 Argentina said to hold pre-election primaries in the list of candidates has thrown up some surprises, who all are in the running to take over the country. The killing of a teenager in Paris has sparked anger and protests. What is the record the French police have been in dealing with minorities? And finally, South Korea seems to have appointed a divisive figure as the Minister of Unification. How does that even make sense? We'll be answering these questions and more in today's Daily Debrief. Argentina will see vital elections in October which will select a new president to succeed Alberto Fernandez. It promises to be a fiercely contested election and one of the first stages are the primaries in August which will determine the candidates. The contenders for the primaries have been announced and there are quite a few surprises, say Zoe Alexandra of People's Dispatch who has been closely following the election. Zoe, welcome to the show and could you first tell us a bit about what the primaries are and who are the candidates who are taking part? Yes, in October, general elections will be held in Argentina. These are crucial elections and actually before even getting to these general elections, there's an intermediary step which is the primaries, the open simultaneous and the obligatory primaries which is called an Argentina de Paso. This is a moment that will take place on August 13th, essentially wherein the different electoral coalitions, the different parties can define who exactly is going to be on their ticket. In some cases, there is a bit of an internal dispute in terms of who will be the candidate of these coalitions and also it serves as a kind of a barometer of how much does each party, what kind of support does each party have and how well will they do in the polls in October. So the Paso which will take place in August is extremely important and as we saw last year in the elections that happened, the legislative elections that happened in Argentina, the Paso is not always definitive. What happens in the Paso is not necessarily repeated in the real elections, however, is a very good indicator and essentially last weekend the tickets and those who are going to be competing in the Paso were announced and there was quite a very couple of surprises. On the progressive Peronista ticket, it was expected that Guadalupe Pedro, who is a son of two disappeared people, he is really from the leftist camp of Kitchenerismo, very close to Cristina. It had been announced it was rumored that he would be the presidential candidate. However, on the Twitter account of Union por la Patria, which is the electoral coalition of this, which is following from frente de todos, the front for all, they confirmed that this ticket would actually be Sergio Massa, who's the current minister of economy, extremely controversial figure in leftist circles. That's a big upset. And at the same time Juan Graboi, who had previously said that he would no longer be a candidate if Guadalupe Pedro did run, said that he actually would compete in the Paso against Sergio Massa to see who would get this ticket for what really is representing the Peronista organizations, people who support the left. It's a very, very important vote. This is, of course, the coalition that is in government right now. And then on the other hand, on the right wing coalitions, we also have some interesting surprises. Horacio Loretta is going to be competing in the Paso for a presidential candidate together for change. This is the electoral coalition that won in 2015 under Mauricio Macri. They had been severely discredited because of the damage he caused the country. However, it will be interesting to see what happens this time around. Loretta is running with no one other than Gerardo Morales, who is the governor of Hujuy, who has been kind of targeted as being responsible for the, for example, the constitutional reform in Hujuy, which is currently in the center of the protests, which are occurring there. He also is responsible for the political persecution of political prisoner Milagro Sala. Gerardo Morales is definitely one of the rising figures in the right wing in Argentina. It's interesting that many progressive people, when the repression was happening in Hujuy, they said that this is a blueprint for what they want to impose on the rest of Argentina. So Gerardo Morales competing to be part of the presidential ticket for Juntos por el Cambio, and they are competing against Patricio Bullrich, who is the minister of security under Mauricio Macri. She also was held responsible for the forced disappearance and assassination of Sergio Maldonado back in 2017. Very, again, a very important figure on the right wing. Maybe some people will remember that before the Célox summit that happened in Argentina, she essentially threatened Nicolás Maduro with arrest and said that if he tries to come to Argentina, she would pursue his arrest, amongst other things. So she's a really, she is also a very important figure in the Argentinian right, did not, she did not suffer the same fate that Mauricio Macri did after they were in office. She has continued to grow and it will be a very interesting matchup between Loretta and Bullrich. We'll have to see what happens there in August. And then finally, another very notable ticket is, of course, the rising figure of Javier Millay, who is from the Libertarian Party in Argentina, this is a party that hadn't been taken very seriously. He has, he's a political leader in a sense that has extremely, extremely reactionary right wing beliefs and discourse, anti-gay, anti-women beliefs in completely cutting state services, making the state smaller, against