TWTW: The World This Week #119 + Elections 2024

The world’s most singularly disruptive week…Romania, Georgia, Syria, Iran, France on the brink…Europe, writ large, targeted… Plus for paid subs: high speed train comes to Laos + our cartoon portfolio

Dec 01, 2024

In this weekly feature for Andelman Unleashed, we continue to explore how the media of other nations are reporting and commenting on the United States, and how they are viewing the rest of the world.

And now with updates on Romania’s critical elections, with extremists held at bay, the decisive second round for the presidency now set for December 8.

This week, still coming to you from Paris….

Setting the scene

This is our 119th weekly tour around our planet on the magic carpet of the world’s media. From our perspective here in Paris today, there is one inescapable conclusion:

This has likely been the the single most persuasively disruptive week to the international order this year for large swaths of our planet. And none of these disruptions involves America—not even Donald Trump.

Before we plunge in, here’s a little snapshot of where we will be taking you, our dear and precious subscriber:

Romania, in the throes of an electoral crisis unlike any since the fall of Communism … Georgia as well now
Ukraine, whose leader has beseeched South Korea for aid and raised a stunning war-ending (or expanding) scenario
Syria, where insurgents have suddenly breached the walls of the 2nd largest city
Lebanon, prospects of peace on the brink
Saudi Arabia, dashing hopes
Iran, with 6,000 new uranium centrifuges on order
France, being pushed suddenly and even more definitively out of Africa, a continent over vast swatches of which it once held sway

Finally, it’s worth pointing to an existential threat creeping up on the entire continent of Europe. London’s Daily Telegraph highlighted it in frighteningly graphic terms:

Taken in isolation, they could be explained away as coincidences–freak accidents, one-off attacks, unfortunate infrastructure failures. The DHL cargo plane that crashed as it approached Vilnius airport. The bomb scares that have hobbled London, from Euston Square and Gatwick Airport to the US Embassy. The drones spotted circling near US Air Force bases in the UK. The explosion at a weapons manufacturing facility in Wales. The telecom cables severed in the Baltic. The many arson attacks, including on a Ukrainian-owned business in Leyton, East London. The successful attempts to interfere with Czech rail operators. The ransomware attack on an NHS provider. The television satellites disrupted and damaged, causing changes to programming across Europe. The defector gunned down in Spain. The assassination attempt on the chief executive of a German arms manufacturer.
Yet isolated is not what they were….Over the last 12 months, as the West has continued to support Ukraine’s war efforts, Russia has dramatically escalated its acts of sabotage across Europe and beyond, sowing a greater sense of instability on the continent than at any time since the Cold War.
“We should expect to see continued acts of aggression here at home,” said MI5 director general Ken McCallum. “The GRU [Russia’s military intelligence service] in particular is on a sustained mission to generate mayhem on British and European streets: we’ve seen arson, sabotage and more. Dangerous actions conducted with increasing recklessness.”
….Bruno Kahl, head of Germany’s foreign intelligence service, said Russian “hybrid measures” only increase “the risk that Nato will eventually consider invoking its mutual defence clause [Article 5]”. And in a joint speech with his French counterpart, Sir Richard Moore, chief of MI6—known as “C”—spoke of the “morally bankrupt axis of aggression” overseen by Vladimir Putin.
“Our security—British, French, European and transatlantic—will be jeopardised,” Sir Richard said of the prospect of Putin reducing Ukraine to a vassal state. “The cost of supporting Ukraine is well known, but the cost of not doing so would be infinitely higher.”

Elections 2024: Romania, Georgia

Romania (still) on the edge

Certainly worth lumping Romania into this litany as far as potential costs. Long dominating the southeastern fringe of Europe, sharing a 380-mile border with Ukraine, Romania’s disarray is suddenly becoming potentially existential—at home and abroad. Last week, Andelman Unleashed examined the dramatic and unexpected first-round dominance of an ultra-fascist darling of Vladimir Putin capturing the lead position in the two-stage balloting for the nation’s presidency.

This weekend were the parliamentary elections, and the turnout was monumental—indeed the highest in 20 years—with some 9.5 million voters or 52% turning out, including 800,000 from the diaspora. And late Monday evening, the nation’s constitutional court ruling that the final left-right showdown can take place in six days.

