This is a weekly thread for people to discuss international news, foreign policy or IR history. I usually start off with coverage of some current events from a mix of countries I follow personally and countries I think the forum might be interested in. Feel free to drop in with coverage of countries you’re interested in, talk about ongoing dynamics like the the wars in Israel or Ukraine, or even just whatever you’re reading.
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Notes -
Ecuador
Daniel Noboa, heir to the banana conglomerate Noboa Corporation, has narrowly won the election with 52% of the vote, beating out Rafeal Correa’s protege Luisa González. Note that while the left is not currently in power in Ecuador, González was still considered the establishment candidate and Noboa, with only two years in Congress, as the upstart, outsider candidate (his own father lost to Correa in one of his many ill fated attempts at the Presidency).
The main issues were the economy (“Ecuador is the only Andean nation to experience negative GDP-per-capita growth for the last five years.”) and security, especially cracking down on the cartels which have recently exploded in Ecuador (awkwardly, recent press took note of the fact that over half of searched banana exports are linked to drug trafficking, but it didn’t seem to hurt the banana candidate too much).
In the legislative elections Noboa’s party performed pretty poorly, though so did several leftist parties that would be in the opposition:
Note that combining the three parties listed above would still only make a coalition of 55 seats, still a good deal short of the 69 needed for a majority. Also, a reminder that Lasso disbanded the National Assembly so the legislative branch literally hasn’t been doing anything for a while anyway. Noboa will only hold the role for about a year and a half, because he’s finishing out prior President Guillermo’s term, though he can of course run again in the next election.
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