World

After the Election, the Dictatorship?

1 | EGYPT

As preliminary results of Egypt’s presidential runoff trickled out, Mohamed Morsy, an Islamist leader of the once banned Muslim Brotherhood, declared victory over Ahmed Shafik, a former Prime Minister who served under ousted dictator Hosni Mubarak. Morsy reportedly garnered 52% of the vote. But the success of the Arab nation’s first democratic presidential elections was overshadowed–indeed, endangered–by the military’s apparent efforts to maintain its grasp on power. On June 14, in a move that reversed the fledgling democracy’s hard-won gains, the country’s Supreme Constitutional Court, appointed by Mubarak, dissolved the popularly elected Islamist-led Parliament. And shortly after the presidential vote last week, the ruling military council issued a declaration substantially diminishing the authority of the new President. Tens of thousands of Egyptians thronged Cairo’s Tahrir Square to protest the actions of the military, which had promised a complete transition to civilian rule. Adding to the country’s political chaos and uncertainty, reports emerged that the 84-year-old Mubarak, who is serving a life sentence for his role in the killing of demonstrators during the revolution last year, is critically ill, with some sources describing him as “clinically dead.”

Reprieve Without Resolution

2 | GREECE

The center-right New Democracy party won a narrow victory in legislative elections, but its 129 parliamentary seats are not enough to rule without a coalition. The pro–European Union party beat out the Coalition of the Radical Left, which was deeply critical of austerity measures mandated by the E.U. Characterized as a referendum on Greece’s membership in the E.U. by candidates and international observers alike, the election provides only temporary relief from worries that Greece might renege on its bailout deal.

LESSONS OF THE VOTE

The euro is safe for now. Greece’s relatively small economy is not crucial to the success of the E.U., but experts warned that its exit could have triggered a large-scale euro-zone breakup

Despite economic stagnation and a debt crisis, the Greek government works: the elections went smoothly, the losing candidates admitted defeat, and the winners moved to build a ruling coalition

Market gains in the wake of New Democracy’s victory were largely offset within two days, underscoring the fact that a fix to the European crisis will not be found in state-by-state solutions

U.K.

‘It represents the archetypal “turd on the plaza.”‘

Oliver Wainwright, British architecture critic, lambasting the new ArcelorMittal Orbit structure at Olympic Park in London

Prodding The Russians On Assad

3 | SYRIA

At the G-20 summit in Mexico, President Obama met with Russian President Vladimir Putin to discuss the continuing bloody uprising in Syria, among other issues. During a tense two-hour meeting on June 18, Obama tried to persuade Putin to help the U.S. force Syrian President Bashar Assad to step down. Two days earlier, the U.N. suspended its observer mission in Syria, saying the situation on the ground had become too dangerous for its monitors. Putin has continued to support Assad, in his eyes a strategic ally, twice using Russia’s veto power to block U.N. Security Council sanctions against Syria.

Field of Dreams

4 | POLAND

A boy in the Polish village of Lisewo prepares to fling a soccer ball. Poland and Ukraine are hosting the European soccer championships, a competition among the continent’s best national teams that is held every four years. Unfortunately for their fans, both host nations were eliminated after the goal-heavy first round. Spain and Germany remain the odds-on favorites to meet in the final.

Out on the Town

5 | VIETNAM

Traveling on the cheap? Consider Hanoi. The Vietnamese capital is TripAdvisor’s most wallet-friendly destination for summer 2012. A room for two at a four-star hotel, for example, will set you back just $84.89. (In the costliest city, London, that figure rises to $361.64.) But prices may not stay low for long: last year Hanoi broke the 6 million-tourist mark–a big boon to the Vietnamese economy–and this year it’ll get its first Hilton. Here’s how other cities stack up.

How much it costs to spend a night in …

HOTEL TAXI COCKTAILS DINNER

[The following text appears within a chart. Please see hardcopy or PDF for actual chart.]

$141 Hanoi

$248 Buenos Aires

$350 Tokyo

$457 New York City

$518 London

SOURCE: TRIPADVISOR

MEXICO 3.9%

Growth rate of Mexico’s economy last year, significantly outpacing Brazil’s 2.7%. It is on track to do the same in 2012. The uptick stems largely from a marked increase in exports to the U.S., where Mexican goods replaced some Chinese products

Gilani Is a Goner

6 | PAKISTAN

In the latest move in an escalating proxy war between Supreme Court Chief Justice Iftikhar Chaudhry and President Asif Ali Zardari, the court ousted Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani from the office he had held since 2008. It was a blow to Pakistan’s civilian government, which still hopes to be the first in the country’s history to complete a full five-year term. Chaudhry ruled that Gilani had ceased to be the nation’s Premier on April 26, when he was convicted of contempt for refusing to comply with the court’s order to reopen a dormant investigation into corruption charges against Zardari. If it leads to the collapse of Gilani’s coalition government, his ouster could force elections ahead of the voting scheduled for early next year.