But, though the far right did have a surge, final results in the parliamentary election on Sunday showed the extremes have been held at bay, as G4Media.ro reported from Bucharest:

Disaster was partially averted. It could be infinitely worse. The fragmentation of the future Parliament is not necessarily bad news. PSD [Socialist Party] proclaimed its victory in the elections through the voice of the outgoing [Socialist] prime minister Marcel Ciolacu, but the truth is that it recorded the lowest score in the history of the party. However, it will hardly be possible to avoid the PSD, no matter who [becomes his successor]. On the other hand, the extremist wave that threatened to swallow Romania did not rise again. With all the victory of Călin Georgescu in the first round, with all the errors of the Constitutional Court, which irritated everyone, the extremist parties gather together amassed only 32%. It would have been really serious if the extremists and neo-legionarians jumped to 40%. In this scenario they ended up in a situation where they could no longer be avoided. Everything now depends on who becomes president: Elena Lasconi or Călin Georgescu? The future president will appoint the candidate for the position of prime minister. That candidate will have to gather a majority around him. It won't be easy at all.

Prime Minister Ciolacu underlined the determination of the Romanian electorate to preserve its determinedly pro-European, pro-NATO stance in the face of a budget deficit, which at 8% of GDP is the highest in the EU.:

It’s an important signal Romanians sent to the political class: to continue developing the country with European money, but at the same time to protect our identity, national values and faith.”

Final returns showed the currently ruling Socialist Party (PSD) still in the lead for control of parliament, though the far-right Alliance for Union of Romanians (AUR/GOLD) did have a surge in popularity. Two other small, far-right parties seem to have breached the 5% threshold and will wind up with seats in the parliament. In third place was the Liberal Party (GNP) followed by the Save Romanian Union (USR) party of the moderate Elena LasconI who will now be facing off in the two-person runoff next Sunday for the presidency. This could still allow for a pro-western coalition in a parliament that will still have a vocal far-right minority.

We will be back for the final round of the presidential election next weekend between pro-Kremlin, neo-fascist Călin Georgescu and moderate Elena Lasconi, anxious to preserve her nation’s role in the EU and as a critical anchor to NATO on Ukraine’s western border.

As Andelman Unleashed discovered during a November swing through Romania, neighboring Moldova and Transnistria, the fear of a Kremlin political move on Romania is palpable, even for this nation that is at once a member of the European Union and NATO. Romanians can already see what has happened to neighboring Hungary with the arrival in power of Putin pal Viktor Orban and in Moldova with its eastern territory of Transnistria bordering on besieged Ukraine under the control of 1,500 heavily-armed Russian “peacekeepers,” statues of Lenin maintaining their vigilance….

Photo by David A. Andelman

Indeed from neighboring Moldova, SubStack colleague David Smith reported in his Moldova Matters newsletter:

Mr. Georgescu has spent the week in the limelight in Romania….Those investigating found additional messianic-religious pronunciations from the candidate including that C-section births are “tragic” because "the divine connection is broken," COVID-19 is fake because “god does not make mistakes” (viruses presumably), the moon landing was faked and a woman can’t be president because "she won’t be able to cope." Most critically the press has focused on his pro-Putin, anti-NATO and “legionary” (aka Fascist adjacent at best) statements.
What is clear is that last week Romania was a politically stable partner for Moldova in many areas including being a top supporter of the country’s EU integration. It was a reliable member of the EU and critical NATO partner and supporter of Ukraine. Now, the media buzzes with talk of the far right coming to power, Russian interference, canceling elections, expelling candidates, mystical theories about the moon landing and more. In a region where stability is in precious short supply this situation is not great.

