Flagship

China, Russia pledge deeper ties

Chinese leader Xi Jinping met with Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov in Beijing on Tuesday, vowing to deepen their ties to counter the U.S. The meeting came a day after U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen threatened to impose sanctions on Chinese banks that help Russia’s war against Ukraine. Beijing has remained neutral in the war, throwing Russia an economic lifeline in the wake of Western sanctions, making their deepening relationship “one of the most important geopolitical outcomes of Putin’s war against Ukraine,” the director of the Carnegie Russia Eurasia Center argued in Foreign Policy. U.S. efforts to drive a wedge between them are “futile,” he said, and “Western officials cannot wish this axis away.”

South Korea votes, K-pop stays neutral

South Koreans will vote Wednesday in the country’s parliamentary elections that threaten to make President Yoon Suk Yeol a lame-duck leader two years into his term. The conservative president has sought to boost the economy and the county’s birth rates, and pursued closer security ties with the U.S. and Japan, but he’s suffered low approval ratings; his recent gaffe about the prices of green onions was widely mocked as a meme. Elections are also a tough time for K-pop stars who need to appear politically neutral: They refrain from wearing bright colors associated with the main parties and limit hand gestures outside polling stations. They still vote, however, so fans can see them as politically engaged.

Emerging markets have global clout

Large emerging markets like Brazil, India, and Indonesia are increasingly influencing the global economy, an International Monetary Fund analysis found, with the power to affect the economies of other countries. The G20’s 10 emerging economies have doubled their share of world trade since 2001 and now account for a third of global GDP. That has positive and negative ripple effects for the rest of the world: Economic slowdowns in those countries would lower global output three times more than they would have in 2000, an IMF simulation found. The analysts called on policymakers to minimize such spillover effects by “strengthening the global financial safety net.”

Tech giants expand global AI goals

Large tech firms are boosting their global AI ambitions. In the past 10 days, Microsoft revealed plans to launch an AI hub in London and make its largest-ever Japan investment; OpenAI announced the launch of its first Asia office in Tokyo; and Nvidia said it will build a $200 million AI center in Indonesia. Southeast Asia particularly has seen massive AI investment; Nvidia’s revenue from Singapore alone increased more than 400%, comprising 15% of the company’s total revenue, according to an earnings report late last year. The expansions come as AI grows more sophisticated: OpenAI and Meta are readying new models that will be capable of reasoning and planning, the Financial Times reported.

Airlines limp toward summer travel season

Airlines are facing a dearth of new planes ahead of a busy summer travel season, while airports are changing their operations to avoid last year’s mass flight delays. Production issues at Boeing and Airbus mean that airlines will receive about 20% fewer planes, forcing them to refurbish old jets. Delivery delays forced Hong Kong-based Cathay Pacific Airways to hold back on releasing some tickets, reducing the window for people to book flights. In Europe, meanwhile, airlines have been staffing up to prevent the extreme delays and long lines that plagued passengers last summer. “The whole of the industry is better prepared,” the CEO of budget airline EasyJet said.

Remembering Peter Higgs

Peter Higgs, the Nobel-winning British physicist who theorized that a particle binds our world together, died Monday at age 94. Higgs worked on the idea for the so-called “God particle” in the 1960s, explaining how the universe’s building blocks have mass. After a decades-long search for the particle, Swiss researchers discovered it in 2012, proving his theory; the particle was named the Higgs boson. He often downplayed his contributions: “I have this kind of underlying incompetence,” he said in 2013, telling The Guardian that he had never sent an email or browsed the internet. But “his name will be remembered as long as we do physics in the form of the Higgs Boson,” prominent physicist Brian Cox said Tuesday.

Rare recurring nova will be visible

A new star will appear in the Northern Hemisphere sky some time between now and September. In the constellation Corona Borealis, there is a binary star system composed of two elderly stars — a red giant and a white dwarf. The smaller star’s gravity pulls gas from the surface of its larger neighbor, which accumulates to the point that it causes a nuclear explosion, bright enough to make it visible from Earth. This “recurring nova” happens around once every 80 years — it was spotted in 1866 and again in 1946, and is predicted to happen this year. Amateur astronomers jonesing for a new fix now that the eclipse has passed might want to keep their eyes on it.

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Climate victory for older Swiss women

More than 2,000 Swiss women won a landmark climate-related lawsuit that could set a precedent in Europe. The European Court of Human Rights on Tuesday ruled in favor of the women, aged 64 and above, who argued that Switzerland’s failure to combat climate change put them at a higher risk of dying in heat waves, owing to their age and gender. “It is the first time that an international court has affirmed clearly that a climate crisis is a human rights crisis,” a lawyer told The New York Times. A rush of similar lawsuits are expected, as the ruling serves as “binding legal precedent” for 46 other European countries, one advocate said, and “a blueprint for how to successfully sue your own government over climate failures.”

Groundbreaking art gallery closes

The Marlborough Gallery, one of the oldest and most high-profile art galleries in the world, will close. The blue-chip gallery represents dozens of well-known artists and their estates, but a board member said it was “time to sunset” the 80-year-old firm. The decision follows a period of upheaval, Artnet reported: Its board fired the president, triggering a series of lawsuits “replete with claims of fraud, defamation, and the mounting of a coup d’état.” Thousands of artworks at its New York, London, and Madrid premises will be sold. Since its founding in 1946, Marlborough has represented superstar artists including Francis Bacon, Henry Moore, Barbara Hepworth, and Lucian Freud.

Hermès challenges Rolex

The French luxury brand Hermès launched a new line of sports watches for women, taking on Rolex. Hermès is best known for handbags, but its century-old watch division — based in Switzerland — has tripled its revenue since 2020, as the rest of the luxury watch industry has shrunk. It is now ranked 16th among Swiss watchmakers, just behind TAG Heuer. The brand is hoping its new Cut range, aimed at women, will “fuel the next chapter,” Business of Fashion reported. Hermès had a strong 2023, reporting revenues of $14.5 billion, up 21% from the year before, driven by demand for its flagship Birkin and Kelly handbags.

The amount that internet traffic dropped during Monday’s eclipse in U.S. states like Vermont and Ohio that were in the path of totality. The drop was slightly less in places with partial views, like New York, which saw a 29% drop in traffic compared to the previous week. Viewers along the 110-mile-wide belt, that stretched from Mazatlán, Mexico to Montreal, Canada, put away their phone devices to look at the real-life spectacle.

April 10:

• Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company, the world’s largest chipmaker, releases its monthly sales figures.
• Muslims celebrate Eid al-Fitr across the world after fasting during the holy month of Ramadan.
• U.S. President Joe Biden hosts Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida at the White House.

Britons are increasingly disappointed in the essential services provided by their government. The Gallup Community Basics Index for the U.K. dropped from 79 in 2011 to 67 in 2023 (out of a possible 100), according to new survey data. The U.K. registered the largest drop of Western European countries, as residents grew increasingly dissatisfied with a lack of quality health care and affordable housing. It’s more bad news for the ruling Conservative Party ahead of elections this year.

The six books shortlisted for the International Booker prize are all “implicitly optimistic,” the contest’s judging chair said. The prize awards works of fiction translated into English and published in the U.K. or Ireland; the shortlist features a book about subsistence farmers in Brazil, a Korean novel about three generations of rail workers, and a story about a relationship set during the collapse of East Germany. Dutch, Argentinian, and Swedish writers also made the cut. The winning author and translator will be announced on May 21.

• Tanzania is wooing Chinese tourists with a new documentary.
• Nigerian bank mergers loom after regulator’s rule change.
• Donald Trump is navigating an abortion backlash.