Innholdsfortegnelse for 26 May 2023 i Guardian Weekly

Reaching out Zelenskiy courts further support Page 13 → No knockout Tightening of sanctions is a sign of failure Page 14 → IN THE HORRIFIC SHADOW OF A PAST NUCLEAR HOLOCAUST, the leaders of the G7 group of wealthiest nations met in Hiroshima in Japan last weekend to discuss war: how to prosecute one in Ukraine and how to prevent one with China. Jake Sullivan, the US national security adviser, once described the G7 as the coordinating committee of the free world, and never has there been such a need for such coordination. It was only in October that Joe Biden warned that the risk of a nuclear Armageddon was at its highest in 60 years. The chance of Vladimir Putin resorting to nuclear weapons appears to have receded since…

Jamal Ali Abdi has seen flooding in Beledweyne before but never on the scale witnessed this month when the Shabelle River burst its banks, causing devastation to the central Somali town and displacing almost the entire population. As water gushed through the streets, Ali’s home was soon surrounded by murky brown flood water. “The water was up to my neck,” said Ali, 36. “Our entire family, including my six children, sought refuge in a relative’s home after our house was immersed. I was barely able to get my children to safety and grab a couple of items as we fled.” Nearly 250,000 people have been forced to leave their homes after heavy rainfall in Somalia and the Ethiopian highlands led to flash floods in Beledweyne, the capital of the Hiran…

Rishi Sunak cut a relaxed figure as he sat in shirtsleeves, clutching a Downing Street mug, chatting to journalists on the plane to the G7 conference in Japan last week. One question ruffled his smooth demeanour, though: what did he make of Nigel Farage’s eye-opening comments the previous evening? Brexit had “failed”, the former Ukip and Brexit party leader had said. Britain had “not actually benefited … economically” from leaving the EU. And who was to blame for this sorry state of affairs? “Useless” Tory governments. Sunak bristled at these remarks. “I voted for Brexit, I believe in Brexit … as chancellor and prime minister I am actually delivering the benefits of Brexit as opposed to talking about it,” he said. He had reason to feel sensitive. More serious than…

Mahmoud Haj Mohammed stands on the roof of his family’s home in the occupied West Bank village of Jalud and points towards a clump of cypress trees on the opposite side of the valley. He has just got back from his job at a concrete factory in the nearby city of Nablus, hot and tired, jeans covered in grey flecks of cement. The 32-year-old began working there two years ago, after the seizure of a key part of his family’s land by Israeli settlers made it unviable to farm. “It’s easy to see where the settlers are. Look at the olive grove below the cypress,” Haj Mohammed said. “That is our land, but we are not farming it. See how close together the trees are? That’s because the settlers have…

Wearing dark suit and sunglasses, Brian Fallon pointed at the gleaming US Capitol building to his left, then to the marble edifice of the supreme court to his right. “If you look at any point in the last 40 years, Congress’s public approval always hovers around 10%,” said Fallon, a former justice department official who worked for Hillary Clinton’s 2016 presidential campaign. “But the [supreme] court’s is now in the 30s and that’s a historical anomaly because there’s always at least been the benefit of the doubt conferred upon the court.” There is no better symbol of the crisis of trust in American institutions than its highest court, pummelled by partisan appointments, divisive rulings and ethical scandals. In a University of Chicago survey last year 18% of Americans said they…

IN THE SHALLOWS OF ARAMOANA, FISH ROILED THE SURFACE OF THE BAY, flickering through the water, reflecting the winter sunlight. Some floated belly up, stunned and dying. Others spun in tight circles. In shallow pools created by the eddying tide, they lay piled on their sides. Occasionally a fish would raise a single fin, worrying the water’s edge. Peter Langlands waded in, grabbing live fish one by one. He had long been an active fisher on the coastlines of New Zealand’s South Island, and knew they were ray’s bream: good eating. Later, he would fillet them, and cook the firm white flesh with spices for a curry. Even as he thought ahead to the evening meal, though, Langlands felt a pang of worry. The fish had been beaching for months…

