United News of Bangladesh

President Joe Biden will sit down with Chinese President Xi Jinping on Monday for their first in-person meeting since the U.S. president took office nearly two years ago, amid increasing tensions between the two superpowers as they compete for global influence. Both men are coming into the highly anticipated meeting — held on the margins of the Group of 20 summit of world leaders in Indonesia — with bolstered political standing at home. Democrats triumphantly held onto control of the Senate, with a chance to boost their ranks by one in a runoff election in Georgia next month, while Xi was awarded a third five-year term in October by the Community Party's national congress, a tenure that broke with tradition. “We have very little misunderstanding,” Biden told reporters in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, where he participated in a gathering of southeast Asian nations before leaving for Indonesia. “We just got to figure out where the red lines are and ... what are the most important things to each of us going into the next two years.” Read more: Biden, Xi coming into highly anticipated meeting with bolstered political standing at home Biden added: “His circumstance has changed, to state the obvious, at home.” The president said of his own situation: “I know I’m coming in stronger.” White House aides have repeatedly sought to play down any notion of conflict between the two nations and have emphasized that they believe the two countries can work in tandem on shared challenges such as climate change and health security. But relations between the U.S. and China have become increasingly strained during Biden's presidency. Before leaving Washington, Biden said he planned to raise with Xi the differences in their approach to the self-governing island of Taiwan, trade practices and China's relationship with Moscow amid its nearly nine months-old invasion of Ukraine. Chinese officials have largely refrained from public criticism of Russia's war, although Beijing has avoided direct support such as supplying arms. Taiwan has emerged as one of the most contentious issues between Washington and Beijing. Multiple times in his presidency, Biden has said the U.S. would defend the island — which China has eyed for eventual unification — in case of a Beijing-led invasion. But administration officials have stressed each time that the U.S.'s posture of “strategic ambiguity” toward the island has not changed. Read more: Biden-Xi meeting: US trying to understand where China really stands Tensions flared even higher when House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., visited Taiwan in August, prompting China to retaliate with military drills and the firing of ballistic missiles into nearby waters. The Biden administration also blocked exports of advanced computer chips to China last month — a move meant to bolster U.S. competition against Beijing and one that was quickly condemned by Chinese officials. And though the two men have held five phone or video calls during Biden's presidency, White House officials say those encounters are no substitute for Biden being able to meet and size up Xi in person. That task is all the more important after Xi strengthened his grip on power through the party congress, leaving U.S. officials seeking direct engagement with Xi as lower-level officials have been unable or unwilling to speak for the Chinese president. Many of Biden’s conversations and engagements during his three-country tour — which took him to Egypt and Cambodia before he landed on the island of Bali on Sunday — were, by design, preparing him for his meeting with Xi and sending a signal that the U.S. would compete in areas where Xi has also worked to expand his country's influence. In Phnom Penh, Biden sought to assert U.S. influence and commitment in a region where China has also been making inroads and where many nations feel allied with Beijing. He also sought input on what he should raise with Xi in conversations with leaders from Japan, South Korea and Australia. Read more: Biden to meet China's Xi on Monday for Taiwan, Russia talks The two men have a history that dates to Biden's time as vice president, when he embarked on a get-to-know-you mission with Xi, then China's vice president, in travels that brought Xi to Washington and Biden through travels on the Tibetan plateau. The U.S. president has emphasized that he knows Xi well and he wants to use this in-person meeting to better understand where the two men stand. Biden was fond of tucking references to his conversations with Xi into his travels around the U.S. ahead of the midterm elections, using the Chinese leader's preference for autocratic governance to make his own case to voters why democracy should prevail. That view was somewhat validated on the global stage, as White House aides said several world leaders approached Biden during his time in Cambodia to tell him they watched the outcome of the midterm elections closely and that the results were a triumph for democracy. Biden planned to deliver public remarks and take questions from reporters after his meeting with Xi.

