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Soriek  9mo ago (text post)   1334 thread views

Transnational Thursdays 25

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 lives in or might be interested in. Feel free as well to drop in with coverage of countries you’re interested in, talk about ongoing dynamics like the wars in Israel or Ukraine, or even just whatever you’re reading.

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Uganda

In response to Uganda’s draconian anti-gay legislation, international consequences has finally come to appear:

President Joe Biden last week ended Uganda’s preferential access to American markets under an accord that benefits more than 30 African nations. As far as US foreign policy is concerned, Uganda is now in the same basket as Niger, Gabon and the Central African Republic — pariah states that have either suffered military coups or invited in Russia’s Wagner mercenaries.

This week, a much-anticipated initial public offering of Airtel Uganda flopped, with investors taking up just 55% of the shares offered. The World Bank froze new loans to the country in August and the finance ministry has estimated that international budget support may plummet 99% next year…

The country had total trade of $432 million with the US last year, and the cocoa, coffee and base metals it exports can easily be found elsewhere.

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