New Delhi:

Elections are taking place in major democracies across the globe, incorporating almost half of the world’s population. The United States will go to polls in November. Halfway through the year, elections have taken place in Russia, South Korea, the European Union, Belgium, Mexico, Pakistan, France, and Taiwan. India, the world’s largest democracy, concluded the electoral exercise in human history.

Interestingly, a report from Pew Research suggests that high-income nations, mostly in the West, are dissatisfied with the way democracy is working in their country.

Who All Are Dissatisfied?

The Pew Research Center conducted over 900 interviews in 27 countries and asked respondents, “How satisfied are you with the democracy working in your country?”

In North America, 68 per cent of people are dissatisfied with the current functioning of democracy. The decline in satisfaction witnessed since 2021, shows a 10 per cent dip in the US. In Mexico, an equal percentage of respondents were satisfied and dissatisfied. In Canada under Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, only 52 per cent of people are okay with the functioning of democracy. Read the full report here

In Europe, only Sweden fared well, with 75 per cent of respondents feeling satisfied with the way democracy is. Interestingly, France, one of the oldest democracies in the world saw 35 per cent pleased.  Greece was the lowest at 22 per cent.

In Asia, only Singapore and India reported over 75% satisfaction. In India, 77 per cent were satisfied with the way democracy is. In Singapore, the percentage stands at 80 per cent. Japan was at the lowest at 31 per cent.

Out of 27 countries, over 50 per cent of respondents in 11 countries are satisfied with democracy. Respondents from 11 countries in the west out of 17, are not majorly not satisfied.

The UK saw a major shift in political inclination with the Conservatives under Rishi Sunak voted out and Keir Starmer’s Labour securing a landslide win after 13 years. In France, a major political turmoil is being witnessed as the  National Assembly delivered a hung parliament, making it hard to know who will be in key government positions.

In the US, Joe Biden is seeking another term amid concerns over his health, while Donald Trump, who is facing legal troubles, is hoping to come back to power. 

Claudia Sheinbaum was elected Mexico’s first woman president by a landslide, making history in a country plagued by rampant criminal and gender-based violence.

Putin tightened its grip on Russia with a reelection which saw little to no opposition. He has been in power since the last day of 1999, he is now on course to become the longest-serving Russian leader in more than two centuries.

Vatican City:

Pope Francis decried the state of democracy and warned against “populists” during a short visit to Trieste in Italy’s northeast on Sunday ahead of a 12-day trip to Asia — the longest of his papacy.

“Democracy is not in good health in the world today,” Francis said during a speech at the city’s convention centre to close a national Catholic event.

Without naming any countries, the pope warned against “ideological temptations and populists” on the day that France holds the second round of a snap parliamentary vote that looks set to see the far-right National Rally (RN) party take the largest share of the vote.

“Ideologies are seductive. Some people compare them to the Pied Piper of Hamelin: they seduce but lead you to deny yourself,” he said in reference to the German fairytale.

Ahead of last month’s European parliament elections, bishops in several countries also warned about the rise of populism and nationalism, with far-right parties already holding the reins to power in Italy, Hungary and the Netherlands.

Francis also urged people to “move away from polarisations that impoverish” and hit out at “self-referential power”.

After Venice in April and Verona in May, the half-day trip to Trieste, a city of 200,000 inhabitants on the Adriatic Sea that borders Slovenia, marked the third one within Italy this year for the 87-year-old pontiff, who has suffered increasing health problems in recent years.

Since travelling to the French city of Marseille in September 2023, the Argentine Jesuit has limited himself to domestic travel.

But he plans to spend nearly two weeks in Asia in September visiting Indonesia, Singapore and the islands of Papua New Guinea and East Timor.

He arrived in Trieste shortly before 9:00 am (0600 GMT) and was due to meet with various groups from the religious and academic spheres, along with migrants and the disabled.

The papal visit is due to conclude with a mass in the city’s main public square before he departs for the Vatican in the early afternoon.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

TAIPEI:

Democracy is not a crime and autocracy is the real “evil”, Taiwan President Lai Ching-te said on Monday after China threatened to impose the death penalty in extreme cases for “diehard” Taiwan independence separatists.

China, which views Taiwan as its own territory, has made no secret of its dislike of Lai, who took office last month, saying he is a “separatist”, and staged war games shortly after his inauguration.

On Friday, China ramped up its pressure on Taiwan by issuing new legal guidelines to punish those it says support the island’s formal independence, though Chinese courts have no jurisdiction on the democratically governed island.

Asked about China’s move at a news conference at the presidential office in Taipei, Lai first reiterated his sympathy for recent flooding in southern China before responding.

“I want to stress: democracy is not a crime; it’s autocracy that is the real evil. China has absolutely no right to sanction Taiwan’s people just because of the positions they hold. What’s more, China has no right to go after Taiwan people’s rights across borders,” he said.

