 Hello, you are watching the International Daily Roundup by People's Dispatch and we bring you some of the top stories from around the world. Let's take a look at the headlines. Russia and the US how hold another round of talks? What is the UAE's plane Yemen? And Brazil's economy continues to suffer. In our first story, we bring you the latest from ongoing discussions to avert a confrontation in Europe. US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov held another round of talks in Geneva on Friday. It's a bit unclear what actually came out of it, with Blinken calling it frank and substantive, while Lavrov termed them frank, adding that there was an agreement to have a reasonable dialogue. One bit of clarity that did emerge was that the US will respond in writing to key Russian demands next week. Some of the demands include a clear commitment to not expand NATO, not deploy missiles in the vicinity of Russia, and stopping military exercises. The talks took place even as the US establishment has been going all out to talk up chances of war and has been threatening harsh responses if Russia invades Ukraine. Russia on the other hand has repeatedly insisted that it has no plans to invade Ukraine. For our second story, we go a bit in-depth into the situation in Yemen where people continue to endure horrific bombing by the Saudi-led coalition. Around a bombing on Thursday, the second time this week, saw at least 70 deaths in the city of Sadah. According to Tahal Mutawakil, the health minister of the Houthi government, those killed were inmates of a prison. Meanwhile, the Saudi-led alliance continues to claim that it was targeting Houthi military facilities. The actual toll is believed to be much higher. Strikes on the port city of Hudayda, which is also under Houthi control, led to the disruption of internet services in large part of the country. The alliance is bombing by the Saudi-led coalition is in response to the strikes by the Houthis on Abu Dhabi a few days ago. This is the first time that the UAE has been directly targeted by the Houthis. We bring you a short analysis from NewsClicks Prabhupur Keista on why the UAE was in the crosshairs. For the last two to three years, the UAE forces who initially were very much a part of the coalition that attacked Ansarullah, the Houthis in Yemen, they had sort of backed off and their main interests seem to have been in some of the southern ports, essentially Aden being the key one. But their focus seems to have been on controlling the Red Sea Gulf of Aden bottleneck, which is the Babylon-Mendep strait. So their focus seems to have been much more on control of the seaway between Mediterranean and North Africa and of course into the Arabian Sea, which is what Babylon-Mendep really controls. And Aden is the key facility over there. So they sometime back got forces aligned to them, which is basically a transitional government as it is being called to take over Aden and it really controls Aden and not much else besides maybe a couple of more ports. So they thought that their stakes are OK if they just control Aden and the port shall we say the air, the waterways that connect Mediterranean to Arabian Sea, also Moka, which is another port which they seem to control. So their interests were limited to that, but if Mareeb falls, it strengthens, of course, the Ansarullah Houthis significantly. And therefore, because of the failure of Saudis to make much headway against Ansarullah forces and seem to be in danger of losing Mareeb, then they have again come back into the coalition with Saudi in terms of the military attack, because if you remember, there were 10 countries who had aligned at that time to attack Northern Yemen or Ansarullah Houthis. And they are now only, effectively only two Saudis and United Arab Emirates. And the UAE were also sort of not getting into direct conflict, direct military action too far. And this is again, after about two to three years, a major intervention they're making. And if you see the map, it is Mareeb, which is for them the crucial area. Of course, Mareeb as a city or as an ancient civilizational context, because it's also where it was the captain of Queen of Sheba, figures in the testaments, figures in various literature. I still remember our old, various historical fiction, if you will, which is to have the Queen of Sheba as a very prominent person. And for our final story, we look at the economic crisis in Brazil. A poll of economists conducted by Reuters indicates that the country could witness a deeper recession in 2022. Inflation has hit 10.4% and interest rates have risen dramatically. Prices of basic goods like fuel increased by 50% and food by 14% in 2021. The pandemic pushed millions of people into hunger and the unemployment rate to 14.9% early last year. The initial economic impact of COVID-19 was somewhat cushioned by a public cash transfer program. However, these benefits were rolled back in October. While the Brazilian economy did briefly recover last year, the growth was ultimately insufficient. Here is a video featured by Brazil de Fatou on the current situation in the country. Economically speaking, 2022 will be a hard year to Brazilians. Despite a certain recovery last year, it was insufficient to reach let alone surpass the pre-pandemic level. The growth projections for this year are close to zero. As we have damaged job market as the situation we are facing now aggravated by a very low growth projection for this year, it's no surprise that families and companies end up in debt. According to data from Brazil's central bank, there was 21.7% rise in granting credit during the pandemic while interest rates were still low. However, with the rising interest rates that took place in December, the impetus for indebtedness may even grow. But it will bump against higher interest rates and worse conditions. Economist Isis Ferreira comments data from a research released in October last year. We have almost 76% of Brazilian families in debt, which means that they have at least one debt to pay in the future. It also means that they really need credit to manage some income until the end of the month. Besides the restrictions imposed due to the pandemic, small businesses owners are also getting more and more trapped in interest of debts already contracted. That's the case of former athlete Luana Machado. She got financing to her gym and opened the new business in March 2020, only two weeks before the first lockdown in the city of São Paulo. Although the gym currently has almost 90 clients, the flow of clients still does not cover the debt instalments and the negotiations beyond complicated. The last answer they gave me was in December. They said that if I don't pay my debt, they'll take my house. I said I'm going to take a legal action and try to resolve it legally. Generally, the financial institutions see the small businesses as risky ones and, obviously, in the pandemic period, whose perception is broader.