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The Economist
June 9th 2018
1
Italy
at long last got a new
government. Nominally head-
ed by a non-political lawyer,
Giuseppe Conte, it is in reality
an uneasy coalition formed
from the populist left-wing
Five StarMovement and the
nationalist Northern League. It
is promising both tax cuts and
benefit increases, which could
rapidly clashwith the
EU
’s
budget rules.
Spain
got a newgovernment,
too. Its primeminister,
Mariano Rajoy, was ousted by
a censuremotion related to old
corruption charges against his
party. The newprimeminister
is Pedro Sánchez, of the Social-
ist party, which controls only
24% of the seats in the lower
house.
In
Slovenia
, an anti-immi-
grant partywon themost seats
in a snap election, but fell short
of amajority. Forming a gov-
ernment may prove difficult or
impossible, since other parties
refuse to deal with it.
A volcanic disaster
Scores of people died and
nearly 200weremissing after
the eruption of the Fuego
volcano in
Guatemala
. Fast-
moving pyroclastic flows of
gas, ash and lava engulfed
nearby villages. The eruption
sent plumes of ash 6km (3.7
miles) into the atmosphere.
Guatemala declared three
days ofmourning.
Nicaraguan
security forces
killed nine people in the city of
Masaya. That brings to at least
127 the number of peoplewho
have been slaughtered since
protests began in April against
the authoritarian rule of Presi-
dent Daniel Ortega.
A strike by lorry drivers in
Brazil
, which blocked roads
and led to shortages of fuel
and food, ended after ten days.
The government agreed to
subsidise diesel for 60 days to
placate the drivers, whose
strikewas provoked by rises in
fuel prices. Pedro Parente
resigned as the chief executive
of Petrobras, the state-con-
trolled oil company, which sets
fuel prices.
A
Mexican
federal court or-
dered the government to start
a new investigation into the
disappearance in 2014 of 43
students in Iguala in the state
ofGuerrero. The court said an
earlier investigation by prose-
cutors, which found that police
had turned over the students
to drug gangs, had not been
independent. The newone is
to be overseen by a truth com-
mission, whichwill be led by
the victims’ families and a
human-rights group.
Taxing times
Thousands of people protested
in
Jordan
against the govern-
ment’s plans to increase taxes
and cut subsidies, part of an
IMF
-backed programme. King
Abdullah responded by sack-
ing the primeminister. He told
the newgovernment to review
the entire tax system.
Iran
is to build newcentrifuges
at the Natanz nuclear site,
increasing its capacity to
enrich uranium. But it said it
would staywithin the limits
on enrichment set by the
nuclear deal in 2015withworld
powers, which America pulled
out of last month. Highly
enriched uranium is needed to
produce nuclearweapons.
Saudi Arabia
issued driving
licences to tenwomen, weeks
before a decades-old ban on
female drivers is lifted. Mean-
while, Saudi prosecutors said
17 activists had been detained,
with eight released “temporar-
ily”. Some had been cam-
paigning forwomen’s rights.
Ethiopia’s
government said
that it will implement a peace
deal, signed in 2000, that
ended a bloody two-yearwar
with
Eritrea
. Ethiopia had
refused towithdraw its troops
fromdisputed territories
awarded to Eritrea in 2002 by a
border commission that was
created by the deal. Abiy
Ahmed, Ethiopia’s newprime
minister, also lifted a state of
emergency, whichwas im-
posed by his predecessor
following protests.
More than1,000 people in the
Democratic Republic ofCongo
were given an experimental
Ebola
vaccine, as healthwork-
ers try to stop the spread of the
disease.
The golden prize
More primarieswere held to
choose candidates for Ameri-
ca’smid-termelections.
Cali-
fornia
held a “jungle” primary,
where the top two vote-getters
go through to November re-
gardless of party. Despite a
crowded field that threatened
to split the party’s vote, Demo-
cratic candidates in the seven
seats it is targeting in the state
made it through. GavinNew-
som, a formermayor of San
Francisco, became the Demo-
cratic candidate for governor.
In a 7-2 decision, the Supreme
Court ruled in favour of a
Christian baker
who refused
to fashion a same-sexwedding
cake (though he offered to sell
the couple any cake off the
shelf). The court found that
officials in Colorado had not
given the baker a fair hearing.
But it did not spell out how
lower courts should balance
concerns about discrimina-
tion, compelled speech and
religious freedom in future
cases.
Getting ready for a date
North Korea
removed three
generals from their posts,
prompting speculation that
they opposed the forthcoming
summit between Kim JongUn,
the country’s dictator, and
Donald Trump. TheWhite
House announced that the
meetingwill take place at a
hotel on the Singaporean
island of Sentosa.
Malaysia’s
newgovernment
appointed an attorney-
general. Tommy Thomas, an
ethnic Indian, is the first
non-Malay to hold the job. He
promised therewould be “no
cover-ups” in the investigation
into the 1
MDB
scandal, in
which billions of dollarswere
siphoned out of a develop-
ment fund. Separately, the
governor ofMalaysia’s central
bank resigned.
Acourt in
Hong Kong
sen-
tenced two pro-independence
politicians and their three
former aides to fourweeks in
jail for trying to barge into a
meeting at Hong Kong’s Legis-
lative Council in 2016. The
politicians had been elected as
legislators but had been barred
from taking their seats for not
taking their oaths properly.
Police in the
Chinese
city of
Chengdu raided an under-
ground church and detained
its pastor and several other
people to prevent a planned
service in commemoration of
the violent suppression of the
Tiananmen Square protests of
1989. America’s secretary of
state, Mike Pompeo, called on
China to “make a full public
accounting” of themassacre.
RodrigoDuterte, the president
of the
Philippines
, drew
howls of protest from femi-
nists for kissing awoman on
the lips at an event for overseas
Filipinaworkers. Mr Duterte
said it was his “showbiz” style.
Thewoman in question said
“it meant nothing.”
Politics
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