Georgian turmoil

Another nation seized by the pro-Putin right where a courageous president has taken the reins, seeking desperately to preserve her people’s right to choose their path toward the west rather than the Kremlin. As the BBC reported from Tbilisi:

Georgia's pro-Western president has said she will stay in post until new parliamentary elections are held, as protests continue over the government's decision to put EU accession negotiations on hold.
Speaking to the BBC, Salome Zourabichvili, who has sided with the opposition, described the current parliament as "illegitimate" after allegations of fraud in last month's elections. Zourabichvili said she would retain her role as president, despite the country's newly elected parliament saying it would choose her replacement on 14 December.
Mass protests in the capital are continuing to erupt for a third consecutive night on Saturday in the capital Tbilisi.
Riot police have been deployed around the country's parliament, the focal point of three nights of protests. Demonstrations were also taking place in the cities of Batumi, Kutaisi, Zugdidi, and other Georgian regions.
"I'm offering this stability for the transition, because what these people on the streets are demanding is a call for new elections in order to restore this country and its European path," said Zourabichvili.
Hundreds of civil servants have signed letters expressing their disapproval of the government's decision to put negotiations with the EU on hold, saying it went against the national interests of Georgia.
Georgian ambassadors to Bulgaria, Netherlands and Italy have also resigned.
The US said it was suspending its strategic partnership with Georgia, citing the government's "various anti-democratic actions".

An Offer !!

Above all, around the globe, red lines are about to be redrawn as never before in history—red lines whose DNA I explored in my last book, A Red Line in the Sand: Diplomacy, Strategy and the History of Wars That Might Still Happen … a free inscribed copy to be dispatched forthwith to every new annual paid subscriber to Andelman Unleashed. Plus regular features & cartoons (below)

How others see the World

Meanwhile, there’s Ukraine….

….where the way forward became a trifle clearer, if murkier, this week. As the South China Morning Post reported:

A Ukrainian delegation led by Defence Minister Rustem Umerov [visited] South Korea and presented a wish list that included anti-air missiles and artillery pieces….
Currently, South Korea has restricted its support for Ukraine to non-lethal aid like gas masks and field rations, adhering to a policy against supplying lethal weapons to countries at war. President Yoon Suk-yeol recently signalled a potential shift. Last month, he stated that Seoul could consider providing weapons, starting with defensive items and escalating to lethal ones depending on the extent of military cooperation between Russia and North Korea.

Meanwhile, back home, Ukraine President Volodmyr Zelensky suggested a possible new negotiating tack in an interview with Britain’s SkyNews:

Volodymyr Zelensky has suggested a ceasefire deal could be struck if Ukrainian territory he controls could be taken "under the NATO umbrella"—allowing him to negotiate the return of the rest later "in a diplomatic way".
In an interview with Sky News's chief correspondent Stuart Ramsay, the Ukrainian president said NATO membership would have to be offered to unoccupied parts of the country in order to end the "hot phase of the war", as long as the NATO invitation itself recognises Ukraine's internationally recognised borders.

He appeared to accept occupied eastern parts of the country would fall outside of such a deal for the time being.
"If we want to stop the hot phase of the war, we need to take under the NATO umbrella the territory of Ukraine that we have under our control," he said. "We need to do it fast. And then on the [occupied] territory of Ukraine, Ukraine can get them back in a diplomatic way."
Mr Zelenskyy said a ceasefire was needed to "guarantee that [Russian President Vladimir] Putin will not come back" to take more Ukrainian territory. He said NATO should "immediately" cover the part of Ukraine that remains under Kyiv's control, something he said Ukraine needs "very much otherwise he will come back".

Speaking of coming back …..

Well that’s what’s left of the Syrian resistance to ruling dictator Bashar al-Assad has done in the nations second largest city, Aleppo. As the authoritative AL-Monitor reported:

Rebel forces opposing President Bashar al-Assad have launched their biggest offensive in years this week….Government forces offered little resistance, and the army admitted that rebels had entered "large parts" of the city.
Why now? Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), a jihadist alliance led by Al-Qaeda's former Syria branch, and allied factions attacked government-held areas of the northern province of Aleppo and the northwestern Idlib region. The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights war monitor said the rebels had seized dozens of towns and villages in the north and "took control of most of" Aleppo.
The violence has killed at least 311 people, mostly combatants on both sides, but also including at least 28 civilians, said the Observatory, which relies on a network of sources inside Syria.
Dareen Khalifa, a researcher at the International Crisis Group, said the rebels had prepared months for this offensive….HTS and their allies are "also looking at the broader regional and geostrategic shift", she said….
Along with Iran, Russia is also a close ally of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, with Moscow intervening in Syria's civil war in 2015, turning the momentum of the conflict in favour of Damascus.
"They're thinking this is a time when the Iranians are weakened, when the regime is cornered and when Turkey is emboldened vis-a-vis Russia," Khalifa said….The Kremlin said it hoped Syria would quickly "restore order" in Aleppo, while Tehran has blamed the offensive on an American-Israeli plot to destabilise the region…."In the next few days, if (rebels) can sustain their gains it will be a test to whether or not Turkey will go all-in," Khalifa said.

