👋 Mbote!*
Welcome to Friday, where the world reacts to the election of Chicago-born Robert Prevost as Pope Leo XIV, WWII Victory Day celebrations kick off in Moscow, and today’s quiz question comes from a soccer fan in Norway. Meanwhile, Tarik Ismail in Daraj reflects on the meaning of the strange viral video of Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa shooting hoops.
[*Lingala, DRC and Republic of the Congo]
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🗞️ FRONT PAGE
The U.S. daily Chicago Sun-Times proudly lends its cover to Robert Prevost after the Windy City native was elected as “da pope” — a nod to the clichéd Chicagoan use of “da” in place of “the.” Prevost, who chose Leo XIV as his papal name, addressed the crowd gathered in St. Peter’s Square with the words “Peace be with all of you!” Leaders worldwide welcomed his message of unity and dialogue, while the international press featured “Il Papa Americano.” Check out our collection of front pages here.
🌎 7 THINGS TO KNOW RIGHT NOW
• Pope Leo XIV holds debut mass as first-ever American pope. Newly-elected Pope Leo XIV held mass in the Sistine Chapel on Friday morning for the cardinals who elected him, marking his first mass since becoming the leader of the Catholic Church. Cardinal Robert Prevost, who chose the name Pope Leo XIV after his election on Thursday, became the first-ever American Pope, hailing from Chicago before spending more than two decades as a missionary in Peru, where he was granted citizenship in 2015. More recently, Leo had been appointed by his predecessor, Pope Francis, to lead the Dicastery for Bishops, a position in the Vatican that vets and selects new bishops. He’s widely seen as an ideological and temperamental successor of Francis within the church, though he has also kept a low public profile and was a relative unknown compared to other candidates for the position.
• Chinese, Brazilian leaders attend Victory Day celebrations in Moscow. Russian President Vladimir Putin began Moscow’s Victory Day celebrations on Friday morning with more than 20 world leaders, including Chinese President Xi Jinping and Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva visiting for the ceremony. Putin had called for a three-day truce with Ukraine during the celebrations, but both Ukrainian and Russian officials said the ceasefire had been broken within just hours of it going into effect. Meanwhile, Ukraine’s parliament ratified a minerals deal with the U.S. that gives Washington access to the largely untapped strategic resources in Ukraine while setting up an investment fund for reconstruction of Ukraine after the war.
• Fighting continues across India-Pakistan border. India and Pakistan have continued to exchange missile, artillery and drone strikes across the shared border for the third day since the nuclear powers began the worst armed fighting between them in nearly three decades. Islamabad denied claims by New Delhi that “military stations” had been targeted in Pakistani attacks, with the Pakistani Information Minister saying the country had only acted in self-defense so far. The fighting, which has so far left 48 dead, began within weeks of a deadly attack on tourists in India-administered Kashmir which New Delhi blames Pakistan for, but which Islamabad denies involvement in.
• UK, U.S. reach trade deal to lighten tariff impacts. The United Kingdom became what President Donald Trump called “the first of many” to reach a trade deal with the U.S. in an effort to limit the impact of tariffs. Though the initial agreement doesn’t reduce the 10% tariffs on the UK, it does lift them on certain strategic sectors including the auto and steel industries. In exchange, the U.S. will get sales opportunities for beef, ethanol and other agricultural products in the UK. Still, analysts said that the substantive benefits of the deal would be relatively limited given how widespread the effects of the tariffs are expected to be.
• Global stocks hold steady ahead of China-U.S. trade talks. Stocks around the world saw modest gains as investors hope for progress in U.S.-China trade talks over the weekend. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng rose by 0.3% while Germany’s DAX gained 0.6% on Friday, and futures for the S&P 500 and Dow Jones Industrial Average in the U.S. held mostly steady Thursday. This comes as top officials from the U.S. and China are set to meet on Saturday in Switzerland to begin hammering out a trade deal.
• Panasonic to lay off 10,000 employees globally. Japanese electronics company Panasonic announced it would be cutting 10,000 jobs through March 2026, with half of the cuts coming from outside of Japan. The cuts for the electronics producer, which supplies batteries to automakers like Tesla and also works in the housing and energy sectors, constitutes about a 4% reduction in the workforce of nearly 230,000.
• News Quiz! A man from Norway bartered his way to a ticket to a Europa League semifinal match that will see local club Bodø/Glimt face Tottenham Hotspur. What did the man reportedly trade for his ticket?
A. A mobile sauna
B. His Tesla
C. 11 pounds of fish
D. His shaven beard
[Answer below]
#️⃣ BY THE NUMBERS
-21%
China’s exports to the U.S. plunged to $33 billion following President Donald Trump’s 145% tariffs on most Chinese imports, according to customs data released on Friday, which represents a decrease of 21% compared to April 2024. While China’s overall exports grew 8.1% in U.S. dollar terms, boosted by shipments to Southeast Asia and Europe, the sharp decline in U.S. trade underscores the economic toll of the tariff war as both nations prepare for de-escalation talks in Geneva on Saturday.
📰 IN OTHER NEWS
🏀 The video circulating of the Syrian leader’s basketball spectacle coincides with a bloody spectacle carried out by the Sunni factions against the Alawite and Druze Syrians.
— DARAJ
🌐 The 80th anniversary of victory in World War II shines a light on the world’s current fractures, because in addition to the war in Ukraine, which pits the allies of 1945 against each other, there’s Donald Trump’s wild card.
— FRANCE INTER
🙊 Despite startling breakthroughs, the first words and signs of great apes are rarely publicly celebrated by scientists. Why?
— UNDARK
📣 VERBATIM
“The picture of the world’s richest man killing the world’s poorest children is not a pretty one.”
— Bill Gates pledged to give away $200 billion via his charitable foundation by 2045 in an interview with Reuters, in which the U.S. businessman and philanthropist blamed entrepreneur and fellow billionaire Elon Musk for ordering huge cuts to the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) budget through his Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE). Musk had publicly bragged about his plan to feed USAID “into the wood chipper” in February — around 80% of USAID programs have been cancelled in March by the U.S. administration. Gates said his money was aimed to help eradicate diseases like polio and malaria, end preventable deaths among women and children, and reduce global poverty. The Microsoft co-founder added that progress would not be possible without government support, and warned of a reversal to decades of progress in reducing mortality worldwide.
Let us know what’s happening in your corner of the world!
✍️ Newsletter by Jacob Shropshire & Cecilia Laurent Monpetit
Quiz Answer: C. Torbjørn Eide, a manager at a fish farm in Senja, Norway, offered up 11 lbs (5 kg) of semi-dried fish in exchange for a ticket to a semifinal soccer match between Bodø/Glimt and Tottenham Hotspur. “We produce Norway’s best boknafisk [partially dried fish], and you probably can’t get it in Bodø city. So I thought maybe someone would want it,” Eide told a local broadcaster after making the trade with a man whose brother wasn’t able to go to the match.
