From the Peoples Dispatch / Globetrotter News Service

U.S. And NATO Allies Accounted for Over Half of Global Military Expenditure in 2022

The world’s total military expenditure surpassed $2.24 trillion in 2022, with Europe recording its steepest rise in the last three decades, according to the annual military expenditure report of the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI). The report was published on April 24.

The annual report notes that global military expenditure rose by 3.7 percent last year. 2022 was the eighth consecutive year of increasing global defense spending. 

The U.S. remains by far the largest global spender with a military expenditure of over $877 billion in 2022—three times more than the second largest spender, China, which spent $292 billion. $19.9 billion of the U.S. military expenditure was military aid to Ukraine. 

The U.S. and its NATO allies have been the primary reason for the rising military expenditure and weaponization in the world.

The U.S. alone accounts for 39 percent of the world’s total military expenditure. This is more than the total military expenditure of the rest of the top 10 military spenders, including China, Russia, and India. According to a SIPRI press release, the 31 NATO members together spent over $1.23 trillion—more than half of the world’s total military expenditure in 2022.

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Chile’s President Announces Plan to Nationalize Lithium Industry

Chile’s President Gabriel Boric, in a televised address to the nation on April 20, announced his plan to nationalize the country’s lithium industry to boost the economy and protect the environment.

Boric stated that his national lithium policy includes the creation of a state-owned company that will eventually take control of the country’s lithium mining sector from private industry giants.

Chile has one of the world’s largest lithium reserves and is the world’s second-largest producer of the metal after Australia. Albemarle and Sociedad Química y Minera de Chile (SQM), the world’s number one and number two lithium suppliers, respectively, are the two companies that currently hold licenses for lithium exploration, mining, and exploitation in the Atacama salt flat in the north of Chile. SQM’s contract is set to expire in 2030, and Albemarle’s in 2043.

Lithium is in high demand worldwide for the manufacture of batteries. Its demand is predicted to increase as much as 40-fold by 2040 due to the global energy transition. Latin America will play a key role in this shift. According to the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), the region is home to an estimated 60 percent of the identified lithium reserves globally.

The head of state added that the plan includes encouraging the use of new technologies to minimize the impacts of mining on ecosystems and promoting research through a salt flat protection network.

President Boric said that future lithium exploration would be undertaken with the participation of all Indigenous communities residing near the extraction zones and reliant on local water basins for their livelihoods.

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Ecuador: Prosecutors Request Preventive Detention of Former President Lenín Moreno

Ecuador’s attorney general’s office, on April 19, requested the preventive detention of former president Lenín Moreno after he failed to appear before the court as mandated in the Sinohydro case. Moreno is accused of receiving bribes for the construction of the country’s largest hydroelectric plant. The attorney general’s office also requested the pretrial arrest of eight other defendants, including Moreno’s wife Rocío González and their daughter Irina Moreno González.

On March 6, during a hearing for the formulation of charges, Judge Adrián Rojas ordered all 37 accused to appear biweekly before the National Court of Justice (CNJ) in Quito to ensure their presence in a possible trial for the crime of bribery.

From the beginning, Moreno, who currently resides in Paraguay and serves as commissioner of the Organization of American States (OAS) for Disability Affairs, had rejected because of his physical condition the obligation established by the judge that forced him to travel to Ecuador every two weeks. He tried to revoke it through two appeals, including a request to appear at the Embassy of Ecuador in Asunción, Paraguay, instead. However, the court rejected both of the preventive habeas corpus actions filed by the former president’s defense.

Initially, the attorney general’s office had requested the provisional detention of all defendants except Moreno and 12 others aged over 65. The former head of state’s failure to appear periodically led the attorney general’s office to seek his preventive imprisonment, along with others. The hearing to review the request will be held next week.

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App Delivery Workers in India Strike Against Increasing Exploitation 

A new pay scheme introduced by Blinkit, a quick-delivery grocery unit under one of India’s largest food delivery platforms, Zomato, has sparked protests by delivery workers across several cities in the country. 

Discussions with the labor department failed to address the key issue of pay revision.

Protests by Blinkit delivery partners were reported in Kolkata, Hyderabad, Pune, and the national capital New Delhi. In videos shared via social media, protestors were seen burning effigies of the quick-commerce platform and holding placards against it. They are demanding that the new pay structure, which will reportedly reduce their current incomes upon implementation, be immediately rescinded.

Zomato bought Blinkit in 2022 for $568 million.

The new payout introduced on April 10 has dropped per delivery rate from Rs 25 ($0.30) to Rs 15 ($0.18). The previous structure had a defined base payment with incentives according to the distance traveled by the partner to deliver the order. In the new payout system, however, there is no base payment. The partner will only be paid per kilometer of travel to deliver the orders, for which the rate ranges between Rs 9 ($0.11) and Rs 12 ($0.15), which can increase to Rs 15 ($0.18) with an additional bonus.

The workers of the aggregator app, who are called “delivery partners” or “delivery executives” by the company, are angry about the loss of their basic income at a time when inflation is soaring at 5.66 percent.