And then there’s Lebanon…and Saudi….

There’s a ceasefire…sorta…as Al Jazeera worried:

Israel’s army has launched strikes inside Lebanon despite terms of the ceasefire and is restricting people from returning to their homes in parts of the south. Will Hezbollah respond?
The 60-day United States and French-brokered ceasefire agreement took effect at 4am Wednesday after nearly 14 months of cross-border attacks and just over two months after an Israeli escalation that wrought widespread devastation…
However, several incidents of Israel attacking within Lebanon have surfaced….
Israeli forces opened fire on people in a car, calling them “suspects”, in southern Lebanon. Israel claims these “suspects” violated the ceasefire – Hezbollah said Israel had attacked people who were trying to go home.

Saudi Arabia meanwhile is setting some conditions on its ties with America and Israel as Khamma Press noted:

Saudi Arabia has decided to back off from pursuing an ambitious defense agreement with the United States. Instead, Riyadh is now seeking a more limited military cooperation deal with Washington. A key condition for any agreement was the formal recognition of Israel by Saudi Arabia.
Earlier this year, Saudi Arabia softened its stance on the formation of a Palestinian state to reach a broader security pact with the U.S. Riyadh indicated to Washington that a public commitment from Israel to a two-state solution could be sufficient for normalizing relations with the Kingdom.
Amid growing public anger in Saudi Arabia and the wider Middle East over Israel’s military actions in Gaza, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman conditioned recognition of Israel on actions that would lead to the establishment of a Palestinian state.

Incidentally, Netanyahu drew his own red line this weekend, firing his ambassador to Washington and naming a far-right extremist as his new ambassador for the Trump years, as Le Monde explained:

Not only was Netanyahu one of the first foreign leaders to warmly congratulate Donald Trump on his re-election to the White House , he also quickly announced the appointment of a new ambassador to Washington , replacing Michael Herzog, the brother of the current president of the State of Israel, whose relations with the prime minister are notoriously strained.
Netanyahu, who himself was deputy ambassador to the United States from 1982 to 1984, then Israeli ambassador to the United Nations from 1984 to 1988, thus regains control of the most strategic post in Israeli diplomacy…..The choice for Washington of Yechiel Leiter, an ultranationalist with no diplomatic experience, is very revealing.
A follower of Rabbi Kahane
Israel's new ambassador to the United States knows the country intimately, having been born in 1959 in the same Pennsylvania town as President Joe Biden. Yechiel Leiter was an activist during his adolescence in the Jewish Defense League (JDL), founded in 1968 in New York by Rabbi Meir Kahane. The JDL's aggressive methods and its plans for attacks exposed the group to repeated prosecutions.

Indeed Andelman Unleashed knew Kahane and his forces well, having penned this portrait of him for The New York Times at his peak more than a half century ago:

Never omit Iran….

….where the ayatollahs have suggested they’re taking a big new step, as Asharq Al-Awsat reported:

The UN nuclear agency has confirmed that Iran plans to install around 6,000 new centrifuges to enrich uranium.
Iran informed the International Atomic Energy Agency that it intended to install around 6,000 centrifuges at its sites in Fordo and Natanz to enrich uranium to up to five percent, higher than the 3.67 percent limit Tehran had agreed to in 2015. The Iranian decision came in response to a resolution adopted on November 21 by the UN nuclear watchdog that censures Tehran for what the agency called lack of cooperation. On Thursday, Iran threatened to end its ban on acquiring nuclear weapons if Western sanctions are reimposed.
The country’s foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, said in an interview that the nuclear debate inside Iran is likely to shift towards the possession of its own weapons if the west goes ahead with a threat to reimpose all UN sanctions.