A showdown between Presidents Joe Biden and Vladimir Putin isn’t happening, but fallout from Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and growing tensions between China and the West will be at the fore when leaders of the world’s biggest economies gather in tropical Bali this week. The Group of 20 members begin talks on the Indonesian resort island Tuesday under the hopeful theme of “recover together, recover stronger.” While Putin is staying away, Biden will meet with Chinese President Xi Jinping and get to know new British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak and Italy’s Giorgia Meloni. The summit’s official priorities of health, sustainable energy and digital transformation are likely to be overshadowed by fears of a sputtering global economy and geopolitical tensions centered on the war in Ukraine. The nearly 9-month-old conflict has disrupted trade in oil, natural gas and grain, and shifted much of the summit's focus to food and energy security. The U.S. and allies in Europe and Asia, meanwhile, increasingly are squaring off against a more assertive China, leaving emerging G-20 economies like India, Brazil and host Indonesia to walk a tightrope between bigger powers. Indonesian President Joko Widodo has tried to bridge rifts within the G-20 over the war in Ukraine. Widodo, also known as Jokowi, became the first Asian leader since the invasion to visit both Russia and Ukraine in the summer. He invited President Volodymyr Zelenskyy of Ukraine, not a G-20 member, to join the summit. Zelenskyy is expected to participate online. Read more: US supports India for G20 presidency “One of the priorities for Jokowi is to ease the tension of war and geopolitical risk,” said Bhima Yudhistira, director of the Center of Economic and Law Studies in Indonesia’s capital, Jakarta. Last year’s G-20 summit in Rome was the first in-person gathering of members since the pandemic, though the leaders of Russia and China didn’t attend. This year’s event is bracketed by the United Nations climate conference in Egypt and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations summit in Cambodia, which Biden and some other G-20 leaders are attending, and the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation meeting in Thailand right afterward. The American president vowed to work with Southeast Asian nations on Saturday, saying “we’re going to build a better future that we all want to see” in a region where China is working to grow its influence. On Sunday, Biden huddled with the leaders of Japan and South Korea to discuss China and the threat from North Korea. One question hanging over the Bali summit is whether Russia will agree to extend the U.N. Black Sea Grain Initiative, which is up for renewal Nov. 19. The July deal allowed major global grain producer Ukraine to resume exports from ports that had been largely blocked for months because of the war. Russia briefly pulled out of the deal late last month only to rejoin it days later. Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba on Saturday called for more pressure on Russia to extend the deal, saying Moscow must "stop playing hunger games with the world.” As leaders contend with conflicts and geopolitical tensions, they face the risk that efforts to tame inflation will extinguish post-pandemic recoveries or cause debilitating financial crises. The war’s repercussions are being felt from the remotest villages of Asia and Africa to the most modern industries. It has amplified disruptions to energy supplies, shipping and food security, pushing prices sharply higher and complicating efforts to stabilize the world economy after the upheavals of the pandemic. United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres is urging the G-20 to provide financial help for the developing world. "My priority in Bali will be to speak up for countries in the Global South that have been battered by the COVID-19 pandemic and the climate emergency, and now face crises in food, energy and finance — exacerbated by the war in Ukraine and crushing debt,” Guterres said. The International Monetary Fund is forecasting 2.7% global growth in 2023, while private sector economists’ estimates are as low as 1.5%, down from about 3% this year, the slowest growth since the oil crisis of the early 1980s. China has remained somewhat insulated from soaring inflation, mainly because it is struggling to reverse an economic slump that is weighing on global growth. Read more: Putin won’t be at G20 summit, avoiding possible confrontation with US The Chinese economy, the world’s second largest, grew at a 3.9% pace in the latest quarter. But economists say activity is slowing under the pressure of pandemic controls, a crackdown on technology companies and a downturn in the real estate sector. Forecasters have cut estimates of China’s annual economic growth to as low as 3%. That would be less than half of last year’s 8.1% and the second lowest in decades. Chinese President Xi will be coming to the summit emboldened by his appointment to an unusual third term as party chairman, making him China’s strongest leader in decades. It's only his second foreign trip since early 2020, following a visit to Central Asia where he met Putin in September. Biden and Xi will hold their first in-person meeting since Biden became president in January 2021 on the event’s sidelines Monday. The U.S. is at odds with China over a host of issues, including human rights, technology and the future of the self-ruled island of Taiwan. The U.S. sees China as its biggest global competitor, and that rivalry is only likely to grow as Beijing seeks to expand its influence in the years to come. The European Union is also reassessing its relationship with China as it seeks to reduce its trade dependency on the country. Biden said he plans to talk with Xi about topics including Taiwan, trade policies and Beijing’s relationship with Russia. “What I want to do ... is lay out what each of our red lines are,” Biden said last week. Many developing economies are caught between fighting inflation and trying to nurse along recoveries from the pandemic. Host Indonesia’s economy grew at a 5.7% pace in the last quarter, one of the fastest among G-20 nations. But growth among resource exporters like Indonesia is forecast to cool as falling prices for oil, coal and other commodities end windfalls from the past year’s price boom. At a time when many countries are struggling to afford imports of oil, gas and food while also meeting debt repayments, pressure is building on those most vulnerable to climate change to double down on shifting to more sustainable energy supplies. In Bali, the talks are also expected to focus on finding ways to hasten the transition away from coal and other fossil fuels. The G-20 was founded in 1999 originally as a forum to address economic challenges. It includes Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, South Korea, Mexico, Russia, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, Turkey, the United Kingdom, the United States and the European Union. Spain holds a permanent guest seat. Some observers of the bloc, like Josh Lipsky, senior director of the Atlantic Council’s GeoEconomics Center, question whether the G-20 can even function as geopolitical rifts grow. “I’m skeptical that it can survive long-term in its current format,” he said in a briefing last week. That makes things especially tough on host Indonesia. “This is not the G-20 they signed up for,” Lipsky said. “The last thing they wanted was to be in the middle of this geopolitical fight, this war in Europe, and be the crossroads of it. But that’s where they are.”

