Flagship

Pakistan strikes, increasing tensions

Pakistan fired retaliatory strikes on Iran, the U.S. launched further attacks on Yemen’s Houthis, and Israel’s army chief warned the likelihood of its war with Hamas expanding to include Lebanon was “much higher.” In the case of both Israel and Iran, domestic politics are a key driver of the growing regional tensions. Iran’s leaders, Western diplomats, and analysts have all said the key to resolving the conflict was to make progress on a two-state solution between Israel and the Palestinians, potentially unlocking Israeli diplomatic normalization with Saudi Arabia. But Israel’s prime minister has rejected such efforts, according to NBC News, while its president told the World Economic Forum in Davos that it was not “willing now to think about” peace.

Iran’s recent strikes on Pakistan, Syria, and Iraq, meanwhile — unusual in that they were carried out by the country itself, rather than the proxies Tehran often relies on — were designed in part “to reassure conservatives domestically and militant allies abroad,” The New York Times said, while warning Israel, the United States, and terrorist groups “that Iran will strike back if attacked.”

Milei’s fiery Davos speech

Argentina’s President Javier Milei appeared to win over more international investors with a fiery speech at Davos in which he warned the West was threatened by an agenda that “inexorably leads to socialism, and therefore poverty.” After summarizing the last 200 years of economic history, Milei — a self-described anarcho-capitalist — said environmentalism, abortion, “radical feminism,” and “social justice” risked undermining the progress capitalism and liberalism have made since the start of the 20th century. Despite his unorthodox policy program, international investors have been heartened by Milei’s austerity plan and his drive to cut regulation: The International Monetary Fund recently upped its support for Buenos Aires and JPMorgan’s president said Milei “may be creating a new beginning” for Argentina.

Smoking rates drop

The number of smokers worldwide dropped from 1.36 billion in 2000 to 1.25 billion in 2022, despite the world population rising by a third in that time. A report for the World Health Organization found that 33% of adults smoked in 2000, compared to 22% now. The drop will not quite meet WHO targets, and some countries’ rates have dropped faster than others, but millions of lives will nonetheless be saved each year. Relatedly, the gap between men’s and women’s life expectancies has been dropping for decades. In the longest-lived countries, women lived on average 4.84 years longer in 1990. By 2010, that figure had dropped to 3.4 years, new research found, partly driven by reduced smoking- and alcohol-related deaths, which disproportionately affect men.

Ukraine agriculture bounces back

Ukraine’s agricultural exports via its Black Sea grain corridor have nearly returned to pre-war levels, a remarkable bounceback resulting from Kyiv’s successful attacks on Russia’s naval forces. Moscow’s earlier strangling of the waterway — Ukraine’s main outlet for its agricultural sales — had sparked worries of global hunger because Kyiv’s exports were a key source of affordable food for developing countries in particular, and a fitful diplomatic effort to allow shipping to resume was abandoned last year. Ukraine has since targeted Russian vessels with land-to-sea weapons, attacks that appear to have successfully deterred Moscow, with overall exports rising and insurance rates on vessels carrying the cargo plummeting. “What has been done is very important,” the head of the Ukrainian Agrarian Confederation told domestic radio.

US lawmakers plan Taiwan trip

A U.S. congressional delegation is reportedly due in Taipei in the coming weeks, a second American visit since the island elected a candidate Beijing considers a separatist. The bipartisan visit amounted to a tacit show of support for Taiwan, which China regards as a renegade province, the Financial Times said, and will likely be followed by a trip by an influential U.S. China hawk to Taipei. Hardline views in Washington towards China are not necessarily mirrored in Taiwan, though: A recent poll showed Taiwanese citizens are divided along largely partisan lines over the threat of conflict with China and whether the U.S. would help defend the island.

TSMC outlines expansion

The world’s largest chipmaker outlined global expansion plans that pointed to the growing geopolitical battle over semiconductor supply chains. Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. said it would open its first facility in Japan next month, begin construction on one in Germany this year, and expand a site in Arizona, as well as in Taiwan. The concentration on the U.S. and its allies underlines the fracturing of chipmaking worldwide, as Washington seeks to deny China access to high-end semiconductors. Partly as a result, the Dutch company that makes the world’s most advanced chip-design machines has seen its stock surge, and South Korea has outlined plans to spend $470 billion on building its own semiconductor hub.

