The muck from incessant rain sloshes around Nestor N’Guessan’s feet as he points to a plot of cocoa trees ravaged by rot on his farm in Ivory Coast.

The 52-year-old grower can’t save those plants from black pod disease, so he’s focusing efforts on quarantining whatever healthy ones he has left. The soakings of recent months mean fewer pods on his trees, with some supporting just a handful of cocoa buds.

“I had to create a boundary to prevent the rest of the plantation from being contaminated,” he said while pruning the healthy thicket. “Yields are low. The weather hasn’t helped us.”

It’s a climate crisis playing out across Ivory Coast and Ghana, the heavyweights of cocoa, with consequences for global food inflation and the cost-of-living squeeze. Too much rain is lowering output and delaying harvests, with the resulting shortfall catapulting wholesale prices in New York to their highest in 46 years.

The total precipitation in West Africa since the rainy season started May 1 has been more than double the 30-year average, according to Maxar Technologies Inc. The damage to yields is compounded by growers’ long struggle over pay, leaving them little money to pour back into their plots.

This is the main harvest period, and the constant deluge turns dirt roads into impassable swamps, knocks flowers off before they bud and fosters breeding of a fungal infection that turns rugby ball-sized pods into black mush.

Ghana’s output is expected to be the lowest in 13 years, and Ivory Coast’s the smallest in seven, based on totals provided by traders and exporters. Together, the countries produce about 60% of the world’s beans, according to the International Cocoa Organization.

The most-active futures are trading at the highest since 1977 in New York, soaring past $4,200 a ton. At that price, you could buy about 50 barrels of oil.

“This is a bull market, and it hasn’t peaked yet,” said Fuad Mohammed Abubakar, head of government-affiliated Ghana Cocoa Marketing Co. (UK) Ltd., which sells and exports premium cocoa. “More risks lie ahead.”

With sugar also reaching a decade high, consumers likely will spend morefor their chocolate bars, cookies and hot cocoa as Christmas approaches. The US Department of Agriculture forecasts prices for sugar and sweets rising 8.9% this year and another 5.6% next year, outpacing total food inflation.

Citing higher supply costs, Mondelez International Inc., maker of Toblerone bars and Oreo cookies, will raise some prices next year, Chief Executive Officer Dirk Van de Put told Bloomberg Television on Nov. 6. Nestle SA, owner of Haagen-Dazs ice cream and Quality Street candies, said it will do the same.

It would be logical to conclude that farmers benefit from the bounty, but in reality they’re not — even with the $400-a-ton premium tacked onto the market price as the living income differential.

The cocoa markets in Ivory Coast and Ghana are strictly controlled by the governments, and regulators typically sell beans to foreign buyers at least 12 months in advance.

That means the money being paid to farmers for this season’s crop was locked in about a year ago, when futures were about $2,500 a ton.

“At current farmgate prices, farmers aren’t incentivized to go into the farms,” said Mahmoud Khayat, senior trader at Ivory Cocoa Products, a bean processing company. “If prices were high, he would swim to get the cocoa.”

Right now, growers are waiting on the government’s negotiations for next season with top buyers such as Barry Callebaut AG, Cargill Inc. and Olam International Ltd. The sides are in a standoff, with the companies holding off purchases because they want a discount, according to people familiar with the matter.

Typically, there would be a push to plant more seedlings to capitalize on the boom, but many growers are prisoners to the rain and can’t afford to hire more hands, use more fertilizer or buy the necessary chemicals to ward off black pod.

The soil on Samuel Addo’s 12-acre plot in Suhum district, Ghana — about 65 kilometers (40 miles) north of the capital, Accra — has a sandy consistency, making it a bit more difficult to grow cocoa even in the best conditions.

After a heavy downpour, nearly every tree sprouted a pod that was either rotting or turning black. The only way to tame the spread is for Addo to spray his buds, called cherelles, every two weeks, but that expense is out of reach.

“It’s never attacked my farm this bad since I started farming cocoa,” Addo, 52, said. “What I’m earning is not enough to invest back into the farm.”

The El Nino weather pattern could trigger more hardship ahead as dry conditions typically set in across West Africa. Global output hasn’t met demand for the past two seasons, and it’s expected to stay that way for several more years, Abubakar said.

“The supply response will not be instant,” he said. “It will take time for higher prices to boost production.”

Plus, deforestation regulations coming from the European Union — a major hub for West Africa's crop — are likely to escalate costs as beans are tracked through the supply chain.

At this time of the year, processing plants in San Pedro, Ivory Coast’s main export hub, should be running at full tilt to clean, fumigate and pack the beans into 65-kilogram (143-pound) jute bags ready for shipment.

Yet total port arrivals in the season that started Oct. 1 total 479,449 tons, compared with an estimated 707,200 tons a year ago. That’s a 32% drop.

The dearth of supply forced Societe Ivoirienne de Transformation de Produits Agricoles, which can process more than 1,500 tons a day, to idle one of its machines the day a Bloomberg reporter visited.

