EsadeGeo Daily Digest, 31/10/2022

Al Jazeera / Brazil election: Lula da Silva narrowly defeats Jair Bolsonaro

• Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva has won Brazil’s presidential election by a whisker, but with incumbent Jair Bolsonaro still not conceding defeat there were concerns the far-right contender might challenge the result. According to the country’s election authority, Lula secured 50.8 percent of the vote compared with 49.2 percent for Bolsonaro on Sunday.
• “Today the only winner is the Brazilian people,” da Silva told the crowds gathered at a Sao Paulo hotel. “This isn’t a victory of mine or the Workers’ Party, nor the parties that supported me in campaign. It’s the victory of a democratic movement that formed above political parties, personal interests and ideologies so that democracy came out victorious.”
• The vote also marked the first time that the sitting president failed to win re-election. Just over two million votes separated the two candidates; the previous closest race, in 2014, was decided by a margin of roughly 3.5 million votes.
• It is a tradition in Brazil for the losing candidate to speak first and accept the election loss, but hours after the authorities had named Lula the winner, Bolsonaro had made no public statement on the outcome.
• Foreign Policy – Robbie Gramer / How team Biden tried to coup-proof Brazil’s elections

Financial Times – Polina Ivanova, Christopher Miller and Emiko Terazono / Russia pulls plug on UN deal to allow exports of Ukrainian grain

• Moscow suspended on Sunday its participation in a UN-backed deal with Kyiv that unblocked the movement of Ukrainian grain out of its southern ports, threatening to deepen the global food crisis. 
• Russia linked its decision to pull out of the deal to an attack on Saturday on ships in the port of Sevastopol in the Crimean peninsula, which Russia annexed from Ukraine in 2014. 
• It blamed the attack on Ukrainian armed forces, claiming air defences shot down Ukrainian drones but autonomous explosive boats had caused damage to navy vessels and energy facilities. 
• “In connection with the actions of the Ukrainian armed forces . . . the Russian side cannot guarantee the safety of civilian dry cargo ships participating in the Black Sea Initiative, and suspends its implementation from today for an indefinite period,” the foreign ministry said.
• Politico – Jones Hayden / Kremlin accused of ‘weaponizing food’ in halt of Ukraine grain deal

Financial Times – Colby Smith / Republicans hold poll edge in last days of midterm election campaign

• New polling shows Republicans hold an edge over Democrats just over a week before midterm elections that will decide control of the US legislative branch, with voters fixated on high inflation and the risk of recession. 
• Republicans appear poised to wrest control of the House of Representatives, a model released by CBS News on Sunday indicated, as the minority party has recaptured leads in certain races days before Americans cast their ballots on November 8. The expected 15-seat gain could narrow should younger voters turn out in higher numbers than the model assumes. 
• Democrats have lost momentum in recent weeks as data has suggested the worst inflation problem in decades is not improving, and in some cases at risk of getting worse, as price pressures become more deeply embedded in the economy. That has fanned fears of an impending recession, given the aggressive steps required of the Federal Reserve to root it out. 
• Separate polling from ABC News and Ipsos released on Sunday show that the economy and inflation are considered the two most important issues heading into the midterms for roughly half of Americans, edging out abortion rights and gun violence. 
• FiveThirtyEight / Latest polls

South China Morning Post – Teddy Ng / China-US relations: Is Wang Yi, Blinken call a step to Xi-Biden summit?

• China’s foreign minister Wang Yi told his US counterpart Antony Blinken that relations between the two sides need to “return to normal track”, in a call on Monday, two weeks before a possible summit between their leaders in Bali, Indonesia.
• According to an official Chinese readout, Wang said Beijing’s major strategies, including its opening up policy, would remain consistent after the 20th Party Congress, which concluded on October 22.
• It would be in the common interest of the two countries, and meet the world’s expectations, if ties returned to a “normal track”, Wang said.
• He also called on Washington to halt its newly announced export restrictions, which he said had seriously damaged China’s “just interests”.
• Foreign Policy – Rishi Iyengar / Biden short-circuits China

Today’s longer reads:

• Foreign Affairs – Emma Ashford / The Ukraine war will end with negotiations
• European Council on Foreign Relations – Nick Witney / The end of Brexit fever