a lot of the social programs which support millions of people in Argentina, extremely, extremely controversial, really represents a threat for the people of Argentina. And he has been rising in the polls. So once again, in these, he is not, his ticket is not competing against anyone, but it will be an important indicator to see how many people actually mobilized behind this ticket in a moment of a lot of economic instability in the country, a candidate and a figure like Javier Millay, who pretends to come from the outside, who is a so on quote unquote political outcast, this kind of figure, as we've seen in many other countries, actually can gain some traction. Right. Now to zoom out a bit, could you tell us a bit about the context in which these elections are taking place? We know that Argentina has been facing a very difficult time for many years now. Well, as we've been covering at People's Dispatch for the past several years, since Alberto Fernandez has taken office, once again, he won in 2019 with the, with the coalition Frente de Todos. This was really a response to the years of the Macri government of neoliberalism. Alberto Fernandez won with a broad coalition of progressive and left wing forces. However, once he assumed office at the end of 2019, he took on a country which had enormous debt with the IMF, a debt which has been condemned internationally and nationally, a debt which was taken out illegally and that the money and people don't know where actually the money went. It was not spent on the people. He took over country just months before the COVID-19 pandemic. And so under Alberto Fernandez, the Argentinian people have really not stopped suffering. When Mauricio Macri left office, poverty levels had skyrocketed to 40%. So it's 40% of the population officially living in a state of poverty, living below the poverty line. Food insecurity had also drastically increased. So this was already a situation that was very, very difficult. And when the COVID-19 pandemic hit Argentina, he did take a very important policy, which was of containment, of trying to stop the spread of the virus, providing people with the means to stay at home, launching many different social programs. But when it came to really taking on capital head on, it quickly became clear that he was not willing to make enough structural changes to really change the situation of the people. And when the negotiations over the IMF debt happened, it also became clear that he wasn't willing to take the extremely bold position they would have had to take, which is to call for an investigation of what happened with the debt is to refuse to pay the debt. These are sort of the only solutions that really would have had a different outcome for the people of Argentina. He has been trying to engage in trade, for example, with China. Argentina has made important closening with China. And of course, with the victory of Lula da Silva in Brazil, this also opened up a very important avenue. However, it hasn't been enough. And in 2022, the inflation rate in Argentina was 100 percent. And that has been very, very hard for the people of the country as they've seen their money devaluate and value. It has become increasingly difficult to live on the salaries that they have. It doesn't. It they're not their salaries aren't able to keep up with the rate of inflation, to keep up with the rate of the currency devaluation. So it's a very, very complicated situation. And this, of course, this situation of deep discontent of economic instability means that it's sort of an open playing field for all of the different candidacies. Despite all of the structural problems that Alberto Fernandez inherited from Mauricio Macri, now the right wing can say, well, look what happens when you elect a leftist president. So it's going to be very, very, very difficult. An uphill battle, of course, for the Perunita Coalition. And we will definitely be following this. The Paso is just over a month and a half away. It will be very, very important to stay tuned onto this to see what happens. How does the Libertarian Party perform? How does the right wing coalition perform? And who will stay from this progressive alliance of Union Polapatia? Will it be the left wing leader, Graboi? Will it be Sergio Massa? That all remains to be seen. And moving on to our next story, the killing of a 17-year-old boy, Nahail of North African origin, by the police, has sparked huge protests in Paris and other parts of the country. This is yet another incident in what is being seen as a trend with those with Arab and African origins being targeted. Meanwhile, tensions are also high in Sweden, as protesters desecrate and burn copies of the Quran outside a major mosque that too on the day of Eid. We are with this, Anish Firmor. Anish, welcome back to the show. Could you first give us the details of the Paris case and why people are so angry? I believe they're saying that this is not an isolated incident. So could you tell us a bit more about this? Yeah, so the government's line is not necessarily... They're not making any comments on whether or not it's isolated, but definitely there are plenty of comments talking about how this is a one-off incident and not necessarily a trend. But if you look at what has happened for a year now, more than a year now, since 2022, there have been 13 shootings. And all of them shootings had traffic checkpoints by the police. And all of them, or at least most of them, were the victims, at least, were people of African or Arab origins. So this clearly shows a very clear trend. This is something that is a jump. In last year, if you have 13, and a year before that, you've only had