The World Today for June 21, 2023

Listen to Today's Edition

NEED TO KNOW

Contextual Legacies

BELGIUM

History has been stirring passion in Belgium as the country prepares to celebrate its 200th anniversary in 2030.

When authorities announced they would spiff up the triumphal arch in the Parc du Cinquantenaire in Brussels – a monument built in 1880 to commemorate the European country’s first 50 years of existence – critics noted that they failed to include any references to Belgian colonization and decolonization in Africa.

“For me, the Parc du Cinquantenaire remains a park strongly linked to the exploitation of Congo,” said Georgine Dibua Mbombo, who runs Bakushinta, an organization that promotes Congolese culture in Belgium, in an interview in the Guardian.

Belgium controlled Congo from 1885 to 1960, including 25 years when the entire African nation, then called the Congo Free State, was considered the personal property of Belgian King Leopold II, explained TRT World. Belgium’s current monarch, King Philippe, has expressed his “deepest regrets” for the 10 million Congolese people who died under Leopold’s brutal rule due to famine, disease, and violence. His critics say Philippe has yet to fully apologize, however.

Meanwhile, curators at the Africa Museum in Tervuren near Brussels have been working with experts to redress their colonial legacy. Leopold II founded the museum. Among its first exhibits were live Congolese people who had been forcibly taken from their homes, wrote the BBC. Now the museum has special educational displays that include explanations for racist statues that formerly might have stood in the building without any such context.

Such efforts might be bearing fruit. In 2001, 95 percent of Belgians believed colonization was positive. Last year, only 35 percent shared that view.

Today, the symbol of post-imperial Belgium might be the Palace of Justice, reported the New York Times. Built in 1883, the building was once the largest in the world. But it has been undergoing renovations since 1984. Since then, the crumbling palace and the botched repair job have become a metaphor for a country that arguably is equally dysfunctional: three officials languages (French, Dutch, and German); one federal and six local parliaments; a myriad of political parties – and the Flemish separatist movement. These layers are one reason why Belgium recently endured two years without a government.

Enlivening the electorate could be one reason Belgium is allowing voters as young as 16 to cast ballots in the European Parliamentary election next year, wrote Politico. Austria, Greece, and Malta also have similarly lowered voting ages for the same elections, noted Euronews.

The Belgians seem to have learned that everyone has the right to try to make history.

THE WORLD, BRIEFLY

Changing of the Guard

FINLAND

Finnish lawmakers approved National Coalition Party (NCP) leader Petteri Orpo as the country’s new prime minister on Tuesday, ushering in a right-wing government following elections that saw the ousting of Prime Minister Sanna Marin, Reuters reported.

Orpo’s approval came after the NCP and three other right-wing parties – including the nationalist and eurosceptic Finns Party – secured a majority of 108 out of 200 seats in parliament at the April elections.

The four parties were engaged in coalition negotiations for 11 weeks that were finalized late last week.

Marin’s Social Democratic Party won 43 seats, but was kept out of a possible coalition because it opposed calls for large cuts to public spending to reboot Finland’s stagnant economy, according to the Telegraph.

During his campaign, Orpo vowed to reduce the government’s budget deficit by cutting spending and reducing taxes, and promised to create new jobs in the private sector.

In their agreement, the coalition parties said they will oppose surrendering any more national powers to the European Union and will not increase Finland’s payment to the bloc’s budget.

Parties also plan to resist European-level bailouts or rescue funds, such as the nearly $820 billion coronavirus recovery fund, which pooled common debt among EU countries.

Meanwhile, the government will also impose stricter rules on immigration and asylum. Among the proposed changes, refugee status will be temporary and the coalition is considering prison sentences for people staying illegally in Finland.

Observers noted that the new coalition risks clashing with the EU, particularly on the issue of the bloc’s budget.

The European Commission, the EU’s executive branch, has been calling for more contributions following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Even so, the new Finnish government pledged to provide a warmer welcome to refugees from Ukraine and maintain the country’s firm support for Kyiv in the face of Russia’s invasion.

