Aurea
@mariaurea.bsky.social
Democrat, antifascist and gauche by nature
Primary Elections Live Updates: Close Race in Democratic Primary for Michigan Senate Seat www.nytimes.com/live/2026/08...
Primary Elections Live Updates: In Michigan Senate Race, El-Sayed and Stevens Face Off
Dr. Abdul El-Sayed, a progressive, and Representative Haley Stevens, a centrist, both gave speeches with the winner still undeclared. Kansas, Missouri, Virginia and Washington also voted.
nytimes.com
Primary Elections Live Updates: Close Race in Democratic Primary for Michigan Senate Seat www.nytimes.com/live/2026/08...
Primary Elections Live Updates: In Michigan Senate Race, El-Sayed and Stevens Face Off
Dr. Abdul El-Sayed, a progressive, and Representative Haley Stevens, a centrist, both gave speeches with the winner still undeclared. Kansas, Missouri, Virginia and Washington also voted.
nytimes.com
Catch up: SpaceX unnerves investors; Qatar says Hormuz talks are progressing www.economist.com/the-world-in... From The Economist
Catch up: SpaceX unnerves investors; Qatar says Hormuz talks are progressing
Catch up quickly on the global stories that matter
economist.com
Catch up: SpaceX unnerves investors; Qatar says Hormuz talks are progressing www.economist.com/the-world-in... From The Economist
Catch up: SpaceX unnerves investors; Qatar says Hormuz talks are progressing
Catch up quickly on the global stories that matter
economist.com
UAE-SUDAN NEXUS IN ONE OF THE BIGGEST GOLD HEISTS IN WORLD HISTORY, highlights the central role the Gulf state plays as Africa's offshore capital and as the most influential foreign power to establish a presence on the continent in the last decade. (FT)
One of the biggest gold heists in world history was made by paramilitary forces combating their former allies of the Sudanese army at the start of the civil war, April 2023. They stole at least 1.5 tons of gold worth US$100m at the time, also raiding jewelry from vaults in commercial banks. (FT)
The Rapid Support Forces-RSF, the paramilitary group, seized the state-owned gold refinery in Khartoum & raided the central bank. The RSF then transported the gold across borders, including to neighboring Chad & South Sudan, but they deny involvement and the details of the theft are disputed. (FT)
Much of the gold was loaded onto planes bound for the United Arab Emirates-UAE, from the international airport in the South Sudan's capital. "The UAE sent cargo planes, sometimes civilian, sometimes military, to transport the gold," the source said. (FT)
The UAE has consolidated significant alliances in many African countries. Its most recent challenge is Iran's closure of the Strait of Hormuz, isolating DP World's strategic port of Jebel Ali — the cornerstone of the UAE's global logistics network. (FT)
The withdrawal of Western donors from Africa has left a vacuum to be filled by middle powers. The United Arab Emirates, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and others have entered the fray, and the competition is intensifying. (FT)
The United Arab Emirates-UAE, under its autocratic ruler Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed al-Nahyan-MBZ, has been spreading investment, influence, & military equipment across Africa at a vertiginous pace, to seize trade & resources for its post-oil future. (FT)
The UAE's power projection spans the entire continent: ports and green energy projects, as well as industrial-scale farms. The country has leased millions of hectares of farmland to bolster food security. (FT)
The UAE acquired mining rights from the Democratic Republic of Congo to Guinea to secure minerals essential for its energy transition and its growing defense sector. (FT)
The UAE's imperial ambition pace under MBZ caught African policymakers by surprise, possibly marking the most significant geopolitical shift since China began courting the continent with a combination of loans, infrastructure, & mining deals at the turn of the millennium. (FT)
The United Arab Emirates is creating a complex system of trade, industrial, and military relations that sometimes strengthens, but also undermines, the sovereignty of fragile states—most notably war-torn Sudan. (FT)
“Africa is one of the emerging lungs of the global economy. It sits at the intersection of the US-China cold war, it has an Arab-Islamic dimension, and the UAE needs a stake not just in Africa’s future but in defining its stability and prosperity,” Nadim Koteich emphasized. (FT)
DP World, which emerged from Dubai's drive to establish itself as a trade and logistics hub, won its first container terminal concessions in Africa in Djibouti, Maputo, and Dakar in the 2000s. Since then, the logistics giant has been expanding aggressively. (FT)
Together with the smaller logistics company, Abu Dhabi Ports, DP World operates or is developing ports, intermodal terminals, & free zones in 13 African countries. DP World thus channels trade between Africa-Asia-Middle East to its Dubai hub at Jebel Ali, the world's largest artificial port. (FT)
More recently, the company has begun acquiring established distribution networks, including Imperial Logistics in South Africa and FMCG in Nigeria, expanding its operations to more than 25 African countries. (FT)
Non-oil trade between Africa & the Gulf countries now exceeds $100bn, according to the IMF, with the vast share of it from the UAE & Saudi Arabia. Also, according to some estimates, the UAE has become the largest source of capital for Africa in the last decade.(FT)
Emirati officials reflect a willingness to support African countries where others are more risk-averse. Many African governments, which each year face a collective infrastructure investment shortfall estimated at $130bn-$170bn by the African Development Bank, welcome the capital flows.(FT)
On the continent, there is unease in some sectors regarding the motives of the UAE and the influence they are gaining through trade, investment, debt, and opaque security cooperation with governments of various autocratic origins. (FT)
In the Horn & the east of Africa, in particular, the UAE has been associated with non-state armed groups in the supply of weapons & the trafficking of illicit gold. According to estimates by Swissaid, nearly $30bn in artisanal gold is exported from Africa to Dubai annually without declaration. (FT)
UN & flight-tracking experts, western intelligence agencies, & human rights groups have vast evidence of the lines fueling the civil war in Sudan: airstrips, military & naval bases on the Red Sea coast & allied African states, which Abu Dhabi uses for covert arms trafficking operations. (FT)
Using this net, UAE has helped turn the once lightly armed RSF in Sudan, accused of committing ethnic cleansing & genocide against non-Arab groups, into a well-equipped militia with sophisticated drones, air defense systems, & fleets of armored personnel carriers. (FT)
Sudan's gold exported to the UAE is helping the civil war, according to several research organizations, such as Chatham House. Much of the country's artisanal production, estimated by Swissaid at over 40 tons per year, is trafficked to Dubai without being formally taxed by the state. (FT)