A showdown between Presidents Joe Biden and Vladimir Putin isn’t happening, but fallout from Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and growing tensions between China and the West will be at the fore when leaders of the world’s biggest economies gather in tropical Bali this week. The Group of 20 members begin talks on the Indonesian resort island Tuesday under the hopeful theme of “recover together, recover stronger.” While Putin is staying away, Biden will meet with Chinese President Xi Jinping and get to know new British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak and Italy’s Giorgia Meloni. The summit’s official priorities of health, sustainable energy and digital transformation are likely to be overshadowed by fears of a sputtering global economy and geopolitical tensions centered on the war in Ukraine. The nearly 9-month-old conflict has disrupted trade in oil, natural gas and grain, and shifted much of the summit’s focus to food and energy security. The U.S. and allies in Europe and Asia, meanwhile, increasingly are squaring off against a more assertive China, leaving emerging G-20 economies like India, Brazil and host Indonesia to walk a tightrope between bigger powers. Indonesian President Joko Widodo has tried to bridge rifts within the G-20 over the war in Ukraine. Widodo, also known as Jokowi, became the first Asian leader since the invasion to visit both Russia and Ukraine in the summer. He invited President Volodymyr Zelenskyy of Ukraine, not a G-20 member, to join the summit. Zelenskyy is expected to participate online. “One of the priorities for Jokowi is to ease the tension of war and geopolitical risk,” said Bhima Yudhistira, director of the Center of Economic and Law Studies in Indonesia’s capital, Jakarta. Last year’s G-20 summit in Rome was the first in-person gathering of members since the pandemic, though the leaders of Russia and China didn’t attend. Read: Ukraine fears 'city of death' as Russia withdraws troops from Kherson This year’s event is bracketed by the United Nations climate conference in Egypt and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations summit in Cambodia, which Biden and some other G-20 leaders are attending, and the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation meeting in Thailand right afterward. The American president vowed to work with Southeast Asian nations on Saturday, saying “we’re going to build a better future that we all want to see” in a region where China is working to grow its influence. On Sunday, Biden huddled with the leaders of Japan and South Korea to discuss China and the threat from North Korea. One question hanging over the Bali summit is whether Russia will agree to extend the U.N. Black Sea Grain Initiative, which is up for renewal Nov. 19. The July deal allowed major global grain producer Ukraine to resume exports from ports that had been largely blocked for months because of the war. Russia briefly pulled out of the deal late last month only to rejoin it days later. Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba on Saturday called for more pressure on Russia to extend the deal, saying Moscow must “stop playing hunger games with the world.” As leaders contend with conflicts and geopolitical tensions, they face the risk that efforts to tame inflation will extinguish post-pandemic recoveries or cause debilitating financial crises. The war’s repercussions are being felt from the remotest villages of Asia and Africa to the most modern industries. It has amplified disruptions to energy supplies, shipping and food security, pushing prices sharply higher and complicating efforts to stabilize the world economy after the upheavals of the pandemic. United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres is urging the G-20 to provide financial help for the developing world. “My priority in Bali will be to speak up for countries in the Global South that have been battered by the COVID-19 pandemic and the climate emergency, and now face crises in food, energy and finance — exacerbated by the war in Ukraine and crushing debt,” Guterres said. The International Monetary Fund is forecasting 2.7% global growth in 2023, while private sector economists’ estimates are as low as 1.5%, down from about 3% this year, the slowest growth since the oil crisis of the early 1980s. China has remained somewhat insulated from soaring inflation, mainly because it is struggling to reverse an economic slump that is weighing on global growth. The Chinese economy, the world’s second largest, grew at a 3.9% pace in the latest quarter. But economists say activity is slowing under the pressure of pandemic controls, a crackdown on technology companies and a downturn in the real estate sector. Forecasters have cut estimates of China’s annual economic growth to as low as 3%. That would be less than half of last year’s 8.1% and the second lowest in decades. Read: G20 finance leaders in Bali to tackle Ukraine, inflation Chinese President Xi will be coming to the summit emboldened by his appointment to an unusual third term as party chairman, making him China’s strongest leader in decades. It’s only his second foreign trip since early 2020, following a visit to Central Asia where he met Putin in September. Biden and Xi will hold their first in-person meeting since Biden became president in January 2021 on the event’s sidelines Monday. The U.S. is at odds with China over a host of issues, including human rights, technology and the future of the self-ruled island of Taiwan. The U.S. sees China as its biggest global competitor, and that rivalry is only likely to grow as Beijing seeks to expand its influence in the years to come. The European Union is also reassessing its relationship with China as it seeks to reduce its trade dependency on the country. Biden said he plans to talk with Xi about topics including Taiwan, trade policies and Beijing’s relationship with Russia. “What I want to do ... is lay out what each of our red lines are,” Biden said last week. Many developing economies are caught between fighting inflation and trying to nurse along recoveries from the pandemic. Host Indonesia’s economy grew at a 5.7% pace in the last quarter, one of the fastest among G-20 nations. But growth among resource exporters like Indonesia is forecast to cool as falling prices for oil, coal and other commodities end windfalls from the past year’s price boom. Read: Biden-Xi meeting: US trying to understand where China really stands At a time when many countries are struggling to afford imports of oil, gas and food while also meeting debt repayments, pressure is building on those most vulnerable to climate change to double down on shifting to more sustainable energy supplies. In Bali, the talks are also expected to focus on finding ways to hasten the transition away from coal and other fossil fuels. The G-20 was founded in 1999 originally as a forum to address economic challenges. It includes Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, South Korea, Mexico, Russia, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, Turkey, the United Kingdom, the United States and the European Union. Spain holds a permanent guest seat. Some observers of the bloc, like Josh Lipsky, senior director of the Atlantic Council’s GeoEconomics Center, question whether the G-20 can even function as geopolitical rifts grow. “I’m skeptical that it can survive long-term in its current format,” he said in a briefing last week. That makes things especially tough on host Indonesia. “This is not the G-20 they signed up for,” Lipsky said. “The last thing they wanted was to be in the middle of this geopolitical fight, this war in Europe, and be the crossroads of it. But that’s where they are.”

