Flagship

Ukraine uses secret US weapons

Ukraine for the first time attacked Russia using long-range ballistic missiles secretly shipped by the US this month. It marks a major shift for the White House, which had been reluctant to supply long-range weapons to Kyiv to avoid an escalation with Moscow; more are expected to be sent as part of the $60 billion aid package to Ukraine that US President Joe Biden signed into law Wednesday. The new weapons could begin arriving in Ukraine within days, and will be “enough to stabilize the front lines” as Russia ramps up strikes, a retired US Marine colonel said, while The Washington Post’s David Ignatius argued that the aid package “will mean a continuation of this bloody war of attrition, not an ending.”

TikTok to challenge US law

TikTok is gearing up for a First Amendment battle with the US after President Joe Biden signed a measure Wednesday that presents the gravest threat yet to the app’s future. The platform vowed to legally challenge the measure, which forces its Chinese parent company ByteDance to either sell the app within nine months or face a ban. If the courts uphold a TikTok ban — experts say the government has a strong argument for protecting national security — then the US could look to India as a preview for what could follow: New Delhi banned the app in 2020, and while creators migrated to other platforms like Instagram, YouTube, and domestic apps, “much of the homespun charm of Indian TikTok never found a new home,” The New York Times wrote.

Countries start wooing Trump

Countries are trying to win over Donald Trump in case he returns to the White House next year. Weeks after UK Foreign Secretary David Cameron visited Trump at his Mar-a-Lago resort, Prime Minister Rishi Sunak on Tuesday announced a £75 billion defense boost — part of an effort to curry favor with Trump, who has pushed for NATO countries to increase defense spending. South Korea is turning to Washington lobbyists to help understand Trump’s views on trade; Mexican officials are meeting with members of his team to discuss migration and fentanyl trafficking; and Japan is planning to deploy an interpreter and “Trump whisperer” who helped former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe bond with Trump over golf, Reuters reported.

Energy battle in South China Sea

China is winning the energy battle in the South China Sea. The sea — most of which Beijing lays claim to — is vital to global trade and security, but also has an abundance of oil and natural gas that Vietnam and the Philippines see as crucial to solving their energy shortages. But “an armada of Chinese fishing boats, coast guard cutters and a giant vessel dubbed the ‘Monster’” have cut off other countries’ access, Bloomberg wrote. “China has effectively established a veto over new oil developments,” said a journalist who wrote a book about the South China Sea. The dynamics have forced Hanoi and Manila to import fuel, rather than develop their own reserves.

Egypt concerned about Rafah

Israeli and Egyptian officials secretly met Wednesday as concerns grew in Cairo that Israel’s planned invasion of the Gazan town of Rafah would force thousands of displaced Palestinians to flee to Egypt, Axios reported. The Israel military said it is ready to launch an assault on Rafah, where more than one million people are sheltering, and is waiting for the green light from the government, which sees an invasion as the only way to dismantle Hamas. The operation looms over the deteriorating humanitarian situation in Gaza: The territory could surpass famine thresholds for food insecurity and mortality in six weeks, the United Nations’ World Food Programme said.

Crypto firm faces orb shortage

An ambitious Sam Altman-backed crypto venture is contending with an orb shortage. Worldcoin uses orbs — made only in one German factory — to scan people’s irises in exchange for a token. The popularity of the crypto wallet — its app sees more than seven transactions per second — means that the 300 to 500 orbs currently available aren’t enough to meet high demand, Semafor’s Reed Albergotti reported. While critics first dismissed a biometric cryptocurrency as dystopian, “the orb shortage — which is temporary and actually a good problem to have — suggests that people are open to the idea,” Albergotti wrote, given that it is, in essence, free money. One man apparently used his Worldcoin to buy a goat he named Sam, after Altman.

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S. Korea sees record low births

This February, South Korea saw the fewest number of births and the highest number of deaths for any February on record. The 19,362 monthly births represented a 3.3% drop over last year, while deaths crept up 9.6% to 29,977 — leading to a record population decline of 10,614. The number of marriages also went down 5% year-on-year. If trends continue, the total population will fall from last year’s 51 million to just 36 million in 2072. The working-age population is expected to drop 35% by mid-century, the Financial Times reported, exacerbating problems for an economy that is already struggling to adapt as its semiconductor export industry faces challenges from rivals in the West and Asia.

Russians get into K-pop and anime

Young Russians are warming to anime and K-pop as wartime sanctions limit access to Western entertainment. Moscow hosted an anime festival last year, and the owner of a K-pop dance school told Reuters that she hosts thousands of students across three large Moscow studios. Russia saw spikes in sales of K-pop albums and books after Western artists canceled concerts following Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine, the Russian business newspaper Kommersant reported. Local concert promoters are reportedly interested in bringing K-pop acts to Russia, but that may prove difficult for an industry that goes to great lengths to appear politically neutral.

Moon lander braves freezing cold

Japan’s first moon lander has survived a third frigid lunar night. Moon vehicles have to deal with extraordinary changes in temperature: In daytime, it can reach 212° Fahrenheit, and at night time, it can drop to -274°. It is challenging to build machines that work at those extremes, not least because oils used to lubricate mechanical parts will either boil or freeze. The Smart Lander for Investigating Moon, SLIM, was not expected to survive its first 14-day lunar night — especially after it landed on its side, obscuring its solar panels until the sun reached a certain angle — but Japan’s space agency said the lander’s key functions are still operating three months after it landed, and that it received an image from the moon’s surface on Wednesday.

Flamethrowing robot dog for sale

A flamethrowing robot dog is now available for purchase in the US for less than $10,000. The “Thermonator” is a 20-inch tall quadruped capable of hurling gasoline or napalm-fueled flames up to 30 feet. It is also legal in 48 US states. The first-ever flamethrower-wielding robot canine costs $9,420 and is controlled via a smartphone app, with a first-person view camera. Flamethrowers are not specifically regulated in states other than Maryland and California, and are not considered firearms by the federal government. Its possible applications include “wildfire control and prevention,” “snow and ice removal,” and “entertainment and SFX,” according to its manufacturer Throwflame. “But most of all,” Ars Technica noted, “it sets things on fire.”

April 25:

• US Secretary of State Antony Blinken meets top officials in China to warn against Beijing’s support of Russia.
• China sends a new three-member crew on the Shenzhou-18 craft to its space station.
• Portugal celebrates the 50th anniversary of the Carnation Revolution, the 1974 coup that overthrew the country’s dictatorship.

An unfinished Gustav Klimt painting thought to be lost for the last 100 years sold for $32 million at an auction Wednesday. Portrait of Miss Lieser shows a young woman in a floral gown; art historians believe she is a family member of two wealthy Jewish industrialists in the Austro-Hungarian empire who commissioned the work a year before Klimt’s death in 1918. The fate of the painting during the Nazi era was unclear, the auction house said, but it had been hanging in a villa near Vienna for decades. The current owners of the painting, who were not identified, struck a deal with the successors of the Lieser family before auctioning it.

• US approves $60 billion in Ukraine aid.
• Victor Khosla on “toasty” equity.
• Why the new US campus protestors cover their faces.