Today’s briefing:
— Three spicy weekend elections
— Iran and Israel are fighting again
— This 80-year-old is fitter than you
Your Insider’s briefing:
— Three spicy weekend elections
— Iran and Israel are fighting again
— This 80-year-old is fitter than you
Good morning {{first_name | Intriguer}}. If you ever find yourself in Lima, do whatever it takes to make friends with a wealthy local, then casually but pointedly nudge them into inviting you for lunch at the exclusive Club Nacional down in the historic centre.
You’ll sit out on a heavy stone balcony while waiters in pristine white gloves silently refill your Pisco between bites of roasted guinea pig (tastes like duck). And as you peer over the Plaza San Martín, maybe you too will find it easy to get lost in the place’s remarkable history: built in 1921 to celebrate a century of independence, that square has since served as the literal staging ground for protests, revolutions, and dramatic downfalls.
All that to say… this plaza is probably about to get busy again, because Peru was just home to one of three wild elections over the weekend featuring duelling dynasties, Russian deepfakes, and even alleged addiction to hallucinogenic mushrooms! Shall we?
 | Managing Editor Jeremy Dicker |
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Number of the day
9.1 million
That’s how many international visitors swung through Spain in April, a new record for the month as tourists seek alternatives amid conflicts in the Middle East.
Elective care.
You’ve just had a busy weekend perhaps binge-watching the NBA finals, arguing about the Monaco Grand Prix, or pretending you understood the French Open final.
So now it’s time for the juiciest messages and spiciest facts from Sunday’s three national elections, framed as 1990s hit movies for some reason. Let’s start with…
🇵🇪 Peru's Cliffhanger
With counting still underway, Peru's right-populist Keiko Fujimori now holds a slight edge over the left-populist Roberto Sánchez.
🧃 The juicy message?
i) These two finalists scraped into Sunday’s runoff with just 29% combined in the first round, meaning many Peruvians are now voting against rather than for anyone
ii) But after nine presidents in ten years, exhausted voters might now be leaning back towards the devil they know: Keiko's dad famously stabilised 1990s Peru and crushed Maoist terrorists, before serving time for crimes against humanity
iii) Investors in this copper and silver powerhouse may breathe easier with tough-on-crime Keiko in charge, though the margin suggests more gridlock ahead.
🌶️ Spicy fact: both candidates are essentially running as loyal defenders of their convicted (god)fathers — Keiko is channelling her late father's iron-fist, while Sánchez promises to free his leftist mentor, now doing time for trying to dissolve congress!
🇦🇲 Armenia's Matrix
Nikol Pashinyan, Armenia's pro-West incumbent, has now claimed a historic third term via his party's trimmed but solid ~57% majority.
🧃 The juicy message?
i) Folks are rewarding (or at least tolerating) his sharp Westward ‘red pill’ pivot after Armenia’s painful 2023 loss of Nagorno-Karabakh
ii) They're also backing his "peace through realism" approach with Azerbaijan, providing him the numbers to finalise a border treaty, and
iii) They're firmly rejecting Russia's heavy-handed interference, which included export bans, AI fakes, and even attempts to fly in diaspora voters!
🌶️ Spicy fact: the billionaire pro-Russian challenger had to campaign from house arrest on coup-incitement and corruption charges, and called the PM a ‘shroom addict!
🇽🇰 Kosovo's Groundhog Day
Albin Kurti, Kosovo's pro-EU and pro-NATO incumbent, has limped to a 43% win in these snap elections, meaning he'll now need to cobble together a coalition to stay in power.
🧃 The juicy message?
i) Record-low 36% turnout reflects epic voter fatigue after three elections in 18 months, rather than outright rejection of Kurti or the West
ii) He's losing altitude fast, down eight points in just six months, and
iii) It all likely means even more dysfunction ahead for Europe's youngest democracy, auguring even slower progress towards its EU/NATO dreams.
🌶️ Spicy fact: this election saw Kosovo's worst AI disinformation in history, including deepfake nudes targeting the ex-president!
Intrigue’s Take
Enough of the spice and juice — what does all this mean? We see three big trends under three more 90s hit films, starting with...
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Intrigue’s Take
Enough of the spice and juice — what does all this mean? We see three big trends under three more 90s hit films, starting with...
The Truman Show: democracy in 2026 is clearly messy. These elections produced strong emotions but weak mandates — a knife-edge in Peru, a reduced majority in Armenia, and another coalition scramble in Kosovo. Voters are tired, turnout is dropping, and gridlock is becoming the default. But the show somehow goes on.
Fight Club: look at how much the past still owns our present. Peru’s election now hinges on whether you want to see ex-leaders as heroes or villains, while Armenia's election is over whether to forgive or punish the Karabakh loss. Even in Kosovo, it's arguably been about whether a reformist (Kurti) has now become the establishment he once opposed. In all three places, identity and historical grievance proved at least as powerful as any pocketbook issues. And…
Independence Day: our world is no longer even pretending to stay out of foreign elections. Putin ran a full-spectrum interference against Armenia and still lost, while both the US and EU are deeply (if more quietly) invested in Kosovo’s journey. As for Peru? Fujimori just held a press conference to tell neighbouring Colombia’s leftist Petro to keep his “red nose” out of Peru’s business!
Anyway, among all the deepfakes, meddling, shroom dunks, and ghosting, democracy might not be pretty, but it’s still breathing. And these days, that still looks to us like a win.