When the protests first started in Syria in 2011, my father changed. He was very calm. He told me: “I had hoped my whole life that this would happen, but I never thought I would witness it. Even if I don’t get to see victory for the Syrian people, it is enough for me that I have been there at the beginning.” I can’t help but think of these words today. It has been more than 3,600 days since my father, Ali, an outspoken critic of the regime and supporter of the Syrian revolution, was dragged from our apartment in Damascus by Bashar al-Assad’s intelligence. It was the last time my sisters or mother saw or heard from him. As countries across the Middle East look to “normalise” relations with…

Letters for publication weekly.letters@theguardian.com Please include a full postal address and a reference to the article. We may edit letters. Submission and publication of all letters is subject to our terms and conditions, see: THEGUARDIAN.COM/LETTERS-TERMS Editorial Editor: Graham Snowdon Guardian Weekly, Kings Place, 90 York Way, London N1 9GU, UK To contact the editor directly: editorial.feedback@theguardian.com Corrections Our policy is to correct significant errors as soon as possible. Please write to guardian.readers@theguardian.com or the readers’ editor, Kings Place, 90 York Way, London N1 9GU, UK Creating global alliances risks chain reaction Simon Tisdall’s cynical account of the way in which the US and China are seeking allies in the Indo-Pacific and beyond in a combative, selfinterested, quest for exclusive dominance in that region is disturbing not only because it is starting…

Navigating Beatriz Milhazes’ febrile reinvention of geometric abstraction can feel like trying to make headway through a carnival crowd. Hoops, mandalas, flowers and other circular motifs spin like dancers across her canvases, their bright colours slamming into each other. With its erupting forms, which have evolved from tumbly, lacy arabesques to hard-edged grids, sprouting leaves and flowing waves, the Rio de Janeiro-based artist’s work has the excess of a street party, a baroque church, a jungle. “I’ve tried to bring new possibilities to the course of abstraction,” she says while preparing for her first UK institutional show in more than two decades: a survey, at Margate’s Turner Contemporary, of 20 works spanning a career of more than 30 years as a leading abstract painters. “My challenge is how to work…

By the time this review appears, the big Ukrainian counteroffensive may have begun. On its success or failure will depend the future course of the war. In February, when the detailed planning for the Big Push was starting, President Volodymyr Zelenskiy told me how nervous he was about it. Such frankness is typical of him. A charming, natural-seeming former actor, he has brought his professional abilities to the job of representing Ukraine at the highest level: providing the roar, he says, channelling Winston Churchill. We know the United States believes Ukraine’s counteroffensive won’t succeed, because we’ve seen the leaked documents that say so. But on the morning of 24 February 2022, Washington was sure the Russians would capture Kyiv within days – as were the Russians themselves. Zelenskiy’s decision to…

Across 5 Painter of The Night Watch (9) 8 Circle of light around the moon (4) 9 Irksome (8) 10 Complain of (6) 11 Strong man raised by apes (6) 13 Colourless blood fluid (6) 15 Chatterbox (6) 16 W – snug tent (anag) (8) 18 A horny male? (4) 19 Player’s offence in court? (4,5) Down 1 Toxic – spiteful (8) 2 Get hold of (6) 3 It’s attractive! (6) 4 Ill at ease (4) 6 Boozed-up yobbo (5,4) 7 All things considered (2,7) 12 Urban areas of the US suffering industrial decline (4,4) 14 Savvy (6) 15 Affable (6) 17 Milligan, Sellers, Secombe or Bentine? (4) Solution No 16,538…

NORMALLY G7 SUMMITS ARE ABOUT BATTLING for the free world comma by comma, as diplomats parse lengthy communiques of ephemeral significance long into the night. Words, after all, constitute much of a diplomat’s work. At the Hiroshima G7, some of the communiques emerging from the summit do matter, notably the toolbox on derisking trade with China, but the true significance of the summit lay in Ukraine’s Volodymyr Zelenskiy’s scene-stealing visit to the summit, courtesy of a ride in Emmanuel Macron’s French aircraft. It was the culmination of a Ukrainian realisation that for months they have been talking to the wrong people. Yes, it is essential to keep lines constantly open to Ukraine’s invested allies in the west, reaping the rewards such as Joe Biden’s decision to finally lift his veto…

