Reuters World News - Trump’s Iowa domination, Iran strikes, China’s charm offensive and Polish politics

Episode Date: January 16, 2024

Donald Trump has secured a resounding win in the first 2024 Republican presidential contest in Iowa. Iran's Revolutionary Guards have launched attacks in Iraq and Syria as concerns grow over the Gaza conflict escalating. China is sending its most significant delegation to Davos since 2017, as it looks to woo the global elite. A Polish court has blocked the dismissal of a top prosecutor by the new government. Plus, Succession and The Bear win big at the Emmys.  Listen to our special episode on Davos here. Listen to our special episode on the Iowa caucuses here. 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, Donald Trump storms to victory in Iowa. Iran attacks for the first time since the war in Gaza began, with strikes in Iraq and Syria. China seeks to woo back international investors at Davos, and Poland's political war heats up. It's Tuesday, January 16th. This is Rooters World News, bringing you everything you need to know from the front lines in 10 minutes,

every weekday. I'm Kim Vinal in Wanganui, New Zealand and I'm Tara Oaks in Liverpool. This has been an incredible experience. The people have been, this is a third time we've won, but this is the biggest win. Donald Trump, speaking after a resounding victory in the first Republican presidential contest in Iowa.

Trump won by a record margin, almost 30 percentage points ahead of his nearest challenger, Rondes Santos. The win strengthens Trump's case that his nomination is a foregone conclusion, and a Biden-Trump rematch is inevitable. So with Ron DeSantis in a distant second place, I will not let you down.

Thank you all. God bless you. Nikki Haley behind him. Tonight, Iowa made this Republican primary a two-person race. And Vivek Ramoswamy, having dropped out of the race altogether, is Trump right? Christopher Waljasper is in Des Moines. We were hearing a lot about how this would narrow the race and we would have a two-candidate race heading into New Hampshire. DeSantis's win over Haley, albeit a point or two, means that he's still got some momentum heading into the next few states.

So both of them have some support, but the margin that Trump won by is so huge. it's really just going to be such an insurmountable competition. A lot of folks are saying that this is a real strong message that Trump is going to be the nominee. You're there on the ground. There were concerns that the freezing temperatures would keep people home. What's it been like? You know, that really wasn't the case where I was.

I went to this town of Knoxville, Iowa, at southeast of the capital. And there were a lot of people there. The county chair said it was nearly as many people as what turned out in 2016. I spoke with some people like this woman Barbara Waters. She was a retired educator in her 70s. How'd it go? I changed my mind two times while I was sitting there.

She said she was really considering DeSantis, but in the end, she voted for Trump because she thought he was the only one who could actually win in November. I just think he's the only one that's going to be able to pull it off. Iran's Revolutionary Guard has launched a barrage of missile strikes in Syria and northern Iraq. In Iraq, they said they targeted an Israeli intelligence center run by Mossad, the spy agency. Israeli officials have not yet commented. Timor Azari is in Baghdad. Timor, what do we know so far?

So Iran's Revolutionary Guards carried out a series of strikes, some insistence. Syria, some in Iraq, targeting what they say was in Israeli Mossad spy headquarters in Iraq's northeastern Kurdistan region, as well as Islamic State militants in Syria in retaliation for a bombing earlier this month that killed almost 100 people. The damage in Syria is not clear right now. In Iraq, we know that these rockets hit the house of a prominent businessman, a multimillionaire, killing him and several members of his family. Rockets also struck the house of a senior Kurdish intelligence official

and a sort of intelligence base in the Kurdistan region. Why is Iran doing this now? So what analysts have said is that Iran over the past three months since the onset of the Gaza War has been careful to limit its actions in the Middle East. Many attacks have been carried out by its network of regional allies and proxies in Lebanon, in Yemen, also in Iraq. What this is is the biggest step by Iran itself to wade into that regional conflict.

