🌍 Reflecting on the NATO summit

Hi there Intriguer. We just found out Australia is wider than the moon and we haven’t stopped thinking about it since…

Today’s briefing is a 4 min read:

• ⚔️ What went down at this week’s NATO summit.

• 🚀 India goes all in on the space race.

• ➕ Plus: Egypt’s embassy in Lisbon, how the papers are covering the ASEAN ministerial meeting, and which world leader was pumped about poetry (and mangoes)?

1. 🇨🇳 China: A China-based hacker group has gained access to the emails of 25 US organisations, including government agencies, according to Microsoft. China denied any involvement, calling the US a “global cyber thief”.

2. 🇪🇸 Spain: A heatwave is bearing down on much of southern Europe and northwest Africa, with land temperatures in Spain surpassing a 60°C (140°F) record. Temperatures in the Italian islands are forecast to reach 48°C (118°F).

3. 🇨🇺 Cuba: Havana is calling a US nuclear-powered submarine’s stop at the Guantanamo Bay military base earlier this month a “provocative escalation”. The US has permanently leased the base since 1903 (in protest, Cuba reportedly hasn’t cashed the US rental cheques since 1959).

4. 🇹🇭 Thailand: The leader of Thailand’s reformist Move Forward Party, Pita Limjaroenrat, has lost an initial parliamentary vote to become the country’s next prime minister. Pita says he’ll re-strategise ahead of next week’s expected follow-up vote.

5. 🇮🇷 Iran: President Ibrahim Raisi kicked off his Africa tour by meeting his Kenyan counterpart William Ruto on Wednesday. The two signed a series of trade agreements to strengthen bilateral ties.

⚔️ NATO | Geopolitics

Highlights from this week’s NATO summit

The annual NATO summit wrapped up on Wednesday, amid a flurry of photo ops and eager hand-shaking. Leaders from 37 countries + the EU attended the conference in Lithuania, including almost-member Sweden, plus non-members Australia, Japan, New Zealand, Georgia, South Korea and Ukraine.

Although brief, the two-day summit was pretty eventful:

• 🇸🇪 Turkey finally let Sweden join, though President Erdoğan is now saying Turkey’s lawmakers won’t be able to rubber-stamp it all until they’re back from break in October (gotta love that work-life balance).

• 🇺🇦 Ukraine was frustrated by NATO’s reluctance to provide a firm timeline for its accession, so President Zelensky fired off a rather fiery tweet which reportedly left the US delegation furious.

• 📢 And the summit’s epic 11,000 word statement devoted plenty of text to Russia (the region’s “most significant and direct threat”) and China (due to its “stated ambitions and coercive policies”). NATO has become pretty direct in calling out adversaries in recent years.

Intrigue's take: The alliance has an ‘open door’ policy, but that doesn’t mean you walk in like it’s a Walmart. Ukraine’s biggest (though not only) hurdle is the fact it’s at war with a nuclear power right now; and NATO members don’t want to take on a treaty obligation to enter that war directly.

So for now, NATO is supporting Ukraine in other ways. And notwithstanding some summit fireworks this week, that pledge still looks pretty rock solid.

Also worth noting:

• From January 2022 through to May 2023, Ukraine has received about $184B in military and humanitarian aid.

• China has promised to deliver a “resolute response” to any NATO “eastward movement into the Asia-Pacific region”.

📰 How newspapers covered…

This week’s ASEAN foreign ministers summit

Intrigue Outloud: Season One

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We’ve compiled all eighteen special edition episodes from our inaugural season of Intrigue Outloud. We’re taking a break from special editions for the summer, but you can still listen to our regular news rundowns on Tuesdays and Fridays.

🚀 India | Tech

India wants to be a space power

India is scheduled to launch an unmanned lunar spacecraft today (14 July) that’s designed "to demonstrate end-to-end capability in safe landing and roving on the lunar surface."

Success is no guarantee. The $73M spacecraft, known as Chandrayaan-3 (aka ‘moon vehicle’), will undertake India’s third mission to the Moon, and its second attempt to soft-land there (Chandrayaan-2 crash landed).

Intrigue’s take: This is mostly about prestige. Only three players – the US, the Soviet Union, and China – have ever soft-landed a rover on the Moon. Others, like Israel and Japan, have tried and failed in recent years.

So there’s a solid gulf between the have-landed-on-the-moons and the have-nots. And India sees a lunar landing as its ticket to exit the pantheon of middle powers and take its place among the big dogs.

Also worth noting:

• The Chandrayaan-3 aims to be the first spacecraft to land on the Moon’s south pole, which may hold the majority of the Moon’s ice.

• Russia plans to launch its Luna-25 lunar lander in August; the US next plans to send astronauts to the Moon in 2025.

🎧 Today on Intrigue Outloud

Israel’s judicial overhaul is restarting. Will it pass this time?

➕ Extra Intrigue

Aaaand… we’re back with a crossword! This week’s theme is world leaders of our time.

Across:

1. The richest acronym around

3. The cigar guy

5. The one who pivoted

6. Loved his mangoes… and poetry

Down:

2. The first female President elected in Africa

4. Collective misrememberings

6. Afraid of dogs

🏡 Embassy of the day

The Egyptian embassy in Lisbon, Portugal

Built in 2017 and constrained by local building codes, Egypt’s Lisbon embassy sits on a narrow plot in the affluent neighbourhood of Restelo. Its patterned walls are designed to evoke ancient Egyptian geometric motifs, and its kaleidoscopic skylight is inspired by Islamic art. Pretty, pretty, pretty good.

🗳️ Quiz time!

Crossword answers:

1. MBS – The richest acronym around

2. Sirleaf – The first female President elected in Africa

3. Castro – The cigar guy

4. Mandela – Collective misrememberings

5. Obama – The one who pivoted

6. Mao – Loved his mangoes… and poetry

6. (down) Merkel – Afraid of dogs

Quiz Answers: 1-d, 2-c, 3-d.