Category: Weekly Summaries

A new post every weekend to sum up that week’s most important events in a few sentences.

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Weekly Summaries

4th of October – 10th of October

A long week for Facebook

Facebook and other apps owned by Facebook like WhatsApp and Instagram were down for over five hours last Monday. The shutdown showed just how dependent people around the world have become on Facebook. Just one day later, last Tuesday, a former product manager at Facebook turned-whistleblower, Frances Haugen, explained to a Senate subcommittee how Facebook “deliberately kept people — including children — hooked on its services,” according to the New York Times. Zuckerberg, the chief executive of Facebook, immediately rebutted the claims.

Other News

  • Kurz, Austria’s chancellor announced on Saturday that he would resign
  • The WHO approved the first-ever malaria vaccine. The vaccine was developed by GlaxoSmithKline and could potentially save the lives of tens of thousands of children in sub-Saharan Africa.
  • The city of Venice in Italy is using hundreds of surveillance cameras and buying the cellphone data of tourists in an effort to establish more crowd control, according to the New York Times
  • The cost of oil, natural gas, and coal has increased drastically the past few months. The rise is caused in part by oil companies refusing to produce more to prevent the prices from dropping.
  • In an order last week, the Indian Supreme Court ruled that the government should pay families who have lost family members to COVID-19 50,000 rupees (around 671 U.S. dollars)
  • The world has lost around 14% of its coral reefs since 2009, a new study revealed
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Weekly Summaries

27th of September – 3rd of October

Lithuania enrages China

Recently, Lithuania has been trying to get closer to Taiwan, enraging China by taking actions such as quitting a Chinese-led diplomatic forum. In response, China recalled its ambassador to Lithuania, made it basically impossible for Lithuanian businesses to sell their goods in China, and paused trips by a Chinese cargo train into Lithuania. While Lithuania is a lot smaller than China — China has 1.4 billion people while Lithuania has fewer than 3 million — the country is important as a “transit corridor” for goods heading to Europe from Asia.

Other News

  • Shortages are restraining the recovery of many parts of the economy worldwide
  • In a tweet last week, the Taliban announced that women would be barred from teaching and studying at Kabul University, Afghanistan’s most prestigious university
  • Facebook has “paused development of an Instagram app for children under 13,” according to the New York Time
  • Japan’s governing party elected its choice for the next prime minister: Fumio Kishida

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Weekly Summaries

20th of September – 26th of September

Elections in Germany

In Germany, elections took place this past Sunday. In Berlin, the marathon took place on the same day, which led to many disruptions and some people only being able to vote after the first results had already been published. The Social Democrats (SPD) ended up winning the election, winning 25.7% of the votes, earning just 1.6% more than the Christian Democratic Union (CDU), which is Angela Merkel’s party. Because no party earned more than 50% of the votes, they have to form a coalition. At the moment, there are three possibilities, but the negotiation talks could take months. It is also still unclear who will become Chancellor now that Angela Merkel’s 16-year long chancellorship has ended.

Elections in Canada

After the current prime minister Trudeau called elections early this summer in the hopes of gaining a majority, the people decided last week that he should stay in power. Overall, Trudeau’s party the Liberals won 158 seats, 12 seats short of the 170 seats required to have a majority. The Conservatives, meanwhile, won 119 seats. However, voter turnout was the lowest in more than a decade, with just 59% of Canadians who are eligible to vote giving their poll.

Other News

  • Meng Wanzhou, the executive of Huawei, has been released and returned to China last week
  • Thousands of residents of the island La Palma had to be evacuated by Spanish authorities last week because a volcano spewed lava and smoke. The eruption was later called the “most powerful eruption in half a century,” according to the New York Times
  • The U.S. lifted its travel ban on foreign travelers who have been fully vaccinated from 33 countries, which include E.U. countries, China, Iran, South Africa, Brazil and India
  • Same-sex marriages are now legal in Switzerland after many people voted for the legalisation in the vote
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Weekly Summaries

12th of September – 19th of September

Australia to get nuclear-powered submarines

Last week, the U.S. and Britain made a joint announcement that they would help Australia deploy nuclear-powered submarines. If this happens, Australia would be able to conduct routine patrols in the South China Sea, which would challenge China. Nonetheless, Australia “committed never to arm the submarines with nuclear weapons,” according to the New York Times. The deal is a major blow to France because of multiple reasons. As a result of the deal, Australia will not buy French-built submarines, which is bad news for French businesses. France sees the event as yet another example of the “widening rift” in U.S.-French relations and has announced that it will withdraw the French ambassadors to the U.S. and Australia in protest.

