Welcome back to World Brief, where we’re looking at expected Labour Party losses in the U.K. local elections, Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva’s White House visit, and China’s latest crackdown on military corruption.
The End of Britain’s Two-Party System?
Local elections across the United Kingdom on Thursday are expected to expose growing dissatisfaction with Britain’s ruling Labour Party. Early polling predicts that voters will choose parties on the far sides of the political spectrum—namely, the far-right Reform UK and the leftist Greens—over mainstream candidates.
“It is starting to look as if the two-party Westminster system, the Labour Party and Conservative Party duopoly that has dominated U.K. politics for more than a century, is coming apart,” Jamie Maxwell writes in Foreign Policy.
Reform UK, a nationalist, anti-immigrant party led by Nigel Farage, is likely to emerge as the big winner on Thursday. In Scotland and Wales, Reform is predicted to become the main opposition group in both devolved national parliaments. Labour is expected to lose control of the Welsh Parliament for the first time since the body was created in 1999.
Reform will also likely expand its control of local councils in England. About 5,000 seats are up for grabs. However, surveys suggest that Labour, which currently holds more than 2,000 of the contested seats, could lose around 75 percent of these spots.
Meanwhile, the Green Party, a left-wing progressive party led by Zack Polanski, is also expected to sweep council seats in England. It could even threaten Labour’s strongholds in London and other major urban centers.
Such upsets are likely to renew pressure for British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, elected in a landslide less than two years ago, to resign. Since the 2024 general election, the Labour leader has faced criticism for his inability to deliver on key economic promises, chief among them to improve the cost-of-living crisis.
Starmer has also taken heat for appointing Labour veteran Peter Mandelson as the U.K. ambassador to the United States despite his known association with convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. Mandelson was removed from the ambassador post last September, and British authorities arrested him in February for misconduct in public office related to his close ties to Epstein. (Mandelson does not face allegations of sexual misconduct.)
With Starmer’s historically low approval ratings, experts are treating Thursday’s elections as a referendum on his leadership of the Labour Party. Starmer’s potential challengers for the premiership include Health Secretary Wes Streeting, former Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner, and Greater Manchester Mayor Andy Burnham.
Yet Starmer won’t go down without a fight. Over the weekend, he called on Britons to “rise to this moment together” against the threat of political division and reiterated his intention to finish his five-year term.
“The answer to this moment, to the world we face today, is not passive government. Nor is it the populists who look out at the world and offer only easy answers that would make us weaker, or bankrupt,” Starmer wrote on Substack. “This is a time for patriots.”
Today’s Most Read
What We’re Following
Lula in Washington. U.S. President Donald Trump hosted Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva at the White House on Thursday. The talks focused on issues concerning security, trade, and critical minerals, with Trump posting on Truth Social that additional meetings will be scheduled in the coming months.
Few specifics emerged from the summit, leading many to question whether events in the last year—marked by public insults and economic backlash—threatened to undermine the two ideologically opposed leaders’ fragile truce.
Since Trump took office last year, the White House has subjected Brazil to harsh trade penalties, including a 50 percent tariff—one of the highest rates against any U.S. trading partner. Trump said the duties were in response to what he called a “witch hunt” against former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, who was sentenced to prison in September for orchestrating an attempted coup.
The United States has now withdrawn most of its levies against Brazil, but tensions remain. Lula has denounced Trump’s threats against Cuba, the U.S. war in Iran, and the White House’s insults toward Pope Leo XIV. In March, Brazil blocked the U.S.-backed renewal of a World Trade Organization e-commerce tariff moratorium—sparking Trump’s ire again.
Meanwhile, the U.S. Treasury Department has imposed sanctions on Brazilian Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes over his role prosecuting Bolsonaro.
Beijing’s anti-corruption crackdown. Two former Chinese defense ministers were given suspended death sentences on Thursday for graft charges. A military court handed down the sentences to Li Shangfu and his predecessor Wei Fenghe but granted a two-year reprieve, meaning that they could be commuted to life imprisonment without parole after two years.
Li and Wei were expelled from the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) in June 2024 for “serious violations of discipline.” Li—who disappeared for roughly two months the previous year—was accused of accepting “huge sums of money” in bribes, offering bribes to others, and not fulfilling his political responsibilities.
Similarly, Wei—who disappeared from public view in March 2023 after a cabinet reshuffle—was accused of accepting a “huge amount of money and valuables” in bribes as well as helping others to “gain improper benefits in personnel arrangements.”
Thursday’s ruling underscores Beijing’s ruthless commitment to tackling military corruption. Under Chinese President Xi Jinping, the CCP has purged several high-ranking officials, including Zhang Youxia, China’s top general and Xi’s longtime ally.
“These arrests are political, first and foremost; anti-corruption is just a cloak in which the politics are wrapped,” Deng Yuwen argued in Foreign Policy following Zhang’s removal.
A fragile truce in Lebanon. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned that “no terrorist has immunity” on Thursday, a day after Israeli forces said they had killed a Hezbollah commander in Beirut. The precision strike on Ahmed Ghaleb Balout was the first such attack on Beirut’s southern suburbs since the Israel-Hezbollah cease-fire went into effect last month. Hezbollah has not confirmed the attack on Balout.
Balout, the head of Hezbollah’s elite Radwan group, “likely read in the press that he had immunity in Beirut,” Netanyahu said. “Well, he read it, and it is no longer the case.” The prime minister added that “anyone who threatens the State of Israel will pay the price.”
Both sides have traded fire in other parts of Lebanon in recent weeks, leading many experts to call the cease-fire a truce in name only.
According to Lebanon’s health ministry, Israeli strikes killed at least 11 people in southern Lebanon on Wednesday. That same day, Hezbollah said it carried out 17 operations against Israeli troops in the vicinity, while the Israeli military said it had targeted more than 15 Hezbollah infrastructure sites.
Odds and Ends
Millions of people belong to South Korea’s largest Buddhist sect, the Jogye Order. As of this week, that group now includes a robot.
Gabi, which translates to “Buddha’s mercy,” became the first robot to be ordained as a Jogye Order monk on Wednesday. Wearing a ceremonial robe and rosary, Gabi recited the five precepts (or vows) that it must live by: to respect life, not damage other robots or objects, follow humans’ commands, not engage in deception, and save energy by not overcharging.
“The ordination of a robot signifies that technology must be used in accordance with the values of compassion, wisdom, and responsibility,” the Jogye Order said in a statement, adding that it “symbolizes new possibilities for the coexistence of humans and technology.”