As the U.N. climate talks in Egypt near the half-way point, negotiators are working hard to draft deals on a wide range of issues they’ll put to ministers next week in the hope of getting a substantial result by the end. The two-week meeting in Sharm el-Sheikh started with strong appeals from world leaders for greater efforts to curb greenhouse gas emissions and help poor nations cope with global warming. Scientists say the amount of greenhouse gases being pumped into the atmosphere needs to be halved by 2030 to meet the goals of the Paris climate accord. The 2015 pact set a target of ideally limiting temperature rise to 1.5 Celsius (2.7 Fahrenheit) by the end of the century, but left it up to countries to decide how they want to do so. Read more: Climate Change: Int’l community must act with fund and solutions to help most vulnerable nations With impacts from climate change already felt across the globe, particularly by the world’s poorest, there has also been a push by campaigners and developing nations for rich polluters to stump up more cash. This would be used to help developing countries shift to clean energy and adapt to global warming; increasingly there are also calls for compensation to pay for climate-related losses. Here is a look at the main issues on the table at the COP27 talks and how they might be reflected in a final agreement. KEEPING COOL The hosts of last year’s talks in Glasgow said they managed to “keep 1.5 alive,” including by getting countries to endorse the target in the outcome document. But U.N. chief Antonio Guterres has warned that the temperature goal is on life support “and the machines are rattling.” And campaigners were disappointed that agenda this year doesn’t explicitly cite the threshold after pushback from some major oil and gas exporting nations. The talks’ chair, Egypt, can still convene discussions on putting it in the final agreement. CUTTING EMISSIONS Negotiators are trying to put together a mitigation work program that would capture the various measures countries have committed to reducing emissions, including for specific sectors such as energy and transport. Many of these pledges are not formally part of the U.N. process, meaning they cannot easily be scrutinized at the annual meeting. A proposed draft agreement circulated early Saturday had more than 200 square brackets, meaning large sections were still unresolved. Some countries want the plan to be valid only for one year, while others say a longer-term roadmap is needed. Expect fireworks in the days ahead. SHUNNING FOSSIL FUELS Last year’s meeting almost collapsed over a demand to explicitly state in the final agreement that coal should be phased out. In the end, countries agreed on several loopholes, and there are concerns among climate campaigners that negotiators from nations which are heavily dependent on fossil fuels for their energy needs or as revenue might try to roll back previous commitments. MONEY MATTERS Rich countries have fallen short on a pledge to mobilize $100 billion a year by 2020 in climate finance for poor nations. This has opened up a rift of distrust that negotiators are hoping to close with fresh pledges. But needs are growing and a new, higher target needs to be set from 2025 onward. COMPENSATION The subject of climate compensation was once considered taboo, due to concerns from rich countries that they might be on the hook for vast sums. But intense pressure from developing countries forced the issue of ‘loss and damage’ onto the formal agenda at the talks for the first time this year. Whether there will be a deal to promote further technical work or the creation of an actual fund remains to be seen. This could become a key flashpoint in the talks.