three incidents, that clearly shows that there is a surge in such incidents. And it also clearly shows that the police in France is becoming more and more emboldened by the use of firearms on even ordinary cases where it's a basic traffic checkpoint. And so in such cases, it is completely false to say that this is a one-off incident. This is a very clear and growing trend. And even though this is the third case, this year, it clearly shows that there is a tendency for the police, which has been, as we should also point out, there has been a very recent liberalization of gun use by the police. And they have actually broadened the scope of it in even in instances where somebody refuses to make a traffic stop, if the police orders them to, can be shot at by the police. And that is something that has been used in all these 13 cases. And this clearly shows that there needs to be a review of such laws that was actually passed in different set of unrest that we need to remember. And the current set of unrest that we are seeing, the police is actually doubling down on their repression. And we have seen about 150 arrests already. And that clearly, and there has been over 2,000 Italian police being dispatched across Paris, especially in the suburbs, which are mostly dominated by ethnic minorities, mostly Muslims from Arab and North African origins. So in all of these cases, again, the victims again tend to be, you know, it's like a spiral. It's where the victims eventually tend to be ethnic minorities who always have felt quite marginalized in the overall French society. But and also, you know, even in its quality and even when it comes to the kind of violence that law enforcement has been inflicting upon them. Right Anish, now moving on to Sweden. Now we often think of countries in that region, in the Scandinavian region is some kind of oasis, you know, where everyone lives in peace and harmony. But actually we do know when from reports that there's quite a strong right wing over there. So what exactly happened in this incident and what does this kind of show about the situation there? Yes. So I mean, to the credit of the stock of authorities, they did try to prevent the sort of demonstration that many of the demonstrators call it as protest. They're protesting Islam for God knows why. But definitely this demonstration, they tried to scuttle it and they did not try, they tried to not give permission to it, but that was obviously shut down by the court saying that it infringes upon freedom of expression. But the intent of such demonstration, this is not the first time that it's happening, not just in Stockholm, but also across Europe, you've seen different kind of, you know, very provocative. It's not, and it's calling it provocative is also quite mild at all. Because when we look at the kind of intent and the kind of caricatures of the kind of vandalism and desecrations that have happened in such, you know, in such similar cases, the intent is quite very clearly hate, hatred towards Muslims, hatred towards Muslims, definitely who are usually Arabs or Africans. So this is something that is quite evident in the current set of demonstrations as well. We see not just merely burning up the Quran, we are seeing very clearly, you know, a very clear set of almost ritualized desecration of the holy book in front of the central mosque in Stockholm and at the time when the Eid prayers were happening. So this very clearly was an intended act of hate. And we need to look at it at an overall picture of rising hate crimes in Sweden as well, where more than half of the latest report which we have of 2021. And in that very, more than 51% of the hate crimes which includes vandalism of mosques, desecration of holy books, you know, and attacks on people as well. And obviously hate speech and slurs. All of these were targeted overwhelmingly against Muslims who are a very small percentage of the country's population. And obviously they're followed by, you know, the anti-Semitic version of hate crimes as well with around one-fifth of the, of such incidents being of that sort. Now, this clearly is coupled with the rise of the writing as you pointed out, the far right in Sweden, not just in Sweden, but across Europe. You see like it is coupled with such rising hate crimes which are often. And when you see like the demonstrations are just trying to push the envelope and trying to, you know, mask the largest set of hate crimes that actually also includes attack on women especially. We have seen more than half of such cases being targeted where the targets are usually women of such ethnic minorities. And in all of these incidents, these demonstrations are just an attempt to mask, you know, and be couched in the language of free speech and freedom of expression in these countries where they really are trying to overturn in not just institution, but also democratic rights of certain people, be it in their rhetoric for anti-immigrationism or for that matter, their rhetoric on containing crimes and, you know, all sorts of things which often, again, includes targeting minority ethnicities and their neighborhoods and their regions. So Anish, stay back with us because we are going to another region. In fact, another country we write, we talk about here on the show a lot, you write about, which is Korea. And we are going to be talking about the Ministry of Unification in South Korea. Now, in a move which is widely viewed as an attempt to further hide the tensions in the peninsula, the President Yoon Sokyol of South Korea has appointed a conservative hardliner and a prominent anti-North Korea ideologue as the new Minister of Unification. In a major reshuffle