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      Russia’s Unsupported ‘Dirty Bomb’ Claims Spread Through Right-Wing U.S. Media

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      After Russia claimed that Ukraine would use a “dirty bomb” — a conventional explosive that can spread radioactive material — on its own territory, Western countries reacted with skepticism, noting that Russia often accused others of doing what Moscow was considering doing itself. Russia provided no evidence to support its claim.But on right-wing media and in many right-wing communities online, Russia’s claim was portrayed as believable, and as a dire warning that could serve to escalate Russia’s war on Ukraine for Ukraine’s benefit, or even trigger a new world war.Alex Jones, the American conspiracy theorist who often spreads lies on his Infowars platform, during his online show on Monday suggested that Ukraine would detonate a dirty bomb within its borders and then blame Russia as “a pretext to bring NATO fully into the conflict” and start World War III. “My analysis is, about 90 percent at this point, that there’s going to be full-on public war with Russia, and at least a tactical nuclear war in Europe,” he added.The Gateway Pundit, another right-wing American news site, repeated Russia’s claims in an article on Sunday and asked: “Would this surprise anyone?”And on YouTube, Gonzalo Lira, an American commentator who lives in Ukraine, said that “all the evidence” pointed to a “deliberate provocation that is being staged by the Americans.” The video received more than 59,000 views and circulated through right-wing social media.America’s far right has repeatedly sided with Russia in the conflict, echoing President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia’s baseless claims that the war was about routing corruption in Ukraine or ending neo-Nazism.As the conflict has continued, online communities have interpreted developments through their own conspiratorial lens, picking up Russian narratives that Ukraine would bomb its own citizens to curry international sympathy.Those discussions continued this week regarding claims about the possible use of a dirty bomb in the conflict.In one video — circulated widely on the messaging app Telegram and seen more than 36,000 times on the video-streaming service Brighteon — a streamer suggested that a “cabal” of Democrats and leftists was plotting to use the dirty bomb to set off a nuclear war, which would prevent Republicans from winning the midterm elections.“The cabal is so desperate, obviously, that they can’t allow that to happen,” the host said. “And even if it does happen, they’ll probably try to push for war before the next Congress gets in.” More

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      Your Tuesday Briefing: Rishi Sunak to Lead Britain

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      Plus Chinese markets react to a stronger Xi Jinping and young Chinese pursue quiet dissent.“We now need stability and unity, and I will make it my utmost priority to bring my party and country together,” Rishi Sunak said yesterday.Aberto Pezzali/Associated PressRishi Sunak to lead BritainRishi Sunak, who lost to Liz Truss just under seven weeks ago in the contest to lead Britain, will become prime minister today.Sunak, 42, prevailed in a chaotic Conservative Party leadership race yesterday after Penny Mordaunt, his remaining rival, withdrew. Sunak, the former chancellor of the Exchequer and the son of Indian immigrants, will be the first person of color to lead Britain.His immediate challenge: reunite his deeply divided party and rebuild its reputation. Some Tories view Sunak as Boris Johnson’s political assassin — his resignation from Johnson’s cabinet in July led to his boss’s fall and Britain’s political upheaval. And Conservatives lag behind the opposition Labour Party by more than 30 percentage points in polls.Sunak faces profound economic challenges, especially a cost of living crisis. Britain is also reeling from the self-inflicted damage of Brexit and of Truss, whose free-market economic agenda, featuring sweeping tax cuts, upended markets and sunk the pound.What’s next: While Sunak’s warnings about inflation and his fiscal conservatism may have cost him the post in September, his accurate assessments may help undo the damage left by his predecessor. India: Indian news media celebrated his historic ascension, but people were more focused on celebrating Diwali.Reaction: Calls are growing for a broader political reassessment. “I think we should have had a general election because of all the mistakes the previous two prime ministers made,” one woman told The New York Times.A Beijing vegetable market last month. China’s economy has already been dragged down by its commitment to “zero Covid” policies.Gilles Sabrié for The New York TimesMarkets react to Xi’s consolidationInvestors unnerved by Xi Jinping’s power grab — and the state-heavy agenda of China’s top leader — sent Chinese shares tumbling yesterday.In Hong Kong, share prices plummeted more than 6 percent, reaching 13-year lows as traders dumped huge numbers of shares. In mainland China, markets fell nearly 3 percent, even though Beijing puts heavy pressure on institutional investors not to sell during politically fraught moments. And the renminbi dropped to a 14-year low against the dollar.The heavy selling was particularly striking given that the Chinese government said the economy grew 3.9 percent in the three months that ended in September, from the same period a year earlier. The data, released yesterday, was stronger than expected but still fell short of Beijing’s target of 5.5 percent for this year.Analysis: Xi has put a premium on politics and security — and a stringent “zero Covid” policy — even at the cost of slowing economic growth and employment.Details: The nosedive in financial markets was particularly focused on the shares of Chinese internet companies, which have been a key target of Xi’s campaign to strengthen the Communist Party’s economic control.Background: During last week’s Communist Party congress, Xi pushed out longtime economic policymakers like Premier Li Keqiang and Wang Yang, an architect of the free-market economic boom in southeastern China.A protestor hung banners openly bashing Xi Jinping from Sitong Bridge, in central Beijing.Dake Kang/Associated PressYoung Chinese quietly dissentThis month, a demonstrator unfurled two banners on a highway overpass in Beijing, denouncing Xi Jinping as a “despotic traitor.”China’s censors went to great lengths to scrub the internet of any reference to the act of dissent, prohibiting all discussion and shutting down many offending social media accounts.But the slogans didn’t go away, my colleague Li Yuan writes. Instead, young Chinese, frustrated with censorship, repression and Xi’s “zero Covid” policies, have used creative ways to amplify and spread his message. They graffitied the slogans in public toilets and used Apple’s AirDrop feature to send fellow subway passengers photos of the messages, even though they’re forced to remain anonymous — often from one another.In doing so, members of a generation known for toeing the government line are overcoming their fear of the repressive government, their political depression and their loneliness as political heretics in a society that espouses one leader, one party and one ideology.Context: The protester, who is now viewed as a hero, was last seen being detained by the police. He’s being called the “Bridge Man,” a reference to the “Tank Man,” who stood in front of tanks during the bloody crackdown on pro-democracy demonstrators in Beijing in 1989.THE LATEST NEWSAsia PacificAustralia’s government will release its budget today, Reuters reports. Growth is expected to slow as inflation cuts into consumer spending.North Korea and South Korea exchanged warning shots along a disputed sea boundary, The Associated Press reports.Around the World“They are not preparing to exit now,” a top Ukrainian official said yesterday, of Russian troops. “They are preparing to defend.”Nicole Tung for The New York TimesThere are growing signs that Russia’s occupation government in Kherson is preparing the city for fighting ahead of a possible Ukrainian counteroffensive.Math scores fell in nearly every U.S. state, a sign of the pandemic’s toll.Jair Bolsonaro, Brazil’s president, and conservative lawmakers are trying to criminalize incorrect election forecasts after polls underestimated his support. The presidential runoff is on Sunday.Other Big StoriesThe first formal peace talks between Ethiopia’s government and Tigrayan rebels are scheduled to begin today in South Africa.Top U.S. executives are heading to a major business conference in Saudi Arabia, despite the Biden administration’s misgivings.OpinionsIn a short documentary, Maria Fredriksson asks: Should Sweden’s tax agency let an Indigenous Sami woman deduct her reindeer-herding dog?Ellen R. Wald, the author of “Saudi, Inc.: The Arabian Kingdom’s Pursuit of Profit and Power,” explains why OPEC is cutting oil production.Noam Shuster Eliassi, a comedian who lives in Tel Aviv-Jaffa, lived through a terrorist attack. She realized that not everything can be funny.A Morning ReadPolitical scientists say the pattern shows how white fear of losing status shaped the movement to keep Trump in power.Annie Mulligan for The New York TimesIn the U.S., the white majority is shrinking disproportionately fast in districts represented by Republican lawmakers who refused to accept Donald Trump’s defeat.Their constituents also lagged behind in income and education. Rates of so-called deaths of despair, like suicide, drug overdose and alcohol-related liver failure, were notably higher as well.Lives lived: Ngo Vinh Long was the most prominent Vietnamese in the U.S. to campaign against the war in Vietnam. He died at 78.CLIMATE FOCUSWhy attack a painting?On Sunday, climate activists in Germany threw mashed potatoes on a painting by Claude Monet, “Grainstacks.” The action came just days after activists in London threw tomato soup on “Sunflowers,” a painting by Vincent van Gogh.The attacks on art, intended to draw attention to climate change, have drawn widespread reaction online. Neither painting was harmed — an intentional choice by the activists. Still, many worried about the paintings’ safety and described the form of protest as misguided.But the dramatic tactic may have a lasting impact, Andreas Malm, the author of “How to Blow Up a Pipeline: Learning to Fight in a World on Fire,” argues in a guest essay for the Opinion section. The tactic has historical precedent, he says: Even though paintings are hardly responsible for the climate crisis, the point is to “create enough disorder to make it impossible to ignore the ongoing climate breakdown.”PLAY, WATCH, EATWhat to CookLennart Weibull for The New York TimesIf you can boil water, slice an onion and use a strainer, you can make niku udon, a Japanese beef noodle soup. It’s Kenji López-Alt’s go-to weeknight dinner.What to Read“The Pachinko Parlor” is a powerful story of dislocation and self-discovery set in Tokyo.The CosmosA solar eclipse will be visible today across Europe and Asia. Here’s how to watch.Now Time to PlayPlay the Mini Crossword, and a clue: Tall and thin (five letters).Here are the Wordle and the Spelling Bee.You can find all our puzzles here.That’s it for today’s briefing. See you next time. — AmeliaP.S. Vox named Zeynep Tufekci, a Times Opinion columnist, to its inaugural list of 50 people working to make the future better.The latest episode of “The Daily” is on election denial in the U.S.You can reach Amelia and the team at briefing@nytimes.com. More