The exporter is receiving about 20 cargo trucks daily, compared with about 24-26 trucks a year ago. The artery to the cocoa basket — a rugged road to begin with — is now pocked by holes brimming with rainwater, making the journey even more treacherous.

The National Federation of Dockers, which represents workers in Ivory Coast’s main ports, said this season has been abnormal. During a recent week, it counted 29 trucks in San Pedro and 32 in Abidjan, compared with 70 and 61, respectively, a year earlier.

“The flow of cocoa harvest arrivals is very low,” the federation said in an email. “Members who are usually very busy unloading cocoa bags from trucks have been redeployed to other jobs.”

The challenging climate and low pay are prompting some farmers to give up their beans in favor of other commodities, notably rubber and gold.

N’Guessan’s farm in Soubre, Ivory Coast’s cocoa heartland, is about a seven-hour drive from Abidjan. In recent years, vast rubber plantations sprung up around him to satisfy demand for tires, hoses and other products.

Rubber trees need less maintenance, and Ivory Coast is now the top producer in Africa.

“Many planters have abandoned cocoa,” he said.

In Ghana, the lure is gold. Artisanal mining accounts for about a third of the country’s output, and farmers talk about companies persistently offering them large sums of money to give up their land.

A ride through the nation’s cocoa belt finds many plantations replaced by what are known locally as galamsey.

“There is a myth that cocoa farms are often sitting on gold-rich stones,” grower Michael Acheampong said, looking at the mine next door. “Some farmers cannot resist the allure of quick money.”

The Cote d’Ivoire-Ghana Cocoa Initiative was created by both nations to dim that luster. The cartel’s purpose is to raise prices paid to farmers, saying they haven’t covered the costs of production or guaranteed a living wage for decades, Executive Secretary Alex Assanvo said.

“If farmers see high prices today and a lower price is given to them, how do we see farmers continue growing cocoa?” he said.

Bloomberg

Israel’s war with Hamas resumes with airstrikes in Gaza after a weeklong truce ends

Israel’s war with Hamas erupted again Friday, as airstrikes hit houses and buildings in the Gaza Strip minutes after a weeklong truce expired. Health authorities in the besieged territory reported dozens of Palestinians killed and Israel dropped leaflets over Gaza City and southern parts of the enclave, urging civilians to flee to avoid the fighting.

Militants in Gaza resumed firing rockets into Israel, and fighting broke out between Israel and Hezbollah militants operating along its northern border with Lebanon.

The resumption of the war threatens to compound the suffering in Gaza. Some 2 million people -- almost its entire population -- are crammed into the territory’s south, where Israel urged people to relocate at the war’s start and has since vowed to extend its ground assault. Unable to go into northern Gaza or neighboring Egypt, their only escape is to move around within the 85-square-mile area (220 square kilometers).

Renewed hostilities also heighten concerns for about 140 hostages still held captive by Hamas and other militants, after more than 100 were freed during the truce. For families of remaining hostages, the truce’s collapse was a blow to hopes their loved ones could be the next out after days of seeing others freed. The Israeli army said Friday it had confirmed the deaths of four more hostages, bringing the total known dead to seven.

Qatar, which has served as a mediator along with Egypt, said negotiators were still trying for a deal to restore the cease-fire. Israel and Hamas traded blame for ending the truce.

A day earlier, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken urged Israeli officials to do more to protect Palestinian civilians as they seek to destroy Hamas. Blinken met Friday with Arab foreign ministers at global climate talks in Dubai.

It was not clear to what extent Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will heed the appeals of the United States, Israel’s most important ally.

Netanyahu’s office said Friday that Israel “is committed to achieving the goals of the war,” including releasing the hostages and eliminating Hamas, which has ruled Gaza since 2007.

In response to the U.S. calls, the Israeli military released an online map dividing the Gaza Strip into hundreds of numbered, haphazardly drawn parcels. It asked residents to learn the number of their location in case of an eventual evacuation. The map did not designate safe areas to evacuate to, and it was not clear how easily Palestinians could access it.

Hours into the renewed bombardment, Gaza’s Health Ministry said 178 people were killed and dozens wounded. Israel said it struck more than 200 Hamas targets.

Up until the truce began, more than 13,300 Palestinians were killed in Israel’s assault, roughly two-thirds of them women and minors, according to Gaza’s Health Ministry, which does not differentiate between civilians and combatants.

The toll is likely much higher, as officials have only sporadically updated the count since Nov. 11. The ministry says thousands more people are feared dead under the rubble.

The war began after the Oct. 7 attack by Hamas and other militants, who killed about 1,200 people, mostly civilians, in southern Israel and took around 240 people captive. The New York Times reported Israel’s military was aware of Hamas’ plan to attack Israeli soil over a year before the devastating operation.

RETURN TO BATTLE

About an hour before the cease-fire was to expire early Friday, Israel said it intercepted a volley of rockets fired from Gaza. Minutes after it expired, the military announced a resumption of combat operations, and strikes soon began.

