World

Your Friday Briefing

Good morning. We’re covering a possible deal on Ukraine’s blocked grain and an interest rate hike in Europe.

Russia’s blockage of Ukraine’s grain exports has been among the gravest international repercussions of Moscow’s invasion.Credit…Finbarr O’Reilly for The New York Times

Ukraine’s grain: Unblocked?

Turkey said that Moscow and Kyiv had reached a deal to unblock Ukrainian grain exports. The Turkish presidency said the pact would be signed today, but Russia and Ukraine did not confirm they had reached an agreement.

If signed, a deal would help alleviate a global food shortage. Ukraine is one of the world’s breadbaskets, and more than 20 million tons of grain have been trapped in the country’s Black Sea ports since Russia invaded.

Details: Russia’s de facto blockade of the Black Sea has caused Ukraine’s exports to drop to one-sixth of their prewar level, which has exacerbated famine in Africa and undermined food supply chains already battered by the pandemic.

Energy: Russia restarted its gas shipments to Germany through the Nord Stream 1 pipeline yesterday. It brought relief, but Moscow may continue to leverage its energy as a cudgel, which could sow division in the E.U.

Fighting: Citing recent successes, Ukraine is reiterating its longstanding refrain: We can win. Just keep the weapons coming. The U.S. raised the possibility of training Ukrainian pilots and giving Kyiv attack planes, and Britain’s spy chief said Russian forces were “running out of steam.”


A market in Paris. Policymakers are trying to slow soaring inflation in the eurozone while avoiding a recession.Credit…Dmitry Kostyukov for The New York Times

Europe raises rates amid inflation

The European Central Bank raised its three interest rates by half a percentage point yesterday as inflation ballooned across the continent, war raged in Ukraine and fears of an economic slowdown grew. The increase, the first in over a decade, was twice as large as expected.

Consumer prices in the eurozone rose on average 8.6 percent last month from a year earlier. The last time inflation was this bad in the region, the euro didn’t exist.

Officials hope the move will be a powerful tool to help control rapid inflation, and the central bank described it as an effort to “front-load” its rate increases. And in a sign of investor confidence, European stocks ended the day roughly where they started.

Financial context: Last week, the euro fell to parity with the dollar for the first time in 20 years. That added to the bloc’s inflationary pressures because the lower currency value increased the cost of imports. Concern is growing that the bloc will enter a recession.

Global context: The increase follows similar measures taken by the U.S. Federal Reserve and dozens of other central banks this year. The world’s outlook has worsened in recent months, as pandemic-induced disruptions and the war in Ukraine have continued to disrupt supply chains.

Resources: Here are answers to questions you may have about what causes inflation and how interest rate increases — which make it more expensive to borrow money — can help fight it.


Tourists crowding the Trevi Fountain in Rome, though coronavirus cases in Italy have risen steadily since mid-June.Credit…Fabio Frustaci/EPA, via Shutterstock

Europe shrugs at rising Covid cases

Covid cases are spiking in Europe, but governments are not jumping to put new restrictions in place, even in countries that once took some of the strictest measures.

In part, that’s because deaths are not rising significantly. Severe cases aren’t, either, and intensive care units are not brimming with Covid patients. Instead, the authorities appear to be relying on high vaccination rates, expanded booster access and past infections to dull the effect of Omicron subvariants, though some experts still worry about vulnerable people.

Europeans also appear to have decided to live with the virus. People are traveling again, entering restaurants without masks and sitting in metro seats once left open for social distancing.

“These are things from the past,” one woman in a Roman bookstore said of floor stickers urging customers to maintain “a distance of at least 1 meter.” She described the red signs, with their crossed-out spiky coronavirus spheres, as artifacts, “like bricks of the Berlin Wall.”

The U.S.: President Biden tested positive for Covid yesterday. The White House said he was “experiencing very mild symptoms.”

Australia: The country’s Covid hospitalizations are nearing a high, but the authorities have refrained from bringing back restrictions.

THE LATEST NEWS

Europe

Credit…Italian Presidential Palace, via Reuters
  • Mario Draghi resigned as Italy’s prime minister yesterday. The president accepted his resignation, dissolved Parliament and called for new elections this fall.

  • Belgium ratified a much-criticized treaty that would allow for prisoner exchanges with Iran.

  • Investigators in New York returned 142 stolen artifacts, valued about $14 million, to Italian officials this week.

  • Seven trees memorializing Holocaust victims who died at Buchenwald were chopped down in what was described as an act of vandalism.

  • The BBC apologized and agreed to pay damages to a former nanny to the children of Princess Diana for falsely suggesting she had been involved with Prince Charles.

World News

  • On Jan. 6, Donald Trump ignored pleas to call off the mob and refused to say the election was over even a day after the attack. Here are other takeaways from the latest hearing in the U.S. House on the Capitol riot.

  • Turkish strikes killed at least eight people at a resort in a semiautonomous Kurdish region in northern Iraq yesterday. Turkey regularly targets militants who take refuge there.

  • China fined the ride-hailing giant Didi $1.2 billion for data breaches, part of an ongoing effort to rein in the country’s high-flying internet sector.

  • The Taliban forced a journalist to publicly retract some accurate articles, threatening to send her to jail if she did not comply.

What Else Is Happening

Credit…Kin Cheung/Associated Press
  • An An, the world’s oldest giant male panda in captivity, died in Hong Kong at 35.

  • Droupadi Murmu, who was elected as India’s next president, will be the first Indigenous person to hold the largely ceremonial position.

  • Monarch butterflies are endangered, the leading wildlife monitor said, citing climate change and habitat loss.

A Morning Read

Credit…Nature Picture Library/Alamy

The world of birds is already “really simple and brown and boring,” an ornithologist said. It is poised to get even more so, a study reported: The current biodiversity crisis means that the most distinctive birds will go extinct first.

ARTS AND IDEAS

Credit…Nick Wall/Netflix

The difficulty of adapting Austen

The best Jane Austen adaptations are true to the novel’s plot and confident in their own worlds. A version of “Persuasion” on Netflix is neither, Sarah Lyall writes.

The problem isn’t that the film takes liberties, she writes. Many Austen iterations do: “Fire Island” sets “Pride and Prejudice” in a present-day vacation home with a group of gay men looking for love. But the new “Persuasion” diverges from the novel’s careful pace, allowing characters to reveal their feelings early on. And it mixes its 19th-century setting with modern phrases (“If you’re a five in London, you’re a 10 in Bath,” one character says).

In an interview, the film’s director, Carrie Cracknell — a drama wunderkind who was the co-leader of a major London theater before she was 30 — defended her choices: “One of the big hopes I had for the film was to draw in a new audience to Austen, and to make them feel that they really recognize the people onscreen.”

PLAY, WATCH, EAT, READ

What to Cook

Credit…Gentl and Hyers for The New York Times. Food stylist: Frances Boswell. Prop stylist: Amy Wilson.

Customize these caramelized-scallion noodles with any toppings you choose.

What to Read

Check out these 13 new books, selected by our staff critics and Book Review editors.

What to Watch

“A Dark, Dark Man” is an exceptionally grim police procedural set in Kazakhstan.

Now Time to Play

Here’s today’s Mini Crossword, and a clue: “Swine” (four letters).

And here’s today’s Wordle and the Spelling Bee.

You can find all our puzzles here.


That’s it for today’s briefing. Thanks for joining me. — Amelia

P.S. Enjoli Liston is leaving The Guardian to join The Times’s live coverage team in London.

The latest episode of “The Daily” is on the possibility of criminal charges against Donald Trump.

You can reach Amelia and the team at [email protected].

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