Standing outside her home under moody skies in Ronta, a hamlet in the Forlì-Cesena area of Emilia-Romagna, Ivana Casadei considers herself lucky. “The water only came as far as our garden,” she said. “But my neighbours’ home was destroyed, so they are staying with us – there are eight of us living together, and five dogs.” Emilia-Romagna remained on red alert this week after catastrophic flooding that claimed 14 lives and left more than 36,000 people homeless. The emergency, which wreaked havoc across 100 cities and towns, prompted the prime minister, Giorgia Meloni, to return early from the G7 summit in Japan. A helicopter attempting to restore electricity to homes crashed close to the badly affected town of Lugo last Saturday, injuring one of the four people on board. “I…

British arms exports doubled during 2022 to a record £8.5bn ($10.6bn), according to the only publicly available official figures, reflecting escalating geopolitical uncertainties and fallout from Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. The largest destination for UK-made weaponry was Qatar, which spent £2.7bn, and 54% went to countries designated as “not free” by the human rights group Freedom House. These include Saudi Arabia and Turkey, as well as Qatar. The £8.5bn recorded in 2022 is comfortably a record since the UK began publishing export data in 2008, and is more than double the £4.1bn recorded in 2021. The previous high was £6.9bn in 2015, a time when Syria had collapsed into civil war. “The latest export licence figures for 2022 show that the UK arms industry is working overtime to arm some…

At the small Bangkok shop-house that Rukchanok Srinork uses as an office, the floor is cluttered with stacks of campaign signs and leaflets. There are bottles of Fanta and fruit donated by her supporters (orange is her party’s colour). And, by the entrance stand her team’s well-known bicycles. Rukchanok, also known as Ice, is one of many young MPs with the progressive Move Forward party, which stunned observers by taking the most seats in the 14 May election. She became known online for cycling around her district, Bang Bon, in the sweltering Bangkok heat as part of a grassroots campaign. Her work paid off: she ousted the son of one of Thailand’s powerful political families, defeating him by 21,000 votes. One Thai media outlet called her a “giant killer” for…

The day before Aly Hegazy graduated from high school in June 2020, his father died from cancer after a long illness. The grief of losing him was compounded by the realisation that, without his father’s signature, Hegazy would be unable to go to university. Under Egyptian law, responsibility for Hegazy, who was 17 at the time, and his younger brother fell not to his mother but to his 90-year-old grandfather, who had dementia. Hegazy’s mother, Eman Helal, began the long process of challenging the country’s guardianship law to take control of her family affairs and get access to her late husband’s pension and bank accounts. Three years on, her legal difficulties continue. “We weren’t ready for any of this,” said Hegazy. The guardianship legislation is one of a number of…

After decades of illness, including a cholera scare and bouts of malaria, Toronto’s Don River succumbed to mounting neglect and was pronounced dead in 1969. A funeral procession of environmental activists wound through the city, with mourners gathering at the polluted banks of the river to pay their final respects. After more than half a century, however, the river has roared back to life. Wildlife is gingerly returning to areas that were once the site of heavy industry. Its waters will soon become cleaner. And after decades of advocacy work from a small group of frustrated citizens, the city is spending billions to save the once-despised body of water. The waterway, named after the River Don in Yorkshire, England, is neither revered nor loved. On most days, it is little…

By the end of March, the surface temperature of the world’s oceans was above anything seen in the 40 years that satellites have been measuring it. Records were “headed off the charts” and, as the heat refused to dissipate for more than a month, the Earth had entered “uncharted territory”, scientists said. The temperature at the ocean’s surface – like that on land – is being pushed higher by global heating, but can jump around from one year to the next as weather systems come and go. But in the 2km below the surface, things are different. The temperature down there has been on a relentless climb for decades. “The heat-holding capacity of the ocean is mammoth,” says Dr Paul Durack, a research scientist specialising in ocean measurements and modelling…

