Reuters World News - Swedish embassy alight in Baghdad, New Zealand mourning and joy - plus Thai turmoil

Episode Date: July 20, 2023

Hundreds of protesters storm the Swedish embassy in central Baghdad, scaling its walls and setting it on fire in protest against the expected burning of a Koran in Stockholm. A deadly shooting in New Zealand hours ahead of the opening match of the Women's soccer World Cup. Plus, what next for Thailand’s anti-establishment movement after their prime ministerial candidate is barred from standing. Visit the Thomson Reuters Privacy Statement for information on our privacy and data protection practices. You may also visit megaphone.fm/adchoices to opt-out of targeted advertising. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Today, Sweden's embassy stormed in Baghdad over a Quran burning. A shooting in Auckland mars the opening of the Women's World Cup, but cheers for the home team with a surprise victory in the first game. Thailand on edge as the election winner is barred from standing as Prime Minister. And Chile's lithium mining plans face opposition from indigenous communities. It's Thursday, July 20th. This is Royta's World News, with everything you need to know from the front lines in 10 minutes every weekday.

I'm Kim Vinal in London. We start in Baghdad where hundreds of protesters stormed the Swedish embassy and set it on fire in the early hours of the morning. Supporters of Shiite cleric Mukta-Sadr were protesting a planned Koran burning outside the Iraqi embassy in Stockholm later today. Several Koran burnings have been held in Sweden. in over recent months. Swedish authorities are powerless to stop them

because of court rulings on the grounds of freedom of speech. Johan Allander in Gothenburg says the government is looking for a workaround. Such acts are protected by Sweden's freedom of speech laws and there's no real political appetite to change that. However, the government said this month that they are examining whether they could change the law to give police permission to stop public Quran burnings, if they endanger Swedish security, which the government, the security service and the police all say that these acts do.

Now to the rest of the top stories around the world. A gunman killed two people in Auckland just hours before the Women's World Cup opener. Police are investigating how the 24-year-old suspect got hold of a weapon despite New Zealand's notoriously strict gun laws. On the pitch, the Kiwi hosts stunned onlookers by upsetting Norway in a 1-0 victory. John Kerry says more time is needed to reach agreements with China on major climate issues. The U.S. climate envoy came away empty-handed after three days of talks in Beijing. Kerry's described the discussions as constructive but complicated.

The climate issue is not a bilateral issue in our judgment. And we all have a responsibility to deal with it. as rapidly as we can. Russia has kept up strikes on Ukrainian port areas, with Moscow warning that ships heading to Ukraine's Black Sea ports could be considered military targets. With Russia's exit from a wartime grain deal threatening to worsen global food supplies,

Ukraine has said it will establish a temporary shipping route via Romania, a neighboring Black Sea country. Yivgeny Progogian has resurfaced in a video welcoming his fighters to Belarus. In the video, the mutinous Wagner mercenary chief tells his fighters that they were done with the Ukraine war for now, calling the conflict a disgrace. Instead, he says they should gather their strength for Africa. The footage reposted by his press service on telegram is the first video evidence of

Progosian's whereabouts since his aborted mutiny against Putin last month. Protesters have clashed with Kenyan police in the third round of protests this month over tax hikes. Several people were shot as demonstrators hurled rocks at security forces and the cost of living protests.

Now for what's going on in markets, we have Carmel Krimmins and Carmel's some disappointment in big US earnings. That's right. Netflix tumbled nearly 9% after it missed sales estimates and it gave a disappointing outlook. Tesla's also having a rough time of it.

Its shares fell nearly 5%. after Elon Musk gave a typically frank assessment. Basically, he's going to cut car prices, even though that's squeezing margins. Now, Tesla has already slashed car prices in a number of markets, and its margins fell to 18% in the second quarter. That's down from 26% last year, and there's more price cuts to come. Political turmoil has deepened in Thailand after the leader of the election-winning party was barred from standing as Prime Minister.

Peter Linger-onrat's anti-establishment move-forward party trounced military-backed rivals in elections two months ago. But his candidacy for prime minister has been blocked by parliament and the next prime ministerial vote will take place next week without him. Kay Johnson is our Southeast Asia bureau chief. So who is going to be the next prime minister then? So all eyes now are going to be on the second place to a Thai party, which has been a powerhouse in Thai politics for most of the last 15, 20 years.

They have only 10 seats fewer in Parliament, so they could nominate their own prime ministerial candidate. So is that a done deal then? Is that how the government is likely to be formed? It's very possible that the Senate could reject any prime minister and any coalition that includes move forward because of their controversial stance to amend laws that protect the monarchy from any kind of insult.

It's very possible that even a Poitai Prime Minister could be rejected and this could drag on for even longer extending this political crisis and raising the possibility that these protests that have begun and taken hundreds to the street could go on and maybe even grow. What does Peter's defeat mean for the anti-establishment movement generally in Thailand? What we're hearing from the protesters on the street and party activists, they feel this is more the same. There's a great deal of frustration.

They see that time and time again, parties will win on an election and find themselves outmaneuvered by a system that was set up by the military. It's hard to see where this movement will go because what we're hearing when we talk to the protesters is they don't see any hope that people's movement will be allowed to take power. Chile is home to one of the world's richest troves of lithium. But much of that mineral, essential for electric vehicle batteries and other green initiatives, is on indigenous land.

Alex Vilejas has been covering Chile's efforts to tap into more of this highly sought-after resource. About 90% of the country's lithium reserves are in the Atacama salt flats. This is kind of this otherworldly region of the country. It's one of the driest areas on the planet. It's also home to small pockets of water and life like flamingo populations. So the Chilean president, Gabriel Boric, is a progressive who said he was going to talk personally with these indigenous communities. The Likantai people who live in the region have actually negotiated a deal with the largest lithium producer in the world to get 3.5. percent of their sales from the lithium they extract from the Apecama. While some indigenous communities

are opposed to any lithium mining expansion whatsoever, others are hoping to use that as a model to be direct stakeholders in any new lithium mining. Lithium is extracted through underwater brine, and while that brine is not drinkable, the extraction affects water tables around the desert, which therefore affect drinking water. So that's a big flashpoint. When I was in the Atacama, I spoke to Francisco Mondaka, who is the head of the environmental unit for the Council of Indigenous Atacamenian people.

He worries that the long-term effects of lithium mining is going to leave the region with no future. Mondaka was also very critical of European cities that boasts about being green and using electrical vehicles, because they ignore the scars that are left in places like the Atacama. He said that while these vehicles help reduce emissions, you can't sacrifice one area to save another. That's it for today's episode of Reuters World News.

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