The New York Times looking at the world in 2022 for the last days of July

If you missed it previously

July 19

A police officer gave water to a British soldier guarding Buckingham Palace yesterday.Matt Dunham/Associated Press

Britain sizzles under a heat wave

Temperatures in Britain neared a record high yesterday as blistering heat swept the country. By midafternoon, Wales had recorded its highest-ever temperature: The thermometer hit 37.1 degrees Celsius, almost 99 degrees Fahrenheit.

Infrastructure is under strain. Some train services were canceled, while others were running at reduced speeds in case the tracks buckled. Flights at Britain’s largest air base were halted over fears that the tar could melt. And the chains of a Victorian-era bridge were wrapped in foil to keep cracks from expanding and threatening the bridge’s stability.

Global warming has exacerbated Europe’s heat waves, which scientists say are increasing in frequency and intensity at a faster rate than in almost any other part of the planet. So have changes in the jet stream, scientists say.

Yesterday, the U.N. secretary general warned that humanity faced a “collective suicide” over the climate crisis. But the top candidates to be Britain’s next prime minister appear to be more focused on the cost-of-living crisis than on the government’s ambitious targets to reach “net zero” carbon emissions by 2050.

What’s next: Experts say Britain’s 2019 record, 38.7 degrees Celsius (about 102 degrees Fahrenheit), could fall today. And few homes have air-conditioning.

Europe: Several areas of France have experienced record-breaking temperatures, and the country is battling wildfires. Farmers in Northern Italy harvested tomatoes early to account for the heat. And in Spain, where at least 30 wildfires are burning, one blaze surrounded a train, and a firefighter died.

Paris: The French capital, which is vulnerable to heat waves, is trying to become more climate-friendly. But a plan to cut down more than 20 trees around the Eiffel Tower to build a huge garden has sparked outrage.

In dismissing two top officials, President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine suggested they had turned a blind eye to traitors in sensitive positions.David Guttenfelder for The New York Times

Ukraine seeks to root out collaborators

Volodymyr Zelensky, the Ukrainian president, said the country had opened 651 treason investigations into employees of the country’s law enforcement agencies and others who were suspected of working with Russia.

Russian sympathizers are reporting the locations of Ukrainian targets like garrisons or ammunition depots, officials say. Priests have sheltered Russian officers and informed on Ukrainian activists in Russian-occupied areas. One official said collaborators had even removed explosives from bridges, allowing Russian troops to cross.

Ukraine’s shadow war against Russian collaborators came into sharp relief on Sunday, when Zelensky dismissed two senior law enforcement officials. He did not accuse them of betrayal, but suggested that they had turned a blind eye to traitors in sensitive positions.

Zelensky specifically cited Ukraine’s security service, an unwieldy force of 27,000 personnel, the largest in Europe. Many intelligence chiefs graduated from K.G.B. schools, and Western allies say that the service has too many areas of operation, leaving it open to corruption and prone to straying from its spy-hunting role.

Context: In Crimea, which Moscow annexed in 2014, and in Ukraine’s east, where fighting has recently intensified, deep cultural and historical ties with Russia have translated to pockets of support for Moscow. The threat has plagued Ukraine for years but has become more acute during the war.

The E.U.: Foreign ministers added gold to the list of banned Russian imports and approved 500 million euros to reimburse member states for weapons sent to Ukraine. That brings the bloc’s total spending on Ukrainian military aid to 2.5 billion euros.

Coronavirus cases are rising in Chicago, but the city’s top doctor said there was no reason for residents to let the virus control their lives.Jamie Kelter Davis for The New York Times

Covid cases rise in the U.S.

Covid-19 is surging again across the U.S. as BA.5 — the most transmissible coronavirus variant yet — drives a wave of new cases.

But many public health doctors say the wave is cause for caution, not alarm: Hospitalizations have climbed 20 percent in the past two weeks, but deaths are rising only modestly. One expert said the nation had entered a newer and less lethal stage, in which vaccines and treatments have significantly improved chances of survival.