According to China, anyone who does not uphold “reunification” is therefore a Taiwan independence supporter, Lai added.

“I also want to call on China to face up to the existence of the Republic of China and have exchanges and dialogue with Taiwan’s democratically elected, legitimate government,” he said, using Taiwan’s formal name. “If this is not done, relations between Taiwan and China will only become more and more estranged.”

Taiwan said that since Thursday, there has been a sharp increase in Chinese military flights as Beijing carried out a “joint combat readiness patrol” near the island.

Between Thursday and Sunday, Taiwan says it detected 115 Chinese military aircraft operating nearby, getting as close at 31 nautical miles (57 km) from the southern tip of the island.

Taiwan has said that for the past four years, China has carried out regular military activity around the island as part of a “grey zone” pressure campaign.

Taiwan’s annual Han Kuang war games next month will aim to mimic actual combat as closely as possible given a rapidly rising “enemy threat” from China, a senior official said.

Lai rejects Beijing’s sovereignty claims and says only Taiwan’s people can decide their future. He has repeatedly offered talks with China but has been rebuffed.

China says any move by Taiwan to declare formal independence would be grounds to attack the island.

The government in Taipei says Taiwan is already an independent country, the Republic of China, and that it does not plan to change that. The Republican government fled to Taiwan in 1949 after losing a civil war with Mao Zedong’s Communists.

Lai also faces domestic challenges, as his Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) lost its majority in parliament in the same election in January that brought him to power.

Speaking at the same news conference, Lai said he would ask the constitutional court to stay a package of contested parliament reforms the opposition has passed and consider whether they comply with the constitution.

The opposition says the reforms, which among other things criminalise contempt of parliament by government officials, are needed to bring more accountability, but the DPP says they were forced through without proper discussion.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier with his wife Elke Budenbender and French President Emmanuel Macron with his wife Brigitte Macron speak with people as they visit the Democracy Festival to mark 75 years of the German Basic Law and 35 years of the peaceful revolution, in Berlin, Germany, May 26, 2024.
| Photo Credit: REUTERS

Emmanuel Macron arrived on Sunday in Berlin on the first state visit to Germany by a French President in a quarter century, bringing a plea to defend democracy against nationalism at upcoming European elections.

Mr. Macron made an appearance at a democracy festival his first stop, where, accompanied by German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier, he warned of a “form of fascination for authoritarianism which is growing” in the two major EU nations.

“We forget too often that it’s a fight” to protect democracy, Mr. Macron said.

If the nationalists had been in power in Europe in the last years, “history would not have been the same”, he said, pointing to decisions on the coronavirus pandemic or Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

“We need an alliance of democrats in Europe,” Mr. Steinmeier said.

Mr. Macron “has rightly pointed out that the conditions today before the European elections is different from the previous election, a lot has happened”.

‘Europe is mortal’

The trip comes two weeks ahead of European elections where polls show, in a major potential embarrassment for Mr. Macron, that his coalition is trailing well behind the far right and may struggle to even reach third place.

In Germany too, all three parties in Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s coalition are polling behind the far-right AfD in surveys, despite a series of scandals embroiling the anti-immigration party.

In a keynote address on foreign policy last month, Mr. Macron issued a dire warning about the threats to Europe in a changing world in the wake of Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine.

“Our Europe, today, is mortal and it can die,” Mr. Macron said. “It can die and this depends only on our choices.”

Ramping up his warning in Berlin, Mr. Macron urged Europeans “to go vote for the party that we back and a party that defends Europe”.

After the talks with Steinmeier in Berlin on Sunday, Mr. Macron is due to bring his message to Dresden in the former East German Saxony state, where the AfD has a strong supporter base.

Tuesday sees Mr. Macron in the western German city of Munster and later in Meseberg, outside Berlin, for talks with Scholz and a Franco-German joint cabinet meeting.

‘Awkward’

Beyond making joint calls for the European elections, Mr. Macron’s three-day visit will seek to emphasise the historic importance of the post-war relationship between the two key EU states, as France next month commemorates 80 years since the D-Day landings that marked the beginning of the end of German World War II occupation.

But all has not been smooth in a relationship often seen as the engine of the EU, and German officials said to be uneasy at times about his often-theatrical style of foreign policy.

In a question-and-answer session on social media with young people this month, Mr. Macron enlisted help from Scholz when asked if the Franco-German “couple” was still working.

“Hello dear friends, long live French-German friendship!” Scholz said in French in a video on Macron’s X feed. “Thank you Olaf! I very much agree with you,” Mr. Macron replied in heavily accented German.

Officials from both sides are at pains to emphasise that while there are periodic tensions on specific issues, the fundamental basis of the relationship remains sound.

But Mr. Macron’s refusal to rule out sending troops to Ukraine sparked an unusually acidic response from Scholz that Germany had no such plans. Germany also does not share Mr. Macron’s enthusiasm for a European strategic autonomy less dependent on the United States.