Other News

  • Iran will allow nuclear monitoring as agreed in a last-minute deal reached last week.
  • North Korea announced that it had launched “long-range cruise missiles” that hit targets 932 miles away, according to the New York Times. This is a major violation of multiple U.N. Security Council resolutions.
  • The company Colossal is hoping to repopulate Siberia with thousands of woolly mammoths, thousands of years after they went extinct.
  • In a huge step towards deciding the fate of Catalonia, Spain’s prime minister Pedro Sánchez and Catalonia’s leader Pere Aragonès met in Barcelona.
  • French forces killed Adnan Abu Walid al-Sahraoui, a leader of the Islamic State
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Weekly Summaries

6th of September – 11th of September

Uncertainty in Nicaragua

The current President of Nicaragua, Daniel Ortega, is taking steps to ensure that he will win the elections in November again. The New York Times writes that there is no “credible challenger” and that Ortega is “turning Nicaragua into a police state.” Seven candidates have been jailed or put under house arrest since June alone and people from all backgrounds — from millionaire banker to a decorated general to a low-profile provincial activist — have been targeted.

Other News

  • The U.S. remembered the 9/11 attacks that happened 20 years ago.
  • Maria Kolesnikova, a Belarusian opposition figure, was sentenced to 11 years in prison during a trial in Minsk last week
  • In a ruling last week, Mexico’s Supreme Court decided that making abortion a crime was “unconstitutional”. Nonetheless, abortion is still not available to most of the Mexican female population.
  • El Salvador adopted Bitcoin as a legal tender, the first country to do so
  • The Taliban named an acting cabinet last week. However, the lack of women and some former leaders from the Taliban’s 1990s regime have raised alarm bells in other countries.
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Weekly Summaries

30th of August – 5th of September

U.S. Forces Left Afghanistan

The last U.S. forces left Afghanistan last Monday. Their departure ended a 20-year long occupation. The war in Afghanistan cost the U.S. over $2 trillion and left more than 170,000 people dead. Shortly before midnight, the last 5 American cargo jets left the Kabul airport, leaving behind many Afghans, including former members of the security forces. The Taliban and fighters celebrated the U.S. departure and gunfire could be heard across Kabul. A day later, President Biden once again defended the withdrawal, claiming that it was a choice “between leaving or escalating” the situation.

Other News

  • The return of a Napoleonic general, Gen. Charles Etienne Gudin, was supposed to improve relations between France and Russia, two countries that have long had difficult diplomatic relations. However, when the ceremony took place, the Presidents were not to be seen. 
  • The leader of Guinea’s special forces led a coup, announcing on state television that the constitution and government had been dissolved. Whether he will be successful is still uncertain.
  • Less than a year after he started office, Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga of Japan said that he would not seek re-election
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Weekly Summaries

23rd of August – 29th of August

Afghan refugees and an increasingly dramatic situation at the airport in Kabul

Thousands of people are still waiting at the airport in Kabul for a flight out of Afghanistan and the August 31st deadline to complete the Afghanistan operation is fast approaching. To make the situation even more urgent, Taliban leaders rejected President Biden’s suggestion to extend the deadline for the completion of the operation. Last Wednesday, President Biden then announced that the U.S. was “on track” for a military departure from Afghanistan on August 31st.

On Thursday, two suicide bombers outside of Kabul’s airport killed at least 13 U.S. troops and many Afghans, including children. The Islamic State has since claimed responsibility for the attack. President Biden vowed retaliation, saying “we will not forgive.”