The public health authorities are also hesitating to impose new restrictions, noting that most Americans are meeting the new wave with a collective shrug. Even residents of what were once among the most cautious places in the country are shunning masks, socializing indoors and moving on from an endless barrage of warnings.

Retirements: Dr. Anthony Fauci, who saw the U.S. through the worst of the pandemic, said he would “almost certainly” retire by January 2025, the end of President Biden’s current term.

Monkeypox: Patients in New York City, the center of U.S. cases, described excruciating pain and a struggle to find care.

Luis Antonio Rojas for The New York Times

Despite President Andrés Manuel López Obrador’s campaign promises, Mexico’s poor are only getting poorer. His government’s welfare policies are only worsening pandemic strife.

What you may have missed this week of July 25 -July 31

July 25

The entrance to the grain terminal at the port in Odesa, Ukraine. Daniel Berehulak for The New York Times

Russia seeks African support

Russia’s top diplomat, Sergey Lavrov, began a tour of four African countries yesterday. He is visiting Egypt, Ethiopia, Uganda and the Republic of Congo this week, where he seeks to blame the West for war-related grain shortages, which have sparked fears of famine.

Lavrov’s visit follows a major development in the growing crisis. On Friday, Russia agreed to a deal brokered by the U.N. and Turkey, which would allow Ukraine to export its grain.

But Russian missiles struck the Ukrainian port city of Odesa, a critical juncture for exports, less than a day after the pact was signed. The strikes raised questions about Moscow’s intention to stick to the agreement.

Context: Many governments in Africa and in the Middle East have tried to stay out of the conflict, seeking to maintain access to Russian exports, despite pressure from the West. No African countries have joined Western sanctions against Moscow.

Azovstal: The Times took a close look at the 80-day siege at the steel plant in Mariupol, where a relentless Russian assault met fierce Ukrainian resistance.

Analysis: The downfall of Mario Draghi, Italy’s prime minister, has raised concerns across Europe about whether populist movements will erode unity against Russian aggression.

Atrocities: Russian forces have tortured and beaten civilians in the areas of southern Ukraine that they control, part of a series of abuses that may amount to war crimes, Human Rights Watch said in a report this weekend.

New York City began offering the monkeypox vaccine late last month but ran out with just about 1,000 doses available.Kena Betancur/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

Monkeypox declared a global emergency

The World Health Organization has declared monkeypox a global health emergency. In a few weeks, the disease — long a concern in some African countries — has spread to 75 countries.

In declaring the disease a “public health emergency of international concern,” Dr. Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the W.H.O.’s director general, overruled a panel of advisers, who could not reach a decision.

The declaration signals a public health risk requiring a coordinated international response. That could lead member countries to invest more in their response to outbreaks and encourage nations to share vaccines, treatments and other key resources.

Details: The U.S., Britain and Spain have each recorded about 3,000 cases, and monkeypox has infected more than 16,000 people worldwide, overwhelmingly men who have sex with men. Many infected people report no known source of infection, indicating undetected community spread.

Context: This is the seventh public health emergency since 2007. Currently, the W.H.O. designation is used to describe two other diseases: Covid-19 and polio.

What’s next: One expert estimated that it might take a year or more to control the outbreak. By then, the virus is likely to have infected hundreds of thousands of people and may have permanently entrenched itself in some countries.

Response: The outbreak has galvanized many in the L.G.B.T.Q. community, who argue that monkeypox has not received enough attention, reminiscent of the early days of H.I.V.

A brass plaque near an unused entrance to the University of Strasbourg’s anatomy building is all that commemorates 86 Jews murdered at a professor’s behest.Dmitry Kostyukov for The New York Times

A reckoning at a French university

A recent report detailed medical crimes committed at the University of Strasbourg during World War II, shedding light on history that had been scrubbed from official memory.

The 500-page report, released in May, detailed closer ties with the Natzweiler-Struthof concentration camp, the only one on French soil, than previously thought.

The report, which deeply recasts the way the university views itself, illuminated crimes committed by three professors who used the camp to procure experiment subjects. The report also identified more victims of their extensive medical experiments.

