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A man holding a cake sings Happy Birthday for Calin Georgescu during an event to celebrate Georgescu's birthday, in Bucharest, Romania, March 26, 2025.
Far-right places first in Romanian election, sets stage for run-off
Far-right nationalist George Simion won the first round of Romania’s presidential rerun election on Sunday, securing 41% of the vote. Simion, leader of the Alliance for the Union of Romanians, or AUR, is known for his pro-Trump, Eurosceptic stance and opposition to military aid for Ukraine. Simion came in first but failed to reach the 50% threshold needed to win outright. Independent Bucharest Mayor Nicușor Dan came in second with 21% of the vote, edging out centrist Crin Antonescu,and will face Simion in the runoff on May 18.
What led up to this election? The vote is a rerun afterthe Constitutional Court annulled Romania’s November 2024 presidential contest over allegations of Russian interference. Moscow was pushing for ultranationalist candidate Călin Georgescu on social media in November, and though barred from running, Georgescu remains influential – he even voted at Simion’s side on Sunday – and could play a significant role in an AUR administration.
How did Simion succeed – and where would he take Romania? Simion tapped into widespread public discontent with Romania’s political establishment, struggling economy, and skepticism toward EU institutions. His rise could bring Bucharest closer to Moscow, and he has pledged to end Romanian support for Ukraine in its war with Russia.People protest Ljubljana's Mayor Zoran Jankovic's support of Serbia's President Aleksandar Vucic near the Serbian embassy in Ljubljana, Slovenia, on March 5, 2025.
Time is running out for Serbia’s embattled president
After months of historic protests, Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić, is now up against something particularly formidable: the clock.
The context: Vučić, a right-wing populist friendly with Serbia’s traditional ally Moscow, has held power since 2012. Last year, the deadly collapse of a canopy at a renovated train station ignited anti-corruption protests that swelled into the country’s largest demonstrations in a generation.
Protesters want a probe and fresh elections. Vučić has dismissed several officials, including his PM, but refused to step down, blaming unnamed foreign governments for the unrest. On Sunday, he tapped a little-known medical professor, Djuro Macut, as PM.
Clock #1: Vučić’s governing SNS party has until April 18 to approve Macut or else face snap elections. SNS has the numbers in the legislature, but approving Macut, whose expertise is in endocrinology rather than governance, would inflame the streets even more. Rejecting him, however, would trigger elections that Vučić wishes to avoid.
Clock #2: Meanwhile, Vučić must also find a buyer for Russia’s stake in Serbia’s oil refinery to avoid crippling US sanctions on his country’s energy industry.
Why it matters: Serbia is a key player in the Balkans, an aspiring EU member, and a pal of Putin’s. The clock is ticking – if the bell rings, it could echo well beyond Belgrade.
Russia's President Vladimir Putin and North Korea's leader Kim Jong Un attend a state reception in Pyongyang, North Korea, in June, 2024.
Can North Koreans help Russia push Ukrainians out of Russia?
North Korea's state-controlled news agency KCNA announced on Tuesday that the country has ratified a strategic partnership agreement that allows Russia to use North Korean troops to help push Ukrainians from Russia’s Kursk region.
Ukrainian, US, NATO, and South Korean officials have warned in recent days that Russia has amassed a force of about 50,000 troops to try to evict Ukrainian forces from Russia’s Kursk and Belgorod regions – and they say the force includes 10,000-12,000 North Koreans.
The presence of North Korean soldiers could help Russia push forward with its offensive in Ukraine’s East. But beyond the ability of the North Koreans to draw Ukrainian fire away from Russian forces, it’s not clear how effective they will be on the battlefield. None of them has significant combat experience, and the Ukrainians they will be deployed to attack have been fighting in their country’s Donbas region for a decade.
In addition, throughout this war, Russian forces have faced command-and-control issues. It remains to be seen how Russian commanders can effectively coordinate real-time battlefield maneuvers with large numbers of non-Russian-speaking troops.
Ukraine swarmed Moscow on Tuesday with its biggest-ever drone attack. Russia said it had destroyed at least 20 Ukrainian attack drones as they swarmed over the country's capital and 124 more over eight other regions.
Hard Numbers: Moscow swarmed with Ukrainian drones, 9/11 first responder deaths rise, Argentinians head to the bank, Australia eyes age restrictions for social media
370: The number of 9/11 FDNY first responders killed from exposure to toxins at Ground Zero has risen to 370 – surpassing the number of department members who died on the day of the terror attacks 23 years ago. In the past year, 28 more members of the FDNY have died from 9/11-related illness. Meanwhile, federal funding is on the verge of drying out by 2028, when the program is expected to start turning away new applicants unless a proposed extension bill is passed.
700 million: Argentines are declaring hundreds of millions of previously hidden savings under a new tax amnesty program that President Javier Milei hopes will boost the country’s lagging economy. The program, which lasts until the end of the month, has fueled over $700 million of previously squirreled away cash to be deposited into banks in both July and August. Milei hopes the program will recoup $40 billion of the roughly $258 billion in undeclared funds that Argentines currently keep in mattresses, overseas, or otherwise outside its financial system.
16: The Australian government has set out to establish a minimum social media age, with the government expected to propose federal legislation later this year. Although the exact age limit has not been established, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese says he favors an age limit as high as 16 years old. The proposal has support across the political spectrum, but it is not clear that the technology exists to reliably enforce such a ban.
