World

Why the Japanese love wearing facemasks

On any given street in Tokyo today, almost everyone will be wearing a mask. The Covid-19 death toll in Japan is around 1,500 in a country of 126 million people. This is dramatically less than the UK’s, yet everyone still covers up, and there are hardly any anti-mask movements of the sort that have become popular in Europe and America. Why are the Japanese so happy to wear masks, when it makes some people from other nationalities so cross? The first reason is the most obvious: to avoid spreading germs. Not catching germs, mind — spreading germs. It is considered bad manners in Japan to have a cold or a

Sweden’s new epidemic: clan-based crime

Stockholm ‘We have an obvious problem,’ admitted the Swedish Prime Minister Stefan Löfven recently. He was referring not to the Covid pandemic, but to a summer of crime that has left even jaded Swedes reeling in disbelief. There are regular bombings, hand grenade attacks and shootings. Young men are killing each other at a horrific rate — ten times that of Germany. The feeling is growing that the government has completely lost control. Yet, while Löfven has finally acknowledged the existence of the problem, he still seems in denial about its true nature. Last month in Botkyrka, south of Stockholm, a 12-year-old girl walking her dog was killed by a

Germany is terrified of upsetting China

As Europe weighs what course to take in the face of Beijing’s growing belligerence, it has become increasingly clear that the decision depends on Berlin. Germany is China’s most important counterpart on the continent. Unfortunately for Europe, it is equally clear that Germany’s economic entanglement with China has become so extensive that reversing it is no longer a realistic option. Germany’s big industrial powerhouses, including Volkswagen and the engineering conglomerate Siemens, were among the first European companies that made the jump to China in the 1980s and have benefited from the unparalleled economic growth in the East. However, over the years the likes of Volkswagen and Siemens developed an unhealthy

Steerpike

The truth about the ‘senior congressmen’ who intervened in Brexit

Lots of excitement in Westminster circles this morning over the four ‘senior American congressmen’ who have written a stern letter to Boris Johnson wading into the latest row over the Withdrawal Agreement and Ireland. The four US lawmakers have warned that a US-UK trade deal would be imperilled by any action the government might take that could undermine the Good Friday agreement.  Steerpike can’t help but notice there’s rather less interest in the fact that, of the four congressmen — Eliot Engel, Peter T King, Richard E Neal, and William R Keating — two appear to have been overt IRA sympathisers, and one was a close friend of IRA leader

Cindy Yu

The advert that reveals China’s problem with race

After the Hong Kong protests, America’s Black Lives Matter protests were like manna from heaven for Beijing. Now Chinese politicians could point the finger at the US as its own house was in disarray. Take just one example, Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying: But China’s own problems with race leave the country open to allegations of hypocrisy. It wasn’t long ago that a Chinese laundry detergent advert had to be pulled because it showed a black man becoming Asian after being put in the washing machine (no, really). This week, perfumer Jo Malone has had to apologise for excising black actor John Boyega from the Chinese version of its latest ad campaign. Directed by

Dominic Green

The thinking behind Pompeo’s Middle East mission

Washington DC Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has warned that if Joe Biden wins the November elections, an incoming Democratic administration would revive the Iran Deal ‘on day one’ and ‘return what would amount to hundreds of billions of dollars to a theocratic, corrupt regime’. In an exclusive interview at the State Department, Pompeo also discussed the Trump administration’s progress in negotiations on withdrawing US forces from Afghanistan and Iraq, and described his anticipation of witnessing leaders from Israel, the UAE and Bahrain signing the Abraham Accords at the White House: ‘It’ll be really a joyous day when the Bahrainis and the Emiratis are here.’ On Saturday, Pompeo participated in Qatar-brokered

Freddy Gray

Is Trump right about mail-in voting?

17 min listen

President Trump is continuing to rail again mail-in voting, alleging that millions of unsolicited ballots could be heading into American postboxes. Is there anything corrupt about the postal voting system, and does it hurt or help the democratic process? Freddy Gray speaks to Marcus Roberts, director of international projects at polling company YouGov.

Ankara’s aggression has spurred a most unlikely pact

The monumental accords being signed in Washington between Israel, the UAE and Bahrain represent a new era in Israeli peacemaking. These agreements are being signed with Gulf states and they are a result of shared interests. At the top of the list of Israeli concerns is the Iranian threat. But Turkey’s increasingly aggressive stance in the Mediterranean and across the Middle East is easily overlooked as a catalyst for closer Israeli-UAE relations.  In the last year, Turkey has invaded parts of northern Syria, sent mercenaries to fight in Libya, launched a military operation in northern Iraq, and threatened Greece, Cyprus, Egypt and France. Ankara’s decision to deploy a naval flotilla in the

Cindy Yu

The real housewives of Beijing: why the Chinese love luxury goods

24 min listen

It’s said that Bicester Village is the second most popular attraction for Chinese tourists in the UK, coming just behind Buckingham Palace. The pandemic recovery figures show much the same – while retail is still struggling to recover, luxury goods sales is leading the bounceback. In this episode, I find out why the Chinese love luxury goods just so much. My guests tell me about why Chanel just doesn’t cut it anymore for the most fashionable housewives of Beijing; how President Xi’s anti-corruption drive recalibrated wealth flaunting among the elite; and why fashionistas are leaving Beijing for Shanghai. With Sara Jane Ho, founder of the Chinese finishing school, Institute Sarita;

Philip Patrick

Meet Japan’s new PM – installed by a grey coup of party insiders

There’s a good chance that nothing that occurs in the new Japanese PM’s tenure will be nearly as interesting as how he got the job in the first place. While not quite in the Belarusian league, Yoshihide Suga’s victory in the ruling Liberal Democratic party leadership election was nonetheless a stitch-up of staggering brazenness for a law-governed democracy. Suga (71) the former Chief Cabinet Secretary in Shinzo Abe’s administration, would probably have lost out to rival Shigeru Ishiba had the election been held in the normal way, with all party members given a vote. But Suga’s cause was massively boosted when the party’s secretary general Toshihiro Nikai decided that in a time

Stephen Daisley

Does Trump deserve a Nobel Peace Prize?

