July 10 update

As her four-day trip to China drew to a close, Janet Yellen, America’s treasury secretary, said that talks had been “productive” and put relations between the two countries on a “surer footing”. Acknowledging a need to communicate clearly on their “significant disagreements”, she said it was possible for “both of our countries to thrive”, and that economic decoupling would be “disastrous”.

Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelensky, returned home from a visit to Turkey accompanied by five commanders of the Azovstal battalion. The men were captured by Russia after the siege of Mariupol and later freed in a prisoner swap on condition that they stay in Turkey for the duration of the war. Russia accused Ukraine and Turkey of violating this agreement.

The head of France’s central bank rejected suggestions that the European Central Bank should raise its 2% inflation target. François Villeroy de Galhau, who sits on the ECB’s governing council, said that such a move would only lead to higher, rather than lower, borrowing costs. He was speaking at an economics conference in France, where the finance minister said there should be no “taboos” about discussing the subject.

President Joe Biden has set off for Europe ahead of a vital NATO summit in the Lithuanian capital of Vilnius, arriving in Britain on Sunday evening. Western allies, including Canada and Spain, have criticised his decision to send cluster munitions to Ukraine. Mr Biden defended his decision as “difficult” but necessary because “the Ukrainians are running out of ammunition”. Cluster munitions release a large number of smaller bombs; unexploded bomblets pose long-term risks to civilians.

In Georgia organisers cancelled the main event of Pride Week after thousands of far-right protesters stormed an event, waving the country’s flag as they burned rainbow ones. Those attending were evacuated as rampagers descended on the festival site just outside the capital, Tbilisi, which they proceeded to tear apart. No one was hurt.

The French government has banned the sale, possession and transport of fireworks during the annual festivities to mark Bastille Day on July 14th. Official celebrations will be exempt. Fireworks were often used during the days of violent rioting last month that followed the fatal shooting of a teenager by police in Nanterrre, just west of Paris.

PepsiCo, an American fizzy-drinks-and-snacks behemoth, suffered a setback in its battle to retain patent protection in India for a variety of potato used in its Lay potato crisps. The high court in Delhi dismissed its appeal against the revocation of the patent, ruling such protection is not available for seeds. In 2019 PepsiCo sued some Indian farmers for cultivating the variety.

Word of the week: gusanos, or “worms”. Fidel Castro’s name for people who fled after the Cuban revolution in 1959. Today they send back $2bn-3bn in cash a year to the country, 2-3% of GDP. Read the full story.

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PHOTO: ALAMY

America’s trade blueprints for Asia

On Sunday negotiators from the 14 countries of the American-led Indo-Pacific Economic Framework begin a seven-day trade summit. At their last meeting in May they set in stone one of the four “pillars” of President Joe Biden’s trade vision for the region, striking a deal on supply-chain resilience. In Busan, South Korea, they will focus on making trade more connected, greener and fairer.

IPEF members hope to conclude negotiations by November. China’s rival Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership is already reshaping the region’s trade terrain. And as the Sino-American tech war heats up, Asian countries are getting anxious about being asked to pick sides.

The supply-chain agreement in May (whose full text has not been made public) was praised by some analysts for pioneering a multilateral framework but criticised by others as platitudinous. And Asia’s exporters continue to lament the lack of measures to improve access to America’s market. To make the IPEF bear weight, haste cannot be allowed to excuse shoddy workmanship.

PHOTO: GETTY IMAGES

Uzbekistan’s rubber-stamp election

When Uzbeks vote in a presidential election on Sunday, the result is a foregone conclusion. There is no real opposition to the incumbent, Shavkat Mirziyoyev. He will storm to victory against three stalking horses put up to create a veneer of democratic choice.

When he assumed power in 2016, Mr Mirziyoyev surprised his compatriots by enacting reforms. He loosened the screws on the media and civil society in what was then one of the world’s harshest dictatorships. But his liberalising tendencies have not extended to allowing political opposition. His regime does not tolerate political dissent and has rejected a potential rival’s attempts to register his party legally.