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      Your Monday Briefing: Xi Jinping Consolidates Power

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      Plus Britain prepares for a new leader and Russia forcibly resettles Ukraine’s children.Xi Jinping is poised to push his vision of a swaggering, nationalist China even further, with himself at the center.Kevin Frayer/Getty ImagesXi Jinping tightens his gripTo no one’s surprise, Xi Jinping has formally secured a third term as head of China’s Communist Party.He thoroughly shook up the party’s top tiers, elevating loyalists and forcing out moderates. In so doing, Xi consolidated his power and created a new ruling elite primed to elevate his agenda of bolstering national security and turning China into a technological great power. And in a moment packed with symbolism, Hu Jintao, who presided over one of China’s more open and prosperous periods, was ushered out of an important political meeting.Xi chose six men with longstanding ties to him for the Politburo Standing Committee, the top echelon of the party. Wang Huning, his chief theoretician, remains on the body, a sign that hard-line policies and the role of ideology will persist. Xi also appointed to the Politburo, the party’s second tier, a number of domestic security officials and military commanders, as well as several people with backgrounds in science and engineering.As Xi tightens his control, Beijing is likely to remain defiant in the face of international criticism of its authoritarian policies. Notably, at the party congress this week, Xi did not mention two long-repeated maxims about peace and strategic opportunity. The omissions revealed Xi’s anxieties about an increasingly volatile world, and warned of a looming conflict with the U.S. for global dominance.Analysis: To supporters, Xi’s centralized control and continuity are strengths. But some argue that ousting critics could leave Xi’s government vulnerable to failures like its mismanagement during the early days of Covid-19.Standing Committee: New appointees include Ding Xuexiang, Xi’s right-hand man, and Li Qiang, who worked under Xi when they were local officials in Zhejiang Province. Li oversaw a contentious Covid lockdown in Shanghai and is now in line to become China’s new premier.Other updates:For the first time in decades, no women will be on the Politburo.Hu Chunhua, once seen as a potential successor to Premier Li Keqiang, has been sidelined: He’s not in the Standing Committee or the Politburo.From Opinion: Ai Weiwei, an artist and outspoken critic of the Chinese government, argues that the Communist Party has suppressed all possible dissent, despite hopes that capitalism and the internet would create opportunities for rebellion.Liz Truss’s departure plunged Britain deeper into financial uncertainty.Sam Bush for The New York TimesBoris Johnson bows outBritain’s Conservative Party plans to select a new prime minister this week, days after Liz Truss resigned.One thing is for sure: It won’t be Boris Johnson, who was forced to resign as prime minister in July. Johnson pulled out of the race yesterday evening, despite speculation that he was eyeing a return to power.The State of the WarA Looming Crisis: Russia’s stepped-up attacks on infrastructure and vital utility networks in Ukraine herald a new phase of the war — one that threatens millions of Ukrainians with the prospect of a winter without electricity, water and heat in half-destroyed buildings.A New Front?: Russia is massing thousands of troops in its western neighbor Belarus, raising fears that Moscow might plan to open another front in the war. But officials in Kyiv and Washington are casting doubt on whether the buildup represents a serious threat.Occupied Regions: President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia declared martial law in four illegally annexed regions of Ukraine as pro-Kremlin authorities in the city of Kherson said they would evacuate tens of thousands of people in advance of a possible Ukrainian counterattack.An Opportunity Ahead: American officials are convinced that the next six weeks, before fall mud spreads, could allow Ukraine’s military to press forward in the Donbas region and potentially retake Kherson.Rishi Sunak, the former chancellor of the Exchequer who had lost to Truss, is now the favorite to win. He had lined up at least 147 votes by late afternoon yesterday, according to a tally by the BBC.Sunak could become prime minister as early as today: If only one candidate receives 100 or more nominations from the 357 Conservative members of Parliament, that person will become the next prime minister.Analysis: Some experts link Truss’s downfall to the bitter factions Brexit created in the Conservative Party.A broken window at a hospital in Mariupol, where many resettled children once lived.Evgeniy Maloletka/Associated PressRussia resettles Ukraine’s childrenSince Russia’s invasion started in February, thousands of Ukrainian children have been transferred to Russia, often against their will, to be adopted and become citizens.Russian authorities have celebrated the adoptions with patriotic fanfare. On state-run television, officials offer teddy bears to new arrivals, who are portrayed as abandoned children being rescued from war.But this mass transfer of children is a potential war crime. Some were taken after their parents had been killed or imprisoned by Russian troops, according to Ukrainian officials. And while many did come from orphanages and group homes, the authorities also took children whose relatives or guardians want them back.“I didn’t want to go,” one 14-year-old girl told my colleague Emma Bubola. “But nobody asked me.” Fighting: Russian forces pounded Ukraine’s power plants with some of the heaviest missile strikes in weeks.THE LATEST NEWSAsia PacificThe women say that they have suffered lasting trauma from the episode at Hamad International Airport in Doha, Qatar.Karim Jaafar/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesFive Australian women have sued Qatar two years after they underwent invasive medical procedures when a newborn was found in an airport bathroom.Pakistan’s election commission effectively barred former Prime Minister Imran Khan from office, escalating a political showdown and raising the possibility of mass unrest.Indonesia has banned cough syrup sales amid worries that tainted product from India may be connected to the deaths of dozens of children in Gambia.BTS members can still perform at South Korean national events during their upcoming military service, The Korea Times reports.Around the WorldThe Jan. 6 committee subpoenaed Donald Trump for testimony and documents.At least 50 people died when security forces in Chad opened fire on protesters, who were demanding that the military junta stick to a promise to hold elections.Palestinians have moved into caves as Israel tries to expel them from their villages and demolish their homes, which could amount to a war crime. Other Big StoriesSteve Bannon, a former adviser to Donald Trump, was found guilty of two counts of contempt of Congress.Chip Somodevilla/Getty ImagesSteve Bannon was sentenced to four months in prison for defying a Jan. 6 committee subpoena.A U.S. court temporarily blocked the Biden administration from canceling any student debt.Protests, a riot and gunshots: Here’s how a fire at a notorious Iranian prison spread.A Morning ReadTamara Plieshkova, right, feels like “an old, mature tree being replanted into new soil,” her daughter said. Plieshkova reunited with her granddaughter in Colorado after escaping the war in Ukraine in September.Theo Stroomer for The New York TimesThere is a name for the specific type of grief that both refugees and migrants experience. It’s “cultural bereavement.”Lives lived: Peter Schjeldahl, an art critic whose enthusiasm and elegant reviews helped define New York’s art scene, died at 80. Read his witty essay from 2019 on his lung cancer diagnosis.GLOBAL GASTRONOMYNoma in KyotoNoma, the celebrated Danish restaurant, will open a 10-week pop-up in Kyoto, Japan. It will span sakura (cherry-blossom) season and incorporate ingredients and methods from the region, which is the historic center of Japanese Buddhism.The very structure of the meal also references Buddhist culinary traditions. The ubiquitous modern tasting menu has its roots in kaiseki, a carefully orchestrated progression of small plates that grew from a Buddhist tea ceremony into a luxurious cuisine in Kyoto. In the late 1960s, elements of the meal began to flow from Japan into fine dining, often through the influential Tsuji culinary school in Osaka.The conceptual approach to ingredients was partially born in kaiseki, too: Kyoto’s kaiseki menus have always changed to reflect the seasons. That idea has given rise to foraging, restaurant gardens and the farm-to-table movement.“I was taught that the tasting menu was invented by the French and then reinvented in Spain,” René Redzepi, Noma’s chef, told The Times. “I had no idea of the vast repository of ideas and techniques that is Japanese food.”Details: Noma Kyoto will be open from March 15 through May 20. The meal will cost just over 850 euros (about $839) per person and reservations will open on Nov. 7 on Noma’s website.PLAY, WATCH, EATWhat to CookKate Sears for The New York TimesYou only need one pan for this shrimp scampi with crispy gnocchi.What to Listen toTaylor Swift’s new album, “Midnights,” comments on life as a deeply observed figure.What to Read“Is Mother Dead,” a harrowing Norwegian novel, features a middle-aged painter desperate to reconcile with her estranged parent.Now Time to PlayPlay the Mini Crossword, and a clue: British baked good (five letters).Here are the Wordle and the Spelling Bee.You can find all our puzzles here.That’s it for today’s briefing. Best wishes for a great week. — AmeliaP.S. The Concorde made its last commercial flight 19 years ago today.Start your week with this narrated long read about Yiyun Li, a novelist beloved for her powerful distillations of grief. And here’s Friday’s edition of “The Daily,” on Liz Truss’s downfall.You can reach Amelia and the team at briefing@nytimes.com. More

