Today, we hang out with a Russian opposition leader, update the top national COVID vaccine rollouts, and remember a short-lived revolution in Cairo.
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Putin’s nemesis
Carlos SantamariaOver the weekend, some 40,000 Russians braved subzero temperatures to turn out in the streets in support of imprisoned Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny. More than 3,000 protesters were arrested, and Navalny called on his followers to prepare for more action in the coming weeks.
But just who is Alexei Navalny, and how significant is the threat that he may pose to Vladimir Putin's stranglehold on power in Russia?
A longtime thorn in Putin's side. Navalny, 44, is a prominent and charismatic anti-corruption crusader with a penchant for social media. He made his mark on Russian politics ten years ago, when he led tens of thousands of people in protests that began over election fraud and corruption but morphed into a broader outcry against Putin.
Since then he has remained a key player in the opposition to the current regime, often publishing exposés detailing corruption among elites close to Putin or the president himself. In 2013, he came in second in the race for mayor of Moscow, getting 27 percent of the vote. A year later he was convicted of graft in a trial viewed as politically motivated, and in 2017 he was briefly detained for protesting against the astonishing wealth of then-PM Dmitri Medvedev.
Last year Navalny was poisoned with a rare Soviet-era nerve agent in an assassination attempt that he and independent observers say was carried out by state security agents. After recovering in Germany, he returned to Russia this week — knowing he'd be arrested upon arrival.
Popular… for some. Navalny has struggled in all his attempts to run for elected office because his support is strongest among urban and younger Russians. Overall, only about 20 percent of the wider population agree with him, and 50 percent oppose his actions. What's more, half of Russians believe his poisoning was either a hoax or that it was carried out by the West.
So, why does he worry Putin? For one thing, Navalny is laser-focused on an issue that affects all Russians — corruption — and has a knack for getting his message out. That can help him broaden his base beyond the the laptop-toting "creative" urban class, and potentially unify Russians from all walks of life across 11 time zones.
As for his other politics, Navalny often takes positions that many in the West would characterize as nationalistic, yet are quite popular in Russia. He defended Russia's invasion of Georgia in 2008, the illegal annexation of Crimea in 2014, and in the past made disparaging comments about Central Asian migrants.
Is this time different? The 2011 protests petered out largely because Navalny then lacked strong support outside of Moscow and St. Petersburg. However, in recent years anti-Putin rallies have increasingly taken place in a host of mid-sized cities, including in remote parts of Siberia.
With Putin — now in his 21st year in power — showing approval ratings near all-time lows (by his own standards) ahead of Duma elections this fall, Navalny has a window of opportunity to raise the stakes. After all, Putin has cleared the way to stay in power until 2036 if he wants.
But let's keep things in perspective. While Navalny's level of support is rising, it's not (yet) enough to pose an existential threat for Putin. Russia's president is not as popular as he once was, but still enjoys an approval rating of more than 60 percent, controls a massive and loyal security apparatus, and has brought the entire business elite to heel.
Navalny's challenge is to put enough people on the streets to scare Putin's cronies and security men into thinking twice about continuing to support him — no easy feat in a country where political apathy is widespread, and fear of 1990s-style instability is real.
The next big test for Navalny will come at Sunday's protest. The turnout will determine his immediate fate as Putin's nemesis.The Graphic Truth
Gabrielle DebinskiEven as vaccines roll out around the world, COVID-19 is continuing to spread like wildfire in many places, dashing hopes of a return to normal life any time soon. Some countries, like Israel and the UK for instance, have been praised for their inoculation drives, while still recording a high number of new cases. It's clear that while inoculations are cause for hope, the pace of rollouts cannot keep up with the fast-moving virus. Here's a look at the countries that have vaccinated the largest percentages of their populations so far – and a snapshot of their daily COVID caseloads (7-day rolling average) in recent weeks.
Quick Take: Pro-Navalny Russian protests make Putin defensive
Ian Bremmer Quick Take - AMLO contracts COVID and Navalny inspires protestAnalyzing the recent jailing of Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, and widespread protests across Russia this past weekend, Ian Bremmer says that one of the most interesting takeaways is the Kremlin's reaction. Putin "clearly sees Navalny as a threat," Bremmer says in this week's Quick Take. Watch the clip here.