In leaflets dropped in southern Gaza, Israel urged people to leave homes east of Khan Younis, warning that the southern town was now a “dangerous battle zone.” Other leaflets warned residents of several neighborhoods in Gaza City in the north to move south.

Hundreds of thousands of people fled northern Gaza to Khan Younis and other parts of the south earlier in the war, part of an extraordinary mass exodus that has left three-quarters of the population displaced and facing widespread shortages of food, water and other supplies.

No trucks carrying aid entered Gaza from Egypt on Friday, Palestinians authorities at the Rafah crossing said, after an increased flow of supplies during the truce.

The International Rescue Committee, an aid group operating in Gaza, warned the return of fighting will “wipe out even the minimal relief” provided by the truce and “prove catastrophic for Palestinian civilians.”

In Washington, U.S. National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said that Israel blocked trucks from crossing into Gaza Friday but that at the request of the U.S. government, it would allow some aid to enter. Kirby said the U.S. would continue to push to increase the assistance of aid into Gaza at least up to the level of goods that entered during the pause.

In Khan Younis, residents frantically searched for survivors in the rubble of a building hit by a strike. “We are women and children here. We have nothing,” said Fatima Nshasi, a relative of a family in the building, as women sobbed nearby. “We were going with life as usual, hoping the truce would be extended.”

Strikes also hit near Gaza City and in the central Gaza refugee camp of Maghazi, where rescuers clawed through the rubble of a large building. A foot stuck out of the tangle of concrete and wiring.

Israel says it is targeting Hamas operatives and blames civilian casualties on the militants, accusing them of operating in residential neighborhoods. Israel says 77 of its soldiers have been killed in the ground offensive in northern Gaza. It claims to have killed thousands of militants, without providing evidence.

Hamas said it fired volleys of rockets from Gaza toward Israeli cities. White smoke trails could be seen over the Israeli town of Sderot on the border with northern Gaza after Israel’s missile protection systems activated.

In Lebanon, Hezbollah said Friday its fighters fired on a group of Israeli soldiers along the border, its first attack since the truce went into effect.

Israel said a number of launches from Lebanon targeted military posts near the border, and others were directed toward the town of Kiryat Shmona but were intercepted. The military responded with artillery. One Hezbollah fighter and his mother were killed when their home was hit, security officials said.

HOSTAGES’ FAMILIES GRIEVE END OF TRUCE

The end of the truce hit families of remaining hostages especially hard.

Meirav Svirsky told Israel’s Channel 12 that a released hostage relayed a message to her from her 38-year-old brother, Itai, who is still held hostage, confirming he is alive. “His body is healthy but his mental state isn’t great,” she said. Meirav and Itai’s parents were killed on Oct. 7.

“They haven’t spoken about releasing the men, and they returned to fighting without exhausting the possibilities,” said Meirav, adding that she thinks “the state is responsible” for the fate of her brother. “From my perspective, every day when there is fighting in Gaza is putting him at risk.”

Netanyahu has been under intense pressure from hostages’ families to bring them home. But his far-right governing partners have also pushed him to continue the war until Hamas is destroyed.

Netanyahu said Hamas had violated the terms of the truce. “It has not met its obligation to release all of the women hostages today and has launched rockets at Israeli citizens,” he said in a statement.

Hamas blamed Israel, saying it had rejected all offers Hamas made to release more hostages and bodies of the dead. Senior Hamas official Osama Hamdan told The Associated Press in Beirut that Hamas rejected an Israeli list of 10 female hostages to release because they were soldiers seized at military posts.

Hamas was expected to set a higher price for releasing Israeli soldiers and male hostages, and negotiations for an extension grew tougher with few women and children hostages remaining in Gaza.

During the truce, which began Nov. 24, Hamas and other militants in Gaza released more than 100 hostages — 81 Israelis and 24 from other nationalities, mainly Thais. Israel freed 240 Palestinians from its prisons. Virtually all from both sides were women and children.

AP

RUSSIAN PERSPECTIVE

Ukraine has lost up to 300,000 soldiers – ex-Zelensky aide

Ukraine has lost up to 300,000 soldiers during its conflict with Russia, Aleksey Arestovich, a former aide to President Vladimir Zelensky, has claimed.

Arestovich made the revelation on Friday while speaking to journalist Yulia Latynina via video link. The former presidential aide was addressing the recent admission made by top Ukrainian MP David Arakhamia, who said the Istanbul talks between Moscow and Kiev were derailed by then-UK PM Boris Johnson, who urged Ukraine to “just continue fighting” instead of attempting to reach a deal with Russia.

“I was a member of the Istanbul negotiating team, but even I don’t know how it happened that we decided to break off the Istanbul [talks],”Arestovich stated.

The initiatives floated during the Istanbul talks were actually “very good,” he admitted, claiming that Ukraine’s neutrality and its non-alignment with NATO was a “red line” for Moscow.