Twitter has been a bit of a mess since billionaire Tesla CEO Elon Musk took the helm, cutting the company’s workforce in half, upending the platform’s verification system, sparring with users over jokes and acknowledging that “ dumb things ” might happen as he reshapes one of the world’s most high-profile information ecosystems. On Thursday, amid an exodus of senior executives responsible for data privacy, cybersecurity and complying with regulations, he warned the company’s remaining employees that Twitter might not survive if it can’t find a way to bring in at least half its revenue from subscriptions. While it’s not clear if the drama is causing many users to leave — in fact, having a front-row seat to the chaos may prove entertaining to some — lesser-known sites Mastodon and even Tumblr are emerging as new (or renewed) alternatives. Here’s a look at some of them. (Oh, and if you are leaving Twitter and want to preserve your tweet history, you can download it by going to your profile settings and clicking on “your account” then “download an archive of your data.") MASTODON Named after an extinct mammal resembling an elephant, Mastodon has emerged as a frontrunner among those curious about life beyond the blue bird. It shares some similarities with Twitter, but there are some big differences — and not just that its version of tweets are officially called “toots.” Mastodon is a decentralized social network. That means it’s not owned by a single company or billionaire. Rather, it’s made up of a network of servers, each run independently but able to connect so people on different servers can communicate. There are no ads as Mastodon is funded by donations, grants and other means. Read more: Elon Musk takes over Twitter: what to expect? Mastodon’s feed is chronological, unlike Facebook, Instagram, TikTok or Twitter, which all use algorithms to get people to spend as much time on a site as possible. It can be a tad daunting to try to sign up to Mastodon. Because each server is run separately, you will need to first pick one you want to join, then go through the steps to create an account and agree with the server’s rules. There are general and interest- and location-based ones, but in the end it won’t really matter. Once you’re in, the feed is reminiscent of Twitter. You can write (up to 500 characters), post photos or videos, and follow accounts as well as see a general public feed. “We present a vision of social media that cannot be bought and owned by any billionaire, and strive to create a more resilient global platform without profit incentives,” Mastodon’s website says. Currently, the site has more than 1 million users, nearly half of whom signed up after Musk took over Twitter on Oct. 27, according to founder Eugen Rochko. Another option, Counter Social, also runs an ad-free, chronological social platform that's funded by users. To prevent foreign influence operations, Counter Social says it blocks access to Russia, China, Iran, North Korea, Pakistan and Syria. It boasts of offering one-click translation into over 80 languages. It has over 63 million monthly users, according to its website. CLUBHOUSE Remember Clubhouse, back when we were all under lockdown and couldn’t talk in person? It’s the buzzy audio-only app that got somewhat overshadowed by copycat Twitter Spaces, which also lets people talk to each other (think conference call, podcast or “audio chat”) about topics of interest. Read more: Musk says Twitter blue tick being revamped Once you join, Clubhouse lets you start or listen into conversations on a host of topics, from tech to pro sports, parenting, Black literature and so on. There are no posts, photos or videos — only people’s profile pictures and their voices. Conversations can be intimate, like a phone call, or might include thousands of people listening to a talk by boldface names, like a conference or stage interview. SUBSTACK and MEDIUM For longer reads, newsletters, and general information absorption, these sites are perhaps closest to the blog era of the early 2000s. You can read both without signing up or paying, but some writers, creators and podcasters create premium content for paying subscribers. TUMBLR Tumblr, which was all but left for dead, appears to be enjoying somewhat of a resurgence. The words/photos/art/video site is known for its devoted fan base and has been home to angry posts from celebrities like Taylor Swift. It angered many users in 2018 when it banned porn and “adult content,” which made up a big part of its highly visual and meme-friendly online presence and led to a large drop in its user base. Onboarding is simple, and for those who miss the early years of social media, there’s a decidedly retro, comforting feel to the site. T2 or TBD? Gabor Cselle, a veteran of Google who worked at Twitter from 2014 to 2016, is determined to create a better Twitter. For now, he’s calling it T2 and says the Web domain name he purchased for it — t2.social — cost $7.16. T2, which may or may not be its final name, is currently accepting signups for its waitlist, but the site is clearly not yet functioning. “I think Twitter always had a problem in figuring out what to do and how to decide on what to do. And that was always kind of in the back of my mind,” Cselle told The Associated Press. “On Monday, I decided to just go for it. I didn’t see anyone else really doing it.” Twitter-style text and TikTok-style videos are one idea. Cselle says for this to work, the text really has to be “amped up” so it’s not drowned out by the videos. “My bet is that it’s going to be easier and more efficient to build a better Twitter or public square now than fix the legacy problems at Twitter,” Cselle added. Cselle, of course, is not the only one jumping to the opportunity. Project Mushroom, for instance, plans a “safe place on the internet — a community-led open-source home for creators seeking justice on an overheating planet” and says it has received 25,000 early signups to its yet-to-launch platform. “My sense is that things are going to further fragment into more ideological platforms and some will die and then we’ll see some new consolidation emerge over the next couple of years,” said Jennifer Stromer-Galley, a professor at Syracuse University who studies social media. NEWS SITES One of Twitter’s most valuable features has been the way it allows people to find information within seconds. Was that just an earthquake? Twitter will tell you. Or at least it did. While there is no perfect replacement for Twitter, staying up to date with local, national and international news is easier than ever. Apple and Google both offer news services that aggregate articles from a broad range of publication (Apple offers a premium subscription service that gets you access to more articles, while Google shows free stories first.) There’s also Flipboard, which works kind of like a personal magazine curated to your interests. Of course, subscribing to individual publications (or downloading a free news app such as the AP’s AP News) is also an option. Yes, you might have to pay for some of them and no, you won’t get a blue check mark with your subscription.