Details: From 1941 to 1944, professors on the medical faculty forced at least 250 people from concentration or death camps to undergo experiments. Some involved chemical weapons, like mustard gas, or deadly diseases, like typhus. And 86 Jews brought from Auschwitz were murdered for a planned skeleton collection.

History: Germany annexed the Alsace region of France in 1940 and poured in money and resources to transform the university into a model Nazi institution: the Reichsuniversität Strassburg.

Context: In 2015, when a book claimed that there were still anatomical remains of Jewish victims on campus, furious school officials strenuously denied it. But that same year, a Jewish doctor in Strasbourg found such remains in a locked storage room. After the discovery, the university commissioned the report in 2016.

July 26

Ukrainian forces are currently about 48 kilometers (about 30 miles) from Kherson at their closest point.Daniel Berehulak for The New York Times

Ukraine to mount a counteroffensive

Ukrainian forces are preparing for a high-stakes counteroffensive to retake Kherson, a crucial Russian stronghold in southern Ukraine. Moscow uses the vital port city as a base to launch attacks across a large part of Ukrainian territory.

The Ukraine attack would be one of the most ambitious and significant military actions of the war. Ukraine is destroying Russian ammunition depots, hitting command posts and targeting supply lines. And Ukrainian troops have liberated 44 towns and villages along the border areas, about 15 percent of the territory, according to local officials.

The counteroffensive could change the balance of power in the south. The region is critical to Ukraine’s plan to resume grain exports across the Black Sea despite a recent Russian missile attack on the port of Odesa.

Background: Kherson was the first city to fall to Russian forces in the war. Regaining control could restore momentum to Ukraine and give its troops a much-needed morale boost.

Ukraine’s economy: Fuel prices are up by 90 percent from a year ago. Food costs have surged by over 35 percent. Over all, prices have jumped by more than 21 percent, fueled by Russian attacks on critical infrastructure and the occupation of industrial and agricultural regions.

Energy: Gazprom, the Russian state-owned energy giant, said it would halve the amount of natural gas it sent to Germany through the Nord Stream 1 pipeline. The flow of gas had already been cut to 40 percent of capacity.

Culture: Britain will host Eurovision next year in place of Ukraine, this year’s winner. And raves have returned to Kyiv despite a curfew imposed amid the war.

Pope Francis offered a sweeping apology to Indigenous people on their native land in Canada yesterday.Ian Willms for The New York Times

Pope apologizes to Indigenous people in Canada

Pope Francis apologized for the “evil” inflicted on Indigenous children in Canada as he visited the site of a former church-run residential school.

“I humbly beg forgiveness,” he said to a large crowd of Indigenous people. He spoke at a site in Alberta that is notorious among survivors of abus e, and said his remarks were intended for “every Native community and person.”

Roughly 130 such facilities were gruesome centers of sexual, mental and physical abuse, forced assimilation and cultural devastation for over a century. Thousands died. The schools separated children from parents, erased languages and used Christianity as a weapon to break Indigenous cultures and communities.

Reaction: The pontiff’s apology fulfilled a critical demand of many survivors, who have long called on the Catholic Church to take responsibility for its role in running the abusive institutions. “Today means hope and healing,” one survivor said.

Background: From the 1880s through the 1990s, Canada forcibly removed at least 150,000 Indigenous children from their homes and sent them to the schools. Catholic orders, which have only recently begun to open their archives, were responsible for running 60 percent to 70 percent of the schools.

Analysis: Francis is a critic of proselytizing and colonialism. He said he was “deeply sorry” — a remark that prompted applause and approving shouts — for the ways in which “many Christians supported the colonizing mentality of the powers that oppressed the Indigenous peoples.”

Rishi Sunak, center, and Liz Truss, right, sparred in a BBC debate yesterday.Jacob King/Press Association, via Associated Press

Thatcher looms large in U.K. race

Either Rishi Sunak, a former top finance official, or Liz Truss, the foreign secretary, will be the next prime minister of Britain.