Refusing to negotiate, however, has only resulted in heavy casualties, while its prospects to join NATO still remain dubious, he suggested.

“Where is NATO? Does it accept us or not? And will it accept us? ... Then the 200 thousand [Ukrainian servicemen] or whatever, 300 thousand, would still be alive,” the ex-aide said.

The remarks come as Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu revealed Moscow’s latest estimates on Kiev’s casualties. Speaking during a ministerial meeting on Friday, Shoigu claimed that the Ukrainian military has lost more than 125,000 troops and around 16,000 military hardware pieces since the beginning of its botched counteroffensive, which started in early June. The country’s efforts, as well as Western aid, have not yielded any tangible result, the minister added.

“The total mobilization in Ukraine, delivery of Western arms, and deployment of strategic reserves by the Ukrainian command have not changed the situation on the battlefield,” Shoigu explained. “Those desperate actions simply increased the losses of the Ukrainian armed forces.”

In recent weeks, top Ukrainian officials admitted the counteroffensive had failed to reach the desired outcome, and they seemed to shift blame for the failure on each other. Early in November, for instance, Valery Zaluzhny, Ukraine’s top general, said the battlefield situation had reached a“stalemate,” with Kiev unlikely to achieve a breakthrough unless it received a wonder-weapon of sorts.

The assessment has been vehemently rejected by Zelensky, who insisted the counteroffensive was still making progress. In an interview with AP published on Friday, however, Zelensky finally admitted that it had failed, stating that he considers the fact that his country’s troops are not retreating at the moment a “satisfying” enough result.

** Zelensky accepts counter-offensve has failed

Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky considers the fact that Kiev’s troops are currently not retreating as a good result in itself, according to an interview published by AP on Friday. He and his allies had previously criticized the country's military leadership for describing the situation a “stalemate.”

The new comments stand in stark contrast to bellicose predictions from Kiev ahead of its much hyped summer counter offensive, which included pledges to quickly retake Crimea.

Valery Zaluzhny, Ukraine’s top general, used the term in early November, triggering a barrage of criticism from senior civilian officials and a rebuke from the president, who urged generals not to involve themselves in politics.

“Look, we are not backing down, I am satisfied,” he was quoted as saying, when asked about the outcome of the counteroffensive, which Kiev launched in early June. AP described the operation as being “powered by tens of billions of dollars in Western military aid, including heavy weaponry,” yet not forging “the expected breakthroughs.”

Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu on Friday estimated Ukrainian losses in the last six months as surpassing 125,000 people and 16,000 pieces of heavy weaponry. Kiev’s forces have failed to change the battlefield situation, despite total mobilization, deployment of strategic reserves, and supplies of Western arms, he claimed.

The Ukrainian president blamed the shortage of Western aid for the lackluster result, but acknowledged that Kiev also has problems with manpower.

“There is not enough power to achieve the desired results faster. But this does not mean that we should give up,” he told the news agency.

Discussing whether the static front line put pressure on him to negotiate a peace deal with Russia, Zelensky said: “I don’t feel it yet.”

There is a legal prohibition in Ukraine against talks with Russia as long as President Vladimir Putin remains in office. Kiev and its Western backers have been pushing the so-called “Zelensky peace formula” as the only possible basis for a negotiated resolution. Moscow dismissed the proposal right after it was unveiled last year, calling it detached from reality.

Some security policy experts, including ex-NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen and ex-Supreme Allied Commander Europe James Stavridis, have suggested that the conflict should be frozen. Ukraine would then be granted a limited membership in the US-led military bloc, with mutual defense clauses applying only to territories under Kiev’s control, the idea goes.

However, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmitry Kuleba rejected such a proposal when asked about it on the sidelines of the NATO-Ukraine Council meeting in Brussels on Wednesday. He also denied that there was a “stalemate” on the battlefield.

Zelensky appeared to justify his reassessment of the situation by the official arrival of winter on Friday, declaring a “new phase” in the fighting.

WESTERN PERSPECTIVE

Ukraine conducts new attack on Russian railway deep in Siberia - source

Ukraine's domestic spy agency has detonated explosives on a Russian railway line deep in Siberia, the second attack this week on military supply routes in the area, a Ukrainian source told Reuters on Friday.

The incidents appear to show Kyiv's readiness and ability to conduct sabotage attacks deep inside Russia and disrupt Russian logistics far from the front lines of Moscow's 21-month-old war in Ukraine.

The source, who declined to be identified, said the explosives were detonated as a freight train crossed the Chertov Bridge in Siberia's Buryatia region, which borders Mongolia and is thousands of kilometres from Ukraine.

The train had been using a backup railway line after an attack on a nearby tunnel a day earlier caused trains to be diverted, the source said.

Baza, a Russian media outlet with security sources, said diesel fuel tanks had ignited on a train using the backup route and that six goods wagons had caught fire. It reported no casualties and said the cause of the explosions was unknown.

The Ukrainian source, who said both operations were conducted by the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU), gave a similar assessment of the damage, citing Russian Telegram channels.

