4 NEWS
THE WEEK 7 May 2022The main stories...
It wasn’t all bad
The war on the ground may be entering an attritional, static
period, said The Independent – but the global situation is
“unmistakably” escalating. In the latest signs
of the war’s expanding scope, the UK said last
week that it will deploy 8,000 extra troops to
eastern Europe, and announced further
military aid. Finland and Sweden seem “on the
verge of joining Nato”; the EU is planning to
ban Russian oil (see page 6); even reluctant
Germany is sending tanks to Ukraine. The US
is stepping up its efforts as well, said The
Washington Post. Congress is likely to approve
Biden’s $33bn package, of which $20bn will
be military aid, in the hope of helping Ukraine
launch counter-attacks in the coming months.Why is Russia’s army failing? Partly, it’s because much of
Moscow’s $250bn defence budget is “squandered or stolen”,
said The Economist. But there are other issues, too. The fact
that Putin and his top commanders kept their invasion
plans from senior officers reflects “a crippling lack of trust”.
Russian generals have made tactical errors; troops have
grown disaffected. For Putin, all this adds up to a
humiliation. “Unfortunately, it also leaves a nuclear-armed
power with a point to prove.”Boris Johnson hailed Ukraine’s resistance
to Russia as its “finest hour” this week,
as he announced an extra £300m in UK
military aid. In the first address by a
world leader to Ukraine’s parliament since
Russia launched its invasion, the PM said
Ukrainians had “exploded the myth of
[Vladimir] Putin’s invincibility”. The aid- including a radar system, GPS jammers,
drones and night-vision devices – is due
to be dispatched within weeks. In the US,
President Biden asked Congress to
approve $33bn in aid for Ukraine.
As Russia struggled to make breakthroughs in its offensive
in Ukraine’s east, Putin ramped up his nuclear threats to the
West. Kyiv claimed it had killed a ninth Russian general in an
artillery strike near the northeastern city of Izyum – an attack
which reportedly also injured Valery Gerasimov, the chief of
general staff of the Russian military. In Mariupol, 156 people
were evacuated from a besieged steelworks where they had
been trapped for weeks. Survivors described horrifying
conditions at the site, where 200 civilians remained this week.What happened What the editorials said
A dangerous escalation
Parliament has always had its “share of misfits, rascals
and rogues”, said The Times. But there does seem to be
“something particularly rotten about the present
cohort”. Two days before Parish’s resignation, his
colleague Imran Ahmad Khan finally stood down
after being convicted of sexual assault. Two MPs
are awaiting trial; others have had the whip
withdrawn owing to allegations that they have
sexually harassed or bullied staff. The spate of
cases has led some to suggest that conduct in
Parliament has actually grown worse since the
so-called “Pestminster” scandals of 2017, said
The Guardian. That’s debatable: the optimistic
view is that female MPs today are more likely to
call out unacceptable behaviour that they would
previously have tolerated. But it’s certainly clear
that things haven’t improved much.It’s also evident that this is about more than just a few “bad
apples” in Parliament, said The Independent. The problem is
linked to the culture of Westminster and it must therefore be
addressed through “wider changes to protocols”. Ending the
current system by which MPs employ their office staff
directly would be a good start.As politicians prepared for this week’s local
elections, there were calls for a drastic
overhaul of working practices in Westminster to
address a culture of sexism and inappropriate
behaviour. The calls were fuelled by the
resignation on Saturday of the Tory MP Neil
Parish, who was seen by female colleagues
watching pornography on his phone in
Parliament. He admitted to having done so
twice, claiming he first stumbled on the content
while searching for tractors.The scandal came in the wake of reports that
56 MPs have been referred to Parliament’s
Independent Complaints and Grievance Scheme (ICGS) for
alleged sexual misconduct. Cabinet minister Anne-Marie
Trevelyan said that she had once been “pinned up against
a wall” by a male MP; her colleague Suella Braverman said
that a minority of men in politics “behave like animals”.
Commons Speaker Lindsay Hoyle launched an urgent
review that could lead to MPs being stripped of the right
to employ their own staff.What happened What the editorials said
Sexism in the Commons
An £11 Italian white wine sold
in a bottle made from paper
is going on sale through the
online retailer Ocado this
week, in a first for a British
supermarket. The bottle, which
was designed by a company
in Ipswich, is made from 94%
recycled paper, and has a
carbon footprint that is around
a sixth that of a normal glass
bottle. Drinkers needn’t worry
about getting it wet, because
the wine is in a recyclable
plastic pocket – but it shouldn’t
be left in an ice bucket.American soldiers based in
northern Italy have presented a
90-year-old Italian woman with
a birthday cake, to replace the
one that US troops stole 77
years ago. Meri Mion was about
to turn 13 when, in April 1945,
US troops arrived in her
village to take on the Germans.
Following the fierce fighting, her
mother made her a cake and left
it on a window to cool. At last
week’s ceremony, she recalled
being “surprised” when it
vanished, but then being happy
to think of it feeding the hungry
Americans – it was a “good end,
given everything they’d done”.A restaurant manager who
transformed the balcony
of his 18th-floor flat in
Manchester into a verdant
oasis during the pandemic
has been invited to display
his work at this year’s
Chelsea Flower Show, in
the balcony and container
gardens category. Jason
Williams says he was
inspired to take up gardening
after buying a marigold at
B&Q, and that every plant in his exhibit can be bought at an
ordinary garden centre. “What I didn’t want to do is create some
show-garden masterpiece that people cannot replicate,” Williams
said. He added that he also wants to challenge the idea that black
people don’t garden:“We do. You just don’t tend to see it on TV.”COVER CARTOON: NEIL DAVIESThe PM addresses Kyiv’s parliamentParish: searched for tractorsBanca do Antfer
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