The World after a Week: May 3, 2020

Although a government was, at last, formed in Israel, Prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu has yet to face the decision of the Supreme Court regarding the charges against him. If the prime minister, suspected of corruption, is unlucky, the Court’s decision will trigger another round of elections.

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It appears that in order to reduce OPEC’s oil production, Donald Trump had threatened Saudi Arabia, suggesting that he would not be able to stop the U.S. Congress from passing legislation to withdraw American troops from the kingdom.

Data suggests that Italy and France entered a recession within the first three months of 2020. The Fitch rating agency downgraded Italy’s credit rating to “BBB-minus“, which is exceptionally low. Collectively, the European Union’s GDP has dropped by 3.5% during the first quarter of the year. The United States, however, are in the same boat, with its economy shrinking up to 4.8% during the first quarter.

Kim Jong-un is alive and breathing. So alive, in fact, that the two Koreas exchanged low intensity fire in the morning, with zero injuries.

Khalifa Haftar announced himself as the leader of a “mandate” of Eastern Libya, characterised as a coup by the UN-backed government. The warlord also mentioned his forces would cease hostilities during the holy Muslim month of Ramadan.

Warren Buffet’s Berkshire Hathaway Inc. suffered great losses as a result of the coronavirus pandemic. Berkshire lost as much as nearly $50 billion. Apart from that, Buffet sold entire stakes in the four major U.S. airlines in April.

Speaking of planes, the majority of EU states is in favour of suspending an EU Law forcing Airlines to refund for cancelled flights.

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55 African states were planning to launch a free-trade zone on July 1st. However, the turbulence of the coronavirus outbreak made the countries postpone this decision.

The regional government of Kurdistan in Iraq sends oil to the central Iraqi government in exchange for its portion of federal budget. However, as there are political and economic tensions, there is a dispute between the parties, to the point that Kurdistan asked the United Nations to mediate in this situation.

A senior diplomat of the High Commission of India was summoned by Pakistan in order to register a complaint regarding ceasefire violations (indiscriminate injuring of Pakistani civilians) in Jammu and Kashmir.

 

 

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Alexandros Sainidis

I am an International Relations Analyst and the creator of the blog Pecunia et Bellum. I have studied International, European and Area Studies at the Panteion University of Social and Political Sciences in Athens, Greece. I am a bilingual Russian speaker and I am currently learning Mandarin in order to gain a deeper understanding of the current International Affairs in Eurasia.

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