Reuters could not independently verify the accounts or assess whether the route is used for military supplies. Russian Railways declined to comment on the latest incident. The regional branch of Russia's Investigative Committee did not immediately respond to a written request for comment.

The Ukrainian source said on Thursday the SBU had detonated explosives in the earlier attack as a cargo train moved through the Severomuysky tunnel in Buryatia.

Russian investigators have concluded that train was blown up in a "terrorist act" by unidentified individuals, the Moscow-based Kommersant newspaper cited unnamed sources as saying.

Russian Railways, the state company that operates the vast rail network, said traffic had been diverted along a new route after the first attack, slightly increasing journey times but not interrupting transport.

The Ukrainian source said the second attack had anticipated the diversion of rail traffic and targeted the backup route at Chertov Bridge, which is on Russia's Baikal-Amur Mainline traversing Eastern Siberia and the Russian Far East.

Russia's Trans-Siberian Railway is widely seen as more important for Russian freight transport than the Baikal-Amur Mainline.

A Russian industry source who declined to be identified said the backup route was functioning and being used by trains carrying freight on Friday afternoon.

** Ukrainian official predicts Kyiv airport soon to reopen

Ukraine has become progressively stronger over the past year and will soon be able to reopen Kyiv's international airport, President Volodymyr Zelenskiy's chief of staff said on Friday.

Andriy Yermak made the pledge while addressing diplomats at Boryspil International Airport outside the capital.

"This return to the elements of peace is possible because Ukraine has grown stronger," Yermak told the diplomats in remarks posted on Zelenskiy's website.

"We are now capable of providing security for this site. Thanks to our defence forces and our friends, your countries. I am certain that the symbolic boarding cards that you were given when you came in today will soon turn into real ones."

Yermak's deputy, Andriy Sybiga, told the gathering that the airport was the first major site to be closed in Ukraine as Russian troops poured over the border on Feb. 24, 2022 and would be the first to be reopened once conditions permitted.

Yermak had invited the diplomats to discuss elements of Zelenskiy's 10-point peace plan, which calls for a withdrawal of Russian troops, recognition of Ukraine's 1991 borders and the establishment of a tribunal to examine war crimes.

A Vietnamese man who had been suffering from severe headaches and even loss of vision over the last five months recently learned that he had a pair of chopsticks stuck in his skull.

The unnamed man was recently admitted to the Cuba Friendship Hospital in the city of Dong Hoi, Vietnam’s Quang Binh province, after complaining of constant headaches, vision loss, and fluid discharge from his nose. When asked, the man revealed no possible cause for these symptoms, but a CT scan showed a tension pneumocephalus, the intracranial equivalent of a pneumothorax, as well as two foreign objects protruding from his nose into his brain. Upon thorough examination, the objects were identified as broken chopsticks.

Asked how the chopsticks might have found their way into his skull, the 35-year-old patient was initially as baffled as his doctors, but he later remembered an incident he had been involved in five months prior that could help explain his situation. While out drinking one night, the man got into a physical altercation and ended up in the emergency room. However, doctors there just patched him up and sent him on his way. Now, he assumes the other man stuck the chopsticks into his skull, through the nose, but he doesn’t remember actually happening.

After considering all the options, the medical team decided to perform endoscopic surgery through the nose, combined with microsurgery to close the patient’s cranial fistula and remove the pair of broken chopsticks. According to doctor Nguyen Van Man, Head of the Department of Neurosurgery at Cuba Friendship Hospital, choosing the optimal surgical method is critical to avoid leaving the patient with sequelae.

The 35-year-old man’s condition is stable and he has been discharged from the hospital.

Getting chopsticks stuck in your skull is apparently not as rare as you’d think. Just a couple of years ago, we wrote about a similar case in Taiwan where a woman ended up with chopsticks piercing her brain after an altercation with her sister.

Oddity Central

Emotional quotient, or EQ, is the ability to perceive, manage, control or communicate emotions.

People with a high EQ often enjoy better interactions not only with friends and family, but strangers, as well, says Matt Abrahams, a Stanford University lecturer in organizational behavior. Abrahams specializes in interpersonal communication.

"A lot of small talk is about empathy and being able to connect with the other person, and people with high EQ are able to do that better," he says.

Here are three things people with a high EQ do that make them better at small talk.

1. They validate the other person

They listen and then respond in a way that makes the other person feel understood. And they don't relate the conversation back to their own experience.

"They'll use paraphrasing or follow-up questions to demonstrate 'I heard you and I value what you said,'" Abrahams says.

If a person is talking about their recent vacation, someone with a high EQ will inquire about specifics or say "tell me more." Someone with a lower EQ might start talking about their own trips.

They'll use paraphrasing or follow-up questions to demonstrate "I heard you and I value what you said."

Matt Abrahams

Stanford University Lecturer

2. They mirror the other person

Mirroring refers to the unconscious act of imitating someone else's behavior in social interactions.

