Yesterday’s Newsletter / March 3, 2021
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El Salvador president cheers big Congress election win, bonds jump
Summary: El Salvadoran president Nayib Bukele and his New Ideas party are expected to win about 70% of the country’s congressional vote, giving the party even more power than they enjoyed following Bukele’s 2019 landslide presidential victory.
Context: Bukele is one of the youngest national leaders in the world at 39, and he’s been criticized for his authoritarian leanings and actions—though his poll numbers remain favorable, and local financial indicators were up with the news of his party’s victory.
—Reuters
Arbitrary detentions in Syria conflict may be war crimes according to UN
Summary: Over the course of the past decade, tens of thousands of Syrians have been disappeared by the government and “arbitrarily detained” according to a United Nations commission report, which also says that these kidnappings and lockups often involved torture and sexual violence, and should be considered war crimes and crimes against humanity.
Context: The Syrian civil war has been ongoing since the Arab Spring protests in 2011, and involves several local groups, each with outside partner states and organizations providing resources and, in some cases, on the ground support; some of these outside groups are also being assessed by the UN for these sorts of crimes.
—The Associated Press
US imposes sanctions on Russians over Navalny poisoning
Summary: The US government has imposed new sanctions on seven Russian officials and 14 other entities that have been found complicit in the production and application of the Novichok agent that was used to poison Putin-critic and opposition party leader, Alexey Navalny.
Context: Navalny is now imprisoned at a penal camp outside of Moscow, and it’s not likely that these sanctions will have much effect on Russia’s stance regarding his supposed crimes—but it may serve as a warning from the new Biden administration that the Russian government’s asymmetric warfare tactics may not go as unpunished as they often were under the previous US administration.
—BBC News
Visual
62%
Percentage of respondents to a Russian poll who said they did not want to take the locally produced Sputnik V vaccine; most cited side-effects like fever and fatigue as their reason.
This same poll indicated that 64% of respondents believed that COVID-19 was created as a biological weapon.
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Yesterday’s Newsletter is published by analytic journalist and host of the Let’s Know Things podcast, Colin Wright.