Welcome back to World Brief, where we’re looking at Russia’s presidential election, LGBTQ+ rights in Japan, and ransom demands for Nigeria’s kidnapped schoolchildren.
Welcome back to World Brief, where we’re looking at Russia’s presidential election, LGBTQ+ rights in Japan, and ransom demands for Nigeria’s kidnapped schoolchildren.
Russia’s Sham Election
Some 24 years after he first entered power, Russian President Vladimir Putin is set to further extend his reign with another six-year term as voting in the country’s presidential election kicks off on Friday.
For all of the Kremlin’s claims that it is a democracy, experts say the vote has effectively been engineered to tighten Putin’s grip on power. Opposition leaders who could challenge Putin’s rule have suspiciously died, been forced into exile, or been barred from running in the election. The three remaining candidates—the Communist Party’s Nikolai Kharitonov, the Liberal Democratic Party’s Leonid Slutsky, and the New People Party’s Vladislav Davankov—do not pose a threat to Putin’s position.
Putin has held power as either president or prime minister since 1999, when former President Boris Yeltsin resigned and made Putin acting president. In the decades since, he has systematically cracked down on political opposition, independent media, and civil society; presided over constitutional changes that allowed him to disregard term limits; and launched invasions in Georgia and Ukraine.
In the run-up to the vote, Putin has focused on issuing stark threats against Western powers, warning that Russia was ready to deploy nuclear weapons if its “sovereignty and independence” came under attack. But he also appeared eager to project a sense of stability and security, adding that he did not think Washington and Moscow were “rushing head-on” toward nuclear war.
The election will take place over three days, from March 15 to 17. And this year, Putin has extended voting to include the Russian-occupied parts of four Ukrainian regions—Zaporizhzhia, Kherson, Donetsk, and Luhansk—where residents are being coerced through a variety of means to vote. Early voting in the occupied territories, as well as in remote parts of Russia, has already begun. Ukraine’s Foreign Ministry on Thursday called Russia’s staging of elections in these territories illegal and void and encouraged Ukrainians living there not to participate.
Results are expected to be released Sunday night, after which the Russian leader may choose to unveil politically unpopular policies. “Russia’s presidential election is not so important as what will come after. Putin has often postponed unpopular moves until after elections,” Bryn Rosenfeld, a professor at Cornell University, said.
This could perhaps include a general mobilization to bolster Russia’s armed forces—a policy the Kremlin has so far sought to avoid. “Right now, mobilization is the most unpopular policy on the horizon,” she said. “The Kremlin’s last partial mobilization in September 2022 sent shock waves through Russian society. Mobilization is the one thing that has shaken Russians’ support for the war.”
LGBTQ+ rights in Japan. A Japanese high court ruled on Thursday that the country’s same-sex marriage ban is unconstitutional. The ruling is in line with shifting social sentiments in Japan, where some 70 percent of the public is in favor of same-sex unions, according to polling. However, the country’s conservative government opposes it. The case, which does not impact current legislation, will now head to the Supreme Court.
The ruling was celebrated by Japan’s LGBTQ+ community, which hailed the decision as a sign of changing perceptions. “It was a long-awaited, delightful ruling which makes me cry,” one plaintiff, Eri Nakaya, told reporters afterward.
Nigeria’s missing schoolchildren. The kidnappers of nearly 300 Nigerian schoolchildren and school staff have asked for 1 billion naira, or $620,432, in ransom, Reuters reported. If the sum is not paid within 20 days of the abduction—which occurred on March 7—the gunmen threatened to kill the hostages, according to Jubril Aminu, a spokesperson for their families who was called by the kidnappers.
The ransom demand comes as Nigerian security forces have intensified search efforts for the abducted schoolchildren in the last week, deploying soldiers and police to comb forests in northwestern Nigeria. While it remains unclear who the perpetrators are, the kidnappers said the abduction was “a way of getting back at the government and security agencies for killing their gang members,” Aminu told CNN.
Perilous journey. At least 60 migrants were killed after their dinghy stopped operating in the Mediterranean Sea, according to others who survived the journey after being rescued by the humanitarian group SOS Méditerranée and the Italian Coast Guard. The dinghy set sail from Libya, and women and at least one child were among the dead, the survivors said.
The tragedy comes as 2023 was the deadliest year ever recorded for migrants traversing global migration routes, the U.N. International Organization for Migration said last week. The group recorded at least 8,565 deaths in 2023, marking a 20 percent increase from the previous year.
Wildlife caretakers in Virginia tending to an orphaned baby fox have started donning an eerie giant fox mask when feeding it, out of fears that the young animal will open its eyes, imprint on humans, and struggle to survive in the wild. “We want the first things she sees to be other foxes even if we don’t have any actual adult or siblings to put her with,” the Richmond Wildlife Center wrote on Facebook. We just hope it doesn’t give the baby fox nightmares like it’s giving us.