Arizona's largest county on Friday will begin releasing the results of ballots dropped off at polling places on Election Day, providing clues about whether Republicans can overtake Democrats in critical races for U.S. Senate and governor. With half a million ballots remaining to be counted statewide, Republican Senate candidate Blake Masters would need to win more than 60% of them to defeat Democratic incumbent Mark Kelly. In the race for governor, Republican Kari Lake would need to win just over half to overtake Democrat Katie Hobbs. By Friday night, Kelly led Masters by more than 5 percentage points, while Hobbs was ahead of Lake by more than 1 point. Republicans including Lake, who are convinced the remaining ballots strongly favor them, have been pressuring election officials in Maricopa County, which includes the majority of Arizona voters, to speed up the count. County Board of Supervisors Chair Bill Gates, a Republican, said the team is working as fast as it can, but it takes time to follow the detailed steps required under Arizona law. “We’re doing things the right way. We’re not doing anything wrong at all,” Gates told reporters at the county elections office Friday. “That someone from here would suggest that we are doing something wrong, that’s frustrating.” Also read: Democrats are losing ground in Arizona's Senate and governor elections County officials have said they were inundated with far more early ballots dropped off on Election Day than they’ve ever before had to process. Voters delivered 292,000 early ballots on Election Day, an increase of 70% over the previous record from 2020. Counting those ballots is time-consuming because officials have to verify that each one came from a legitimate voter, a process that couldn't begin until Wednesday. Gates said that Maricopa County will release results from 80,000 ballots Friday evening and that more than half will be from the crucial group of early ballots received on Election Day. The report will also include fewer than 10,000 ballots received before Tuesday and “a good amount” of the roughly 17,000 ballots cast at vote centers on Tuesday, which could not be counted immediately because of a printing issue. The Tucson area’s Pima County also had a sizable chunk of votes left to count. Together, the state’s two urban counties account for 90% of the remaining ballots, according to data from the secretary of state. Also read: GOP moves closer to winning the House; the Senate's fate may depend on a runoff Either party could clinch control of the U.S. Senate by winning Arizona and either the outstanding Nevada Senate contest, which remained too early to call Friday, or next month's runoff in Georgia. Democrats think it's possible that the remaining ballots in Arizona are much less favorable to the GOP and will allow some or all of their candidates to maintain their leads. By Friday afternoon, Democrats led the secretary of state contest by 5 points and the attorney general race by just under 1 point. In two of the state's uncalled House contests, the candidates were separated by 2 points or less. In a third, Democratic incumbent Greg Stanton had a much more comfortable lead of 14 points.

The food import costs are on course to rise to near record $2 trillion this year, around $128.6 billion more than predicted in June, as countries are facing ballooning costs for staples, the UN food agency said Friday. Many economically vulnerable countries, with weak economic forecasts and high debt-to-GDP ratio, are paying more while receiving less food, heaping pressure on the world's poorest. The low-income countries' food import shipments are expected to shrink by 10 percent as their food import costs for the year are expected to remain little changed, pointing to growing accessibility issues. Read: Australia to send millions to Bangladesh, Myanmar for food, shelter "These are alarming signs from a food security perspective, indicating importers are finding it difficult to finance rising international costs," the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) said in its twice-yearly Food Outlook report. In addition to beverages and basic foods like cereals and meat, the FAO's food import costs cover a larger range of items, from fruit and vegetables to seafood, chocolate, tea, and spices. World food prices jumped to record highs in March after the war broke out between Russia and Ukraine, the latter a key grains and oilseeds producer. Although the UN-mediated Black Sea Grain Initiative, starting July this year, guaranteed safe sea passage to ships carrying food grains in the conflict-prone region, it was unable to significantly cut food prices in the global market. Read: Currency depreciations risk intensifying global food, energy crisis: World Bank Food imports will rise by $180 billion, or 10 percent, above the previous year's record high, with high- and upper middle-income countries accounting for the majority of the increase. As the purchasing power of countries that import goods is reduced by rising prices and a stronger dollar, the rate of that bill's increase will slow, lowering volumes. Also, import costs for agricultural inputs such as fertilisers, fuel and seeds are expected to rise 48 percent to a record $424 billion from 2021, forcing some countries to buy and use less. Higher bills and a stronger dollar will cut input applications, threatening both productivity and food security into next year, the FAO said. "This will inevitably lead to lower productivity, lower domestic food availability and negative repercussions for global agricultural output and food security in 2023."

