Scam Inc
The world this week
Politics
Business
The weekly cartoon
This week’s cover

Leaders

International crime
The vast, sophisticated and fast-growing global enterprise that is Scam Inc
Online scamming leaves nobody safe
U.S. President Donald Trump speaks to reporters about the collision of an American Airlines flight with a military Black Hawk helicopter near Ronald Reagan National Airport, in the Brady Press Briefing Room at the White House.
American business and politics
The meaning of Donald Trump’s war on woke workers
A worthwhile idea is straying into cruelty and, possibly, illegality
Destroyed buildings stand on the Gaza coast, June 25th 2024
MAGA in Gaza
America’s scheme for Gaza contains much to regret
As well as some hard truths
This illustration shows a large green military truck with multiple wheels. It has a red shipping container mounted on its back, raised at an angle by hydraulic arms. The background is plain yellow.
The end of the beginning
It’s not over: Donald Trump could still blow up global trade
Ideology, complacent markets and a need for revenue may still lead to big tariffs
This illustration shows Cambridge and Oxford universities. They are surrounded by a curved, black-and-white striped path. The background is bright red with black and white speckles.
Going up
How Labour can unshackle Britain’s most innovative region
It will have to confront the charge of elitism

Letters
On airport slots, oligarchies, Africa, rock climbing, dishonest societies, corporate hierarchies
Letters to the editor
By Invitation

Canada in Donald Trump’s tariff sights
Donald Trump poses a grave threat to others’ sovereignty and freedom, says Chrystia Freeland
Briefing
An illustration shows scammers at their desks, linked by glowing wires resembling a computer hard drive. The wires connect to microchips stamped with global currency symbols, symbolizing the vast, intricate network of digital fraud.
Scam Inc
Online scams may already be as big a scourge as illegal drugs
And they are growing fast
Asia
People welcome China's space-tracking ship Yuanwang-5 at Sri Lanka's Hambantota International Port in Sri Lanka
Subcontinental drift
Why India isn’t winning the contest with China
Big cats, big lessons
India’s attempt to save the tiger has been a remarkable success
A belated reckoning
Japan could finally face its own #MeToo crisis
Durand under duress
Pakistan is furious with the Afghan Taliban
Banyan
Donald Trump and Japan’s Ishiba Shigeru make for an odd couple
Tai, spy
China is infiltrating Taiwan’s armed forces
China
Illustration of A long conveyor belt. Big products, barrels, shipping palettes, pass through a Chinese gate. They turn to smaller parcels on the way and pass a Mexican gate and in the end get piled up behind a US gate.
Fentanyl and free trade
Donald Trump’s new trade war with China is also an opioid war
Shutdown
Cuts in American aid are crippling groups promoting rights in China
United States
Elon Musk arrives in the Rotunda of the US Capitol in Washington DC before the presidential inauguration at
The Twitter playbook
Elon Musk is shredding America’s government as he did Twitter
Hard reboot
Florida comes to Washington, DC
Confirmation bias
RFK junior and Tulsi Gabbard, set to sail through a cowed Senate
Crisis management
New York City commits to involuntary commitment
A rocky start
The clean-up after the LA fires is already revealing tensions
Lexington
Donald Trump is turning payback into policy

The Americas
President Claudia Sheinbaum of Mexico
Round one
How Mexico and Canada handled Trump’s tariff threat
A chink of light
The Trump tariff saga offers Canada’s Liberals a lifeline
A record of violence
Ecuador chooses a leader amid murder, blackouts and stagnation
Middle East & Africa
A Palestinian flag flies above detroyed buildings in the Magrafe neighbourhood of Gaza
From MAGA to Gaza
Donald Trump’s eye-popping plan to make Gaza American
From rebel to ruler
Warlord, jihadi or nation-builder?
Of Mecca and Mammon
Why Islamists in the Arab world speak the language of free markets
The long au revoir
France’s bitter retreat from west Africa
An interview with a Congolese rebel
A leader of Congo’s rebels vows to fight on
Europe
A collage showing Putin, Trump, Merz and Scholz with tanks and the European flag, on the colours of the german flag.
Only halfway there
Germany’s election campaign is creating a security risk
The transparent battlefield
The added dangers of fighting in Ukraine when everything is visible
Protest and repression
Can Georgia’s shadowy despot survive?
Per Erdogan ad astra
Turkey is building a spaceport in Somalia
Charlemagne
Can Europe afford to be the world’s last free-trader?
Britain
Illustration of a molecular diagram representing a connection being made between Oxford and Cambridge, at the bottom left there's an image of the Radcliffe Camera in Oxford and at the top right is the King's College chapel in Cambridge
Build the Arc
Oxford and Cambridge are too small
Expanding cities
Milton Keynes shows the rest of Britain how to grow
Plan it and the builders will come
Worries about Britain’s construction crunch are overdone
Causing concern
Britain’s plan to shake up school inspections pleases no one
Equal pay
British “equal value” lawsuits have become an absurd denial of markets
Rhetoric and reality
Speeches in Britain’s Parliament are getting shorter—and worse
Bagehot
Must Leeds always lose?
International
An illustration showing a wireframe globe vertically divided in two halves by a red chain. On the left side are clouds and on the right are red cargo ships with the stars of the china flag on the stern.
Trade trouble
Xi Jinping swings his “assassin’s mace” of economic warfare
The Telegram
Allies will not appease Donald Trump for ever
Business
Overlapping shadows of Donald Trump, a man and a women
Whiplash
Corporate America’s diversity wars are just getting started
Splashing the cache
The data-centre investment spree shows no signs of stopping
Next level
Can Nintendo’s new console propel it to even greater heights?
Parcel out
Shein and Temu are in Donald Trump’s cross-hairs
Bartleby
An encounter with the reception desk
Schumpeter
Donald Trump loves big oil. Does big oil love him back?
Finance & economics
President Donald J Trump signs executive orders in the Oval Office of the White House
Worse to come
Why Donald Trump’s protectionist zeal has only grown
Mercantilist menace
Tariff uncertainty can be as ruinous as tariffs themselves
All good things
When will remote workers see their pay cut?
Onwards and sideways
Europe has no escape from stagnation
Seventh heaven
Narendra Modi is struggling to boost Indian growth
Buttonwood
How to invest like a MAGA bigwig
Free exchange
Don’t propose with a diamond
Science & technology
A member of a drone operations team, keeps a careful eye out for enemy drones
Fighting flight
Fighting the war in Ukraine on the electromagnetic spectrum
Make some noise
Fine-tuned acoustic waves can knock drones out of the sky
Crypto crime-hunters
Cryptocurrencies are spawning a new generation of private eyes
Well informed
Are ice baths good for you?
Culture
An illustration of pink praying hands holding a phone and a rosary with a tiktok logo.
What the flock?
How TikTok became a religious pulpit
Puffed out
It’s spellbinding! Riveting! A triumphant tour de force!
Hammered
Why auction houses are turning to private sales
Brain fog
Have doctors been wrong about how to treat Alzheimer’s disease?
Back Story
Performing in a cinema near you: Bob Dylan and Maria Callas
Let’s Thai the knot
Fans are going crazy for Thai television shows and music
Economic & financial indicators
Indicators
Economic data, commodities and markets
Obituary
Marianne Faithfull
“Virgin on a Pedestal”
Marianne Faithfull battled labels all her life