World Briefing: September 6, 2024
It’s official: the widely-respected foreign minister of Ukraine, Dmytro Kuleba, is officially gone - replaced by a lower-level MFA official and apparent Zelensky loyalist. After Zelensky, the outgoing foreign minister was probably the most recognizable face of the Kyiv government - and some analysts say his visibility and popularity had become too much for the Zelensky team, which is widely believed to be controlled by chief of staff and long-time Zelensky associate Andrij Yermak.
There were many other cabinet changes as well but the shuffling out of Kuleba raised the most eyebrows in western capitals. German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock previously stated that she only worked closely with few people the way she did with Kuleba. She posted a moving farewell on Twitter.: “Long conversations on night trains, at the G7, on the frontlines, in Brussels, in front of a bombed-out power plant. There are few people I've worked as closely with as you, Dmytro Kuleba. You put the people of your country before yourself. all the best from the bottom of my heart — we shall meet again when peace and freedom finally has returned to all of Ukraine.”
The Zelensky team spun the changes as “giving the war effort new energy.” But as I told CNN: “This is more of a move to consolidate power within the office of the president - specifically under chief of staff Andrij Yermak. I think they’ve really overstepped this time and as one former deputy prime minister put it, they’re careening towards a severe governance crisis. Upon hearing the news (of Kuleba’s ouster), there was a lot of dismay in European capitals.”
Separately, Odesa opposition MP Oleksij Goncharenko in Parliament accused the Zelensky government of “playing games” with the reshuffle. He slammed them for pushing through the changes without proper explanations and without the president, prime minister or speaker present.
The controversial cabinet shuffle came just as Ukraine upped its campaign to get more air defence systems and the OK to use western supplied missiles to strike at legitimate military targets deep inside Russia. Kuleba was replaced by Andrii Sybiha - a career diplomat who served as Ukraine's ambassador to Turkey in 2016-2019. He joined Zelensky's administration as deputy chief of staff in 2021 and then rejoined the Foreign Ministry earlier this year. According to one source, Sybiha also served as a speech writer to the president. Kuleba did not come to the Verkhovna Rada to deliver his report on the work done while in office, as is customary - indicating discomfort in the way he was ousted. Also notable that Zelensky did not thank Kuleba for his years of work as the country’s chief diplomat (at least on Twitter) - nor did Sybiha.
Kuleba, the son of a diplomat, entered the position aiming to professionalize the diplomatic service. He’s what I referred to as “a diplomat’s diplomat” and within a year-and-a-half of assuming the post, he increased the number of female ambassadors from four to 14. He told our Global Impact Show that he aimed to continue naming women as Ukrainian envoys overseas until there was gender balance. Kuleba said that the Covid-19 pandemic set back face-to-face diplomacy considerably - to the point of making the annual UNGA into an optional event for world leaders.
“ I want to leave a Ukraine at peace and with a clear understanding that it’s strong enough to defend itself, and to win the respect of any other country in the world”
French President Emmanuel Macron on Thursday named Michel Barnier, 73, as the country's new prime minister. The long-awaited announcement comes some two months after no party won an outright majority in snap elections, leading to an impasse in negotiations over who should lead France's government. Barnier is a former European commissioner and foreign minister from the centre-right Les Républicains party. He later served as the European Commission's head of relations with the United Kingdom and is credited with negotiating the latter's exit from the bloc. The announcement comes nearly three months after snap legislative elections put France into political deadlock when no party won an outright majority. The New Popular Front leftist alliance surprised everyone by taking the most seats, with Macron’s Ensemble coalition coming in second ahead of the far-right National Rally. Barnier's appointment has already angered politicians on the left, who maintain that the head of government should reflect French voters' clear preference for the leftist New Popular Front. - France 24
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s Justice and Development Party (AKP) had confirmed that Turkey had formally applied to join the BRICS bloc of emerging economies. “Our president has expressed multiple times that we wish to become a member of BRICS,” AKP spokesman Omer Celik told journalists in Ankara on Tuesday. “Our request in this matter is clear, and the process is proceeding within this framework.” Turkey’s BRICS candidacy marks the first time a NATO member and candidate for EU membership has applied to join a group dominated by Russia and China that views itself as a counterweight to the Western-led global order. The move, by a member of the world’s most powerful military alliance, highlights the geostrategic shifts straining the post-war order at a time of heightened international strains - France 24
Russia has built a covert trade channel with India, secretly acquiring sensitive goods for the war effort through channels hidden from western governments. The plans were outlined in leaked files from Moscow, the FT reported. Moscow’s industry and trade ministry, which oversees defense production to support Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, drew up confidential plans in October 2022 to spend about $1bn at the time to secure critical electronics through channels hidden from western governments. The plan, revealed in letters to a shadowy trade promotion body with strong links to Russian security services, aimed to use “significant reserves” of rupees amassed by Russian banks from booming oil sales to India. It saw India as an alternative to source goods “previously supplied by unfriendly countries.”
My comment: Indian Prime Minister Nahendra Modi was recently in Ukraine and a month before that in Moscow, where he hugged President Putin on the same day Russia bombed a children’s hospital in Kyiv. The question needs to be asked: how does the above headline make the Ukrainian leadership feel after hosting Mr. Modi? And going forward, will the relationship be a no holds barred one?
Summer 2024 sweltered to Earth’s hottest on record, making it even more likely that this year will end up as the warmest humanity has measured, European climate service Copernicus reported Friday. And if this sounds familiar, that’s because the records the globe shattered were set just last year as human-caused climate change, with a temporary boost from an El Nino, keeps dialing up temperatures and extreme weather, scientists said. The northern meteorological summer — June, July and August — averaged 16.8 degrees Celsius (62.24 degrees Fahrenheit), according to Copernicus. That’s 0.03 degrees Celsius (0.05 degrees Fahrenheit) warmer than the old record in 2023. Copernicus records go back to 1940, but American, British and Japanese records, which start in the mid-19th century, show the last decade has been the hottest since regular measurements were taken and likely in about 120,000 years, according to some scientists. - AP
Speaking of summer, to many Italians, the end of the season may feel like the sky is falling from the heavens: by the end of the month, concessions end for people who inherited concessions to control strips of beach in Italy. As of September 30, municipalities and other granting bodies will begin to issue tenders for hundreds of kilometers of beaches considered to be state property - and that includes the renting out of beach chairs, tables and cabanas, La Stampa reported. Impacted are some 7,000 companies and 65,000 employees. So-called entrepreneurs say they feel betrayed by the government and are demanding compensation.
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