“The Franco-German relationship is about disagreeing and trying to find ways of compromise,” said Helene Miard-Delacroix, specialist in German history at the Sorbonne university in Paris.

Mujtaba Rahman, managing director for Europe at risk analysis firm Eurasia Group, said relations between France and Germany “remain awkward, verging on hostile”.

“On the big issues, little progress should be expected,” he said on X.

While Mr. Macron is a frequent visitor to Berlin, the trip is the first state visit in 24 years following a trip by Jacques Chirac in 2000 and the sixth since the first post-war state visit by Charles de Gaulle in 1962.

White House national security communications advisor John Kirby speaks during the daily briefing at the White House in Washington on May 17, 2024.
| Photo Credit: AP

Applauding the people of India for exercising their right to vote, the White House on May 17 said there are not too many more vibrant democracies in the world than India.

“Not too many more vibrant democracies in the world than India. And we applaud the Indian people for exercising, you know, their ability to vote, and to have a voice in their future government. And we wish them well throughout the process, of course,” White House National Security Communications Advisor John Kirby told reporters at a news conference in Washington.

Mr. Kirby was responding to a question on the ongoing Indian elections, wherein over 969 million people are exercising their right to franchise at one million polling stations to elect 545 members of Parliament from thousands of candidates representing as many as 2,660 registered political parties.

Responding to another question, Mr. Kirby said the India-U.S. relationship has strengthened under Prime Minister Narendra Modi in particular during the last three years of the Biden administration. “Our relationship with India is extremely close and getting closer,” he said.

“You saw it on a State visit [last visit]. We launched all kinds of new initiatives, working on critical emerging technologies together, and bolstering and expanding the relevance of the Indo-Pacific quad, of course, which India is a part of. And then, just the people to people exchanges, and the military that we share with India,” Mr. Kirby said.

“It’s a very vibrant, very active partnership. We are grateful for Prime Minister Modi’s leadership,” said the White House official.

When asked if President Joe Biden believes that India and Japan are xenophobic countries, he replied in the negative and said the President was recently making a broader point.

“I mean, the President was making a broader point here about the vibrancy of our own democracy, here in the United States, and how inclusive and participatory it is,” Mr. Kirby said.

Washington:

Applauding the people of India for exercising their right to vote, the White House on Friday said there are not too many more vibrant democracies in the world than India.

“Not too many more vibrant democracies in the world than India. And we applaud the Indian people for exercising, you know, their ability to vote, and to have a voice in their future government. And we wish them well throughout the process, of course,” White House National Security Communications Advisor John Kirby told reporters at a news conference here.

Kirby was responding to a question on the ongoing Indian elections, wherein over 969 million people are exercising their right to franchise at one million polling stations to elect 545 members of parliament from thousands of candidates representing as many as 2,660 registered political parties.

Responding to another question, Kirby said the India-US relationship has strengthened under Prime Minister Narendra Modi in particular during the last three years of the Biden administration. “Our relationship with India is extremely close and getting closer,” he said.

“You saw it on a State visit (last visit). We launched all kinds of new initiatives, working on critical emerging technologies together, and bolstering and expanding the relevance of the Indo-Pacific quad, of course, which India is a part of. And then, just the people to people exchanges, and the military that we share with India,” Kirby said.

“It’s a very vibrant, very active partnership. We are grateful for Prime Minister Modi’s leadership,” said the White House official.

When asked if President Joe Biden believes that India and Japan are xenophobic countries, he replied in the negative and said the president was recently making a broader point.

“I mean, the president was making a broader point here about the vibrancy of our own democracy, here in the United States, and how inclusive and participatory it is,” Kirby said.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

Dharamshala:

The Dalai Lama on Saturday congratulated jailed Iranian activist Narges Mohammadi on winning the Nobel Peace Prize and said the award was also in recognition of the vital role women play in people’s lives. Mohammadi, 51, was awarded the prize on Friday in recognition of her tireless campaigning for women’s rights and democracy and against the death penalty.

In a letter to her on Saturday, the Tibetan spiritual leader said, “Today, the values of democracy, transparency, respect for human rights, and equality are increasingly recognised on every side as universal values, which can only benefit us all.”

“I have met and held discussions with previous Nobel laureates, including your sometime colleague, Mrs. Shirin Ebadi. I admire their efforts to overcome discrimination against women and improve society in a peaceful way. I believe that the award of this Nobel Peace Prize is also in recognition of the vital role women play in the lives of us all from the very day we are born,” the Dalai Lama wrote.

He said there is a growing desire for change in the world, a change that will see conflicts resolved through dialogue and non-violence.

“The foundation of such change will be kindness, compassion and human responsibility. I believe that this goal can be achieved through education based on a deeper appreciation of the oneness of humanity. Because we are so interconnected, this is a question of the well-being of us all,” he wrote.