DeepMind AI can solve complex math

Google DeepMind’s new artificial-intelligence model, AlphaGeometry, can solve complex geometry problems almost as well as the brightest human students. It combines a large language model, like ChatGPT, with a rule-based logic system, and solved 25 out of 30 problems from the International Mathematical Olympiad: LLMs on their own struggle with logical reasoning. One computer science professor told MIT Technology Review that the new model shows more “sophisticated, human-like problem-solving skills.” Relatedly, DeepMind’s co-founder Mustafa Suleyman warned that in the long term, AIs will be “fundamentally labor-replacing tools” as they become capable of more and more of the tasks humans perform.

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Apple removes blood tech from watch

The latest Apple Watch went on sale in the U.S. again after the company removed its blood-oxygen monitoring capabilities. Regulators upheld a rival tech firm’s complaint that Apple had infringed its patents on the technology. Apple disagreed but disabled the function to allow sales while it appealed. It’s been a bad start to the year for the tech giant: Netflix refused to make a dedicated app for its new Vision Pro augmented-reality headset and the U.S. Department of Justice is reportedly ready to launch an antitrust case as soon as March. Bloomberg reported that the suit will focus on hardware and software limitations on iPhones and iPads that slow down competitive services and force users toward Apple products.

Nadal signs Saudi deal as stars leave

Rafael Nadal was accused of supporting Saudi Arabia’s “relentless sportswashing operation” for becoming an ambassador for the country’s tennis federation. Riyadh has invested hugely in sports, setting up a rival to the PGA golf tour, buying European soccer teams, and boosting its own domestic league with expensive foreign stars. Employing the 22-time-Grand-Slam-winner Nadal suggests a move into tennis is next. The soccer league plan may already be stumbling, however: Just six months after signing for Saudi teams, the former Liverpool captain Jordan Henderson is leaving for Ajax and Karim Benzema, the World-Cup-winning France star, is rumored to be returning to Europe.

Africa’s growing architectural heft

Lesley Lokko became the first African woman to win the Royal Gold Medal for Architecture, the U.K.’s highest distinction in the field. Born in Scotland to a Ghanaian father, Lokko also became the first woman of African descent to curate the Venice Architecture Biennale last year. The award comes at a moment of validation for African architects. In 2022, Diébédo Francis Kéré became the first African to win the Pritzker Prize, often referred to as architecture’s equivalent of the Nobel Prize. Despite their recognition in the West, however, architects such as Kéré continue to work across Africa, endowing the continent with buildings they lacked during their childhood there. “Architecture is an instrument we can use to … inspire the best generation,” he told BBC Afrique.

Semafor’s 2024 World Economy Summit, on April 17-18, will feature conversations with global policymakers and power brokers in Washington, against the backdrop of the IMF and World Bank meetings.

Chaired by former U.S. Commerce Secretary Penny Pritzker and Carlyle Group co-founder David Rubenstein, and in partnership with BCG, the summit will feature 150 speakers across two days and three different stages, including the Gallup Great Hall. Join Semafor for conversations with the people shaping the global economy.

• U.S., South Korean, and Japanese envoys meet in Seoul to discuss North Korea’s recent activities and ties with Russia.
• Public sector workers in Northern Ireland go on strike over the freezing of pay rises due to a breakdown of the region’s power-sharing government.
• Fans mark “Winnie the Pooh Day,” commemorating the bear’s creator, A.A. Milne, on the anniversary of his birth.

Next week Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi will inaugurate a Hindu temple at India’s most controversial religious site, fulfilling a decades-old promise by his ruling Hindu nationalist party. Seema Chishti, editor of The Wire, was reporting in Ayodhya on 6 December 1992, the day Hindu hardliners tore down the Babri Masjid, sparking riots that left some 2,000 people dead.

Society of the Snow, a film about the survivors of a plane crash in the Andes, topped a most-watched Netflix list. With more than 51 million views, the Spanish-language movie, an Oscars contender, is on track to become one of the streamer’s biggest non-English films ever, Variety reported. The survival thriller is inspired by the real-life events of Uruguayan Air Force Flight 571, which crashed en route from Montevideo to Santiago in 1972. Like previous adaptations of the disaster, it depicts harrowing details, including how passengers resorted to eating the bodies of those who died in order to stay alive.

• China warns U.S. against escalating strikes on Houthis.
• Africa’s top smartphone seller Transsion is the world’s fastest-growing phone maker.
• U.S. lawmakers announced an agreement for a $78 billion tax package in a rare bipartisan feat.