Friday News Roundup – International

The 1A Show

The 1A Show / Interview with Moisés Naím, Greg Myre & Susan Glasser

President Trump was in Helsinki this week, and he made headlines around the world for his lack of pushback on Vladimir Putin’s assertion that Russia did not meddle in American elections. Trump subsequently walked it back, saying he misspoke during the conference.

But is the damage done? How did this meeting play around the world?

In tech news this week, the European Union fined Google $5 billion for violating anti-trust laws.

The Verge breaks down the case.

In short, the European Commission has ruled that Google has been unfairly using Android (which Google owns and develops) to push Google search (which makes up most of Google’s business) on users, giving them an unfair and uncompetitive advantage.

Specifically, it calls out three things:

Google requires device makers to include search and Chrome in order to have access to the Play Store and other Google apps and services.

Google “made payments to certain large manufacturers and mobile network operators” to exclusively bundle the Google search app on handsets in favor of other search engines.

Google has allegedly blocked phone makers from creating devices that run forked versions of Android. In other words, in order to get any Google apps — including the Play Store and Google search — phone makers had to agree not to develop or sell any devices at all that ran on an Android fork (like Amazon’s Fire OS for tablets)

Also in the EU, Amazon workers went on strike this week for better labor conditions all over Europe. This strike was timed for Prime Day, the company’s summer sale for members.

And protests in Nicaragua went viral this week, after a Washington Post journalist published a story about students pinned down by gunfire inside a small Catholic Church compound in Managua, starting on the afternoon of July 13. These students were revolting against President Manuel Ortega’s government. Much of Nicaragua has been rebelling for the past three months, per the Post.

From the article:

Two students were killed and at least 10 were injured before top Catholic clergy were able to negotiate their release on Saturday morning and escort the surviving students across police lines.

Ortega’s government has ultimately wrested back control of this campus — as well as other rebellious cities across Nicaragua — but the cost to his government could be steep. There is a growing international condemnation of Ortega’s heavy-handed tactics to break the protests. Business leaders and other former allies have called for early elections or for him to step down.