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      How Tumultuous Forces of Brexit Divided U.K.’s Conservative Party

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      Some experts link Liz Truss’s downfall to the ripple effect of Britain’s departure from the European Union and the bitter, ideologically opposed factions it created in her party.LONDON — When Prime Minister Liz Truss of Britain resigned on Thursday after only 44 days in office, she spoke almost wistfully about how the collapse of her economic plans meant she would never achieve her goal of creating a “low-tax, high-growth economy that would take advantage of the freedoms of Brexit.”Her nostalgia for Britain’s exit from the European Union might be misplaced, at least when it comes to her Conservative Party. Brexit is the fault line that runs through Ms. Truss’s ill-fated attempt to transform Britain’s economy, just as it ran through Prime Minister Theresa May’s doomed government, and David Cameron’s before hers.Except for Boris Johnson, who was forced out because of scandals related to his personal conduct, the forces unleashed by Brexit have undone every Conservative prime minister since 2016. They have also severely divided the party, creating bitter, ideologically opposed factions seemingly more interested in warring with each other than in governing a country with the world’s sixth-largest economy.Ms. Truss’s calamitous tenure, critics said, is the most extreme example of post-Brexit politics that have now brought the Conservatives to crisis. In the process, it has damaged Britain’s economic standing, its credibility in the markets, and its reputation with the public, which is watching a leadership contest that may return Mr. Johnson to the helm of a party that tossed him out only three months ago.Prime Minister Liz Truss after announcing her resignation on Thursday at Downing Street in London.Daniel Leal/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images“The Conservatives are never going to recover the coherence that will make for good governance,” said Timothy Garton Ash, a professor of European studies at Oxford University. “This is a party that is tearing itself apart.”He traced the party’s unraveling from the 2016 referendum, called by Mr. Cameron, through Mrs. May’s futile efforts to craft a softer form of Brexit, to the uncompromising “hard Brexit” of Mr. Johnson, and finally to Ms. Truss’s experiment in trickle-down economics, which he said bore all of the hallmarks of Brexit thinking, from the derision of expert opinion to the disregard of Britain’s neighbors and the market.“It’s taking the logic of Brexit to the absurd,” said Professor Garton Ash, who has long lamented the vote to leave.Ms. Truss’s tax cuts made Britain an outlier among Western countries, but the factionalism of post-Brexit Britain plagues other European countries, from Italy to Germany, as well as the United States, where some may view the potential return of Mr. Johnson as a harbinger for another restless populist, Donald J. Trump.In announcing her trickle-down policies, Ms. Truss was an evangelist for a particular model of Brexit, an agile, fast-growing, lightly regulated Britain that its backers once branded Singapore-on-Thames. Whether that is a viable economic construct was never tested. Her policies were swiftly rejected by the markets because they were judged to be reckless at a time of double-digit inflation.More on the Situation in BritainA Rapid Downfall: Liz Truss is about to become the shortest-serving prime minister in British history. How did she get there?Lifelong Allowance: The departing prime minister is eligible for a taxpayer-funded annual payout for the rest of her life. Some say she shouldn’t be allowed to receive it.Staging a Comeback?: When Boris Johnson left his role as prime minister in September, he hinted he might return. He is now being mentioned as a successor to Ms. Truss.But Ms. Truss faced equally hostile forces within her own cabinet, which are fueled by the same nationalistic passions that drove Brexit.Suella Braverman, the home secretary whom Ms. Truss fired last week ostensibly for violating security rules, attacked Ms. Truss for abandoning the party’s promise to cut down immigration numbers. The prime minister talks tough about illegal immigrants, too, but her policies were shaping up to be more moderate because she believes new arrivals are needed to accelerate Britain’s growth.The clash between Ms. Truss and Ms. Braverman was part of a bigger clash between rival camps in the party — a free-market, libertarian wing, exemplified by the prime minister, and a hard-line anti-immigration wing, represented by Ms. Braverman. Those views, Ms. Braverman argues, are critical to retaining the loyalty of working-class voters in the north of England, who used to back the Labour Party but who propelled the Conservatives to a landslide general election victory in 2019.Suella Braverman, a Conservative Party hard-liner on immigration.Tolga Akmen/EPA, via ShutterstockThe party also has a centrist faction — personified by Ms. Truss’s chancellor of the Exchequer, Jeremy Hunt — which embraces small-government, business-friendly policies that predate Brexit. The centrists regained some influence after the market’s repudiation of Ms. Truss, when she was forced to hand over the Treasury to Mr. Hunt and the home office to one of his allies, Grant Shapps.Some major party figures, like Rishi Sunak, who served as chancellor under Mr. Johnson and is expected to run in next week’s leadership contest, do not fit neatly into a single group. He voted in favor of Brexit but opposed Ms. Truss’s tax cuts, warning that they would cause havoc in the markets.Quarrels over Britain’s relationship with Europe date back decades in the Conservative Party, of course. Mr. Cameron had little choice but to resign after failing to persuade voters to reject a motion to leave in his referendum. Mrs. May was forced out by her party’s lawmakers after trying to strike compromises with the European Union that made her look, to some, as too conciliatory.With Mr. Johnson having led Britain out of the European Union in 2020, the battles are now over how to shape its post-Brexit society. But they still revolve to a great degree around Europe-related issues, like the flow of asylum seekers across the English Channel or trade rules in Northern Ireland. Pressure from the party’s hard-liners forced Mr. Johnson and Ms. Truss to toughen their approach to Northern Ireland, for example.“The factions are on display in this leadership campaign,” said Tony Travers, a professor of politics at the London School of Economics. “But this is now on a bigger scale and profoundly affects what was once the incredible adherence of the Conservative Party to common-sense and pragmatism.”It also helps explain why Mr. Johnson, who only six weeks ago left Downing Street under a wreath of scandal that prompted a wholesale mutiny of Conservative lawmakers and a mass walkout of his ministers, suddenly finds himself a plausible candidate to retake control of the party. He returned on Saturday from a vacation in the Dominican Republic to lobby lawmakers for votes.Former Prime Minister Boris Johnson is one of three top contenders to replace Ms. Truss as prime minister.Alberto Pezzali/Associated PressMany Conservative lawmakers, fearful of losing their seats in the next general election, yearn for the political magic of “Get Brexit Done,” the upbeat slogan that Mr. Johnson used to unite the party’s affluent southeastern suburbanites with the so-called red wall voters in the Midlands and north. They are willing to accept Mr. Johnson, even with his ethical flaws, for the big-tent appeal he once commanded.“The advantage that Boris has is that he’s not interested in these factions,” Professor Travers said. “He’s not interested in ideology but in power. And the reason the members want him back is because they think he can help them stay in power.”As prime minister, Mr. Johnson did not hesitate to exploit populist passions. His government began the practice of putting asylum seekers on flights to Rwanda, drawing condemnation from human-rights lawyers and activists.But Mr. Johnson also oversaw a costly state intervention in the economy to insulate people from the effects of the coronavirus pandemic. And his signature program involved spending hundreds of billions of pounds on high-speed trains and other projects to “level up” corroded cities in the north with more prosperous London.Ms. Truss said comparatively little about leveling up. One of the first moves made by her first choice as chancellor, Kwasi Kwarteng, was to scrap a limit on bonuses paid to bankers, a move intended to appease London’s financial district.The problem for Mr. Johnson, if he were to run and win, is that he would have far fewer financial resources this time around to govern as a big-state Conservative. Mr. Hunt has warned that the government will have to make “eye-wateringly difficult” decisions about which programs to cut. Britain’s need to rebuild its shattered credibility with investors will require strict fiscal discipline.Jeremy Hunt represents a centrist faction of the Conservative Party.Henry Nicholls/ReutersBritain’s economic troubles, experts say, cannot be blamed wholly or even mainly on Brexit. While its departure from the European Union has tightened the labor market and hampered trade, Britain’s growth never recovered after the financial crisis of 2008. Its depleted public services are a legacy of the austerity of Mr. Cameron and his chancellor, George Osborne, which predated Brexit.Still, the often-ruthless tactics of the “Vote Leave” campaign, critics say, planted the seeds for the Truss government’s mishandling of economic policy. Campaigners for Brexit famously argued that the country should ignore experts who warned that leaving the European Union would exact a high cost. They brandished spurious figures about the cost for Britain of remaining in the bloc.This experts-be-damned philosophy was the underpinning of Ms. Truss’s economic plan. When Mr. Kwarteng announced the tax cuts, he refused to submit them to scrutiny by the government’s independent watchdog. He fired the most senior civil servant at the Treasury, Tom Scholar, a sign of his disdain for economic orthodoxy.“It wasn’t so much the fact of Brexit, or even the referendum itself, but the dishonesty of the referendum campaign,” said Jonathan Portes, a professor of economics and public policy at King’s College London. “They took a lesson from that, which was that dishonesty and trashing institutions was a way to success.” More