Each candidate has tried to adopt the style of Margaret Thatcher, the former prime minister whose right-wing policies remain popular among the Conservative voters that Sunak and Truss hope to win over. They are casting themselves as the heir to Thatcher’s free-market, low-tax, deregulatory revolution at home and her robust defense of Western democracy abroad.

But experts on Thatcher say the candidates are cherry-picking the legacy of the woman known as the Iron Lady. They are emphasizing the crowd-pleasing elements while glossing over the less appetizing ones, like tax increases in 1981, during the depths of a recession, at a time when she was determined to curb runaway inflation.

Sunak: He kicked off his campaign over the weekend in Grantham, Thatcher’s birthplace, and described his agenda as “common-sense Thatcherism.” His approach echoes Thatcher’s belief in balancing the books and her dislike of borrowing, which she viewed as a burden on future generations.

Sunak served in Boris Johnson’s government and is responsible for some of the economic policies he now proposes to sweep away.

Truss: She is channeling Thatcher in a more stylistic way and has modeled her appearances on the international stage closely on the Iron Lady’s. Truss has copied famous images, including one of Thatcher at the turret of a tank in West Germany.

She has even taken to wearing a silk pussy-bow blouse, a familiar Thatcher look, which could risk self-parody. Truss has rejected the comparison, which she casts as gendered.

July 27

E.U. officials agreed on a deal that encourages members to cut gas consumption by 15 percent.Johanna Geron/Reuters

E.U. agrees to cut gas use

European Union energy ministers reached a deal yesterday to reduce their natural gas consumption by 15 percent, an effort to blunt Moscow’s ability to use energy as leverage.

The deal is initially voluntary, and some member countries are exempt. Nations will have to agree that there’s a broader energy supply emergency to make the measures mandatory.

Still, the quick compromise signified an important step in managing the E.U.’s dependency on Russia. It is intended to avert an energy meltdown as the Kremlin tries to punish Europe for its support of Ukraine.

The agreement came less than 24 hours after the Russian gas company Gazprom said that it would further reduce the amount of natural gas it sends to Germany through the Nord Stream 1 pipeline. Russian gas, which supplies 40 percent of the E.U.’s consumption, was less than one-third the normal average in June.

Germany: The E.U.’s largest economy is turning to liquefied natural gas, which it had once disregarded, to keep warm through the winter.

Space: Russia said it would leave the International Space Station after 2024, a potential end to two decades of space cooperation with the U.S.

Diplomacy: Lawyers for the U.S. basketball star Brittney Griner made a case for leniency yesterday. Griner, who is detained in Russia on drug charges, may testify today. In Britain, the Foreign Office froze the assets of a blogger yesterday for his pro-Kremlin propaganda.

Global inflation is rising more rapidly and broadly than the I.M.F. anticipated earlier this year.Diego Ibarra Sanchez for The New York Times

An imminent global recession?

The International Monetary Fund said the world could be on the brink of a recession.

The economies of the U.S., China and Europe have slowed more sharply than anticipated, the group said in a new report. It said that the probability of a recession starting in one of the Group of 7 advanced economies was now nearly 15 percent, four times its usual level.

Global economic prospects have darkened amid war in Ukraine, inflation and a resurgent pandemic. If the threats continue to intensify, the world economy will face one of its weakest years since 1970, a period of intense global stagflation.

Growth: The I.M.F. downgraded global forecasts from its April projections, predicting that output would fall from 6.1 percent last year to 3.2 percent this year. Growth is expected to slow even further in 2023 as central banks raise interest rates to tame inflation.

Inflation: The I.M.F. expects prices to rise 6.6 percent in rich countries and 9.5 percent in emerging markets and developing economies.

The U.S.: The Fed is expected to raise interest rates by three-quarters of a percentage point today. The I.M.F. said some indicators suggested that the U.S. was in a “technical” recession, though economists say the country doesn’t meet the formal definition.

Most major political parties in Tunisia urged supporters to boycott the Constitutional referendum.Zoubeir Souissi/Reuters

A new Constitution in Tunisia

Tunisians have approved a new Constitution that cements the one-man rule instituted by President Kais Saied, according to the results of a referendum on Monday.

