Flagship

Disciplined Starmer crushes UK Tories

Britain’s opposition Labour Party will form the country’s next government after a landslide election victory. Presumptive Prime Minister Keir Starmer did not inspire huge enthusiasm, but ran a disciplined campaign from the center, helping Labour win at least 412 out of a possible 650 seats. The tired, fractured, unpopular Conservative Party fell to its worst result in history: Prime Minister Rishi Sunak congratulated Starmer and said he would resign as party leader. “Tory England lies in ruins,” wrote UnHerd’s political editor. Starmer faces a pressing inbox, notably the faltering economy and high immigration which undermined Sunak’s rule. European leaders nevertheless welcomed Starmer’s victory, suggesting improved cooperation with Brussels, while Kyiv said the UK would remain a “reliable” partner.

The strange death of Tory England

Britain’s political right has collapsed, a prominent Conservative wrote. “For a hundred years the electoral system has favoured a unified right against a split left,” Daniel Finkelstein, who was adviser to two Conservative leaders, said in The Times of London. “Now the opposite holds.” The Tories lost 173 seats, and in 124 of them the populist-right Reform Party’s vote outweighed the margin of the Tories’ defeat, a psephologist noted on the BBC. “Labour won because the Tories lost,” said Finkelstein: The government “vacated the centre ground, where elections are always, always won,” and “failed on every measure of reasonableness and competence,” leaving room for the challenge on their right. “The Conservative coalition has simply fallen apart.”

Biden readies for fightback

US President Joe Biden geared up for potentially the most important weekend of his political career, insisting he would run for the White House in the face of Democratic turmoil. Biden will make appearances in key swing states and be interviewed on ABC News, hoping to reassure voters — and more importantly party officials, donors, and grandees — that he is fit for a second term: A Disney heiress who has donated $50,000 to progressive causes this year told CNBC she would withhold funds to the Democrats until Biden stood aside, while New York Magazine reported that the president’s press aides now worry less about gaffes and more “that he will communicate through his appearance that he is not really there.”

Far right favored in French polls

French voters go to the polls this weekend in the second round of parliamentary elections, in which the far right is expected to win the most seats but fall short of an outright majority. The results could lead to legislative gridlock, and undo President Emmanuel Macron’s legacy. Analysts pointed to his near-total absence from the campaign trail as a sign of his unpopularity, while Le Monde published separate pieces spotlighting momentous recent meetings — one this week with his cabinet, where “silence and regret hang heavy”; the other last month with US President Joe Biden, “a perfect evening” during which “a double catastrophe was brewing.”

Xi, Putin court Western allies

A series of high-level diplomatic meetings this month showcase Beijing and Moscow’s efforts to challenge Western alliances. Russian President Vladimir Putin will today reportedly host Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán — a meeting that drew anger across Europe, particularly given that Budapest holds the rotating presidency of the European Union’s leaders’ grouping — just a day after Putin and Chinese leader Xi Jinping headed a Shanghai Cooperation Organisation summit that hailed “tectonic shifts in global politics.” Later this month, Putin will host India’s prime minister, whose government has sought to avoid taking sides in the Russia-Ukraine war, while Xi will welcome Italy’s leader.

Bolsonaro accused of money laundering

Former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro was indicted for money laundering. Bolsonaro is accused of smuggling jewelry reportedly worth $3 million from Saudi Arabia into Brazil undeclared: Brazilian law requires all goods worth more than $1,000 to be declared and taxed upon entry into the country. Bolsonaro faces a “dizzying array” of other legal threats, the Associated Press reported, including accusations of inciting an uprising against his successor in a 2023 riot after his ousting and of falsifying his COVID-19 vaccination certificate. He was also accused of harassing a humpback whale, although the investigation was dropped. Bolsonaro still commands strong support, but is barred from seeking office in Brazil until 2030 over his role in the riot.

Sahel military leaders meet

The military rulers of Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger will hold a joint summit tomorrow — their first since they took power in a series of coups. The meeting marks the latest sign of stepped-up cooperation between the juntas, which each face Western and regional sanctions and last year formed a new grouping to counter the more established West African regional bloc ECOWAS. Though the military leaderships have each claimed they will increase their focus on combating the jihadism that has plagued their countries, recent analysis by the OECD found that their policies have in fact “accelerated the worsening of violence.”

Jakarta seeks school lunch cues

Indonesia’s incoming president is seeking advice from Japan, China, and India on how to build a nationwide free school-lunch program. Prabowo Subianto, who takes office in October, campaigned on a pledge to improve nutrition for Indonesia’s more than 75 million schoolchildren, many of whom suffer from malnourishment — a far cry from Japan, for example, which debuted its school meal system in 1889 and which now includes training for young people on healthy eating and food etiquette. If anything, one official told Nikkei, Jakarta has told Tokyo that “Japanese school lunches are too highly polished.” Prabowo also visited a Beijing school this year to discuss its school-lunch program, and his vice-president-elect met with India’s ambassador to Indonesia on the topic.

Chemical recycling for clothes

A 15-minute chemical process could make old clothes recyclable, a technique that could help tackle the “growing mountain of waste” created by the fast-fashion industry. Less than 1% of textiles are currently recycled and most old clothes end up in landfill or incinerated, Nature reported. The problem is that many fabrics are mixed materials and mechanical recycling struggles to separate them into useful parts. The new technique uses heat and a catalyst to break the long molecular chains of both natural and synthetic fibers into smaller, easily reusable chemical units. Scientists hope it could allow 88% of clothing worldwide to be recycled.

Three decades of The Everything Store

Amazon turned 30. Jeff Bezos founded the company in 1994 as an online bookstore — now it offers streaming services, home camera systems, and tablets, and next-day delivery of almost any item. It also supports much of the internet’s infrastructure via its cloud-computing division. It called itself The Everything Store, but “at this point, Amazon is sort of ‘The Everything Company’,” an analyst told the BBC: The company itself once joked the only way you could get through a day without making Amazon richer was by “living in a cave.” It has faced criticism over its treatment of staff and of its tax affairs, but the main question it must answer, another analyst said, is “What the heck is left?”

• Iran holds a runoff presidential election between a moderate lawmaker and the Iranian supreme leader’s protege.
• Italy’s industry minister concludes an official two-day visit to China.
• The British Grand Prix takes place in Silverstone on Sunday.

The number of pilots who have safely ejected from aircraft using Martin-Baker ejection seats. Brake failure after landing forced a Greek air force pilot to abandon her Mirage 2000-5 fighter on Monday. Martin-Baker originally made aircraft, but after the crash death of test pilot and co-founder Valentine Baker in 1942, his partner James Martin turned the company towards aircrew safety, and in 1949 a UK air force pilot became the first to escape his stricken plane using a Martin-Baker seat. The Greek pilot will now be given a certificate, tie, and pin or brooch to mark her acceptance into the Martin-Baker “Tie Club,” along with other survivors of ejection.

La Chimera, directed by Alice Rohrwacher. This 2023 film, the Italian’s fourth feature, is a magical-realist tale of a search of lost Etruscan treasures in 1980s Tuscan graveyards, filled with characters “constantly trying to sniff something out,” Esquire said. The movie switches genres, swaying between thriller, comedy, and romance, making for an exciting outcome. And while the two-hour-plus feature can feel like it’s dragging at times, a series of reveals in the second half makes up for the director’s frequent digressions in the first, Esquire added.

• Kenyan protesters are using AI in their anti-government fight.
• House Republican support grows for corporate tax increase.
• OpenAI to join Washington lobbying group BSA.