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      Italia articula su próximo gobierno en torno a un rostro conocido: Silvio Berlusconi

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      El apoyo del magnate de los medios de comunicación definirá la posición de Giorgia Meloni como posible primera ministra del país. La salud de la democracia italiana también está en juego.ROMA — Durante el último mitin de campaña de la coalición de derecha italiana antes de su victoria en las elecciones del mes pasado, el magnate multimillonario Silvio Berlusconi, con una sonrisa congelada en su rostro de cera, estaba en el centro del escenario, apuntalado, literalmente, por sus aliados de la ultraderecha, Giorgia Meloni y Matteo Salvini, que agitaron la mano de Berlusconi por encima de su cabeza.El cuadro pudo haber evocado una versión italiana de Weekend at Bernie’s más que un triunvirato moderno. Pero los tres formarán ahora el gobierno italiano más derechista desde Mussolini. Berlusconi, con 86 años y cada vez menos popularidad, es su frágil eje.Hace casi 30 años, Berlusconi fue quien incorporó a los partidos de sus aliados, antes pequeños y marginales, a uno de sus gobiernos y a la política italiana establecida. Pero ahora es Meloni, líder de los Hermanos de Italia, un partido que desciende de los restos del experimento italiano con el fascismo del siglo pasado, quien casi con seguridad será la próxima primera ministra cuando se forme un gobierno, quizás esta misma semana.La cuestión ahora, sin embargo, es si el envejecido líder de centroderecha puede cumplir su promesa de fungir como una fuerza moderadora y proeuropea en el próximo gobierno de Italia, o si ha perdido el control de la política que puso en marcha y que ha convertido a Italia, la cuna del fascismo, otra vez en un campo de pruebas para el avance de la extrema derecha en Europa. El lunes, Suecia instaló su propio gobierno de derecha, respaldado por un partido de raíces neonazis.“Europa espera mucho de nosotros”, escribió la semana pasada en Twitter Berlusconi, que declinó una solicitud de entrevista. “Y nos consideramos el garante del próximo gobierno”.Incluso antes de que se forme el gobierno, las tensiones ya son evidentes. La semana pasada, cuando Berlusconi ocupaba su nuevo escaño en el Senado, un órgano que hace casi una década lo vetó temporalmente tras una condena por fraude fiscal, los fotógrafos hicieron un acercamiento sobre sus apuntes, quizá colocados a propósito para que fueran visibles, en los que describía a Meloni como “prepotente, arrogante, ofensiva”. Cuando los periodistas le preguntaron al respecto, Meloni espetó que había olvidado algo: “No chantajeable”.Los dos parecieron hacer las paces durante un encuentro el lunes por la noche en Roma; publicaron una foto sonriendo juntos, y Berlusconi los llamó “unidos”.La idea de Berlusconi como protector de la democracia italiana es para muchos algo profundamente preocupante.Simpatizantes del partido de extrema derecha Hermanos de Italia el mes pasado en Cagliari, Cerdeña. Es casi seguro que Meloni, la líder del partido, será la próxima primera ministra cuando se forme un gobierno.Gianni Cipriano para The New York TimesSus numerosos críticos recuerdan los abusos del poder gubernamental para proteger sus intereses empresariales, sus escapadas libertinas con mujeres jóvenes y las llamadas fiestas Bunga Bunga realizadas cuando ocupaba el cargo, su humillación a las mujeres y la cultura italianas con su humor, y sus canales de televisión, a menudo burdos, que, junto con sus periódicos y revistas, aprovechó para realizar propaganda política.Para ellos, es el villano que degradó la democracia italiana, cuyos conflictos de intereses, asociaciones dudosas y aparente ilegalidad desencadenaron un movimiento de oposición de furiosos populistas antisistema y llevaron a la izquierda a una crisis nerviosa de la que aún no se ha recuperado.En la escena internacional, es un viejo amigo del presidente ruso Vladimir Putin, al que defendió el mes pasado, lo que supuso un dolor de cabeza para Meloni, que apoya firmemente a Ucrania en la guerra con Rusia.Berlusconi también provocó un motín entre los centristas de su propio partido en julio, cuando hundió al gobierno del primer ministro Mario Draghi, al que admiraba públicamente, en su afán por volver a probar el poder.“Es muy importante entender inmediatamente que Berlusconi no es amigo de la democracia”, dijo antes de morir Paul Ginsborg, biógrafo de Berlusconi, en una conversación reciente.Pero dada la composición del nuevo gobierno, algunos analistas creen que Berlusconi puede ser el mejor amigo que tienen los defensores de una Italia proeuropea, centrista y democrática.“La parte responsable de la centroderecha la encarna el líder que durante mucho tiempo ha sido considerado el más irresponsable del mundo”, dijo Claudio Cerasa, autor de un nuevo libro, Le catene della destra (Las cadenas de la derecha), sobre la aceptación de las teorías de conspiración por parte de nacionalistas y populistas.