Flagship

El Salvador leader likely to win poll

Nayib Bukele, El Salvador’s president, looks set to win a new five-year term when Salvadorans head to the polls on Sunday. Since gaining power in 2019, Bukele has cracked down on both the gangs that used to control swaths of the country, and on opposition to his government: The self-styled “coolest dictator in the world” is a candidate despite a constitutional ban on running for a second term. Meanwhile his crackdown on violence has made El Salvador — once one of the world’s most dangerous countries — safer than the U.S. in terms of murder rate, offered a model for other Latin American leaders to emulate, and driven his approval rating above 90%.

US strikes on Iran look imminent

The U.S. could soon hit Iranian targets across the Middle East in retaliation for a deadly drone attack on American soldiers, the country’s defense secretary said, raising the specter of direct conflict between Washington and Tehran and an expanding regional war. U.S. officials believe Iran does not have full control over its proxies in the Middle East, Politico reported, with one Tehran-backed militia group in Iraq pledging to keep up its attacks on U.S. forces despite an Iranian commander visiting Baghdad urging fighters to stand down, according to The National. Already, Iran appears to be pulling back: Tehran withdrew several senior and mid-ranking officers from Syria ahead of potential U.S. strikes, Reuters reported.

US crafts Mideast realignment

The Biden administration is crafting what could be the “biggest strategic realignment” of the Middle East in decades, a new piece argued. According to New York Times opinion columnist Thomas Friedman — who has been essential reading on the Israel-Hamas war — the potential U.S. regional policy is made up of three core threads: A resolute stand against Iran including military retaliation, “an unprecedented U.S. diplomatic initiative to promote a Palestinian state — NOW,” and a significantly expanded security alliance with Saudi Arabia. Beyond winning over regional allies, what Friedman called the Biden doctrine has an additional merit: “It is a strategy that could work with Arab Americans,” a voting bloc crucial for the president’s reelection campaign this year.

GOP fundraising slows

Republican fundraising is slowing at multiple levels as the U.S. election campaign enters full swing. The Republican National Committee’s financial position is its weakest to start an election cycle in several years, Semafor’s David Weigel reported, while official data showed Donald Trump was outpaced by President Joe Biden when it comes to fundraising ahead of the pair’s likely rematch in November’s presidential vote. Trump’s legal woes appeared to be the most significant drag on his own campaign finances, but the frontrunner for the Republican presidential nomination nevertheless looked to be maintaining his standing among voters: A new CNN poll gave him a four-percentage-point lead over Biden in a general election.

China raises focus on innovation

A new phrase promoted by Chinese leader Xi Jinping indicates Beijing wants to increase its focus on innovation in science and technology, analysts said. A Chinese Communist Party Politburo study session this week focused on “new productive forces,” a term Xi introduced late last year and which points to a focus on “original and disruptive innovations,” the state-run China Daily reported, while Beijing Youth Daily noted it required a move “away from traditional economic growth modes and paths.” Analysts at the China-focused research firm Trivium wrote: “This may all sound obtuse, but it’s critically important. Xi is asking officials to rethink fundamental aspects of how the Party runs the economy.”

S. Africa’s crime struggles

The five African cities with the highest crime rate in 2023 were all in South Africa, new research showed. Despite making progress compared to a peak of violence in the mid-90s, South Africa has grappled with a wave of crime over the past decade as unemployment and inequality have reached record highs. Officials have responded harshly, militarizing police and making interactions with alleged criminals more forceful. The severe response has further eroded trust in the police, Guy Lamb, a criminologist at Stellenbosch University, argued in The Conversation. The crisis requires a “whole-of-government and whole-of-society” approach. “This is a ‘war’ the police can’t win on their own,” Lamb wrote.

UK carbon price hits record low

The U.K.‘s carbon price fell to a record low, spurring analyst warnings that heavy polluters may be disincentivized from cutting their emissions. Concerns abound over “greenwashing” in the voluntary carbon market, but that is separate from official compliance markets such as the U.K.’s where emissions caps fall over time. The cost of an individual carbon-emissions permit fell to £31.48 per tonne, down 40% from a year ago. That may present an opportunity: Macquarie, the Australian bank, projects the U.K. carbon price to triple by 2027 and forecasts up to 140% appreciation across major markets in the coming years. “No other commodity under our coverage offers the same price upside.”

February 05 | Washington D.C.
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‘Floating solar’ boom in SE Asia

Southeast Asia is increasingly turning to floating solar panels as land for renewable energy production grows scarce. Solar energy is cheap, but has a large footprint, and much of Southeast Asia is densely populated. Analysis suggests the region has 500 megawatts of floating solar, about 2% of its total. The figure will grow 60% in the next few months and “floatovoltaics” could make up a tenth of Southeast Asian solar capacity by 2030. The technology is expensive, but the floating arrays can have higher output as water offers natural cooling. New Scientist reported that covering 30% of the world’s reservoirs in solar panels could provide enough electricity to power the U.S. twice over.

Meta stands out in Big Tech earnings

Meta was the standout performer among tech giants reporting their earnings. Facebook’s parent company unveiled a 25% increase in revenues and forecasted even greater growth this quarter: Its stock jumped 14% as investors apparently agreed that it had bounced back from its advertising slump and cut costs through layoffs, The Information reported. Amazon likewise looked to have boosted margins through job cuts, but Apple continued to see “anemic” growth of just 2% in revenue, resulting in a 3% fall in stock price: CNN said that slowing demand in China was behind investors’ concerns. That is, nonetheless, the best quarter of growth Apple has seen in a year, with a slight recovery in iPhone sales lifting performance.

US combats AI robocalls

U.S. regulators are seeking to ban spam robocalls which use artificial intelligence-generated voices. Voters received a call purporting to be from President Joe Biden last month, telling them not to vote in New Hampshire’s Democratic primary, and Americans already receive around 2.1 billion spam calls every month, a growing number of which are AI-powered deepfakes. The Federal Communications Commission said that “AI-generated voice cloning and images are … tricking consumers into thinking scams and frauds are legitimate,” and wants to use existing laws which ban artificial and prerecorded calls to make them illegal. The growth of misleading AI content was also highlighted last month after explicit fake images of Taylor Swift went viral.

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• The U.S. State Department’s assistant secretary visits Bosnia.
• Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg is due in a London court over an October protest during which she was arrested.
• King Perry, a final posthumous album by Lee “Scratch” Perry, is released.

Each Friday, we’ll tell you what a great bookstore suggests you  read.

Sonya, a staff member at Changing Hands bookstore in Phoenix, Arizona, recommends Going Dark, by Melissa de la Cruz. She said it was “so un-put-down-able, I finished this book in one sitting.” A story of an influencer whose followers realize she is missing when she fails to update her feed, told through social media posts and diary entries, it is “both fun and heartbreaking.” Buy it from Changing Hands or from your local bookstore.

The Japanese architect Junya Ishigami, known for his nature-inspired floating buildings, unveiled a new project in China. The Zaishui Art Museum in the coastal city of Rizhao is a one-kilometer-long building constructed along the full length of an artificial lake. “While sunlight from above bathes the interior, lake water laps gently at its base, even coming inside and washing up against the concrete floor,” the Architectural Record reported. Other works by Ishigami include a Japanese university workshop likened to a forest scattered with clearings and a proposal for a monumental “Cloud Arch” in Sydney.

• Nigeria’s “japa” economy is spurring a battle for the remittances market.
• What’s happened one year after Balloongate.
• In response to Roe v. Wade, France moves towards enshrining abortion rights in its constitution.