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A selection of correspondence

Are plastics greener than they seem?

This illustration depicts the Grim Reaper holding a red-and-white striped plastic straw instead of a scythe, symbolizing death being used as or acting as a gatekeeper.

Letters

The world this week

Politics

Business

The weekly cartoon

All grown up 

Saudi Arabia is pulling off an astonishing transformation  

Leaders

An existential struggle

What Putin wants—and how Europe should thwart him

The Himalayas of peace

Luck stands between de-escalation and disaster for India and Pakistan

Israel’s forever conflict

The war in Gaza must end

Illusion of control 

Donald Trump is right to ditch Joe Biden’s chip-export rules  

Dollar dolour

This time really is different for the dollar, writes Kenneth Rogoff

By Invitation

Watching the bear

Would Vladimir Putin attack NATO?

Briefing

Russia’s military-industrial complex

A glimpse inside Putin’s secret arms empire

Not your father’s kingdom

Saudi society has changed drastically. Can the economy change, too?

Punishment time

Can India and Pakistan control a new cycle of escalation?

Asia

The Australian Labor Party’s thumping win

Australia is no longer lucky

The devil you know

Trade tensions help Singapore’s prime minister to a big win

A call to arms

Taiwan’s other war 

Banyan

How should India promote Hindi? By doing nothing

Deliverance

China’s gig economy could help it survive the trade war 

China

Toil and struggle 

Xi Jinping glorifies hard work, but the young are not so sure

The very long arm

China intensifies its campaign against exiled Hong Kong dissidents

Right on cue

The men’s and women’s world snooker champions are now both Chinese

After Grants Pass

American cities are criminalising homelessness. Will that help?

United States

Pete’s purge

Pete Hegseth is purging both weapons and generals

Replacement rate

A social history of America in a warehouse

Born in the USA

One of the most controversial executive orders will shortly land at SCOTUS

America’s sort of Cass Review 

Where the Trump administration has science on its side  

Mr Equal Protection

Trump knocks down a controversial pillar of civil-rights law

Lexington

Harvard has more problems than Donald Trump

The strategic south

Xi Jinping tries to press China’s advantage in South America 

The Americas

Farmacias Similares

A Mexican pharmacy chain revolutionised health care at home

Breaking point

Killer gangs are inches from ruling all of Haiti 

Who will feed the strip?

Israel’s radical new course in Gaza

Middle East & Africa

Gaza’s death toll

How many people have died in Gaza?

Agree to disagree

MAGA meets MBS 

The Red Sea

A Faustian pact with the Houthis 

Threat from above

The fight for Sudan’s skies

A nation in the dark

Nigeria has more people without electricity than any other country

 The ides of Merz

Trouble at home threatens Friedrich Merz’s global ambitions

Europe

Frugal times ahead

Berlin’s culture bosses must become more commercial

MAGA man

Romania’s next president may be George Simion, a Trump ally

When enough is not enough

Portugal heads to the polls for the third time in barely three years

The tethered threat

How new drones are sneaking past jammers on Ukraine’s front lines

Charlemagne

To grasp Europe’s fragmentations, look to a 31-year treasure hunt

Churchgoing, going…gone? 

The Church of England is dying out and selling up

Britain

Time to transubstantiate

Young British men are turning to Catholicism in surprising numbers

Double-Trussed

Nigel Farage’s economic plans are a disaster

The start of the deals

The Britain-India trade deal is a sign of things to come

The very few

Britain’s second-world-war veterans are dying out 

The green stuff

Aberdeen shows why the UK’s clean-energy transition will be messy

Bagehot

Kemi Badenoch is simply too interesting for Downing Street

Nvidious

How China is still getting its hands on Nvidia’s gear

Silicon surprise 

Huawei and other Chinese chip firms are catching up fast

Board games

OpenAI’s flip-flop will not get Elon Musk off its back

Battle of the bulge

Eli Lilly looks set to steal Novo Nordisk’s weight-loss crown

Us against the world

What is behind the staggering ascent of Palantir?

Bartleby

Why so many IT projects go so horribly wrong

Schumpeter

Bosses beware: the tariff shock is not like covid-19

Poor slackers

Why Gen X is the real loser generation

Finance & economics

Over a barrel

How Saudi Arabia is cranking up the pressure on its OPEC allies

Taiwan straits

Trump is a threat to Asia’s giant insurers 

Dollar drama

Global turmoil has at least one beneficiary: currency traders

Cheap thrills

Buy the dip: the trend that keeps stocks from crashing

The oracle plans to step down

Warren Buffett has created a $348bn question for his successor

Free exchange

What happens when a hegemon falls?

State of flux

How to build strong magnets without rare-earth metals

Science & technology

Uneasy listening

Compressed music might be harmful to the ears

Dog and pony show

Companies have plans to build robotic horses

Friends like these

Dogs really do look and act just like their owners

Well informed

Is your hay fever getting worse?

Lights, camera, tariffs?

Hollywood is in trouble. Politicians should not try to save it

Culture

Proto type

The language that changed the world

Forged in blood

The friendship of a Chilean dictator and a Nazi war criminal

Bringing back the Queen of Crime

How to write, according to the bestselling novelist of all time

Back Story

The morals of “Sinners”, a fantasia of vampires and the blues

Making a splash

If you haven’t heard of webtoons, you will soon

Indicators

Economic data, commodities and markets

Economic & financial indicators

Notes from underground

Alice Tan Ridley knew how to make New York’s subways ring

Obituary

All grown up: Saudi Arabia’s surprising transformation  

Current topics

World

Business & economics

Opinion

In depth

Culture & society

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Our A-to-Zs

Your guide to the agonies of office life 

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Are plastics greener than they seem?

Also this week, birthright citizenship, Donald Trump’s economics, liberation theology, company lunches

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From the May 10th 2025 edition

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