“Europa espera mucho de nosotros”, escribió Berlusconi la semana pasada en Twitter. “Y nos consideramos el garante del próximo gobierno”.Gianni Cipriano para The New York TimesCerasa, que también es director de Il Foglio, un periódico fundado por la familia de Berlusconi pero que ahora es independiente, señaló que solo Berlusconi en la derecha italiana había rechazado el trumpismo, el populismo antielitista y el nacionalismo euroescéptico. También sirvió de contrapeso a la desconfianza que Meloni y Salvini expresaron ante las vacunas, y gobernó en coaliciones con la centroizquierda.Muchos en la clase política creen que Berlusconi evitará que Meloni ponga en peligro la unidad europea al gravitar de nuevo hacia sus viejos aliados, entre ellos el primer ministro euroescéptico y de extrema derecha Viktor Orbán de Hungría y Marine Le Pen en Francia. “Él es como una brújula”, dijo Cerasa.No está claro que Meloni lo siga. Este mes, ella participó en un mitin del partido español de extrema derecha Vox, junto con el expresidente Donald Trump y Orbán. “No somos monstruos”, dijo en un mensaje de video. “El pueblo lo entiende”.Meloni, consciente de las preocupaciones que genera su pasado ideológico, desea calmar a los mercados internacionales al nombrar a tecnócratas reconocidos para los ministerios económicos clave. Pero estos siguen rechazándola.Algunos sostienen que el legado más duradero de Berlusconi en la política italiana —más que el debate que forzó sobre los impuestos onerosos o la extralimitación judicial— puede ser su creación de una coalición europea moderna de derecha, formada por partidos antes marginados cuyas versiones actuales lideran Meloni y Salvini.De este modo, Berlusconi eliminó la noción, según John Foot, un historiador del fascismo, de que “un fascista no debería hablar, no debería existir, no debería tener un lugar en la sociedad italiana”.En 2019 Berlusconi dijo durante un mitin político que, en lo que respecta al partido de la Liga de Salvini y a los “fascistas”, “los dejamos entrar en el 94 y los legitimamos”. Insistió, sin embargo, en que “somos el cerebro, el corazón, la columna vertebral”.“Sin nosotros”, dijo, “la centroderecha no existiría ni existirá nunca”.Meloni el mes pasado en Roma. Algunos sostienen que el legado más duradero de Berlusconi en la política italiana puede ser su creación de una moderna coalición de derecha europea.Gianni Cipriano para The New York TimesAlgunos de los antiguos partidarios de Berlusconi consideran que esa alianza fue un golpe maestro democrático, por obligar a la franja a normalizarse y comprometerse con la realidad transaccional de la capital.“Transformó estos dos movimientos que eran, digamos, balas perdidas, o variables fuera de control, y los llevó al puerto constitucional”, dijo Renato Brunetta, que ayudó a fundar el partido Forza Italia de Berlusconi. “Esto fue un elemento estabilizador”.Pero después de que Forza Italia ayudó a desencadenar nuevas elecciones, Brunetta, que fue ministro en el gobierno de Draghi, abandonó el partido y dijo que Meloni era “realmente regresiva en lo que respecta a la cultura de la derecha en Italia”.Meloni, por su parte, agradeció la obra de Berlusconi. En una reciente entrevista, reconoció que “hizo algo inesperado” cuando en 1993 apoyó la candidatura a la alcaldía del entonces líder de su partido Alianza Nacional, que luego fue Ministro de Relaciones Exteriores de Berlusconi.“Eso seguramente hizo que muchos que quizás no tenían el valor de decirlo, y lo creían de corazón, salieran a la luz”, dijo Meloni. “En este sentido, es el tema de la legitimación”.Pero, añadió Meloni, “creo que el momento de la derecha había llegado”.Ahora claramente llegó. El partido de Meloni obtuvo el 26 por ciento de los votos, más que ningún otro. Insistió en que no se limitaba a andar con Berlusconi porque necesitara el pequeño porcentaje de su partido para gobernar, como él necesitó en su día al partido de ella.“No necesitamos llevarlo con nosotros”, dijo Meloni. Y añadió: “Puede que sea la persona que más se ha impuesto en la historia italiana, en la historia republicana italiana, más que cualquier otro en los últimos 20 años”.De hecho, a pesar de su paso cansino y de los jóvenes con banderas que lo protegen de la vista del público al salir del escenario, las cosas parecen ir a favor de Berlusconi.La semana pasada, con el pelo lacado, fue el centro de atención en la sesión de apertura del Senado recién elegido.Berlusconi, en el centro, el jueves en la primera sesión del recién elegido Senado en Roma.Antonio Masiello/Getty ImagesTodas las contradicciones de la historia y la política actual de Italia estaban a la vista. También las tensiones entre los aliados de la derecha.La sesión la abrió un sobreviviente del Holocausto y senador vitalicio que recordó que el fascismo de Mussolini tomó el poder hace 100 años. Los senadores eligieron como presidente a Ignazio La Russa, líder del partido de Meloni, que lleva el segundo nombre de Benito y guarda en su casa recuerdos de Mussolini.Berlusconi, que recibió apretones de manos y peticiones de selfis por parte de los senadores, tiró el bolígrafo y maldijo furiosamente a La Russa, cuya presidencia intentó bloquear como represalia por la negativa de Meloni a nombrar ministra a su propia lugarteniente, Licia Ronzulli, una antigua enfermera que se sienta a su lado y solía ayudar a organizar sus veladas nocturnas con mujeres jóvenes.La novia de Berlusconi, Marta Fascina, de 32 años, obtuvo un escaño en el Parlamento en representación de una ciudad siciliana en la que nunca hizo campaña. El 29 de septiembre, el día del cumpleaños de Berlusconi, hizo que un globo aerostático soltara miles de globos con forma de corazones rojos sobre el jardín de su villa.Al día siguiente, Berlusconi publicó un video de su cena de cumpleaños en el que meseros con guantes blancos sacaban un pastel de varios pisos: uno por su equipo de fútbol, otro por su partido político y otro por su imperio mediático.Encima de todo estaba la imagen de un Berlusconi mucho más joven y con su traje característico, sonriendo junto a una tierra comestible.Jason Horowitz es el jefe del buró en Roma; cubre Italia, Grecia y otros sitios del sur de Europa. Cubrió la campaña presidencial de 2016 en Estados Unidos, el gobierno de Obama y al congreso con un énfasis en perfiles políticos y especiales. @jasondhorowitz More

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      Italy’s Next Government Hinges on a Familiar Face: Silvio Berlusconi

