Flagship

EU passes China tariffs

European Union member states approved tariffs on Chinese-made electric vehicles in a vote that laid bare disunity within the bloc. Germany — the continent’s automotive behemoth — was among five countries that voted against, while 12 abstained, but the 10 who voted in favor were sufficient to pass the proposals. China’s automakers see Europe as their “main battleground,” but the EU argues that Beijing has used illegal state subsidies to help its carmakers dominate the EV sector. Brussels’ hardening view “tells us a thing or two about the EU’s readiness to wield its economic leverage with China,” one expert wrote, and “about the shifting balance of power within Europe on China policy.”

US dockworkers suspend strike

US dockworkers will return to work following a three-day strike that paralyzed trade in East and Gulf Coast ports. Workers will now extend their contracts through January, defusing a crisis estimated to have cost the US economy up to $5 billion per day. The strike could also have upended the US presidential election next month by fueling inflation and forcing the White House to step in, Bloomberg reported. Global trade could yet be disrupted, however, by simmering conflicts around the Strait of Hormuz, one of the world’s most trafficked trade routes: Oil prices recorded their biggest weekly gain since early 2023 on the back of potential Israeli strikes on Iranian energy facilities.

Harris’ foreign policy views

US Vice President Kamala Harris will likely shelve her boss’ democracy-vs.-autocracy foreign policy framing if she wins next month’s election, multiple reports suggested. Harris — who is neck-and-neck with ex-President Donald Trump in the race for the White House — will instead favor what Nikkei described as “a more pragmatic approach” in which the US works more closely with allies regardless of their domestic political systems and trumpets its support for a rules-based order. President Joe Biden’s approach has spurred frustration, particularly in Asia where Washington-friendly countries such as Singapore, Thailand, and Vietnam have been excluded from the White House’s democracy summits. Harris, by contrast, has not used the word “autocrat” since being named the Democratic candidate for the presidency.

Sheinbaum presses on working hours

New Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum promised to reduce the country’s work week from 48 hours to 40. Employees across Latin America work some of the world’s longest hours, with those in Mexico and Colombia tallying nearly twice as many as those in Germany according to data from the OECD, a group of mostly rich nations. However Latin American countries’ economic productivity is among the OECD’s lowest, largely on account of the region’s low education rates, lack of formal jobs, and limited business competition. Addressing the root causes of productivity is complex, but any progress could “finally take Latin America into a new era” of higher economic growth, an expert wrote for the World Bank.

Lebanon’s heavy toll

Israel’s offensive into Lebanon is exposing Iranian geopolitical weakness, analysts argued, but at huge civilian cost. Separate pieces in The Wall Street Journal and The Atlantic said Tehran had “no good options,” and was facing “a terrifying moment” after Israel assassinated the leader of its Lebanese proxy Hezbollah. The humanitarian fallout of that push into Lebanon has been enormous: More than 1,300 people have been killed, making it the deadliest conflict in Lebanon in more than 30 years and 1.2 million displaced. One family told Radio Free Europe of having to sleep on beaches in search of safety. “It’s a disaster,” a shopkeeper told The National.

A possible diabetes cure

For the first time, a case of type 1 diabetes appears to have been cured. The genetic type 1 is the rarer form of the disease, but still affects about 2 million people in the US alone. It used to be fatal and, although it can now be managed with regular insulin injections, is still a lifelong condition. Last year, Chinese researchers modified patients’ own cells to create insulin-producing pancreatic tissue, and a year later, the first patient is still producing her own insulin and her blood sugar level is well controlled, Gizmodo reported. The results are preliminary and stem-cell research is fraught with dead ends and scientific fraud, but hopes are high that a cure is near.

Is US obesity on the decline?