Meanwhile, talks seem to be going pretty much nowhere as Iran Insight reported:

Senior diplomats from Iran, Britain, France, and Germany convened a new round of talks on Tehran's disputed nuclear program in Geneva, Switzerland to test diplomacy ahead of Donald Trump's return to power in the US but made little or no progress. The purpose of the Geneva meeting, the first such talks since Trump's election victory, was to assess the feasibility of engaging in serious negotiations before the official inauguration of the new US president on January 20. The United States had previously announced it would not participate in the Geneva meeting.

A taste of the world to come.

Don’t forget Africa….

It seemed for a moment that anti-colonialism, the pace of military coups, and expulsion of western military forces that had brought a degree of stability in the face of Russian-inflamed Wagner military forces, had finally run their course. But now, suddenly, two more convulsions rippled across the continent. Let’s let Benjamin Roger and Elise Vincent of Le Monde Afrique pick up the story:

The French army has always considered it its stronghold in Africa. An aircraft carrier in the middle of the desert that, despite the headwinds from the Sahel in recent years, had to be preserved. Chad, which is home to one of France's five military bases on the continent, and where generations of French officers have succeeded one another since independence in 1960, announced on Thursday, November 28, that it was breaking the defense agreement between the two countries. A decision "which marks a historic turning point" , according to the press release from Chadian diplomacy, which adds that the time has come "to assert its full sovereignty and to redefine its strategic partnerships".
The press release was issued when the plane of the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Jean-Noël Barrot, had barely taken off from Chad - after a quick twenty-four-hour visit to the country. At the Elysée, the Ministry of the Armed Forces, or even the Quai d'Orsay, no one seemed to have been warned. Several French officers, visiting N'Djamena to discuss the continuation of military cooperation, had not been informed either.

This was a far cry from 1983 when I first landed in Chad with my CBS News crew, just behind a substantial force of French legionnaires, and at least 2,000 Zimbabwean troops sent by Mobutu Sese Seko to repel a threat from Libyan strongman Muammar el-Qaddafi.

Now, it seems, it’s all falling apart. Why exactly, and who’s to benefit? Le Monde‘s Roger and Vincent pick up the story:

[Chad’s] Minister of Defense himself learned of this decision by the president, Mahamat Idriss Déby, just before the press release. Elected in May, after succeeding his father in 2021, the 40-year-old general was seen as France's last ally in the Sahel since the French army was driven out of Mali, Burkina Faso and then Niger by the juntas that took power there between 2020 and 2023.
For the French army, the Chadian explosion is all the more disastrous because it comes just hours after an initial setback inflicted by another historic African partner: Senegal. Just before the announcement in N'Djamena, President Bassirou Diomaye Faye, a defender of a sovereigntist line, stated in an interview with Le Monde that there would soon be no more French soldiers in his country – and therefore no more bases in Dakar….After the divorce with the Sahelian countries, the cracks are increasingly visible in all the former colonies….
Chadian Foreign Minister Abderaman Koulamallah said the decision was "carefully considered". There is no indication that Paris had been informed before its announcement, while Jean-Noël Barrot, the French Foreign Minister, was on a trip to N'Djamena, the day before.

Quite a snub….and then the dénouement:

"They should have taken the initiative to leave instead of being chased away like that. The French military presence reassures foreign investors, but it is no longer politically profitable," analyses an official Ivorian source . "It is obvious that, within ten or fifteen years, there will no longer be a single French soldier in Africa. Because France can no longer afford it financially and because African youth can no longer stand it."

Of course there’s the debt….

Indeed, the dough may not be there much longer for such adventures, as the leading French business daily Les Echos suggested:

Unprecedented. France is now borrowing on the markets at the same level as Greece. A sad record. The cause: threats of censure and the fear that the 2025 budget will not be adopted. Enough to make the financial markets shudder. "The problem is that the measures to be taken are very difficult to get through politically. Without corrective measures, the debt trajectory could become explosive. More deficit means more debt. More debt means more interest. And more interest means more deficit," explains Stéphane Déo, manager at Eleva Capital, interviewed by Guillaume Benoit.
Some predict a Greek scenario. In short, a situation where investors would refuse to lend to us. But it is another catastrophe that awaits us, warns Alexandre Counis in an alarming editorial: that of a serious distrust of the markets in the long term. Are investors likely to turn away from France, as they once did from Greece to the point of refusing to lend to it?