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      Giorgia Meloni’s likely turn as prime minister will depend on support from the billionaire media mogul. So may the health of Italian democracy.ROME — During the final campaign rally for Italy’s right-wing coalition before it emerged victorious in Italy’s elections last month, the billionaire mogul Silvio Berlusconi, a smile frozen on his waxen face, stood center stage, propped up, quite literally, by his hard-right partners, Giorgia Meloni and Matteo Salvini, who waved Mr. Berlusconi’s hand above his head.The tableau may have evoked an Italian remake of “Weekend at Bernie’s” more than a modern-day triumvirate. But the three will now make up the most right-wing Italian government since Mussolini, with Mr. Berlusconi, 86 and decreasingly popular, as its fragile linchpin.It was nearly 30 years ago that Mr. Berlusconi brought his partners’ once small, marginalized parties into one of his governments and Italy’s political mainstream. But today it is Ms. Meloni, the leader of the Brothers of Italy, a party descended from the wreckage of Italy’s experiment with Fascism last century, who is almost certain to be the next prime minister when a government is formed, perhaps as soon as this week.The question now, though, is whether the aging center-right leader can fulfill his promise to act as a moderating, pro-European force on Italy’s next government, or whether he has lost control of the politics he set in motion that have made Italy, the birthplace of Fascism, once again a testing ground for the far right’s advance in Europe. On Monday, Sweden installed its own right-wing government, backed by a party with neo-Nazi roots.“Europe expects much from us,” Mr. Berlusconi, who declined a request for an interview, wrote last week on Twitter. “And we consider ourselves the guarantor of the next government.”Even before the government begins, the tensions are already evident. Last week, as Mr. Berlusconi took his new seat in the Senate, a body that almost a decade ago temporarily barred him after a conviction for tax fraud, photographers zoomed in on his notes, perhaps purposefully left visible, describing Ms. Meloni as “overbearing, arrogant, offensive.” Asked about it by reporters, Ms. Meloni snapped that he forgot something: “Not blackmailable.”The two seemed to make peace during a meeting on Monday evening in Rome; they released a photo of themselves smiling together, and Mr. Berlusconi called them “united.”The notion of Mr. Berlusconi as a protector of Italian democracy is for many a deeply troubling one.Supporters of the hard-right Brothers of Italy party last month in Cagliari, Sardinia. Ms. Meloni, the party leader, is almost certain to be the next prime minister when a government is formed.Gianni Cipriano for The New York TimesHis legions of critics recall his abuses of government power to protect his business interests, his libertine escapades with young women and so-called Bunga Bunga parties while in office, his degrading of Italian women and culture with his humor, and his often crude television channels, which, along with his newspapers and magazines, he exploited for political propaganda.For them, he is the villain who debased Italian democracy, whose conflicts of interest, questionable associations and apparent illegality set off an opposition movement of angry anti-establishment populists and drove the left into a nervous breakdown from which it has still not recovered.On the international stage, he is a longtime friend of President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia, whom he defended as recently as last month, causing a headache for Ms. Meloni, who is a strong supporter of Ukraine in the war with Russia.Mr. Berlusconi also prompted a mutiny of centrists in his own party in July when he sank the government of Prime Minister Mario Draghi, whom he publicly admired, as he reached for another taste of power.“It’s very important to understand immediately that Berlusconi is no friend to democracy,” Paul Ginsborg, the biographer of Mr. Berlusconi, said in a conversation recently, before his death.But given the composition of the new government, some analysts believe that Mr. Berlusconi may be the best friend proponents of a pro-Europe, centrist and democratic Italy have.“The responsible part of the center-right is embodied by the leader considered for a long time the most irresponsible in the world,” said Claudio Cerasa, the author of a new book, “The Chains of the Right,” about the embrace of conspiracy theories by nationalists and populists.“Europe expects much from us,” Mr. Berlusconi wrote last week on Twitter. “And we consider ourselves the guarantor of the next government.”Gianni Cipriano for The New York TimesMr. Cerasa, who is also the editor of Il Foglio, a newspaper founded by Mr. Berlusconi’s family but is now independent, noted that Mr. Berlusconi alone on the Italian right had rejected Trumpism, anti-elite populism and Euroskeptic nationalism. He also served as a counterweight to vaccine skepticism exercised by Ms. Meloni and Mr. Salvini, and he governed in coalitions with the center left.Many in the political establishment believe that Mr. Berlusconi will prevent Ms. Meloni from endangering European unity by gravitating back toward her old allies, including the Euroskeptic and hard-right Prime Minister Viktor Orban of Hungary and Marine Le Pen in France. “He’s like a compass,” Mr. Cerasa said.It is not clear that Ms. Meloni is following him. This month, she, along with former President Donald J. Trump and Mr. Orban, took part in a rally of the far-right Spanish party Vox. “We are not monsters,” she said in a video message. “The people understand that.”Ms. Meloni, aware of concerns about her ideological past, is eager to assuage international markets by appointing mainstream technocrats to key economic ministries. But they keep turning her down.Some argue that Mr. Berlusconi’s most lasting legacy on Italian politics — more than the debate he forced about burdensome taxation or judicial overreach — may be his creation of a modern European right-wing coalition, made from previously untouchable parties, which are now led in their current iterations by Ms. Meloni and Mr. Salvini.In doing so, Mr. Berlusconi eliminated the notion, John Foot, a historian of Fascism, said, that “a Fascist should not speak, should not exist, should not have a place in Italian society.”Mr. Berlusconi said in 2019 at a political rally that, when it came to Mr. Salvini’s League party and the “Fascists,” “we let them in in ’94 and we legitimized them.” He insisted, though, that “we are the brain, the heart, the backbone.”“Without us,” he said, “the center right would never exist and will never exist.”Ms. Meloni last month in Rome. Some argue that Mr. Berlusconi’s most lasting legacy on Italian politics may be his creation of a modern European right-wing coalition.Gianni Cipriano for The New York TimesSome of Mr. Berlusconi’s longtime supporters cast that alliance as a democratic masterstroke, for forcing the fringe to normalize and compromise in the transactional reality of the capital.“He transformed these two movements which were, let’s say, loose cannons, or who were out-of-control variables, and brought them into the constitutional harbor,” said Renato Brunetta, who helped found Mr. Berlusconi’s Forza Italia party. “This was an element of stabilization.”But after Forza Italia helped trigger new elections, Mr. Brunetta, who was a minister in Mr. Draghi’s government, quit the party and said Ms. Meloni was “actually regressive when it comes to right-wing culture in Italy.”Ms. Meloni, for her part, appreciated what Mr. Berlusconi had done. In a recent interview, she acknowledged that he “did something unexpected” when in 1993 he supported the mayoral candidacy of the leader at the time of her National Alliance party, who later served as Mr. Berlusconi’s foreign minister.“That surely brought many who maybe did not have the courage to say it, and thought it in their hearts, to come out,” Ms. Meloni said. “In this sense, it is the theme of legitimization.”But, Ms. Meloni added, “I believe the time of the right had arrived.”It now clearly has. Ms. Meloni’s party received 26 percent of the vote, larger than any other. She insisted she was not merely carrying Mr. Berlusconi along because she needed his party’s small percentage to govern, as he once needed her party.“We don’t need to carry him with us,” Ms. Meloni said. She added, “He may be the person who has imposed himself in the Italian history, in the Italian Republican history, more than any other in the last 20 years.”Indeed, despite his shuffling gait and the flag-bearing youths who shield him from view as he exits the stage, things seem to be going Mr. Berlusconi’s way.Last week, his hair looking lacquered, he held court during the first seating of the newly elected Senate.Mr. Berlusconi, center, on Thursday at the first seating of the newly elected Senate in Rome.Antonio Masiello/Getty ImagesAll of the contradictions of Italy’s history and current politics were on display. As were the tensions between the right-wing partners.The session was opened by a Holocaust survivor and senator for life who noted that Mussolini’s Fascism took power 100 years ago. Senators elected as their president Ignazio La Russa, a leader in Ms. Meloni’s party, who carries the middle name Benito and keeps Mussolini memorabilia in his house.Mr. Berlusconi, who received handshakes and selfie requests from senators, threw down his pen and angrily cursed Mr. La Russa, whose presidency he tried to block as a reprisal for Ms. Meloni’s refusal to make a minister out of his own lieutenant, Licia Ronzulli, a former nurse who sat beside him and used to help organize his after-hours soirées with young women.Mr. Berlusconi’s girlfriend, Marta Fascina, 32, won a seat in the Parliament representing a Sicilian town she never campaigned in. On Sept. 29, his birthday, she arranged for a hot-air balloon to release thousands of red balloon hearts over his villa’s garden.The next day, Mr. Berlusconi posted a video of his birthday dinner where waiters in white gloves brought out a multitiered cake — one for his soccer team, one for his political party, one for his media empire.Atop it all sat a likeness of a Mr. Berlusconi, much younger and in his trademark suit, grinning next to an edible earth. More