The referendum could spell the end of a young democracy. The Arab Spring uprisings began in Tunisia more than a decade ago. At the time, the country was internationally lauded as the only democracy to survive the revolts.

But in the years since, many Tunisians have come to view the government as corrupt and inadequate. In 2019, frustration with political paralysis and economic devastation led many to look to Saied, a political outsider at the time. That same anger drove some voters to vote yes on the referendum this week.

“If you tell me about democracy or human rights and all that stuff, we haven’t seen any of it in the last 10 years,” a 50-year-old bank employee said. He said he did not mind the Constitution’s concentration of powers in the hands of the president. “A boat needs one captain,” he said. “Personally, I need one captain.”

Context: The Constitution was approved by 94.6 percent of voters, according to the results released yesterday. But most major parties boycotted the vote to avoid lending it greater legitimacy.

Background: Saied suspended Parliament and fired his prime minister a year ago, effectively giving himself almost absolute power.

Details: The new Constitution demotes the Legislature and the judiciary to something more akin to civil servants. It weakens Parliament and gives the president ultimate authority to form a government, appoint judges and present laws.

July 28

Paul Whelan, left, and Brittney Griner, both detained by Russia, could be released in exchange for Viktor Bout.Pool photos by Alexander Zemlianichenko/

U.S. proposes a prisoner swap

The U.S. offered a prisoner swap to Russia: Viktor Bout, a notorious Russian arms dealer, for Brittney Griner, the W.N.B.A. star, and Paul Whelan, a former Marine.

Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Wednesday that he would speak to Russia’s foreign minister, Sergey Lavrov, for the first time since Russia invaded Ukraine about a “substantial proposal” to free Griner and Whelan. The U.S. State Department says the two were wrongfully detained.

Blinken’s comments came the same day that Griner, who has been detained in Russia on drug charges since February, testified in court. She said that she had been tossed into a bewildering legal system with little explanation of what was happening. Here are live updates.

Background: Bout, who is known as the “Merchant of Death,” is serving a 25-year federal prison sentence for conspiring to sell weapons to people who said they planned to kill Americans. Whelan was sentenced in Russia in 2020 to 16 years in prison on espionage charges.

Energy: Russia cut the flow of natural gas to Germany yesterday. Germany, the E.U.’s largest economy, is now turning to liquefied natural gas to keep warm through the winter.

Fighting: Ukrainian missiles struck a key bridge in Kherson as Russia increased attacks across southern Ukraine. The U.S. estimated that more than 75,000 Russian forces have been killed or injured.

Dissent: Russian opposition figures face a difficult choice: Stay and risk imprisonment or try to keep up the resistance from abroad.

Lufthansa’s canceled flights left more than 130,000 travelers scrambling.Daniel Roland/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

Lufthansa cancels flights

Lufthansa Airlines canceled virtually all its flights in and out of Frankfurt and Munich yesterday after around 3,000 employees walked off the job to protest for better wages. Nearly 130,000 travelers were stranded.

The protest was scheduled to end at 6 a.m. this morning, but the wage fight is likely to continue. A union official said that salaries were “not high enough to account for inflation,” while Lufthansa outlined pay increases that it had already offered.

This strike is just the latest travel interruption in Europe. Airport and other transport employees have been striking throughout the summer to demand better staffing and pay.

And even as international Covid-related restrictions continue to wane, the pandemic has left deep scars across the travel industry: Airports and airlines who let employees go during the pandemic are now struggling to meet a recent surge in demand.

Airports: Heathrow, in London, and Schiphol, in Amsterdam, have both tried to limit the number of passengers in August. Heathrow’s announcement came after photographs of luggage piled up at the airport circulated on social media.

Tips: A flight attendant offered suggestions for avoiding airline chaos this summer.

Girogos Kontarinis/Eurokinissi, via Associated Press

A Greek opposition leader was targeted with malicious spyware, the first attempted hack detected against a European Parliament member.