A person with high EQ might match the tone of voice or facial expression of the person they are having a conversation with.

3. They use open nonverbal language

Body language can also help convey that you are interested and listening.

"People who have a higher EQ are more open in their posture, they are nodding more," Abrahams says.

They also give more "backchannel" responses, like "uh-huh" and "I see."

"People with high EQ are better at understanding what's important to other people," Abrahams says.

During small talk with a stranger, this proves to be a huge asset.

CNBC

OPEC+ handed Nigeria a 2024 oil output target lower than Africa's largest oil producer had hoped for while lowering Angola's target, according to a statement from the group of oil-producing countries.

The move follows a meeting in June where OPEC+ agreed a complex deal that revised production targets for several members.

OPEC had tasked three consultancies - IHS, Rystad Energy and Wood Mackenzie - with verifying production figures for Nigeria, Angola and Congo.

Based on that it has given Nigeria a 2024 target of 1.5 million barrels per day (bpd), Angola one of 1.11 million bpd and Congo a target of 277,000 bpd, OPEC+ said in the statement.

In June it had been agreed, pending the assessments by the consultancies, that Angola could produce 1.28 million bpd and Nigeria 1.38 mln bpd and possibly as much as 1.58 million bpd.

Both have failed to meet previous quotas hurt by underinvestment and security issues.

Congo's target for 2024 is roughly in line with what was agreed in June.

NIGERIA 'OPTIMISTIC'

Disagreements over African output quotas was cited by sources as a reason OPEC+ postponed an in-person OPEC+ meeting sceheduled for Nov. 26 until Thursday.

Angola on Thursday was unhappy with its 2024 output target and does not plan to stick to it, Bloomberg reported.

Nigerian output has been in decline for years, but has picked up in recent months helped by more production offshore, which is less prone to security problems, two analysts told Reuters.

Still, Nigeria's own targets of hitting 2 million bpd in crude and condensate output next year are more optimistic than realistic, they said.

According to Rystad's calculations, under its base case scenario Nigeria can expect to see crude output rise to 1.5 million bpd next year assuming no further disruptions.

FGE analyst James Forbes said that the country's maximum crude output this year has been about 1.51 million bpd, so this is likely what they can achieve if all streams were to operate at maximum capacity.

"However, most of Nigeria's fields are mature and declining so it is unlikely this would happen," he said.

Reuters

For the first time since Vladimir Putin invaded Ukraine on February 24th 2022, he looks as if he could win. Russia’s president has put his country on a war footing and strengthened his grip on power. He has procured military supplies abroad and is helping turn the global south against America. Crucially, he is undermining the conviction in the West that Ukraine can—and must—emerge from the war as a thriving European democracy.

The West could do a lot more to frustrate Putin. If it chose, it could deploy industrial and financial resources that dwarf Russia’s. However, fatalism, complacency and a shocking lack of strategic vision are getting in the way, especially in Europe. For its own sake as well as Ukraine’s, the West urgently needs to shake off its lethargy.

The reason a Putin victory is possible is that winning is about endurance rather than capturing territory. Neither army is in a position to drive out the other from the land they currently control. Ukraine’s counter-offensive has stalled. Russia is losing over 900 men a day in the battle to take Avdiivka, a city in the Donbas region. This is a defenders’ war, and it could last many years.

However, the battlefield shapes politics. Momentum affects morale. If Ukraine retreats, dissent in Kyiv will grow louder. So will voices in the West saying that sending Ukraine money and weapons is a waste. In 2024 at least, Russia will be in a stronger position to fight, because it will have more drones and artillery shells, because its army has developed successful electronic-warfare tactics against some Ukrainian weapons and because Putin will tolerate horrific casualties among his own men.

Increasing foreign support partly explains Russia’s edge on the battlefield. Putin has obtained drones from Iran and shells from North Korea. He has worked to convince much of the global south that it has no great stake in what happens to Ukraine. Turkey and Kazakhstan have become channels for goods that feed the Russian war machine. A Western scheme to limit Russian oil revenues by capping the price for its crude at $60 a barrel has failed because a parallel trading structure has emerged beyond the reach of the West. The price of Urals crude from Russia is $64, up nearly 10% since the start of 2023.

Putin is also winning because he has strengthened his position at home. He now tells Russians, absurdly, that they are locked in a struggle for survival against the West. Ordinary Russians may not like the war, but they have become used to it. The elite have tightened their grip on the economy and are making plenty of money. Putin can afford to pay a lifetime’s wages to the families of those who fight and die.

Faced with all this, no wonder the mood in Kyiv is darker. Politics has returned, as people jostle for influence. Volodymyr Zelensky, Ukraine’s president, and Valery Zaluzhny, its most senior general, have fallen out. Internal polling suggests that corruption scandals and worries about Ukraine’s future have dented Zelensky’s standing with voters.