In April Mr Mirziyoyev oversaw constitutional reforms that extended presidential terms from five to seven years. This “election” is being held under the new constitution, allowing him to run for office twice more. Uzbekistan could remain a political one-man show until 2037.

PHOTO: GUERNSEY2023

The Island Games, a niche competition

With its population of just over 100,000, Jersey, a self-governing British island near France, rarely seems a sporting powerhouse. However, at the Island Games, a biennial event for athletes from non-sovereign territories of European nations, it has won more medals than anywhere else. The 19th edition of the games kicks off on Sunday in neighbouring Guernsey, also in the British Isles, with 3,000 athletes from as far south as the Falkland Islands and as far north as Greenland, competing across 14 sports.

Being a big fish in a small pond is the extent of most islanders’ success, but occasional break-out stars have emerged. Heptathlete Kelly Sotherton represented the Isle of Wight before winning Olympic medals for Britain in 2004 and 2008, and Mark Cavendish of the Isle of Man is skipping the games to ride in the Tour de France, seeking the single stage win he needs to break Eddy Merckx’s all-time record.

PHOTO: REUTERS

How BTS came to rule the world

Since their debut ten years ago, the global ascent of BTS, a South Korean boy band, has been smooth like butter—as one of their songs goes. In 2016 they released their second album, “Wings”, which sold more than 1m copies. By 2020 they were the biggest-selling artists in the world. Even a hiatus in 2022, when several members performed their country’s mandatory military service, has caused little friction, with successful solo singles.

The release of an oral history of BTS on Sunday—the tenth anniversary of the group’s fan club getting its name, ARMY—is also set to be a hit. “Beyond The Story: 10-Year Record of BTS”, written by Kang Myeong-seok, a journalist, has already topped bestseller lists with preorders. Full of interviews with the band’s members as well as QR codes linking to videos and songs, the book is sure to keep the most militant member of ARMY happy.

PHOTO: GETTY IMAGES

Weekend profile: Barbie

Sporting a black-and-white striped swimsuit, red lips and a sideways gaze, Barbie first tottered off the production line in 1959. She was named after the daughter of the couple who developed her, but her figure was copied from an erotic doll sold to German men. American children were besotted; their mothers fretted that the 11.5-inch, anatomically impossible woman was a bad influence. So Barbie was given a job (as a model) and marketed as a way to teach girls to look neat and stylish. On Sunday, 64 years later—yet not one day older—she will grace the pink carpet for the Hollywood premiere of “Barbie”, her first live-action film.

Barbie’s inventor was Ruth Handler. With her husband she founded Mattel, the toymaker that still owns Barbie. Barbie prototypes were mistakenly given nipples. Deemed too outré, they were delicately filed off. In 1961 Barbie acquired a preppie boyfriend, Ken.

Handler believed that “little girls want to pretend to be bigger girls” and that Barbie would free them from the infantilising world of baby dolls. Never presented as a wife or a mother, Barbie has had 250 careers including astronaut, surgeon and presidential candidate. Still, many feminists have long despaired at her unrealistic shape, materialism and conformity to gender stereotypes. Lamenting that “math class is tough” did a 1992-era talking Barbie few favours. The best-selling Barbie model, also sold in the 1990s, had floor-length hair, irresistible for brushing. Barbie’s biographer, M.G. Lord, calls this “a modern re-enactment of an ancient goddess-cult ritual”.

Baby-boomers who grew up with Barbie bought her for their children. Mattel needs those millennial children, now parents themselves, to do the same. But there is more competition these days: Barbie’s crown has been threatened by Elsa, the star of Disney’s “Frozen”; Lego is ascendant. So Mattel has given Barbie a makeover. In 2016 she was relaunched with seven skin tones and four new body shapes.

But what better marketing ploy than a feature-length advert? The doll’s on-screen universe is a kitschy, girlie utopia until one Barbie, played by Margot Robbie, starts asking existential questions. Trailers have lit up social media in advance of the film’s opening in cinemas on July 21st. It will take a truly determined parent to avoid Barbiemania this summer.