of his cabinet, Yoon appointed Kim Yong-ho, a well-known critic of the North Korean government to helm this ministry, which oversees inter-Korean relations and peace process. Now, Anish, before we get into the nitty-gritty of this appointment, what is this unification ministry and why is it important? The Unification Ministry is quite significant and there is a similar sort of, you know, a government department in North Korea as well. Now we have to remember that the North and the South were divided, not just an ideological line, but because of a Cold War era battle that ended in a sort of ceasefire and the war is still technically ongoing. So in both the cases, if you look at the Constitution itself, in both the cases, both the Koreas actually claim the full of Korea as, and they've claimed to be representative of the full of Korea. And it's a very similar case that we see with China and Taiwan as well. And in this case, unification departments very clearly outlines an ideological framework for not just foreign policy, but also for future plans of how they intend such, if possible, a unification or a reunification of the two Koreas as one country and how they want to smooth out these functions. Very primarily at the moment and on more practical sense of the term, this ministry essentially handles inter-Korean relations in most cases and it also is at the forefront, sorry, the front lines of any kind of peace processes that might emerge or have emerged in the past as well. So in both the cases, you have a very clear set of guidelines being enunciated by the ministry and it is the person at the head of the ministry who more or less kind of sets the tone for how the government wants to move forward with their relations with the North. And that is primarily why an appointment like that clearly shows where the UN government is right now heading towards and why such an appointment is going to create bigger tensions for the two Koreas in the coming days. Red Anish, so could you tell us a bit more about this new minister, what has been his record? Why is there such a controversy around him? Yeah, so he was part of a previous cabinet as well as a secretary again of the ministry of unification and in that cabinet was the previous conservative cabinet that pretty much ended the sunshine policy which was basically an attempt to, which was a major attempt to create a sustained peace process between two Koreas by a previous democratic government. The sunshine policy was the biggest kind of landmark sort of policy instance where and before the Moon Jae-in government actually created a proper peace process and dialogue between the two countries. And the ending of that was seen as a major setback to the Korean peace process as a force. And he was definitely part of that entire process. And if you look at some of his statements in the recent past, some of his stand on North Korea he has very vehemently focused a large part of his as a public ideologue on opposing North Korea and focusing on human rights, but more than human rights focusing on how any kind of unification would have to be not just denuclearization but demilitarization of the North Korean state and obviously implicitly meaning that a takeover of the state by force or through dominance. So appointing a person like this at the helm of the unification ministry clearly show, it kind of also changes the definition or the understanding of what unification would mean for the UN administration because it changes from reuniting of two ideologically opposed states or maybe reconciliation as well which was always the kind of guiding framework for past administrations even some conservative administrations to becoming a more confrontational maybe a kind of unification which might include user force or for that matter a dominance where the other has to be obliterated for any kind of unification to happen. So this is the kind of situation that the UN administration and this is not new actually we have talked about how UN administration ever since it came to power has always tried to push a more confrontational side and that was in fact a part of its election campaign as well. So the whole point was to create more confrontations with the North Korean administration because they essentially believe that there cannot be any kind of peaceful reconciliation with the North and that is what a large part of these hard line conservatives do believe in and which also form significant constituency as well at the ground in the South Korea. So this sort of pro-U.S. and they are very much ready to make any kind of concessions to the pro-U.S. agenda for that matter even if it's at the cost of their national interest but when it comes to North Korea it has to be all sort of no compromise only confrontation kind of line and this is pretty much what the UN administration is giving signals to from not just this appointment but also from recent moves that he has actually adopted under his administration. Right, thank you so much Anish for giving us I think a clear explanation of what's really happening this might be one ministerial appointment but it's really part of I think a larger trend which you've been talking about on this show and unfortunately very depressing and disturbing events coming from that part of the world continuously and I'm sure you'll be tracking it and we'll come back to you for more details on such stories as well. Thank you so much and that's all we have time for today on this episode of Daily Debrief we'll be back tomorrow but in the meantime do go to our website peoplesdispatch.org do follow us on all the social media platforms of your choice and keep watching and reading.