Western governments insist they are as committed to Ukraine as ever. But polls around the world suggest that many doubt it. In America the Biden administration is struggling to make Congress release funding worth over $60bn. Next year’s election campaign will soon get in the way. If Donald Trump is elected president, having promised peace in short order, America could suddenly stop supplying weapons altogether.

Europe should be preparing for that dire possibility—and for American help to slow, whoever is in the White House. Instead, European leaders are carrying on as if munificent Joe Biden will always be in charge. The European Union has promised Ukraine €50bn ($56bn), but the money is being held up by Hungary and, possibly, a budgetary mess in Germany. In December the EU should signal that it is ready to start talks for Ukraine’s membership. But many believe that the process will be intentionally strung out because enlargement is hard and threatens vested interests. Italy’s prime minister, Giorgia Meloni, was recorded (during a prank call) saying that Europe is weary. You would think a Trump presidency would galvanise support for Ukraine, as Europe took responsibility for its own defence. One leader privately predicts that support will in fact fragment.

That would be a disaster. By 2025 the strain of running a war may start to catch up with Putin. Russians may increasingly resent the forced mobilisations, inflation and diversion of social spending to the army. Yet simply hoping that his regime collapses makes no sense. He could remain in power for years and if he does, he will threaten war because that is his excuse for domestic repression and his own people’s suffering. He has blighted his country’s prospects by isolating it from Europe and driving its most enterprising people into exile. Without war, the hollowness of his rule would be on full display.

Europe must, therefore, plan for Putin as the main long-term threat to its security. Russia will rearm. It will have combat experience. Planning for Europe’s defence should be designed to prevent Putin from sensing weakness on its flank—especially if he doubts a President Trump’s willingness to fight should a NATO country be attacked.

The best way to deter Putin would be for Europe to demonstrate its resolve by showing right now that it is fully committed to a thriving, democratic, westward-looking Ukraine. Weapons matter, especially air defences and long-range missiles to strike at Russian supply lines, which is why it is crucial for America to approve the latest tranche of aid. Because arsenals are already depleted, more work needs to go into increasing the capacity of Western arms-makers. Sanctions could be targeted more effectively to split the regime from the elite.

Political action in Europe is essential, too (see Charlemagne). Putin will attack Ukraine’s cities and subvert its society to sabotage the country’s transformation into a Western democracy. In response Europe should be redoubling its efforts to ensure that Ukraine progresses, with the promise of money and EU accession. European leaders have not acknowledged the size of the task—indeed, too many seem to shrink from it. That is folly. They should heed Leon Trotsky: they may not be interested in war, but war is interested in them.

More Israeli hostages freed and more Palestinian prisoners released under tenuous Gaza truce

Israel released another group of Palestinian prisoners Friday, hours after Hamas freed additional Israeli hostages under a last-minute agreement to extend their cease-fire by another day in Gaza. But any further extension renewal, now in its eighth day, could prove more challenging as Hamas is expected to set a higher price for many of the remaining hostages.

Hamas freed six hostages hours after releasing two Israeli women Thursday afternoon. All were handed over to the Red Cross in Gaza after eight weeks in captivity. They were brought to Israel for medical evaluations and to be reunited with their families, the Israeli military said.

A busload of 30 Palestinian prisoners released by Israel was welcomed home in the West Bank city of Ramallah. Dozens of men, some holding green Hamas flags, greeted the prisoners. The men were hugged as the crowd chanted, “God is great.”

During the truce, at least 10 Israelis a day, along with other nationals, have been freed by Hamas in return for Israel’s release of at least 30 Palestinian prisoners. Asked why Hamas on Thursday released fewer than 10 hostages, as outlined in the cease-fire agreement, the military’s chief spokesman, Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari, noted that 12 Israeli citizens had been released the day before, implying that the overall total had met Israeli demands.

“We insist on getting the maximum possible,” Hagari said. “It’s been that way every day and also today.”

International pressure has mounted for the truce to continue as long as possible after weeks of Israeli bombardment and a ground campaign following Hamas’ deadly Oct. 7 attack on Israel that triggered the war. Thousands of Palestinians in Gaza have been killed and more than three-quarters of the population of 2.3 million have been uprooted, leading to a humanitarian crisis.

Israel has vowed to resume the fighting — with the goal of dismantling Hamas — once the cease-fire ends.

The cease-fire was set to expire Friday, though international mediators are working to extend it. The talks appear to be growing tougher, with Hamas having already freed most of the women and children it kidnapped on Oct. 7. The militants are expected to make greater demands in return for freeing scores of civilian men and soldiers. Roughly 140 hostages are believed to remain in Hamas captivity.

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken, who met with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and other top officials on his third visit to the region since the start of the war, said he hoped the cease-fire could be extended and more hostages could be released.

Blinken also said that if Israel resumes the war and moves against southern Gaza to pursue Hamas, it must do so in “compliance with international humanitarian law” and must have “a clear plan in place” to protect civilians. He said Israeli leaders understood that ”the massive levels of civilian life and displacement scale we saw in the north not be repeated in the south.”