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      As Europe Piles Sanctions on Russia, Some Sacred Cows Are Spared

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      The European Union has been severing economic ties with Moscow to support Ukraine, but some countries have lobbied to protect key sectors.BRUSSELS — Eight months into the war in Ukraine, and eight rounds of frantic negotiations later, Europe’s sanctions against Russia run hundreds of pages long and have in many places cut to the bone.Since February, the European Union has named 1,236 people and 155 companies for sanctions, freezing their assets and blocking their access to the bloc. It has banned the trade of products in nearly 1,000 categories and hundreds of subcategories. It has put in place a near-total embargo on Russian oil. About one-third of the bloc’s exports to Russia by value and two-thirds of imports have been banned.But even now some goods and sectors remain conspicuously exempted. A look at just a few items reveals the intense back-room bargaining and arm-twisting by some nations and by private industry to protect sectors they deem too valuable to give up — as well as the compromises the European Union has made to maintain consensus.The Belgians have shielded trade in Russian diamonds. The Greeks ship Russian oil unimpeded. France and several other nations still import Russian uranium for nuclear power generation.The net impact of these exemptions on the effectiveness of Europe’s penalties against Russia is hard to assess, but politically, they have allowed the 27 members of the bloc to pull together an otherwise vast sanctions regime with exceptional speed and unanimity.“Ultimately, this is the price of unanimity to hold together this coalition, and in the grander scheme of things the sanctions are really working,” said Jacob Kirkegaard, a senior fellow in the Brussels office of the research group the German Marshall Fund, citing Russia’s diminished access to military technology as evidence.A Lukoil gas station in Priolo Gargallo, Italy, last month. The European Union has put in place a near-total embargo on Russian oil, but some sectors of trade remain conspicuously exempt from sanctions.Gianni Cipriano for The New York Times“We would love to have everything included, diamonds and every other special interest hit, but I am of the opinion that, if sparing them is what it takes to keep everyone together, so be it,” he added.The Ukrainian government has criticized some of the exemptions, with President Volodymyr Zelensky chiding European nations for continuing to permit business with Russia, saying they are skirting sacrifices.“There are people for whom the diamonds sold in Antwerp are more important than the battle we are waging. Peace is worth much more than diamonds,” Mr. Zelensky said to the Belgian Parliament during an address by video link in late March.Keeping Diamonds ComingThe continued success of Belgium and the broad diamond sector in keeping the Russian diamond trade flowing exemplifies the sacred cows some E.U. nations refuse to sacrifice, even as their peers accept pain to punish the Kremlin.Exports of rough diamonds are very lucrative for Russia, and they flow to the Belgian port of Antwerp, a historically important diamond hub.The trade, worth 1.8 billion euros a year — about $1.75 billion — has been shielded in consecutive rounds of the bloc’s sanctions, despite being raised as a possible target soon after the Russian invasion of Ukraine in late February.The Belgian government has said that it has never asked the European Commission, the E.U. executive body that drafts the measures, to remove diamonds from any sanctions list and that if diamonds were added, it would go along.Diamonds being sorted in Mirny, Russia, at a facility operated by Alrosa, the Russian state-owned diamond company. Russian diamonds have been shielded in consecutive rounds of European sanctions.Maxim Babenko for The New York TimesTechnically speaking, that may be true. But the latest round of penalties, adopted this month, exposed the intensive interventions when a coordination error occurred among the various services in the bloc that are involved in the technical preparation of sanctions.The incident, described to The New York Times by several diplomats involved as “farcical,” shows how the lobbying works. The diplomats spoke anonymously in order to describe freely what happened.The European Commission over the course of September prepared the latest round of sanctions and left diamonds off that list.But the European External Action Service — the E.U.’s equivalent of a foreign service or state department, which works with the commission to prepare sanctions — did not get the memo that diamonds should remain exempted and included in its own draft listings Alrosa, the Russian state-owned diamonds company.Once Alrosa had been put on the draft document, removing it became difficult. Spotting the error, Poland and other hard-line pro-Ukraine countries in the bloc dragged out the negotiations over the package as much as they could on the basis that Alrosa should indeed face sanctions.In the end, the need for unanimity and speed prevailed, and Alrosa continues to export to the European Union, at least until the next round of sanctions is negotiated. In proposals for a fresh, ninth round of sanctions, presented by Poland and its allies last week, diamonds were again included, but formal talks on the new set of penalties have not yet begun.A spokesman for the European External Action Service declined to comment, saying it does not comment on internal procedures involved in preparing sanctions.The Tricastin nuclear power plant in the Drôme region of southeastern France. France is one of several E.U. countries that depend on Russian uranium to operate civil nuclear power facilities. Andrea Mantovani for The New York TimesNuclear PowerMost exemptions have not been as clear-cut as diamonds because they have involved more complex industries or services, or affected more than one country.Uranium exported from Russia for use in civil nuclear power production falls under this category. Nuclear power plants in France, Hungary, Slovakia, Finland and other countries depend on Russian civilian uranium exports.The trade is worth 200 million euros, or about $194 million, according to Greenpeace, which has been lobbying for its ban. Germany and other E.U. countries have supported the calls to ban civilian nuclear imports from Russia, making this another issue likely to come up in the next round of sanctions talks.In August, Mr. Zelensky also highlighted the persistent protection of the Russian nuclear exports to Europe just as Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant came under fire.Some supporters of keeping Russian uranium running say that France and the other countries’ ability to generate electricity by operating their nuclear power plants during an acute energy crisis is more important than the political or financial gains that could come from a ban through E.U. sanctions, at least for now.Tankers in the NightOne of the most complex and important lobbying efforts to protect a European industry from sanctions is the one mounted by Greek diplomats to allow Greek-owned tankers to transport Russian oil to non-European destinations.This has facilitated one of the Kremlin’s biggest revenue streams. More than half of the vessels transporting Russia’s oil are Greek-owned, according to information aggregated from MarineTraffic, a shipping data platform.Supporters of the Greek shipping industry say that if it pulled out of that business, others would step in to deliver Russian oil to places like India and China. Experts say lining up enough tankers to make up for a total Greek pullout would not be simple, considering the sheer size of Greek-interest fleets and their dominance in this trade.According to European diplomats involved in the negotiations, their Greek counterparts were able to exempt Greek shipping companies from the oil embargo in a tough round of talks last May and June.Since then, the E.U. has come around to a United States-led idea to keep facilitating the transport of Russian oil, in order to avert a global oil-market meltdown, but to do so at a capped price to limit Russia’s revenues.The Greeks saw an opening: They would continue to transport Russian oil, but at the capped price. The bloc offered them additional concessions, and Greece agreed that the shipping of Russian oil would be banned if the price cap was not observed.The Greek-flagged oil tanker Minerva Virgo. Greek diplomats have lobbied for Greek-owned tankers to be allowed to transport Russian oil to non-European destinations. Bjoern Kils/ReutersEven if the economic benefits of such exemptions are hard to define, from a political perspective, the continued protection of some goods and industries is creating bad blood among E.U. members.Governments that have readily taken big hits through sanctions to support Ukraine, sacrificing revenues and jobs, are embittered that their partners in the bloc continue to doggedly protect their own interests.The divisions deepen a sense of disconnect between those more hawkish pro-Ukraine E.U. nations nearer Ukraine and those farther away, although geographical proximity is far from the only determinant of countries’ attitudes toward the war.And given that the bloc is a constant negotiating arena on many issues, some warn that what goes around eventually will come around.“This may be a raw calculation of national interests, but it’s going to linger,” Mr. Kirkegaard said. “Whoever doesn’t contribute now through sacrifice, next time there’s a budget or some other debate, it’s going to come back and haunt them.” More

