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Guyana's president, Irfaan Ali; Barbados' prime minister, Mia Mottley; and Jamaica's prime minister, Andrew Holness, during an emergency meeting in Jamaica on March 11. (Photo: Collin Reid / AP)
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1. Following PM’s resignation, Haitian politicians rush to form transitional government
Under pressure, Haitian Prime Minister Ariel Henry announced in a video address on Monday that he will resign, but only after a transitional council is put in place. Once formed, the council will temporarily assume the duties of Haiti’s president and will name a prime minister to replace Henry as soon as possible.
The council will be composed of seven voting members representing Haiti’s major political parties and two observational nonvoting members.
Henry’s resignation and the council’s creation came out of Monday’s meeting in Jamaica, where U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and other global leaders discussed how to restore order to a country where civil unrest is out of control.
In recent weeks, armed gangs have taken over the airport and port of Haiti’s capital city, Port-au-Prince. Haiti has become increasingly unstable since the 2021 assassination of President Jovenel Moïse. National elections have not been held since 2016.
Henry attended the meeting on Monday by video from Puerto Rico, where he’s been stranded since a diplomatic trip to Kenya two weeks ago. In Nairobi, he signed an agreement saying that Kenya would deploy 1,000 police officers to the embattled Caribbean nation. Kenya said on Tuesday, however, that it’s pausing the deployment amid Henry’s resignation.
In Jamaica, Blinken announced that the Department of Defense will double its security funding to Haiti, and that the U.S. will give $33 million in humanitarian funding to Haiti.
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2. Chef José Andrés’ aid on way to Gaza amid increasing starvation
A ship with aid collected by World Central Kitchen, a charity founded by celebrity chef José Andrés, is on its way to the Gaza Strip. The aid is being transported by Spanish aid group Open Arms and is expected to reach Gaza in two to three days.
Business publication Fast Company calls World Central Kitchen “a kind of food version of Médecins Sans Frontières—Doctors Without Borders.” Along with operating in Gaza, the organization is engaged in aid efforts across the world, including in Ukraine and Chile.
By mid-February, World Central Kitchen had already sent over 34 million meals into Gaza using aid trucks and airdrops, accounting for 62% of all aid provided by non-governmental organizations in Gaza up to that point, according to the charity.
In Gaza, the situation is growing more dire by the day — at least 20 children have died from starvation, and in northern Gaza, one in six children under 2 years old is acutely malnourished.
Israel continues to limit the amount of aid going into Gaza. In recent weeks, the United Nations’ aid organization has only been able to get 150 or fewer aid trucks into the region per day, half of the 300 daily trucks it says Gazans need.
In last week’s State of the Union address, President Joe Biden announced that the U.S. will build a temporary floating dock on Gaza’s shore to help aid get in, which the Department of Defense estimates could take two months to build.
Since the Hamas-led attacks on Oct. 7, the United States has quietly approved more than 100 foreign military sales to Israel.
In other Gaza-Israel news:
- Biden is considering conditioning U.S. aid to Israel if Netanyahu moves ahead with his intended invasion of Rafah, according to U.S. officials.
- A 19-year-old American Israeli soldier who went missing during the Oct. 7 Hamas attacks was confirmed dead on Tuesday by the Israel Defense Forces.
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3. A Nobel-winning writer is being sued under China’s patriotism law
Mo Yan, who won China’s first Nobel Prize for literature in 2012, is being sued for not being patriotic enough.
The high-profile lawsuit has prompted heated discussion in China about nationalism in recent weeks.
A blogger named Wu Wanzheng filed the lawsuit against the writer last month under the 2018 “Heroes and Martyrs Protection Law.” The law prohibits criticism of the folklore surrounding the 1949 formation of the People’s Republic by Communist revolutionaries. Violations are punishable by up to three years in prison.
Wu says that Mo’s books denigrate the Communist Party’s reputation and its former leader Mao Zedong.
Related: On Jan. 1, the Chinese government implemented the Patriotic Education Law, which aims to promote national unity and counter “historical nihilism,” or skepticism over the Communist Party, in schools and churches.
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In other news
- That doesn’t sound great: According to U.S. intelligence, the United States is facing an “increasingly fragile world order” due to global powers “challenging long-standing rules of the international system.” [Reuters]
- The White House could soon announce a $300 million aid package to Ukraine, which would provide a number of “Army Tactical Missile Systems” to the country’s military, according to U.S. officials. [POLITICO]
- Meanwhile, House Democrats are attempting to force a vote on Biden’s $95 billion aid package for Ukraine, Taiwan, and Israel using a “discharge petition,” which is not often successful. The bill has been stalled in Congress under Speaker of the House Mike Johnson. [Associated Press]
- Inflammatory influencer Andrew Tate and his brother, who are dual U.S.-British nationals, were arrested in Romania on Monday on charges of sexual aggression in a U.K. case. [Deutsche Welle]
- Greta Thunberg and 40 other climate activists blocked the doors to Swedish parliament on Monday, pressing for sweeping climate reform. [PBS NewsHour]
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Say that again
“I am very conscious of the fact that I am yet another man standing at this podium addressing you,” said Achim Steiner, the head of the U.N. Development Program. He was at a meeting on Monday promoting equality for women and girls, which opened with five male speakers in a row. [Associated Press]
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‘Inflation is like the temperature of the patient’
“It’s high inflation — fever — [that] makes it a bad thing,” says economist Monica Garcia-Perez.
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What we’re cooking
Spanish food is probably my favorite cuisine that, for whatever reason, I don’t actually cook. I studied abroad in Barcelona when I was in college, and my señora, Maricarmen, made many incredible dishes: crispy fried zucchini; a wonderful, creamy mushroom-and-ham pasta; and, of course, Spanish tortilla.
I’d imagine my life would be improved by about 239% if I added any of those dishes to my repertoire.
One of the Spanish dishes I do make, though, also happens to be the easiest: pan con tomate.
It’s so simple, it doesn’t need a recipe: Just toast a few slices of crusty bread, rub a cut tomato on there, drizzle olive oil and sprinkle salt over it, and eat. I’ll turn it into a full meal by putting sardines or manchego cheese on top and pairing it with olives and a side salad (as seen in the below photo from — full disclosure — July 2021).
If you’re feeling more ambitious than rubbing tomato on bread, you could do worse than any dish off of this very good-looking list of recipes from the aforementioned Chef José Andrés, who hails from Spain. I’ll for sure be making those cauliflower fritters and cava and pomegranate cocktails in the future.
—Laura Adamczyk, staff writer
Thanks for reading. We’ll see you tomorrow.
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