From a distance, the endless landscape of solar panels stretching toward the horizon can easily be mistaken for crops nearing harvest. But here in the desert in southern Egypt, workers have been cultivating another precious commodity: electricity. After the sun strikes the photovoltaic solar panels, a thermal charge generates electricity that runs to four government-owned power stations distributing power across Egypt's national grid. It's part of the country's push to increase renewable energy production. With near-perpetual sunshine and windy Red Sea coastlines, experts say Egypt is well-positioned to go green. Read more: COP27: Bangladesh wants developed countries to deliver on $100 billion promise Yet it is also a developing country and like many others faces obstacles in making the switch. Much of its infrastructure depends on fossil fuels to power the nation of some 104 million people. The solar panel farm — Egypt's flagship project named Benban, after a local village — puts it at the African continent's forefront when it comes to renewable energy. But questions remain over Egypt’s long-term green energy strategy, and whether there are enough incentives for the cash-strapped government to supply 42% of the country's electricity from renewable resources by 2035, as it has announced. Karim el-Gendy, an expert at Chatham House who specializes in urban sustainability and climate policy, says Egypt has failed to meet its goal of having 20% of its electricity sourced from renewables by 2022. The current figure is now closer to 10%, according to according to the International Energy Agency. There's less demand for solar energy, partly due to the influx of natural gas, thanks to new discoveries located in Egypt's section of the Mediterranean Sea. “We have seen less interest in the past couple of years in integrated renewable energy projects in Egypt, both in terms of solar, in the south, and wind,” he said. As host of this year’s global climate summit, known as COP27 and now underway in the Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt has said it will pressure other nations to implement climate promises made at previous conferences. Egypt is not bound by any carbon emissions cap, but it has vowed to mitigate and curb its emission rises across key polluting sectors, such as electricity and transport. Its use of natural gas has also helped, allowing Egypt to move away from burning coal and oil, much dirtier industries — but nevertheless, gas is still a fossil fuel. The government has revealed few details on how it will implement or finance the 2035 vision. Foreign investment will likely play a big part, as countries in Europe look south for solar power. The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development has allotted $10 billion of funding for over 150 projects across Egypt, with Benban claimed as one of its major successes. The sprawling farm is designed to grow as demand for solar energy increases. ‘‘It offers great potential for us and other investors,’’ said Faisal Eissa, general manager for Egypt at Lekela, a Dutch company that has invested in Benban. Read more: COP27: Bangladesh prioritises realisation of green climate fund, Environment Minister tells UNB Egypt’s New and Renewable Energy Authority claims Benban has already reduced the country's annual greenhouse emission output. But there is still a long way to go. In 2020, renewables accounted for 6% of Egypt’s energy consumption, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, with petroleum products accounting for 36% and natural gas for 57%. Coal accounted for just 1%. Egypt may also have less of an incentive to invest in renewables as it grapples with domestic challenges, including an economic crisis brought on by the coronavirus pandemic, Russia's war in Ukraine and a years-long government crackdown on dissent. Last month, Cairo reached a preliminary deal with the International Monetary Fund that would allow access to a $3 billion loan. Effects of climate change are already being felt in the Nile River Delta, where rising seas have brought on creeping salt that eats away roots and cakes farms, devastating the livelihoods of Egyptian farmers. The Arab world’s most populous country accounts for only 0.6% of global carbon dioxide emissions. But it faces high levels of urban pollution. Most of the population lives in densely packed neighborhoods along the fertile banks of the Nile and its northern delta. Here, car fumes and mass transport running on diesel clog the streets. Egyptians’ exposure to air pollution is, on average, 13 times higher than the World Health Organization’s recommended guidelines. It was responsible for 90,559 premature deaths in 2019, according to statistics gathered by the United Nations. The country's congested capital city of Cairo is the second top source of greenhouse gas emissions, after the giant offshore Zohr gas field, according to the Climate TRACE. The remaining 90% of Egypt's land is uninhabitable desert. By better utilizing the vast expanse and coastlines, the Abu Dhabi-based International Renewable Energy Agency said the North African country could generate over half of its electricity from renewables by 2030. It's a different way of viewing the country's sun-scorched landscape. “People here have started to look at the sun as a source of power," said Ahmed Mustafa, who runs one of the area's many new logistics companies that work alongside Benban's developers and engineers, supplying them with equipment. For the locals, the solar farm has been transformative. Thousands worked at the site when it was under construction, and many stayed as technicians and cleaners once it became fully functional. Ultimately, the development of more wind and solar capabilities will come down to what makes business sense for the government, despite its expressions of good intent, according to el-Gendy. ‘’The need to expand its renewable sector all depends on Egypt’s commercial interests,’’ he said.

Elon Musk sought to reassure big companies that advertise on Twitter on Wednesday that his chaotic takeover of the social media platform won’t harm their brands, acknowledging that some “dumb things” might happen on his way to creating what he says will be a better, safer user experience. The latest erratic move on the minds of major advertisers — that the company depends on for revenue — was Musk’s decision to abolish a new “official” label on high-profile Twitter accounts just hours after introducing it. Twitter began adding gray labels to prominent accounts Wednesday, including brands like Coca-Cola, Nike and Apple, to indicate that they are authentic. A few hours later, the labels started disappearing. “Apart from being an aesthetic nightmare when looking at the Twitter feed, it was simply another way of creating a two-class system,” the billionaire Tesla CEO told advertisers in an hour-long conversation broadcast live on Twitter. “It wasn’t addressing the core problem.” Musk’s comments were his most expansive about Twitter’s future since he closed a $44 billion deal to buy the company late last month, dismissed