Hard Numbers: Climate reparations, Ukraine grain deal extension, crypto mess, MH17 verdict

Climate activists take part in a protest during COP27 in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt.
Climate activists take part in a protest during COP27 in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt.
REUTERS/Mohamed Abd El Ghany

134: That's how many developing countries are threatening to walk out of the COP27 climate summit in Sharm el-Skeikh, Egypt, if wealthy nations don't agree to establish a "loss and damage" fund to compensate them for climate change. It's unlikely there will be a deal before the gathering ends on Friday.

4: A UN- and Turkey-brokered deal for Russia to allow shipments of grain from Ukraine's Black Sea ports, which was due to expire Saturday, has been extended for four months. Kyiv wanted a full year, but this is still good news to help mitigate a global food crisis aggravated by Russia's war in Ukraine.

40: The new CEO of bankrupt cryptocurrency exchange FTX says he's never seen anything worse in more than 40 years of restructuring distressed firms, including Enron. The shambolic collapse of FTX is already having international ripples, with Singapore writing down $275 million in funds.

3: Three men — two Russians and a Ukrainian — were sentenced in absentia to life in prison Thursday by a Dutch court for shooting down the MH17 flight over Russian-occupied eastern Ukraine in 2014, killing all 298 passengers. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky hailed the verdict, but the Kremlin rejected it, calling it "scandalous."

This was featured in Signal, the daily politics newsletter of GZERO Media. For smart coverage of global affairs that normal people can understand, subscribe here.


More from GZERO Media

Listen: In seven short weeks, the Trump administration has completely reshaped US foreign policy and upended trade alliances. Will China benefit from US retrenchment and increasing global uncertainty, or will its struggling economy hold it back? On the GZERO World Podcast, Bill Bishop, a China analyst and author of the Sinocism newsletter, joins Ian Bremmer for a wide-ranging conversation about China—its domestic priorities, global administration, and whether America’s retreat from global commitments is opening new doors for Beijing.

German Chancellor-in-waiting Friedrich Merz speaks to the media after he reached an agreement with the Greens on a massive increase in state borrowing just days ahead of a parliamentary vote next week, in Berlin, Germany, on March 14, 2025.
REUTERS/Axel Schmidt

Germany’s election-winning center-right Christian Democratic Union/Christian Social Union, led by Friedrich Merz, and the Social Democrats have reached a preliminary agreement with the Green Party on a deal to exclude defense spending from the country’s constitutional debt break and establish a dedicated $545 billion fund for infrastructure investments.

A Russian army soldier walks along a ruined street of Malaya Loknya settlement, which was recently retaken by Russia's armed forces in the course of Russia-Ukraine conflict in the Kursk region, on March 13, 2025.

Russian Defence Ministry/Handout via REUTERS

The Russian leader has conditions of his own for any ceasefire with Ukraine, and he also wants a meeting with Donald Trump.

Mahmoud Khalil speaks to members of the media about the Revolt for Rafah encampment at Columbia University on June 1, 2024.

REUTERS/Jeenah Moon

The court battle over whether the US can deport Mahmoud Khalil, the 30-year-old Palestinian-Algerian activist detained in New York last Saturday, began this week in Manhattan. Khalil, an outspoken activist for Palestinian rights at Columbia University, was arrested Saturday at his apartment in a university-owned building at Columbia University by Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers, and he is now being held in an ICE detention center in Louisiana.

The Israeli Air Force launched an airstrike on Thursday, targeting a building in the Mashrou Dummar area of Damascus.
(Photo by Rami Alsayed/NurPhoto)

An Israeli airstrike destroyed a residential building on the outskirts of Damascus on Thursday in the latest Israeli incursion into post-Assad Syria.

Lars Klingbeil (l), Chairman of the SPD parliamentary group, and Friedrich Merz, CDU Chairman and Chairman of the CDU/CSU parliamentary group, talk at the end of the 213th plenary session of the 20th legislative period in the German Bundestag.

Germany’s government is in a state of uncertainty as the outgoing government races to push through a huge, and highly controversial, new spending package before its term ends early this spring.

EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin, a Republican, speaks as the U.S. vice president visits East Palestine, Ohio, U.S., February 3, 2025.
Rebecca Droke/Pool via REUTERS/File Photo

On Wednesday, Environmental Protection Agency chief Lee Zeldin redefined the agency’s mission, stating that its focus is to “lower the cost of buying a car, heating a home, and running a business.”