The end of the world is nigh, again. And as usual, it’s being greeted largely with a shrug. Perhaps you felt a prick of unease as you scrolled the headlines, or half listened to some radio debate about the fact that sometime in the next four years the planet is likely to breach the 1.5C rise that we have long been told is the tipping point to avoid. (Although this time the breach should be only temporary, the World Meteorological Organization report stresses that it still takes us into uncharted waters, and if nothing changes the world is likely to cross this dangerous threshold more and more often in future.) Perhaps you even felt rage or frustration that it’s taking everyone else so long to wake up. But the chances…

My chocolate truffles and ganache are suddenly seizing up and turning into an oily mess. I’ve tried different dark chocolates and melt in the microwave. What’s going on? Louise, Birmingham, England, UK “It could be the chocolate, so check the ingredients, because there might be other things interfering,” says Guardian baking columnist Ravneet Gill. Baking chocolate, for example, often contains added oils and fats, so Gill suggests using a 70-72% bar from the confectionery aisle instead. And, says Joanna Brennan, the co-founder of Pump Street Chocolate in Orford, Suffolk, buy the best you can afford: “Truffles and ganache are 100% based on the taste of the chocolate and cream.” That said, technique is by far the most likely cause for Louise’s oily mess, and specifically her use of the microwave.…

Just off the main square in this southern Alentejo town is a post office resembling a tiered wedding cake. At the point where its curved front meets the first flat, tiled roof is a series of protruding brick supports. Into the 10 alcoves framed by these and spanning no more than 6 metres of the facade, house martins have inserted roughly 200 of their little mud-brick houses. Scores of the chattering labourers fly in and out of their works to present to any passing observer a glorious, ever-changing weave of blue-and-white flight lines. We were far from the only people to stop and admire this kinetic sculpture, the most densely packed subcolony of this species I’ve seen. In the whole town there must be hundreds, if not thousands, of swallows…

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1 UKRAINE Russia edges closer to seizing control of Bakhmut Russia appeared close to taking control of Bakhmut on Monday, although Ukraine said it continued to fight on in the fringes of the city largely devastated by an intense year of deadly fighting. Hanna Maliar, Ukraine’s deputy defence minister, said Ukraine still controlled “certain facilities” in the Litak district, but reports said the defenders had lost control of the last of the remaining high-rises in the eastern Ukrainian city. Bakhmut was first shelled in May 2022 and Russian forces consistently targeted the mining city that had a pre-war population of about 70,000. Although not considered of particular strategic value, the city has acquired a high symbolic value for both sides. Separately, fighting broke out along the border in the Belgorod…

CONSERVATIVES Official knew of minister’s alleged speeding request The most senior civil servant in the Home Office was made aware of allegations that Suella Braverman wanted civil service help in dealing with a speeding fine, the Guardian understands. The development raises questions about how many other senior officials and ministers across Whitehall were then informed about the claims, and puts pressure on the prime minister to order an investigation into the allegations. Matthew Rycroft, the department’s permanent secretary, was told about the home secretary’s alleged request to set up a private driving awareness course in the autumn, informed sources said. Braverman had made the request to another senior civil servant who “had concerns about whether it was appropriate”, it is understood, so had reported it to the top official. The…

“Russia has offered to supply oil and gas at a discount and found plenty of ready buyers THE TIGHTENING OF SANCTIONS AGAINST RUSSIA announced by the G7 summit in Hiroshima is evidence that the west remains solidly behind Ukraine in its battle against aggression. It is also a sign of failure. Despite talk of quick victory, there has been no knockout blow in the economic war, let alone signs that freezing assets, targeting oligarchs, seeking alternative energy sources and depriving Russia of vital components has brought about a change of heart in the Kremlin. The lack of instant success should not come as a surprise. The earliest example of the use of sanctions dates back to ancient Greece and their record has been mixed since. For the most part, turning…

To many western investors, China under president Xi Jinping is a tough nut to crack. While Chinese leaders insist that they welcome foreign investment, the ruling party’s extension of control to companies, with crackdowns on domestic tech giants and more recently the “anti-spying” raids on consulting firms, including America’s blue chip Bain & Company, are puzzling to the outside world. Chris Marquis, author and professor of Chinese management at the University of Cambridge, believes that part of the explanation lies in the ruling party’s ideology. He says one must “dig into the Maoist roots in Chinese institutions and political economy to try to understand ideas that Xi has”. Marquis has studied entrepreneurs, listed companies and officials in China, and found that Mao Zedong’s ideology, campaigns and institutions have a deep…