Baby Wars

GEORGIA

The Georgian government is working on a draft law to regulate surrogacy and in vitro fertilization more strictly, a move that has sparked concern among the country’s surrogacy industry and foreign parents seeking to have children via surrogacy from the South Caucasus nation, Radio Free Europe reported.

Details about the bill have not been specified, but the new rules would limit surrogacy to the “principle of altruism only.” This means that surrogates would only be able to receive compensation for their time and expenses rather than a commercial fee.

The draft legislation would also bar Georgian women from carrying babies for foreign biological parents after 2023 – meaning that surrogacy services would be restricted to domestic couples only.

The proposed changes come after Prime Minister Irakli Garibashvili expressed concern about the fertility sector’s impact on Georgian women, and the possibility of children being adopted by same-sex couples abroad.

But many Georgian surrogacy and egg donation agencies were shocked by the move and questioned the rationale behind the ban. They emphasized that safeguards are already in place to prevent same-sex couples from taking children born through surrogacy out of the country.

They cautioned that the changes could result in a decline in the amount of compensation surrogates receive, as the demand for surrogacy services may decrease due to the ban on foreign couples.

Analysts noted that the proposed law aligns with the rise of conservative influence in Georgia, driven by the Georgian Orthodox Church’s stance on LGBTQ rights and traditional family values.

Georgia has been one of the few nations that allow both commercial and altruistic surrogacy. Internationally, nations have different approaches to surrogacy, with some legalizing it and others banning it outright.

Round One

INDIA

Indian authorities filed charges this week against the country’s wrestling chief, Brij Bhushan Sharan Singh, following months-long protests by female wrestlers over claims of sexual harassment, CNN reported.

Police in the capital New Delhi said Singh has been accused of assault, stalking, and sexual harassment. He has not been taken into custody.

Singh – who is also a senior politician of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) – has denied the allegations and has accused India’s opposition of staging the demonstrations.

India’s top male and female athletes, including Olympic medalists, have taken to the streets in recent months accusing Singh of sexual harassment and demanding his arrest.

The issue escalated to the point that some wrestlers vowed to throw their Olympic medals into the Ganges river – a holy waterway for India’s Hindu majority.

The demonstrations have become a sticking point for the government after opposition politicians and protesters accused authorities of blocking the course of justice and of a heavy-handed approach in dispersing the demonstrations.

Delhi police came under fire for being slow in responding to the allegations, but launched a probe in April following an intervention by India’s Supreme Court.

DISCOVERIES

Journey to the Core

Geoscientists recently collected large samples of Earth’s mantle rock, a major breakthrough that could unveil more about the mysterious layer’s structure and composition, USA Today reported.

Last month, scientists aboard the JOIDES Resolution vessel drilled beneath the North Atlantic Ocean floor at an underwater mountain called Atlantis Massif.

They explained that reaching the mantle is challenging because they would have to dig around 25 miles into the Earth’s crust. But drilling at the ocean floor is a bit simpler, Smithsonian Magazine added.

Drilling in the Atlantis Massif offers easier access to mantle rocks that have been brought closer to the surface through a slow process of seafloor spreading, researchers noted.

Although they didn’t drill into the mantle itself or set a record for the deepest hole drilled, they did retrieve the deepest samples of mantle rock ever obtained, from depths of up to 4,157 feet.

The team collected a record-breaking amount of mantle rock, with samples stretching to more than 3,200 feet in total length. They said the mantle samples were made up of peridotite, an igneous rock made of the minerals pyroxene and olivine that is predominately found in the upper mantle.

The new finding underscores decades of scientific investigation into Earth’s second layer.

Scientists hope that the samples can provide a better understanding of the overall composition of the Earth and the role magma plays in volcanism.

Thank you for reading or listening to DailyChatter. If you’re not already a subscriber, you can become one by going to dailychatter.com/subscribe.