How others see America

We’ve left to the last, but really what more is there to say, beyond what a senior counsellor to French President Emmanuel Macron told me at the Elysée Palace....He and Donald Trump had a “very productive” conversation on the telephone after the election. The American people have chosen. What his election really presents is a great opportunity for France and for Europe more broadly—to stand on their own feet since it is quite clear America will be out to take care of itself, and Europe must look to do the same. Not dissimilar to what Macron has been preaching from his earliest days in office, as I wrote for CNN more than seven years ago.

Perhaps Macron could yet again prove to be Europe’s Trump whisperer. But certainly, as his advisor suggested to me, Trump’s return represents a clarion call to Europe to look to and build its own defenses, its own way of standing up to its enemies and supporting its friends. In short, to do unto itself as Trump wishes to do unto his nation. But perhaps in a kinder, more humane fashion?

Sunday morning, incidentally, the French woke up to the horrifying news of just who Trump plans to name as his ambassador to France, as Le Monde pointed out with a reminder of the first person ever to hold this office and how the nature of America and its presidency has changed:

Even center-right daily Le Figaro couldn’t resist this lede:

Politics is also a family affair: Donald Trump announced on Saturday that he was appointing Charles Kushner, the father of his son-in-law and former advisor Jared Kushner, as US ambassador to France….
Charles Kushner spent a year in federal prison for tax fraud and was pardoned by Donald Trump toward the end of his first term in the White House. His son Jared Kushner is married to Ivanka Trump, the president's eldest daughter.

This is what our paid subs can enjoy!

High speed rail…Vientiane-Beijing, wow, nothing like my last visit a half century ago!… And cartoonists around the world mark the arrival of “peace” in Lebanon, and several other milestones, or at least points of reference in a unique portfolio with a tribute to the incomparable associates from Cartooning for Peace ....

Vientiane-Beijing in a heartbeat (or two)

When I first pitched up in Laos in the late spring of 1975, the Pathet Lao were in the process of taking control of the final Indochinese nation that had still eluded their eventual communist rulers. Indeed, I was forced to announce their final takeover in a dispatch from Bangkok since American journalists were no longer regularly welcomed in their Laos….

Never in my wildest imagination could I have foreseen the quiet little riverside jungle hamlet of Vientiane with the boat landing along the Mekong where I welcomed Hunter Thompson for his first visit ….

….would today be the arrival point of a sleek, high speed rail link capable of speeding high-end tourists from one communist capital to antoher. But voila.

There it is, as the Bangkok Post headlined:

Laos-China railway boosts trade and tourism, but also Beijing's clout
For Laos, the line is its first long-distance railway. Stops along the way include World Heritage sites such as Laos' Luang Prabang, known for its Buddhist temples, and Puer in Yunnan, which is celebrated for its tea forests.
At present, there are just two direct passenger services a day between Vientiane and Kunming, with one running in each direction, but other trains run along the route in both countries up to the border.
In October, passengers on a train making the nearly four-hour journey from Vientiane to Boten were a mix of foreign travellers and locals. First-class and second-class cars were available, with announcements made in Laotian, Chinese and English.
In-com Suriyawong, a 63-year-old Lao woman from Luang Namtha who requires treatment at a Vientiane hospital, said the new train that travels at a maximum speed of 160 kilometres per hour is a huge boon. "Before I had to ride a public bus, and it took 24 hours. It is very convenient," she said.
A group of Thai passengers, meanwhile, were on a tour to Yunnan Province cities across the border. The train experience was a "relaxing way to enjoy the scenery," they said. They were taking advantage of a program launched in March allowing Thais and Chinese to make visa-free short-term visits to each other's countries. Laos and China have yet to come to a similar arrangement.
China aims to extend the railway to Bangkok and eventually to Singapore via Malaysia as part of its Belt and Road infrastructure initiative. The outlook, however, remains dubious as it faces substantial costs to acquire land and other difficulties in becoming profitable.

Let cartoonists draw !

Many of the world’s cartoonists turned their attention this week to the Middle East, particularly the truce that Israel and Hezbollah have proclaimed but that appears to be a challenge to sustain … as this latest portfolio, assembled by Andelman Unleashed from some of the most accomplished members of the Paris-based Cartooning for Peace collective demonstrates:

Fadh Bahady : Germany