What We're Watching: Tahrir Square 10 years on, Italy's PM resigns, AMLO gets COVID, India-China border row
Gabrielle DebinskiTahrir Square — a decade on: This week marks a decade since mass protests in Cairo's Tahrir Square sparked a revolution that toppled Egypt's longtime strongman Hosni Mubarak as part of the Arab Spring. But ten years on, Egypt's brief experiment with democracy has long since been undermined by current President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi. El-Sisi, a former General who in 2013 capitalized on fresh street protests to oust the country's first democratically-elected president, has quashed dissent and crushed political opposition. Egypt is now one of the most dangerous countries in the world to be a journalist, and has one of the lowest internet freedom rankings. As if to make the point that Tahrir Square — long the site of anti-government protests — is now his, el-Sisi recently oversaw a $6 million renovation that dressed up the place with the trappings of a European-style monumental plaza, covering over most of the open spaces where hundreds of thousands once camped out and defied the regime. Ten years after the Arab Spring bloomed in Cairo, Egypt may actually be less free than it was on January 24, 2011.
AMLO-19: Mexican president Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador announced Sunday he had tested positive for COVID-19, capping a dark few days in which the country saw its highest weekly death toll yet from the virus. From the beginning of the pandemic, AMLO, as the left-wing populist is known, has resisted taking broad lockdown measures, citing his concern for the country's massive population of working poor who can't simply work from home. And despite the fourth highest global COVID death toll, AMLO has remained broadly popular. The 67-year old former smoker tweeted that his symptoms are mild and he's still on the job, but if things do take a grimmer turn, the situation could get rocky fast — AMLO is a towering figure in Mexico, with no clear and viable successor in sight. What's more, his ruling Morena party faces tough mid-term elections this year, and they will need him hale and hearty to make sure they retain their grip on Congress.
PM Conte resigns in Italy: After weeks of political dysfunction, in which Italy's fragile coalition government narrowly survived a confidence vote in the Senate just last week, Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte now says he will resign, pushing the country into political chaos. The timing couldn't be worse: Italians are now left without a stable government amid a massive effort to rollout a COVID-19 vaccine and revive the pandemic-battered economy (Italy's GDP shrunk by a whopping 10 percent in 2020). There are a few potential scenarios going forward: One is that Conte could remain prime minister if the president appoints him to head a (weak and fractious) new coalition. Another option is that former prime minister Matteo Renzi's party — which triggered the latest upheavals by withdrawing from the government in a dispute over how to spend EU coronavirus relief funds — could return to government, with a different prime minister. Lastly, new elections could be called. One player who might particularly like to see that outcome is former interior minister Matteo Salvini, whose far-right Lega party is currently leading in polls.
India and China in another high border skirmish: The two Asian giants clashed again over their ill-defined frontier in the Himalayas, with Indian sources reporting that its troops repulsed a Chinese patrol that had crossed into Indian territory. The situation along the strategically important high altitude border has been unresolved for decades, but things have gotten more tense again over the past year. Last June a melee of sticks and fisticuffs left dozens dead, and last fall the two sides exchanged fire. With strongly nationalistic leaders in charge of both nations, the border has become a flashpoint in a broader increase of India-China tensions as the world's two most populous countries vie for supremacy in Asia.
Hard Numbers: Dutch riot, Israel's COVID balancing act, Estonia's new PM, Germans heart Biden
Gabrielle Debinski10: Violent protests against new coronavirus restrictions have erupted in at least 10 regions in the Netherlands, which recently imposed the country's first nationwide curfew since World War Two. Protesters clashed with police and looted stores — and police say that a far-right anti-immigrant group has taken advantage of the discontent to exacerbate tensions.
1: Estonia's parliament has approved the nomination of Prime Minister Kaja Kallas of the center-right Reform party, making her the country's first-ever female head of government. Kallas takes the reins after Estonia's government was recently thrown into chaos amid a corruption scandal and will now oversee the country's post-COVID recovery.
40: Despite rolling out the most successful vaccine drive in the world, Israel's vaccination rate cannot keep pace with the spread of disease as Israelis continue to flout social distancing rules. The country will now close its airport to all international travel for at least a week to try and stop the spread of new COVID variants, with the British strain now accounting for around 40 percent of all new infections in the country.
79: After a tumultuous few years under the Trump presidency, Germans are feeling good about Joe Biden: 79 percent of them say they have confidence in Biden's approach to global affairs, compared to just 10 percent who said the same about President Trump last fall.
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This edition of Signal was written by Gabrielle Debinski, Carlos Santamaria, and Alex Kliment. Graphic by Gabriella Turrisi. Spiritual counsel from Larry, who did a lot of interviews.