The US may have reached peak obesity, partly thanks to the growth of weight-loss drugs. The Financial Times’ chief data reporter noted that newly released figures showed obesity rates fell by 2 percentage points between 2020 and 2023. The fall was even faster among college graduates, the group most likely to use semaglutide and other weight-loss drugs. One in eight US adults have used the drugs, and 6% are using them right now, enough to make an impact at population level: It’s not certain the drugs are the cause, but “it is highly likely.” The shift may, he argued, be as significant a turning point as 1963, when US tobacco sales peaked.

On this week’s episode of Mixed Signals, Ben and Nayeema tackle the age-old debate of man vs. machine and ask the bold question: Can AI cure writer’s block? Glaringly absent from this week’s Veep debates, AI and its use cases (or lack thereof) are at the center of everything, from the dockworkers’ strike to Hollywood’s grand plans. To figure out how long they, along with creatives and the media elite, have job security, they talk with Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist and playwright Ayad Akhtar, whose latest play, McNEAL, wrestles with AI and ethics.

Japan’s demographic ‘emergency’

Japan’s demographic crisis is a “quiet emergency,” its new prime minister said. The country has the world’s second-oldest population, three-quarters of its cities are shrinking, and its birth rate is around 1.2 children per woman, far below the population replacement rate of 2.1. Shigeru Ishiba, who took office this week, promised to support families with measures such as flexible working hours. The country’s lack of children is a particular concern for one family: Japan has only one male imperial heir. Male-only succession rules mean the royal family “faces extinction,” AFP reported. Stabilizing the number of imperial family members “is a particularly urgent issue,” Ishiba said. A recent poll also found that 90% of the public support allowing female heirs.

Deadly Marburg outbreak in Rwanda

The death toll from the Marburg virus outbreak in Rwanda reached 11. A further 25 cases have been confirmed and are in isolation. The Ebola-like hemorrhagic disease, which causes vomiting, diarrhea, and bleeding and spreads through contact with bodily fluids, is fatal in nearly 90% of cases if left untreated. The country’s health minister said the majority of those infected were health care workers, and that people who had been in contact with patients were being traced. There is no approved vaccine or drug for Marburg, but researchers are racing to gather data and hope to trial at least one candidate vaccine in Rwanda if the outbreak continues, using it to immunize known contacts of an infected individual.

Science’s fake citation scandals

The head of Spain’s oldest university was accused of inappropriately citing his own work hundreds of times in order to boost his research metrics. Computer scientist Juan Manuel Corchado’s alleged citation-gaming was “absolutely insane,” an analyst told Science. Academics’ careers are judged by how often their work is cited in prestigious journals. Some therefore resort to artificially padding their statistics, by over-citing their own work, forming “citation rings” with other researchers, or even paying black market businesses for fake references. China has recently become the leading nation in terms of scientific citations, but that is partly thanks to “citation stacking,” citing largely irrelevant work to boost colleagues’ numbers, Nature reported.

• US non-farm payrolls data is expected to show hiring picked up, potentially encouraging the Federal Reserve to slow the pace of interest-rate cuts.
• Denmark’s Queen Mary and the Danish climate minister are on an official visit to Brazil focusing on climate change and deforestation.
• Season two of CURSES!, a spooky adventure series for kids, is released on Apple TV+.

The number of people who took part in the first Parkrun, in Bushy Park, southwest London, 20 years ago this week. That has changed: More than 300,000 people ran in the free 5-kilometer (3.1-mile) weekly event last Saturday. The volunteer-run event now takes place every weekend in more than 2,000 parks and outdoor spaces — including at least one prison — across the world. Scientists credit it with boosting health and happiness. Find your local Parkrun, or set one up, here.

Life and Death of the American Worker by Alice Driver. This “intimately reported” look at the lives of migrant workers in chicken factories in Arkansas, US, documents the health risks they face as they process more than 100 birds a minute each, The New Yorker said, listing it as one of the best books of 2024 so far. Buy Life and Death of the American Worker at your local bookstore.

• China’s domestic struggles won’t change its trajectory in Washington.
• Gulf sovereign wealth fund in talks to invest in big US lender.
• Vance wants to be a ‘pro-family’ Republican. His party isn’t there yet.