How serious an escalation is this? So what's important here is that while the attacks in Iraq happened near the US consulate in Erbil, there were no US casualties and no damage to US infrastructure. So while this is seen as another step up that escalatory ladder, Iran was very careful not to kill or injure any U.S. forces, which would have been a serious escalation. Hamas has said that two Israeli hostages captured on October 7th have been killed in Israeli airstrikes.

The militant group released video footage that appeared to show their bodies. Reuters couldn't verify the group's claim. Israel's military has said there was serious concern about the fate of the hostages. A military spokesman said at least one of them. was not killed by Israeli fire. Yemen's Iran-aligned Houthi movement has said it will expand its targets in the Red Sea to include U.S. ships. The Houthis attacked a U.S.-owned commercial ship on Monday

after U.S. and British strikes on their sights in Yemen. Hit TV shows, Succession and The Bear have dominated this year's Emmy Awards, taking six trophies each, including Best Drama and Best Comedy, respectively. Netflix's beef also had a big night, winning awards for writing, acting and Best Limited series. Meter's high snow has hampered the evacuation of a thousand tourists stranded in a remote holiday village in China. Avalanches hit the scenic Hemu village near Kazakhstan several days ago, and road access remains cut off. Chinese officials, including Premier Leika Chang, have headed to a different snowy mountain range,

the Alps. Today, at the World Economic Forum in Davos, China is trying to woo global partners into trusting them for investments and geopolitics, and Swatkovsky is in Davos. So China is sending the most senior delegation to Davos since President Xi Jinping attended the forum himself in 2017. And this show of force is meant to highlight to the world that China is indeed open for business, that following the arduous and difficult COVID lockdowns, it wants to attract foreign investment and that it's back on the global stage. The slight wrinkle or the slight problem with this message is that the post-pandemic recovery

in China has indeed not been what a lot of people expected. It's been actually pretty sluggish. How is China trying to make nice with investors in Davos? We know that there is a big reception plan for tonight called a Dalian reception, so they'll definitely be hosting, whining and dining, many investors there, and we know that in Davos this is really what matters. China also appears to be more willing to wade into geopolitics. It's calling for a peace conference in Gaza, for instance. What has sparked that change? Well, China has tried to play this role of this geopolitical power broker as its military might grow. and as it kind of becomes more assertive and tries to effectively reshape the global order in a way that makes it more multipolar.

But if we look at sort of deals over hostage releases, for example, it's really been the United States that's sort of been trying to negotiate. So although China wants to be seen as a power broker and wants to be sort of perceived as such, right now I think many experts are still sort of expecting this attempt to test the limits of Chinese diplomacy. And sticking with Davos, European policymakers there are putting a dampener on the mood in markets.

Carmel Grimmons has more. Yes, Bundesbank President Joachim Nagel said it was too early to discuss interest rate cuts. An Austrian central bank governor Robert Holsman warned not to bank on a rate cut at all this year. The upshot is that investors are now scaling back their expectations for an ECB cut in borrowing costs this year, and stocks are down. We all know that 2024 is going to be a year of political drama with elections in the US and around the world. But in Poland is the post-election period that's proving problematic. Donald Tusk's new pro-European government tried to dismiss a senior prosecutor accused of politicising the country's legal system. But they have been blocked by President Andje Duda, an ally of the nationalist law and justice, or peace party, who formed the previous government.

Alan Charlishe is in Warsaw. Alan, why is the transition of power turning out so tricky in Poland? Well, the main complication is that the president is from a different political camp from the new government. And they're also facing opposition from people who are appointed under the peace government to powerful positions in the courts and also in certain regulatory bodies. And what's at stake if these divisions remain between? the president and the new government? One of the main goals which the new government has

is to unblock funding from the European Union, which was frozen over rule of law concerns. However, given that the president has the power of veto, that considerably complicates these efforts. Convierte your passion in a business with Shopify and bathe records of ventas with the form of pay with a better conversion of the world. Has heard of bien?

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