This past week reports also surfaced which state that weeks before Kabul fell to the Taliban, tens of thousands of Afghans were already traveling across Iran, hoping to cross Turkey to reach Europe. However, President Erdogan of Turkey has claimed that Turkey will not be “able to shoulder the additional burden” as it has already taken in 5 million refugees. Last week alone, more than 1,400 Afghans who were in Turkey were rounded up and pushed back by the police in a single operation.

Other News

  • The IMF (International Monetary Fund) gave financial aid to poor countries worth US $650 billion to help them “pay down debt and withstand the costs of combating the coronavirus pandemic,” the New York Times reports
  • The highest point on Greenland’s ice sheet has never experienced rainfall that is until last week
  • To prevent Belarusian migrants from entering, Poland and Lithuania are planning to build fences along their shared borders with Belarus, according to the New York Times
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Weekly Summaries

16th of August – 22nd of August

Chaos at the airport in Kabul

Thousands of Afghans continue to try to flee the country, with some clinging on to departing planes and crowds at the airport trampling people to death. Britain and Canada have since announced that they will both take 20,000 Afghans each who had fled the country. Meanwhile, President Biden defended the “hard and messy” retreat from Afghanistan, claiming that he had to either follow through on the deal with the Taliban he inherited from President Trump or fight the Taliban, according to the New York Times.

Earthquake in Haiti

Haiti was already trying to cope with the aftermath of the 2010 earthquake and the murder of President Jovenel Moïse in July. Now, another earthquake has hit, the death toll of which has now increased to more than 2,200 people. The government also estimates that around 10,000 more people have been injured. Heavy rains have made rescue missions difficult and the people are turning to local churches for support.

Elections in Zambia

Hakainde Hichilema, the leader of Zambia’s main opposition party — the United Party for National Development — won the presidential elections, receiving 59.38% of the votes. His main opponent, Edgar Lungu, who was the previous President, received only 38.33% of the votes. It is only the third time in Zambia’s history that an opposition leader won the election.

Other News

  • Amazon has taken over Walmart’s position and become the world’s largest online retailer operating outside of China, according to the New York Times
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Weekly Summaries

9th of August – 15th of August

The Taliban take over Kabul

On Sunday, the Taliban took over Kabul, Afghanistan’s capital city. The U.S. has had a heavy military presence in Afghanistan for twenty years, which now came to an abrupt ending. The collapse of Kabul comes a lot faster than even many experts had expected, meaning that most Afghans now have no way of getting out. President Ashraf Ghani fled the country to Uzbekistan after the finance minister already fled last week. Since then a council of Afghan officials has opened negotiations with the Taliban to discuss the takeover, according to the New York Times. Troops from the U.S. and other Western countries, which had been stationed in Afghanistan, started withdrawing in May. Around that time the Taliban started their offensive to take over Afghanistan. What the future of Afghanistan and the people who live there will look like remains uncertain, but prospects point to the worst.

Other News

  • Michael Calvey, an American businessman, was sentenced to a suspended sentence “for embezzlement charges” for 5 and a half years, according to the New York Times
  • After facing accusations of sexually assaulting 11 women, New York’s Governor Andrew Cuomo has resigned
  • The cost of coffee beans is up by almost 44% in 2021 compared to 2020, according to the New York Times

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Weekly Summaries

26th of July – 1st of August

Chaos in Tunisia

The President of Tunisia, Kais Saeid, tried to seize power in what some call a coup. He announced that he would fire the prime minister and has already suspended Parliament. However, so far it seems that his success is very limited, although many Tunisians expressed their support. Tunisia has been a democracy since the Arab Spring revolutions.

Other News

  • A landslide in India killed 9 people, most of them tourists. Furthermore, monsoons on the western coast have also killed more than 164 people so far.
  • France has been witnessing many protests against the so-called “Covid Pass” policy
  • North Korea and South Korea have — after 14 months of silence — reopened diplomatic and military hotlines between the two countries
  • Flash floods in Afghanistan have killed at least 80 people, but the search for survivors still continues
  • President Biden announced that EU citizens will continue to be barred from entering the U.S., citing fears that the Delta variant would be spread, despite the fact that U.S. citizens are allowed to enter EU countries, as long as they are fully vaccinated
  • Forest fires in Turkey and wildfires in Greece have had devastating consequences for the people living in the surrounding areas

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