Russia's President Vladimir Putin and North Korea's leader Kim Jong Un arrive for a gala concert in Pyongyang, North Korea June 19, 2024.
Putin and Kim sign mutual defense deal
Russian President Vladimir Putinarrived in Pyongyang early Wednesday for his first official visit to North Korea in 24 years. He met with Supreme Leader Kim Jong Un and signed a deal to provide “mutual assistance in the event of aggression against one of the parties to this agreement.”
Putin called it a “breakthrough” document, but “aggression” is a vague term that leaves plenty of room for interpretation.
The real news. Russia, which has been isolated by the international community over its invasion of Ukraine, desperately needs more munitions to continue the war — that’s what this visit is really about. Moscow is deepening ties with Pyongyang to ensure it keeps the ammunition train rolling.
North Korea has sent roughly 10,000 shipping containers to Russia that could contain as many as 4.8 million artillery shells, according to recent comments from South Korea’s defense minister. Russia and North Korea have denied such arms transfers are taking place.
During Putin’s visit, North Korea notably declared “full support” for Russia’s war in Ukraine.
What does North Korea get? The expanding partnership between the two countries could see Russia provide North Korea with everything from food to military technology.
Like Russia over its war in Ukraine, the rogue state faces crippling sanctions over its nuclear program. Putin is also calling for increased cooperation between the two in fighting these sanctions, decrying such economic penalties as an effort by the West to maintain its hegemony.
Russian President Vladimir Putin, Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu, and Chief of the Russian Land Forces Oleg Salyukov attend a military parade on Victory Day, in Moscow, on May 9, 2024.
How high school explains Putin’s reshuffle
One way to look at Russian President Vladimir Putin’s decision to replace long-serving Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu with career economist Andrey Belousov is this: Since the invasion of Ukraine, Putin’s nerds have performed better than his jocks.
The jocks: Right from the start, Russia’s generals and spies – poorly prepared, badly informed, and deeply corrupt – screwed up what was meant to be a short victorious war. Two years later, the locker room bully clique continues to grind, slowly and destructively, across Ukraine, but that’s largely because Russia’s manpower is virtually unlimited while the West’s support for Ukraine is not. Despite Secretary of State Antony Blinken’ssurprise visit to Kyiv today to tell President Volodymyr Zelensky military aid is "now on its way,” there's no doubt the recent slowdown in US support, thanks to months of congressional infighting, has exacerbated Ukraine’s challenges on the battlefield.
The nerds: The stars of math class, meanwhile – led by Central Bank Chief Elvira Nabiullina and Finance Minister Anton Siluanov – have done the seemingly impossible: They kept the Russian economy afloat despite crippling Western financial sanctions. They held the line as the “War Machine” became central to the economy.
Now Putin, settling in for a forever war against the West, wants to ensure it’s economically sustainable. His spokesman even warned of the danger of a “1980s” situation, when overspending on the quagmire in Afghanistan and the arms race with Washington helped to bring down the USSR.
To avoid a similar fate, Putin is now banking on a little nerd power at the barracks.
Russian Deputy Defence Minister Timur Ivanov inspects the construction of apartment blocks in Mariupol, Russian-controlled Ukraine, in this October 2022 image.
Shocked! Russian deputy defense minister jailed for graft
Russian authorities this week detained a prominent deputy defense minister on corruption charges. Timur Ivanov, a long-standing close ally of Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu, oversaw a wide variety of construction and logistics projects for the Russian armed forces, including in Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine.
Anti-corruption activists, including the outfit of late opposition leader Alexei Navalny, had long focused on Ivanov’s lavish lifestyle. This is the highest-profile corruption takedown since Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022.
Now, if you are shocked – shocked! – that there’s corruption in Russian military contracting, we’ve got news for you: Corruption is rife in the Russian government. Getting busted is usually less about a sudden universal respect for transparency, and more about turf battles within the Russian elite.
Is Shoigu in trouble? Not yet, but note two things. One, he’s heard lots of criticism from pro-war hawks who accuse him of corruption and incompetence in his military strategy. The most prominent of them, Yevgeny Prigozhin, is no longer among the living, but the grumblings continue. Second, in just a few weeks, Vladimir Putin will be reinaugurated and will have to name a new cabinet. If Shoigu really is in any trouble, that’s when it will become clear.
British Foreign Secretary David Cameron holds a joint press conference with US Secretary of State Antony Blinken at the State Department in Washington, US, April 9, 2024.
Ukraine and Russia war over energy
UK Foreign Secretary David Cameron visited Washington on Tuesday to lobby for greater material US support for Ukraine, and Congress is likely to provide a package that includes help for Ukraine by the end of the month, according to analysis from Eurasia Group, our parent company.
The war, meanwhile, has settled into a grim exchange of attacks that are unlikely to speed an end to the fighting, but which target energy supplies. Russia continues to launch missiles against Ukraine’s energy infrastructure, and it has reportedly begun to prioritize targets like hydroelectric and thermal power stations outside Kyiv and other major cities that are less well-defended.
In response to the Russian barrage, the EU has announced that help is on the way. Austria, Germany, Sweden, and the Netherlands have offered 157 power generators as part of the EU Civil Protection Mechanism, and the EU itself has deployed 10 large-capacity power generators from its own stockpiles.
For its part, Ukrainian drones have repeatedly struck oil refineries deep inside Russian territory since the beginning of the year, and Russian air defenses haven’t yet found a way to defend against them.