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      Elections Approaching, Erdogan Raises the Heat Again With Greece

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      Turkey’s president suggested that troops “may suddenly arrive one night” in Greece. With inflation rampant and the lira sinking, a manufactured crisis might be just the thing he needs.ISTANBUL — Last week at a closed dinner in Prague, Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis of Greece was addressing 44 European leaders when President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey interrupted him and started a shouting match.Before stalking from the room, Mr. Erdogan accused Mr. Mitsotakis of insincerity about settling disputes in the eastern Aegean and blasted the European Union for siding with its members, Greece and Cyprus, according to a European diplomat and two senior European officials who were there.While the others, flabbergasted and annoyed, finished their dinners, Mr. Erdogan fulminated at a news conference against Greece and threatened invasion. “We may suddenly arrive one night,” he said. When a reporter asked if that meant he would attack Greece, the Turkish president said, “Actually you have understood.”The outburst was only the latest from Mr. Erdogan. As he faces mounting political and economic difficulties before elections in the spring, he has been ramping up the threats against his NATO ally since the summer, using language normally left to military hawks and ultranationalists.While few diplomats or analysts are predicting war, there is a growing sense among European diplomats that a politically threatened Mr. Erdogan is an increasingly dangerous one for his neighbors — and that accidents can happen.Mr. Erdogan needs crisis to buoy his shaky standing at home after nearly 20 years in power, a diplomat specializing in Turkey said, requesting anonymity. And if he is not provided one, the diplomat said, he may create one.The rising tensions between Greece and Turkey, both NATO members, now threaten to add a difficult new dimension to Europe’s efforts to maintain its unity in the face of Russia’s war in Ukraine and its accumulating economic fallout.Mr. Erdogan met President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia in Kazakhstan on Thursday.Pool photo by Vyacheslav ProkofyevAlready, Mr. Erdogan has made himself a troublesome and unpredictable ally for his NATO partners. His economic challenges and desire to carve out a stable security sphere for Turkey in a tough neighborhood have pushed him ever closer to President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia.Mr. Erdogan has earned some shelter from open criticism by allies because of his efforts to mediate between Russia and Ukraine, especially in the deal to allow Ukrainian grain exports.But he has refused to impose sanctions on Russia and continues to get Russian gas through the TurkStream pipeline, while asking Moscow to delay payment for energy.On Thursday, Mr. Erdogan met Mr. Putin in Kazakhstan, where they discussed using Turkey as an energy hub to export more Russian gas after the pipelines to Germany under the Baltic Sea have been damaged.But it is the escalating rhetoric against Greece that is now drawing special attention.Sinan Ulgen, the director of EDAM, an Istanbul-based research institution, said that of course there was an electoral aspect to Mr. Erdogan’s actions. But there were also deep-seated problems that foster chronic instability and dangerous tensions.“Turkey and Greece have a set of unresolved bilateral disputes,” he said, “and this creates a favorable environment whenever a politician in Ankara or Athens wants to raise tensions.”The two countries nearly went to war in the 1970s over energy exploration in the Aegean, in 1995-96 over disputed claims over an uninhabited rock formation in the eastern Mediterranean, and in 2020, again over energy exploration in disputed waters. “And now we’re at it again,” Mr. Ulgen said. “And why? Because of elections in Turkey and Greece.”Mr. Mitsotakis is also in campaign mode, with elections expected next summer, damaged by a continuing scandal over spyware planted in the phones of opposition politicians and journalists. As in Turkey, nothing appeals to Greek patriotism more than a good spat with an old foe.A Turkish drill in August off Mersin, Turkey. Turkey and Greece nearly went to war in 2020 over Turkish energy exploration in disputed waters.Adem Altan/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesHe has sought to appear firm without escalating. Confronted at the dinner in Prague, Mr. Mitsotakis retorted that leaders should solve problems and not create new ones, that he was prepared to discuss all issues but could not stay silent while Turkey threatened the sovereignty of Greek islands.“No, Mr. Erdogan — no to bullying,” he said in a recent policy speech. He told reporters that he was open to talks with Mr. Erdogan despite the vitriol, saying he thought military conflict unlikely. “I don’t believe this will ever happen,” he said. “And if, God forbid, it happened, Turkey would receive an absolutely devastating response.”He was referring to Greek military abilities that have been significantly bolstered recently as part of expanded defense agreements with France and the United States.Mr. Mitsotakis has also taken advantage of American annoyance with Mr. Erdogan’s relations with Russia and his delay in approving NATO enlargement to Finland and Sweden to boost ties with Washington. In May, he was the first Greek prime minister to address Congress and urged it to reconsider arms sales to Turkey.He has said Greece will buy F-35s, while Turkey, denied F-35s because of its purchase of a Russian air-defense system, is still pressing to get more F-16s and modernization kits, using NATO enlargement as leverage.But Mr. Erdogan is facing considerable problems at home, making tensions with Greece an easy and traditional way to divert attention and rally support.Mr. Erdogan is presiding over a disastrous economy, with inflation running officially at 83 percent a year — but most likely higher — and the currency depreciating. Turkish gross domestic product per capita, a measure of wealth, has dropped to about $7,500 from more than $12,600 in 2013, based on Turkey’s real population, which now includes some four million Syrian refugees, according to Bilge Yilmaz, a professor at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.Mr. Erdogan is presiding over a disastrous economy, with inflation running officially at 83 percent a year.Yasin Akgul/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesMr. Erdogan has kept cutting interest rates against conventional economic advice. “We need to reverse monetary policy,” said Mr. Yilmaz, who is touted as a likely finance minister should Mr. Erdogan lose the election. “A strong adjustment of the economy will not be easy.”There is also growing popular resentment of the continuing cost of the refugees, who were taken in by Mr. Erdogan as a generous gesture to fellow Muslims in difficulty.Still, Mr. Erdogan is thought to have a solid 30 percent of the vote as his base, and government-controlled media dominate, with numerous opposition journalists and politicians jailed or silenced.In a report on Wednesday, the European Union criticized “democratic backsliding” and said that “in the area of democracy, the rule of law and fundamental rights, Turkey needs to reverse the negative trend as a matter of priority with addressing the weakening of effective checks and balances in the political system.”Still, at this point, analysts think Mr. Erdogan could lose his majority in Parliament and might just lose the presidential election itself.That is an analysis firmly rejected by Mr. Erdogan’s Justice and Development Party, the AKP, said Volkan Bozkir, a former diplomat and member of Parliament, who says flatly that Mr. Erdogan and his party will be re-elected.Constantinos Filis, the director of the Institute of Global Affairs at the American College of Greece, believes that Mr. Erdogan is trying to keep all options open, “casting Greece as a convenient external threat and creating a dangerous framework within which he could justify a potential move against Greece in advance.”As for Washington, he said, they are telling Mr. Erdogan: “Thank you for what you did in Ukraine, of course you haven’t imposed sanctions on Russia, but OK, you’re in a difficult position, strategically, diplomatically, economically — but don’t dare to do something in the Aegean or the Eastern Mediterranean that will bring trouble to NATO.”Migrants at the border between Turkey and Greece in March 2020. There is growing popular resentment of the continuing cost of the refugees in Turkey, who include four million Syrians.The New York TimesMore likely, Mr. Filis said, Mr. Erdogan would again send migrants toward Europe, or launch another energy exploration in disputed areas off Cyprus or Crete, which produced near clashes in 2020, or intercept a Greek ship transporting military equipment to one of the Aegean Islands.Mr. Ulgen also does not expect armed conflict but would not be surprised. “It could happen; it’s not something we can rule out anymore,” he said. “But if it happens, it will be small-scale.”Niki Kitsantonis More