in prison for leaking state secrets. While Khan is already serving a three-year term on corruption charges, this is Qureshi’s first conviction. The new ruling comes just a week before general elections on Feb. 8. Khan’s political party, Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf, called it “a sham case” and plans to challenge the decision in a higher court.
2.6: Is President Vladimir Putin’s military spending spree paying off? Russia’s GDP is expected to grow 2.6% in 2024, according to the International Monetary Fund, which is 1.5 percentage points higher than its October forecast. For 2025, the IMF sees GDP growth for Russia easing to just 1.1%.
2: Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. signed two memorandums of understanding with Vietnam on Tuesday to boost cooperation on maritime security in the South China Sea. Vietnam also agreed to a five-year trade deal to supply up to two million tons of white rice to Manila. China, which is less than thrilled by such agreements between its neighbors, launched military drills in the disputed waters earlier this month as the US and Philippines initiated their exercises in the region.
50,000: German authorities on Tuesday seized 50,000 Bitcoins worth nearly $2.17 billion in Saxony. While no charges have been filed yet, police suspect that two men who purchased the cryptocurrency did so with profits from a piracy website. Police are investigating unauthorized commercial exploitation of copyrighted works and money laundering.
A dozen countries suspend UNRWA funding over Oct.7 allegations
On Sunday, France, Austria and Japan announced they were joining the US, Germany, Canada, Italy, the UK, the Netherlands, Switzerland, Australia and Finland in pausing their funding for the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees. At least a dozen employees of UNRWA allegedly cooperated with Hamas in planning the Oct. 7 attacks.
Together, the countries that have pulled their money made up well over 60% of the funds for UNRWA in 2022, and representatives of the organization say they will not be able to function long without the support. Norway and Ireland, however, agreed to continue funding UNRWA, saying their work supporting the displaced and devastated population of Gaza is too important.
What happens now? UNRWA has fired nine of the 12 employees accused of cooperating with Hamas, though the details of their alleged collaboration are not publicly known. The US did frame its suspension of funding as temporary, leaving the door open to resumption. But UNRWA is already regarded with deep distrust within Israel, and the Biden administration may face pressure from its ally not to resume funding.
In the meantime, however, over 2 million Gazans are in desperate straits, displaced from their homes and reliant on UNRWA for what food and medicine they can get. Some are calling for the Gulf states to step in with funding to replace what the West has withdrawn, but no signs yet the money is forthcoming.
Hard Numbers: Kenyans march against femicide, Corruption costs Ukrainian defense, Germans protest far right, Evergrande tries to avoid liquidation (again), Say more than ‘Oui’ to Paris!
14: So far this year, 14 women have been murdered as a result of gender-based violence in Kenya, and thousands took to the streets in Kenya’s capital, Nairobi, on Saturday in response. Nearly a third of Kenyan women face physical violence at some point in their lives, while 13% are victims of sexual violence, according to a 2023 government report.
40 million: The country’s security service, SBU, says five employees from a Ukrainian arms company have been charged with conspiring with officials to embezzle nearly $40 million from defense coffers. The money, meant for buying mortar shells to aid the fight against Russia, has been seized and returned to the defense budget. But the incident signals how Ukraine’s battle against corruption continues.
100,000: Protests were held in 30 German cities on Saturday, with up to 100,000 people demonstrating against far-right extremism in Deutschland. The protests – coincidently held on International Holocaust Remembrance Day – were a rebuke of the anti-immigrant rhetoric peddled by the increasingly popular Alternative for Germany party, or AfD, just months ahead of three major regional elections in eastern Germany where the AfD tends to do well.
$300 billion: A court in Hong Kong ordered Chinese property development giant Evergrande to liquidate as it struggles to restructure debts to service over $300 billion in liabilities. It is unclear whether China will allow foreign investors to seize Evergrande assets, and there are fears of major ramifications for the Chinese economy as a whole.
A2-B1: If you dream of moving to Paris, you’ll need to dust off your Petit Larousse and embrace the subjunctive. While French competence was previously only required for those seeking French citizenship, a new law passed on Saturday requires anyone applying for multi-year residency to prove they understand French at the A2 level (advanced beginner). And a 10-year residency card now requires a B1 (intermediate) level of proficiency.