Hi there,
Today, we'll look beyond the Camp David Trump-Taliban meeting controversy to update you on what's actually happening inside Afghanistan, peek at how tech is shaping the Hong Kong protests, warily welcome a breakthrough in Ukraine-Russia tensions, and look ahead to the next Brexit lunacy.
As a bonus: what can today's tech firms learn from Chernobyl? I sat down with Microsoft president Brad Smith to find out.
Love us, hate us, let us know. And thanks for reading.
-Alex Kliment (@saosasha)No Peace for Afghanistan
Gabrielle DebinskiAs the US-led mission in Afghanistan nears its nineteenth year, we have now reached a point where a child born on this date in 2001 — before the attacks of 9/11 — is old enough to be deployed there. Over the weekend, President Trump scuttled months-long negotiations with the Taliban that were meant to end the longest war in America's history.
While that decision provoked the usual storm of partisan recriminations in Washington, Afghanistan's political, social, and economic fabric continues to deteriorate. Consider that Afghanistan recently surpassed Syria as the single most violent country in the world.
With peace talks in limbo and the country's future uncertain, here's a look at what's happening in Afghanistan today.
A political patchwork — Afghanistan's political scene is fractious and unstable. Five years ago, after an inconclusive presidential election the US backed a power sharing deal between President Ashraf Ghani and his rival, Abdullah Abdullah, who holds the post of chief executive. Crippled by tribal divisions and endemic corruption, Afghanistan's unity government has failed to govern effectively. It controls less than half of the country's districts.
The Taliban, meanwhile, have staged a resurgence in recent years – they now control more land than at any point since before the US invasion in 2001. Their control of the lucrative opium trade nets them more than a billion dollars a year. Their gunmen and suicide bombers have killed hundreds of ordinary Afghans in recent years. They have refused to negotiate directly with the Kabul government, which they consider a puppet of Washington. They will speak only to the US, and only about one thing: conditions for the withdrawal of US troops. A deal on that score seemed near until this weekend.
An economy in shambles — Violence and corruption have sapped the promise of Afghanistan's economy. For years, warlords and criminal networks have squandered foreign aid intended to stimulate businesses and jobs. For the first time, unemployment for youth has topped 40 percent, the bleakest mark on record, according to a new Gallup poll. As more people struggle to get by day-to-day — 90% of Afghans recorded experiencing financial hardship, the highest in the world last year—a destructive cycle of poverty and violence has become a key part of the Afghan experience.
Afghanistan, the worst place to be a woman — The US-led ouster of the Taliban after 2001 opened up new freedoms for women, who, under Taliban control, were barred from going to school or working, and were routinely stoned for transgressions like attempting to flee forced marriage. More women have enrolled in universities and some men have been prosecuted for domestic violence, long an epidemic in Afghanistan's deeply patriarchal society. Still, eighty-seven percent of Afghan women are illiterateand three quarters of its female population are victims of forced marriage.
What's next? — Long delayed presidential elections are scheduled for later this month. The Taliban oppose the ballot, and they are likely to carry out a spate of attacks on elections, as they've done in the past. The US, meanwhile, has recalled its chief negotiator with the group. Afghans, weary after years of war, are bracing for a fresh surge in violence.Graphic Truth: Afghanistan Up For Grabs
Ari WinklemanFollowing President Trump's last-minute decision to scuttle Afghanistan peace talks between the US and the Taliban, the country's political future is more uncertain than ever. The US-backed government in Kabul controls less than half of the country's districts. The rest are controlled or actively contested by Taliban fighters or warlords. Here is a map of who controls what in a country that is still very much up for grabs.
What Chernobyl Can Teach Tech: a chat with Microsoft’s Brad Smith
New technologies that thrive on data have brought great promise and benefits to our lives. But they also pose new threats to our privacy, our jobs, our national security, and even to our democracies.
Few people are as keenly attuned to these challenges or as involved in trying to sort them out as Brad Smith, president of Microsoft and author, with Microsoft's senior director Carol Ann Brown, of the new book Tools and Weapons: the promise and peril of the digital age.
GZERO's Alex Kliment sat down with him recently to talk about the challenges that tech poses to our societies and what, if anything, can be done to address them. We discussed the prospect of a new iron curtain dividing the pacific, the role of government in regulating tech, and what horses can teach us about the challenges of artificial intelligence.