its top executives almost immediately and, on Friday, fired roughly half of its workforce. Major brands including General Motors, United Airlines, General Mills and others have temporarily halted buying ads on the platform as they watch whether Musk’s plans to loosen its guardrails against hate speech will lead to a rise in online toxicity. Scores of companies big and small made their presence known among the more than 100,000 Twitter Space listeners by signing in with their brand Twitter accounts. The brand accounts for companies including banks Deutsche Bank, TD Ameritrade, gas company Chevron, automaker Nissan, airline Air Canada and many others appeared. Car brand Audi, which has paused Twitter ads, was there, as was retailer R.E.I., which said after the call its ads were still paused. Musk said he’s still planning a “content moderation council” representing diverse viewpoints that will tackle inappropriate content and reassure advertisers, but it would take “a few months” to put together. He said it will be advisory and “not a command council.” Lou Paskalis, longtime marketing and media executive and former Bank of America head of global media, said the briefing raised questions that will likely leave Fortune 500 advertisers uneasy. The biggest concern for big advertisers is brand safety and risk avoidance, he said. And Musk seems uninterested in reining in his Twitter persona that can be divisive — such as his tweet ahead of the election advising Americans to vote Republican. “To come out like Elon did ... and say ‘vote Republican since there’s a Democrat in the White House’ — I don’t know what marketer wants to go near that,” he said. One solution could be to hire a CEO to run the company and create stability while Musk continues to be his “Chief Twit” persona, Paskalis said. Read more: Elon Musk takes over Twitter: what to expect? Musk had earlier threatened by tweet a “thermonuclear name & shame” on advertisers that quit Twitter. But he took a more measured approach Wednesday, asking them to “give it a minute and kind of see how things are evolving.” “The best way to understand what’s going on with Twitter is use Twitter,” he told the group, which was represented mostly by the head of the Interactive Advertising Bureau, a trade association. However, the confusion on Twitter continued Wednesday. The rollout hours earlier of the “official” labels appeared arbitrary, with some politicians, news outlets and well-known personalities getting the label and others not. In some cases, whether users could see an account’s “official” label appeared to depend on what country they were in. Then the labels started disappearing. YouTube personality and author John Green got the label but his younger brother and “vlogging” partner Hank Green didn’t make the cut. Then John Green’s label was gone. Another popular YouTuber, Marques Brownlee, who posts videos on technology, tweeted he got the label, then tweeted again that it disappeared. “I just killed it,” Musk responded, though at first it wasn’t clear if he was referring specifically to Brownlee’s label or the entire project. The site’s current system of using “blue checks” to confirm an account’s authenticity will soon go away for those who don’t pay a monthly fee. The checkmarks will be available for anyone willing to pay a $7.99-a-month subscription, which will also include some bonus features, such as fewer ads and the ability to have tweets given greater visibility than those coming from non-subscribers. The platform’s current verification system has been in place since 2009 and was created to ensure high-profile and public-facing accounts are who they say they are. Read more: Elon Musk says will ban impersonators on Twitter Experts have expressed concern that making the checkmark available to anyone for a fee could lead to impersonations and the spreading of misinformation and scams. The gray label — a color that tends to blend into the background whether you use light or dark mode to scroll Twitter — was an apparent compromise. Esther Crawford, a Twitter employee who has been working on the verification overhaul, had said Tuesday on Twitter that the “official” label would be added to “select accounts” when the new system launches. “Not all previously verified accounts will get the ‘Official’ label and the label is not available for purchase,” said Crawford. But after the labels started disappearing Wednesday, she again took to Twitter to say “there are no sacred cows in product at Twitter anymore.” “Elon is willing to try lots of things — many will fail, some will succeed,” she said. There are about 423,000 verified accounts under the outgoing system. Many of those belong to celebrities, businesses and politicians. But a large chunk of verified accounts belong to individual journalists, some with tiny followings at local newspapers and news sites around the world. The idea was to verify reporters so their identities couldn’t be used to push false information on Twitter. Read more: Musk says Twitter blue tick being revamped Musk, who often bristles at critical news coverage, pushed back against that use of the tool Wednesday, saying he wanted to elevate “citizen journalism” and the “voice of the people” over publications he suggested had too much influence in defining the “Western narrative.” Journalism professionals generally consider Musk’s concept of elevating “citizen journalists” dangerous because it ignores the need for standards, including fact-checking, that responsible news organizations enforce.

Russian President Vladimir Putin will not attend the Group of 20 summit in Indonesia next week, avoiding a possible confrontation with the United States and its allies over his war in Ukraine, an Indonesian government official said Thursday. U.S. President Joe Biden, Chinese President Xi Jinping and other world leaders are to attend the two-day summit in Bali that starts Nov. 15. The summit was to have been the first time Biden and Putin would have been together at a gathering since Russia invaded Ukraine in February. Luhut Binsar Pandjaitan, the Chief of Support for G-20 events told reporters in Denpasar, Indonesia, that Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov will lead the Russian delegation. Read more: G20 Presidency: India to invite Bangladesh as guest country “The Indonesian government respects the decision of the Russian government, which President Putin himself previously explained to President Joko Widodo in a very friendly telephone conversation,” said Pandjaitan, who is also the Coordinating Minister of Maritime and Investment. Biden had ruled out meeting with Putin if he had attended the summit, and said the only conversation he could have possibly had with the Russian leader would be to discuss a deal to free Americans imprisoned in Russia. Read more: Rebuked by many, Saudi crown prince feted at G20 summit Biden administration officials said they had been coordinating with global counterparts to isolate Putin if he had decided to participate either in person or virtually. They have discussed boycotts or other displays of condemnation.