Flames rip through the windows of Manila’s central post office during a massive fire, which destroyed the nearly 100-year-old landmark. Firefighters said the blaze started before midnight last Sunday in the basement of the five-storey building and was brought under control on Monday morning, more than seven hours later. Seven people were slightly injured. An investigation was underway this week to determine the fire’s cause and assess the damage. The building, which was the country’s main mail-sorting and distribution hub, was built in 1926 with high columns in the traditional neoclassical style. It was severely damaged during the second world war and reconstructed in 1946.…

News that a Socorro dove in London Zoo had produced a hatchling three weeks ago provoked joyous celebrations among conservationists. Zenaida graysoni is extinct in the wild, its captive population reduced to a single breeding pair in the last century. Numbers have been rising slowly and the birth of the chick raises hopes that the doves, which once thrived on Socorro island, 600km off the west coast of Mexico, before being eradicated, could be restored to their former homeland. “We await results of a DNA test of its feathers. That will tell us its sex,” said Gary Ward, the curator of birds at the Zoological Society of London (ZSL). “If it turns out to be female, she will instantly become the most important bird in London Zoo – for she…

For more than 100 years they have been making cricket bats from Kashmir’s willow trees. Along the highway leading to the town of Sangam in the Indian-administered region, dozens of little workshops display neat stacks of the roughly hewn pale wood outside. Inside, the willow is painstakingly fashioned into cricket bats, which are then shipped across India and to other countries around the world. The humid environment and fertile soil make the area ideal for willows, which traditionally provide the material for cricket bats. Kashmiri willow bats have a reputation for quality, and skilled bat-makers here have refined their craft since the 19th century. But the plantations created decades ago are not being replaced by farmers, who are turning to more lucrative crops with greater resilience in a changing climate.…

The vaping industry turns 20 this year, but Ira Simeonidis fears the golden age of e-cigarettes is already wafting away. “It’s a bit destroyed,” said the organiser of Hall of Vape, Europe’s largest vaping trade fair, held in Stuttgart this month. His festival once drew more than 20,000 visitors, who attended talks, partied with DJs and browsed rows of exhibits by renowned designers showing off their latest “mods”, elaborately crafted devices for inhaling nicotine – and other substances of choice. “It was for professional and passionate vapers,” Simeonidis said. “A community thing, to get together, drink beer, vape and see each other once a year.” But no more. While the festival was suspended for two years during the Covid-19 pandemic, the vaping world transformed. Markets around the world have been…

‘In is natural history.” Foreign Bodies is the end,” writes Simon Schama at the beginning of his extraordinary book on pandemics old and new, “all history ostensibly an account of the bacteriologists and epidemiologists who studied the natural history of infectious diseases from the late 18th to the early 20th centuries, developing vaccines and saving millions from smallpox, cholera and the plague. But as its subtitle, Pandemics, Vaccines and the Health of Nations, suggests, it is also a reflection on the political and scientific conflicts of the Covid pandemic, and the failure of contemporary leaders to coordinate a scientifically driven global response to the virus. Over millennia, biological and environmental imperatives rather than states and empires have shaped human destiny. Now capitalism’s degradation of the planet threatens our survival. Zoonosis…

Across 8 Fish the deep bay? (8) 9 Stop measure by lawyers (5) 10 See 5 11 Unity’s lost diary in tatters outside institute (10) 12 Old compact Danish city (6) 14 Material about eastern Mediterranean area (8) 16 Famous silent film character left before last of the crush (7) 18 Labour on retrospective cover-up (7) 21 Beautify, being fairly excited (6,2) 23 Intertwine branches of fruit around line (6) 24 One who endures sees signs of ageing (5,5) 26 Little dear for an essayist? (4) 27 Take by force? Nice! (5) 28 Water runs through this county estate with ultimately little resistance (8) Down 1 One who progresses the motion of drones circling London’s financial centre (8) 2 Don’t embrace husband when star’s around (4) 3 Swears to move…