Should Donald Trump be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize? So far the President has notched up two nominations in a twist that all but confirms my suspicions that 2020 is being directed by M Night Shyamalan. We appear to be witnessing a hinge moment in the Middle East, a region that has left successive US presidents battered, bruised and bitter. Now, in the space of two months, Trump has secured agreements from the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain to normalise relations with Israel, with more Arab and Muslim states expected to follow. True, these alliances have developed over time and are, in part, driven by the common threat of a

Katy Balls

Will Ireland stump a Brexit deal?

19 min listen

The EU said it could walk away from trade talks after the government announced that it planned to break international law in its Internal Markets Bill. But how will Ireland, one of the countries most affected by the government’s decision, react? Katy Balls speaks to Peter Foster, public policy editor of the Financial Times, Pat Leahy, political editor of the Irish Times and James Forsyth.

Douglas Murray, Francis Pike and Philip Hensher

32 min listen

On this week’s episode, Douglas Murray asks – why would anyone want to be a government adviser, given what’s happened to Tony Abbott? The historian Francis Pike reads his piece on Thailand’s Caligula; and Philip Hensher reviews a new book on Wagner. Spectator Out Loud is a weekly audio collection of three Spectator writers reading their pieces in the latest issue.

The growing case for an independent Western Cape

A few days ago, the results of a poll conducted in the Western Cape by Victory Research – one of South Africa’s most respected polling organisations – were released. They delivered quite a shock. Like recent Scottish opinion polls, they showed a small majority for independence among supporters of the Democratic Alliance (DA), now in its third straight term as the governing party of the Western Cape (South Africa’s other eight provinces are ruled by the ANC). The party will come under increasing pressure to hold a referendum on secession from the rest of South Africa. According to the polling, around two-thirds of the Western Cape’s DA supporters also want

Freddy Gray

Is Biden better for Brexit Britain?

9 min listen

While Congress Speaker Nancy Pelosi this week gave an ultimatum to the British government over the latter’s plans to breach international law, it’s clear that London frequently finds Trump a difficult partner. So at the end of the day – is Biden better for negotiating a trade deal? Freddy Gray talks to the Spectator’s Economics Correspondent, Kate Andrews.

Could the Japan trade deal offer a shortcut to a UK-US agreement?

The news over the last few days has been a tale of three trade negotiations. First came the threatened collapse of the trade talks with the EU over plans to override the Withdrawal Agreement. This was followed by a statement from Nancy Pelosi (the Speaker of the House of Representatives) that there could be no UK-USA trade deal unless the Irish question was sorted. And finally, the successful conclusion of the UK-Japan trade negotiations. Although relatively small in comparison to existing trade with the EU, this negotiation at least gives some direction to how the UK’s trade position might evolve. A key part of the Japanese agreement was that Japan would

Cindy Yu

Winning shot: how the vaccines race has become a power struggle

34 min listen

Vaccines are normally in the realm of scientists; but not this time as world leaders race to be the first. (00:50) Brexit is heating up, but is the government in a stronger position than it seems? (13:35) And a modern day Caligula – the life and times of the Thai king Rama X. (22:40) With journalist Matthew Lynn; immunologist Beate Kampmann; our political editor James Forsyth; YouGov pollster Marcus Roberts; and Asia historian Francis Pike. Presented by Cindy Yu.

John Keiger

What explains France’s Covid chauvinism?

It’s that old Covid chauvinism again. France is in denial about the severity of its new pandemic flare up and possibly a second wave. French news bulletins, but also supposedly authoritative newspapers like Le Monde, have concentrated on how badly things are going elsewhere. In the last few days, Spain was singled out as having reached a new peak of around 3000 positive tests in the previous 24 hours, Britain had hit a similar number. Few mention that France’s numbers were way above that. What is behind this diversionary tactic? To put it bluntly, as I explained in The Spectator on 5 May, Covid statistics are just international politics by

The EU’s bizarre new climate change targets

In recent years, governments have increasingly opted to legislate to ensure they do the things they say they are going to do. In the UK, for example, the commitment to allocate 0.7 per cent of GDP to the international aid budget is legally binding, and in 2019 the UK became the first major economy to pass laws to achieve net zero carbon emissions by 2050. The peculiar aspect of these laws is that Parliament is still supreme, and so a future government can repeal any laws it finds inconvenient. In reality, these legal targets have two effects. First, they help governments resist pressure from their backbenchers, for example when it

India and China are on a path to war

The foreign ministers of China and India, Wang Yi and Subrahmanyam Jaishankar, will meet today on the sidelines of a conference in Moscow. Their conversation is sure to be frosty: earlier this week, a four-month stand-off between the two countries’ armed forces escalated into warning shots being fired in the western Himalayas. This was the first discharge of guns between the two nations in 45 years. Chinese president Xi Jinping and Indian prime minister Narendra Modi have so far refrained from speaking to each other to defuse the tension. Worryingly, the belligerence from the Chinese bears resemblance to its tone before the two countries went to war in 1962. ‘The