Mar 9 update

Jens Stoltenberg, NATO’s secretary-general, warned that Bakhmut, an eastern Ukrainian town that Russia has sought to capture for several months, may fall in the coming days. Yevgeny Prigozhin, the head of the Wagner Group, claimed that his group of mercenaries had taken control of the eastern part of the town. Western officials say that between 20,000 and 30,000 Russian troops have been killed or wounded in the battle for Bakhmut, which has gained talismanic status in Russia.

Protests erupted in Tbilisi, Georgia’s capital, after the country’s parliament began the process to pass a law that could limit press freedom and suppress civil society. The bill, which America described as “Kremlin-inspired”, requires NGOs and media outfits that receive funding from abroad to classify themselves as “foreign agents”. Critics worry it will hurt Georgia’s chances of joining the EU.

The Dutch government intends to restrict the export of chip-manufacturing machines to curtail Chinese access. The Netherlands is home to ASML, a big toolmaker, and has been under pressure from America to extend export controls from chips to the advanced machines that make them. Rules are to be finalised by the summer.

Volkswagen has reportedly paused work on a battery plant in eastern Europe while the carmaker drives ahead with one in North America, lured by subsidies of around €10bn ($10.5bn) from the Biden administration. VW said it was still committed to plans to build six such factories in Europe, but that it would “wait and see what the so-called EU Green Deal will bring”.

The EU’s second-highest court overturned a sanctions listing against the mother of Yevgeny Prigozhin, the boss of the Wagner Group, a Russian firm of mercenaries fighting in Ukraine. In a rare move, the court annulled the EU’s decision in February 2022 to place Violetta Prigozhina on a sanctions list, finding insufficient evidence of a link to her son beyond mere familial bond.

Silvergate Capital, a listed crypto bank, said it would liquidate. The firm promised that all deposits—it holds around $11bn-worth in total assets—would be repaid. Until last week Silvergate operated a service for clients to convert fiat currencies into crypto. In February Bloomberg reported that America’s Justice Department was probing its dealings with FTX, the bankrupt crypto exchange.

TikTok announced a new security scheme to protect its European customers’ data. The plan seems intended to allay concerns among politicians in both Europe and America that the Chinese app is collecting information for surveillance purposes. (TikTok denies this accusation.) Earlier, the Biden administration backed a bill giving it the power to ban TikTok because of its potential threat to national security.

Fact of the day: 45,000, the number of migrants that crossed the English Channel in small boats last year. Read the full story.

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PHOTO: DAVE SIMONDS

America’s protracted budget fight begins

A presidential announcement of the annual budget would, in most countries, be a big event. But when President Joe Biden lays out his tax-and-spending plans on Thursday, it will be merely the opening bid in messy fiscal negotiations. Mr Biden will propose raising a health-care tax on rich Americans and imposing a surtax on billionaires. These changes would shore up Medicare and reduce the federal debt.

Alas, these ideas stand little chance of making it into the final budget. Republicans, who control the House of Representatives, want to focus on cuts. The debate could play out over months. A moment of peril will come around July when Congress approaches a hard deadline to raise the debt ceiling, a legal cap on government borrowing. The battle lines are drawn: Democrats want to protect entitlement programmes; Republicans want to shrink the government. There are no obvious compromises to be found.

PHOTO: REUTERS

What next for Georgia?

On Thursday Georgia’s parliament was meant to vote on a new law requiring civil-society organisations that receive more than 20% of their funding from abroad to register as “agents of foreign influence”. But such was the public backlash that the ruling party, Georgian Dream, quietly brought the vote forward to Tuesday, where a version of the bill passed its first reading. In response, thousands of protesters gathered in Tbilisi, the capital, where riot police used tear-gas and arrested dozens.

The bill’s critics say it comes straight out of the Kremlin’s playbook (a similar foreign-agents law exists in Russia). They also fear it will damage Georgia’s faltering attempts to join the EU, as the bloc has already sounded the alarm over the country’s democratic backsliding. Now, observers from America, Europe and the United Nations have condemned the latest example of that authoritarian turn. The vast majority of Georgia’s people want EU accession. Should the government continue to jeopardise it, the protests will grow.

PHOTO: GETTY IMAGES

Meloni softens her tone on migrants

As Britain launches its latest chest-thumping plan to stop migrants arriving in small boats, Italy’s conservative government is trying to present a softer image. The country’s cabinet will meet on Thursday in Cutro, a town in southern Italy near the site of a migrant-boat shipwreck late last month. Giorgia Meloni, the prime minister, wants to show that her government cares about the victims, even though it is opposed to migrants arriving without authorisation. At least 72 people, including 17 children, died in the latest disaster. Ms Meloni’s interior minister, Matteo Piantedosi, has been criticised for appearing to blame the victims for their misfortune, something he strenuously denies.

Prosecutors have begun an investigation into the causes of the tragedy. Questions surround the coastguard’s failure to reach the scene until about five hours after the EU’s border agency, Frontex, signalled the approach of the boat. Irregular landings on Italy’s shores more than doubled between January 1st and February 23rd this year, compared with the same period in 2022.

PHOTO: SHUTTERSTOCK

Turkey v the NATO Nordic aspirants

At a meeting in Brussels on Thursday, Finnish and Swedish diplomats will try to convince a delegation from Turkey that their countries have met its conditions for NATO membership. Turkey has blocked the pair’s accession, accusing both countries of harbouring Kurdish separatists. It wants the Nordic neighbours to crack down on local members of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, an armed Kurdish group that has long been a thorn in Turkey’s side.

No one expects a breakthrough. Turkey has warmed to the idea of Finnish membership, but says Sweden’s government needs to do more. Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Turkey’s president, seems to think he can win more concessions, including extraditions of Kurds whom his government considers terrorists. He probably also wants to appear strong at home, ahead of presidential elections in May. Sweden and Finland look set for at least a few more months in the waiting room.

PHOTO: REUTERS

Bassem Youssef returns

In 2011 Bassem Youssef, an Egyptian heart surgeon, began filming political satire in his laundry room. Mr Youssef was funny—perhaps dangerously so. His show was soon picked up by a big television network. At its peak “The Programme”, as it was called, raked in 30m viewers each week. Then in 2013 Abdel-Fattah al-Sisi came to power in a coup. The stiff-lipped military dictator did not consider satire, particularly at his expense, a laughing matter. “The Programme” was blocked from the air; Mr Youssef received death threats. He eventually fled to America.

Mr Youssef has since reinvented himself as an English-speaking stand-up comedian. A tour of his new routine, “Adam”, lands in Britain on Thursday, with other stops in Europe and America. The set will focus on his experiences as an Arab immigrant to the West; expect witty criticism of dictators and sharp commentary on racism. Mr Youssef has an exceptional talent for finding humour in even the darkest of places.