Harley Palangchao/Associated Press

At least four people were killed when a 7.0 magnitude earthquake hit the northern Philippines yesterday morning.

July 29

The legislation’s most immediate effect will be supercharging the growth of wind and other clean energy industries. Luke Sharrett for The New York Times

U.S. debates climate and the economy

The gross domestic product of the U.S. shrank again, fueling fears of a recession.

G.D.P. fell 0.2 percent in the second quarter after a 0.4 percent decline in the first. That means by one common but unofficial definition, the U.S. economy has entered a recession, two years after it emerged from the last one.

News of the back-to-back contractions heightened a debate in Washington over whether a recession had begun and, if so, whether President Biden was to blame.

Democrats are increasingly focused on taming inflation. They argue there’s one possible step forward. It’s the energy, tax and health care agreement that was announced Wednesday after Senator Joe Manchin reversed his opposition to the bill.

If it can get past Republican opposition, the $369 billion package would be the most ambitious action ever undertaken by the U.S. to combat climate change. It comes during an abnormally hot summer, and Democrats hope it will pass ahead of fall’s midterm elections. Here are seven key provisions of the bill.

Context: Most economists still don’t think the economy meets the formal definition of a recession. But for many, the label matters less than the economic reality: Growth is slowing, businesses are pulling back and families are struggling to keep up with rapidly rising prices.

A Ukrainian tank in a camouflaged position in the southeast Kherson region.David Guttenfelder for The New York Times

Ukraine’s growing counteroffensive

Ukraine said it had a limited window to dislodge Russia’s forces in the south as it prepares for a counteroffensive in and around Kherson, a strategic port city.

Ukrainian forces have been preparing for a broad counteroffensive in the south. Now, Russian troops around Kherson are increasingly isolated from eastern strongholds after coordinated Ukrainian strikes disrupted crucial resupply routes.

But Russia is hurrying to bolster its forces in the region and to solidify control of the territory it holds. The Ukrainian military said that Russia was moving “the maximum number” of forces to the southern front in the Kherson region.

In the north, Russia renewed its assault yesterday, conducting strikes from the Black Sea and Belarus that injured at least 15 people in and around Kyiv, Ukrainian authorities said. And missiles continued to rain down on Kharkiv, in the northeast.

In the east: Ukrainian forces continue to hold their defensive lines while targeting key Russian strongholds.

Culture: Painting will not stop missiles. Music will not end suffering. But culture is not powerless, and a visit to Ukraine reaffirms what it can do at its best.

Grain: Ukraine’s harvest is underway, swelling the country’s backlog of grain. Some farmers have their doubts about an international agreement to ease a blockade on grain shipments through the Black Sea.

“You’re telling me; I have to go around in a wheelchair, eh?” Pope Francis said in a speech. “But that’s how it is, that’s life.”Ian Willms for The New York Times

Pope Francis speaks for the old

Pope Francis, 85, has long spotlighted older people and regularly denounces how they are treated like garbage in a “throwaway culture.”

On a trip to Canada this week, as he relied on aides to get in and out of wheelchairs, Francis used his own visible frailty to again demand dignity and respect for other older people.

In Alberta, Francis said that there needed to be “a future in which the elderly are not cast aside because, from a ‘practical’ standpoint, they are no longer useful.”

Analysis: The world is aging rapidly. A U.N. report predicted that by 2050, people age 60 and over will exceed people under 15. “Never as many as now, never as much risk of being discarded,” Francis said.

Context: Francis — who has had numerous health issues — is not the first pope to make the dignity of the old a central concern of his later papacy. His immediate predecessors ailed in public or resigned citing advanced age.

W.H.O. Declares Monkeypox Spread a Global Health Emergency

There have been more than 16,000 cases in 75 countries, overwhelmingly among men who have sex with men.

July 30

After Clash, Manchin and Schumer Rushed to Reset Climate and Tax Deal

The West Virginia Democrat said he had relented and agreed to sign on to a climate, energy and tax package after returning to negotiations to draft a version that would combat inflation.