TOP NEWS

China's growth  

Beijing is considering a large package of 1,400 billion  

 

China is considering issuing government bonds equivalent to 1,400 billion kroner to finance new stimulus for the battered economy. This is according to sources with access to Bloomberg.  

 

The proposal under discussion would involve the sale of ultra-long government bonds to finance projects related to food, energy, supply chains and urbanization.  

 

According to the news agency, similar bond packages have been issued only three times before in the past 26 years. The last time this happened was in 2020 to pay for support measures during the pandemic. The tool was also used in the aftermath of the 1998 Asian financial crisis to recapitalize banks. 

 

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The EU election|Political situation in Germany  

The new "conservative left" - a threat to the far right?  

 

Can Europe's new "conservative left" convince voters to abandon the far right? Professor Cas Mudde asks himself that question in an opinion piece in The Guardian.  

 

What he describes as a conservative left has a lot to do with the newly formed German party Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance (BSW). The party, with the "awkward name", was founded last autumn by Sahra Wagenknecht. The idea is to combine a left-leaning economic policy with a right-leaning in cultural matters. The goal: to take voters from the right-wing nationalist AFD.  

 

But the strategy risks falling flat, claims Mudde. He believes that there are several examples that show that Wagenknecht's immigration-critical tone can reinforce the normalization of the views of the far right. This usually leads, for example in the elections in the Netherlands last autumn, to increased, rather than decreased, support for the parties on the far right. 

 

The Economist reports at the same time that BSW has two major opportunities to establish itself on the political scene. Partly in the form of the EU elections this summer, which voters tend to see as something of an experimental workshop, and partly because three former East German states are holding elections this autumn. Wagenknecht, who grew up in East Berlin, may have good traction from his background, according to the newspaper. 

 

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The Russian invasion|The response of the outside world  

Switzerland promises to organize peace summit on Ukraine  

 

Switzerland will host a peace summit on the war in Ukraine. Swiss President Viola Amherd made that announcement at a press conference she held together with Volodymyr Zelenskyj in the capital Bern on Monday.  

 

- The work starts tomorrow, says Amherd, who according to Berner Zeitung did not present a date for the conference. 

 

The list of participants is also unknown, but Russia will apparently not be invited. To a question, Zelenskyy answered that he welcomes all countries that respect Ukraine's sovereignty. 

 

- So draw your conclusions about who we will invite. 

 

Zelenskyy is in Switzerland on the occasion of the meeting of the World Economic Forum, which is organized in Davos this week.

 

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The North Korea crisis 

North Korea has "no plans to avoid" a war  

North Korea has "no plans to avoid" a war with South Korea - and will no longer seek to reunify the Korean peninsula. This is what the country's dictator Kim Jong-Un says according to the state-controlled news agency KCNA, AP writes.  

 

He also warns the neighboring country against violating the demilitarized zone between the countries. 

 

- If South Korea steps over as much as 0.0001 millimeters, it will be considered a declaration of war, he says.  

 

Kim's announcement to abandon the decades-long goal of reunifying North and South comes amid heightened tensions between the countries, after North Korea recently carried out a series of weapons tests.  

Last week, among others, the nuclear scientist Siegfried Hecker warned that Kim may have made a "strategic decision to start a war", Expressen writes.