Check an edited transcript of the interview here, or listen to it in podcast form here. Note that Microsoft is a sponsor of GZERO Media content.What We’re Watching: Hong Kong Apps, Russia-Ukraine Prisoner Swap, Brexit by the Letter
GZERO MediaBrexit by the Letter? Britain's parliament is now suspended ("prorogued") for five weeks. Opposition MPs have made clear they won't give PM Boris Johnson the elections he wants until a law is implemented that blocks the potential for a no-deal Brexit. They've also voted to force Johnson to ask the EU for an extension of the October 31 Brexit deadline. What spectacular political gymnastics will Johnson conjure up next to avoid complying with this? Will he send the required letter asking the EU for that extension, and then send another that says he was joking? Send the letter, but call on a sympathetic EU government to veto the extension request? Call a vote of no-confidence in his own government to force elections? Resign? All these options are under discussion in the British press. And now that colo(u)rful Commons Speaker John Bercow vows to leave his post on October 31, will he pursue a career as a wrestling referee?
Hong Kong Crowdsourced Protest Maps — Violent protests and police crackdowns continued this weekend despite chief executive Carrie Lam's decision to withdraw the extradition bill that started it all. Thousands of activists gathered outside the US embassy Sunday to sing the Star Spangled Banner and ask for American help to "liberate" their city, while on Monday students formed human chains to support calls for a more accountable government. The basic problem remains: the protesters want more self-rule than China's hardline President Xi Jinping is willing to deliver. We're also watching how technology is quite literally shaping the protests: activists have developed real-time crowd-sourced maps that indicate where the police are, along with an amazing phone-to-phone "ripple" transmission system that is meant to overcome slow cellular data speeds. Check out Quartz's feature on it here.
Russia and Ukraine Exchange Prisoners — Russia and Ukraine exchanged dozens of prisoners this weekend in a move that European and American leaders hailed as a step toward ending the five-year long conflict over eastern Ukraine and Crimea. The freed prisoners include 24 Ukrainian sailors captured by the Russian Navy in a clash last fall, a Ukrainian filmmaker accused by Moscow of terrorism, and a Russian citizen who was involved in the separatists' downing of Malaysian Airlines flight MH17 in 2014. We are watching to see if this is really, as President Trump says, a "first giant step towards peace." We are skeptical, because the basic problem of the Ukraine conflict is intractable: Russia wants Kyiv to give the Russian-backed eastern provinces a measure of influence over Ukraine's foreign policy, but that's not something Ukraine's parliament can agree to. And forget about Russia ever giving back Crimea.
What We're Ignoring
Saudi Arabia's Bid to Influence the Influencers — Over the past few months Saudi Arabia has tried to bleach the stain left by allegations that its agents murdered journalist Jamal Khashoggi last October. One approach has been to fly Western Instagram influencers to the kingdom to show their followers how progressive and cool it is to visit (there are reports that Riyadh will begin issuing tourist visas for the first time later this month.) There are many reasons to want to visit Saudi Arabia – we'd love to see in person how Crown Prince Mohamed is cautiously liberalizing some areas of society while also ruthlessly crushing dissent. But the chance to mingle with clueless Western "influencers" like Aggie Lal posing in orientalist fantasy getups isn't one of them.
Hard Numbers: A Magnificent Seven Rescue for the Amazon?
56: In May, President Trump threatened to impose hefty tariffs on Mexican imports if that country's government didn't act to slow the flow of migrants making their way north. Mexico has reported a 56 percent decline in undocumented migrants crossing into the US since then.
600: Nigeria says it will send 600 South Africans back to their country of origin amid growing tensions between the two countries concerning xenophobic riots that took place in Johannesburg last week.
7: As thousands of fires continue to rage across the Amazon rainforest, seven South American countries with Amazon territory have signed a deal to protect it. Brazil has signed it, but will President Jair Bolsonaro really change his policy of loosening restrictions on turning the forest into farmland?
2.1 million: That Iranian oil tanker that British marines recently detained (and then released) under suspicion it was heading to Syria in violation of EU sanctions has been spotted by a drone . . . off the coast of Syria. The vessel is thought to have sold 2.1 million barrels of Iranian crude oil to that country.This edition of Signal was written by Alex Kliment and Gabrielle Debinski, with Willis Sparks. The graphic was made by Ari Winkleman. Editorial support from Tyler Borchers. Spiritual counsel from an accordion player at the Duroc metro station in Paris.