The Economist Continental Europe Edition January 30, 2021

The cumulative number of recorded infections worldwide reached 100m. The true figure is thought to be much higher. In Britain the recorded death toll passed 100,000, the world’s fifth-highest and far ahead of other European nations. England’s lockdown will last until at least March 8th. Restrictions at the country’s borders were tightened. With infections falling, Cyprus is to ease its lock-down, allowing schools to reopen on February 8th. The White House banned non-American travellers from South Africa, where a virulent strain of the disease has been discovered, from entering the United States. The International Olympic Committee said that the postponed games in Tokyo, scheduled to start on July 23rd, will definitely go ahead. For our latest coverage of the virus please visit economist.com/ coronavirus or download the Economist app.…

Politics The spectre of vaccine nationalism stalked Europe as a row erupted between Britain and the European Commission over supply of the Astra-Zeneca-Oxford vaccine. Because of manufacturing problems at one of its European factories, AstraZeneca has said it will deliver less to the EU than it had planned in the coming months. The commission wants some of the shortfall to be made up with vaccine allotted for Britain. That risks breaching contractual obligations. But there are threats from the EU that if AstraZeneca does not agree, then supplies to Britain of other vaccines made in Europe, in particular the Pfizer jab, may be affected. Large protests took place in Moscow and many other Russian cities, following the arrest of Russia’s leading opposition figure, Alexei Navalny. There were thousands of arrests. More rallies…

Politics The spectre of vaccine nationalism stalked Europe as a row erupted between Britain and the European Commission over supply of the Astra-Zeneca-Oxford vaccine. Because of manufacturing problems at one of its European factories, AstraZeneca has said it will deliver less to the EU than it had planned in the coming months. The commission wants some of the shortfall to be made up with vaccine allotted for Britain. That risks breaching contractual obligations. But there are threats from the EU that if AstraZeneca does not agree, then supplies to Britain of other vaccines made in Europe, in particular the Pfizer jab, may be affected. Large protests took place in Moscow and many other Russian cities, following the arrest of Russia’s leading opposition figure, Alexei Navalny. There were thousands of arrests.…

The cumulative number of recorded infections worldwide reached 100m. The true figure is thought to be much higher. In Britain the recorded death toll passed 100,000, the world’s fifth-highest and far ahead of other European nations. England’s lockdown will last until at least March 8th. Restrictions at the country’s borders were tightened. With infections falling, Cyprus is to ease its lock-down, allowing schools to reopen on February 8th. The White House banned non-American travellers from South Africa, where a virulent strain of the disease has been discovered, from entering the United States. The International Olympic Committee said that the postponed games in Tokyo, scheduled to start on July 23rd, will definitely go ahead. For our latest coverage of the virus please visit economist.com/ coronavirus or download the Economist app.…

THIRTY-ONE countries, from Brazil to Sweden, have flirted with nuclear weapons at one time or another. Seventeen launched a formal weapons programme. Just ten produced a deliverable bomb. Today nine states possess nuclear arms, no more than a quarter-century ago. Yet the long struggle to stop the world’s deadliest weapons from spreading is about to get harder. In the past 20 years most countries with nuclear ambitions have been geopolitical minnows, like Libya and Syria. In the next decade the threat is likely to include economic and diplomatic heavyweights whose ambitions would be harder to restrain. China’s rapidly increasing regional dominance and North Korea’s growing nuclear arsenal haunt South Korea and Japan, two of Asia’s largest powers. Iran’s belligerence and its nuclear programme loom over the likes of Saudi Arabia and…

THIRTY-ONE countries, from Brazil to Sweden, have flirted with nuclear weapons at one time or another. Seventeen launched a formal weapons programme. Just ten produced a deliverable bomb. Today nine states possess nuclear arms, no more than a quarter-century ago. Yet the long struggle to stop the world’s deadliest weapons from spreading is about to get harder. In the past 20 years most countries with nuclear ambitions have been geopolitical minnows, like Libya and Syria. In the next decade the threat is likely to include economic and diplomatic heavyweights whose ambitions would be harder to restrain. China’s rapidly increasing regional dominance and North Korea’s growing nuclear arsenal haunt South Korea and Japan, two of Asia’s largest powers. Iran’s belligerence and its nuclear programme loom over the likes of Saudi Arabia…