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Meanwhile, elsewhere…
🇮🇷 IRAN — Fiery ceasefire.
Israel has now claimed hits across western and central Iran after Iran launched its first direct ballistic attacks on Israel since April, in turn framed as a response to Israeli operations in Lebanon! President Trump had only just publicly called for Israel’s Netanyahu not to retaliate. (BBC)
Comment: This entire US-Iran ceasefire is looking increasingly performative.
🇨🇺 CUBA — Sanctions bite.
New secondary sanctions against foreign firms dealing with Cuba’s military conglomerate entered force on Friday, prompting various foreign hotel chains, shipping lines, and banks to pause operations rather than get frozen out of the US. (Politico)
Comment: The pace of exit is a reminder of the bite in US secondary sanctions.
🇵🇭 PHILIPPINES — Deadly earthquake.
A 7.8-magnitude earthquake off the coast of the Philippines has left at least 19 dead and another 134 injured. (PhilStar)
🇯🇵 JAPAN — Historic baby.
Shoko Kawata, the 35-year-old mayor of Yawata (Kyoto), has announced she’ll become Japan’s first sitting mayor to take maternity leave. (CNN)
Comment: We mention this less for the yay factor (though congrats!) and more for the touchy topics it hits: Japan remains laser-focused on its declining birth rates, and continues to insist it can retain its minimal reliance on migrant labour by instead encouraging more women to join the workforce. But the fact Shoko’s routine news is so historic hints at how far Japan has to go on both fronts.
🇰🇷 SOUTH KOREA — KOSPI carnage.
Korea’s KOSPI stock index plunged as much as 8% earlier today (Monday), triggering an emergency halt to trading, while there were also tech-led drops across Japan (-4%), Hong Kong (-1.8%) and Shanghai (-1.5%). (Investing.com)
Comment: It’s likely a mix of profit-taking and capital rotation after an epic tech super-cycle, plus renewed Iran-US-Israel tensions spiking key oil prices. But it’s also a sharp reminder how exposed Asia’s export champions are when sentiment flips.
🇲🇽 MEXICO — Hecho en casa.
President Sheinbaum has unveiled the ‘Olinia’, Mexico’s first 100% domestically designed and built EV. Aimed at everyday local drivers, the $5k-10k city car (named “to move” in Nahuatl) is slated for production from 2027. (Bloomberg $)
Comment: Sheinbaum has a few aims here, including to a) move up the value chain, b) boost industrial sovereignty, c) push the green transition, and d) score political points (national pride, jobs). But success will depend whether this state-led project can execute at scale and compete with China’s models already dominating the streets.
🇲🇺 MAURITIUS — An offer they can’t refuse.
Mauritius insists it hasn’t heard anything, amid British media reports that President Trump could offer to buy the Chagos Islands and sidestep the UK’s (paused) plans to transfer sovereignty to Mauritius. (Guardian)
Comment: While Trump has long opposed the UK’s 2024 deal with Mauritius, the Iran War might’ve been an accelerant here: these islands host the secretive US-UK Diego Garcia base, which has played a key role in US operations (and featured as one of Iran’s early missile targets, suggesting its ballistic range was longer than pledged).
Extra Intrigue
🤣 Your weekly round-up of the world’s lighter news
A French billionaire is pleading for new laws so he can disinherit his children.
A robot in a clown wig has roundhouse-kicked a small child in China.
Australian newspapers have retracted an academic’s opinion piece urging students not to use AI, because the academic used AI to write it.
One South Carolina cop has pulled his gun on another after he started reheating some fish in the office microwave.
And organisers have had to delay the British screening of a WWII bomb disposal film after someone found a WWII bomb.
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Flex of the day
Bro is NOT skipping leg day. Via President Lula’s X account
Think you had a busy weekend?
Brazil’s 80-year-old president just dropped an absolute no-filter thirst-trap workout video that’s had the entire country doing a double-take: a 6km run, chest and arms, AND legs! Just have a look at those chiselled pipes right there, completely mogging 95% of the political scene while hardmaxxing his delts. Not pictured: protein shake.
And yet the subtext is both obvious, not to mention deliciously political: there’s a 35-year age difference between Lula and his rival (Bolsonaro Jr) in October’s high-stakes elections.
So while President Lula’s caption technically reads “have you exercised yet?”, his message is something more like “I can still lead”, and maybe “mog or be mogged.”
Today’s poll
In this chaotic world of ours, where do you stand on golf?
Thursday’s poll: Which El Niño effect rattles you the most?
🏜️ Droughts (38%)
🌧️ Floods (14%)
🔥 Heat (23%)
🐟 Fisheries collapse (13%)
🛢️ Energy (7%)
🚢 Shipping (2%)
✍️ Other (write in!) (3%)
Your two cents:
🏜️ A.F: “Rain harvesting is the primary water source for Pacific atolls — droughts have a devastating impact.”
🔥 T.S: “Heat has a large effect on all the rest.”
✍️ M.S: "El Niño tends to flood the Horn of Africa while drying out Southern Africa. When Africa's rains fail, food-import bills balloon, deficits widen and currencies slide — except the continent already borrows at a premium the UN puts at roughly $75bn above what its fundamentals justify, before a single cloud misbehaves.”
✍️ C.B: “It's a natural cycle that impacts us all — this too shall pass and viewing it through a doomsday lens adds to the anxiety many feel already!”