Most of Gaza’s population is now crammed into the south with no exit, raising questions over how an Israeli offensive there can avoid heavy civilian casualties.

Qatar and Egypt, which have played a key role in mediating, are seeking to prolong the deal by another two days, according to Diaa Rashwan, the head of Egypt’s State Information Service.

Thursday morning, Palestinian gunmen opened fire on people waiting for buses along a main highway entering Jerusalem, killing at least three people and wounding several others, according to Israeli police.

The two attackers, brothers from a neighborhood in annexed east Jerusalem, were killed. After the attack, six other members of the family were detained, and the government ordered their house demolished. Hamas claimed responsibility for the attack, casting it as retaliation for the killing of women and children in Gaza and the occupied West Bank and other Israeli “crimes.”

The attack did not appear to threaten the truce in Gaza. But escalating violence — including Israeli raids — in the West Bank and east Jerusalem could blow back to wreck the quiet in Gaza, even though these areas are not covered under the cease-fire.

TENSE HOSTAGE TALKS

Netanyahu is under intense pressure from families of the hostages to bring them home. But his far-right governing partners are also pushing him to continue the war until Hamas is destroyed, and could abandon his coalition if he is seen as making too many concessions.

Israel says it will maintain the truce until Hamas stops releasing captives, at which point it will resume military operations, even as the Biden administration has urged it to operate with far greater precision if it does so.

The initial truce, which began Nov. 24 and has now been extended twice, called for the release of women and children.

Hamas said it handed over the two women released earlier Thursday to the Red Cross in Gaza City, suggesting they may have been held in northern Gaza, where Israeli troops have controlled much of the area for weeks and have been searching for hostages.

It’s not clear how many of the remaining women hostages might be soldiers. For soldiers and the civilian men still in captivity, Hamas is expected to demand the release of high-profile Palestinians convicted of deadly attacks, something Israel has strongly resisted in the past.

Israel says around 125 men are still held hostage, including several dozen soldiers.

The Palestinians released by Israel include 22 teenagers and eight Israeli Palestinian women who were arrested since the war started, most of them for pro-Palestinian social media posts, according to the Palestinian Prisoners Club, which advocates for prisoners. Israeli authorities have carried out a crackdown on such posts, arresting more than 270 Palestinian citizens on allegations of inciting violence, according to rights groups.

The 240 Palestinians released so far under the cease-fire have mostly been teenagers accused of throwing stones and firebombs during confrontations with Israeli forces. Several of the freed women were convicted by military courts of attempting to attack soldiers, some of them after being found carrying scissors or knives near security positions.

A total of 83 Israelis, including dual nationals, have been freed during the truce, most of whom appear physically well but shaken. Another 24 hostages — 23 Thais and one Filipino — have also been released, including several men.

Before the cease-fire, Hamas released four hostages, and the Israeli army rescued one. Two others were found dead in Gaza. On Thursday, the military confirmed the death of Ofir Tzarfati, who was believed to be among the hostages, without providing any further details. The 27-year-old attended a music festival where at least 360 people were killed and several others were kidnapped on Oct. 7.

Hamas and other Palestinian militants killed over 1,200 people — mostly civilians — in their wide-ranging attack across southern Israel that day and took around 240 people captive. Authorities have only provided approximate figures.

Israel’s bombardment and invasion in Gaza have killed more than 13,300 Palestinians, roughly two-thirds of them women and minors, according to the Health Ministry in Hamas-ruled Gaza, which does not differentiate between civilians and combatants.

The toll is likely much higher, as officials have only sporadically updated the count since Nov. 11. The ministry says thousands more people are feared dead under the rubble.

Israel says 77 of its soldiers have been killed in the ground offensive. It claims to have killed thousands of militants, without providing evidence.

Palestinians in Gaza have been calling for a permanent end to the war, saying the temporary truces don’t resolve the humanitarian catastrophe in the territory. Over 1.8 million people have fled their homes, with more than 1 million sheltering in U.N. schools and struggling to find basic items including cooking gas and flour.

AP

WESTERN PERSPECTIVE

Ukraine's Zelenskiy calls for fortifications in key frontline areas

President Volodymyr Zelenskiy called for faster construction of fortifications in key sectors under pressure from Russian forces, particularly in eastern Ukraine, the focal point of Moscow's advances 21 months into its invasion.

Zelenskiy issued his appeal after touring Ukrainian positions in the northeast, one of several areas where Russian forces have been trying to make recent headway - and recapture areas taken back by Ukrainian troops a year ago. He said one of the meetings he held with commanders dealt with fortifications.

"In all major sectors where reinforcement is needed, there should be a boost and an acceleration in the construction of structures," Zelenskiy said in his nightly video address.

"This of course means the greatest attention to the Avdiivka, Maryinka and other sectors in Donetsk region. In Kharkiv region, this means the Kupiansk sector and the Kupiansk-Lyman line."

Russia has made slow progress in trying to secure all of the eastern regions of Donetsk and Luhansk, but has boosted attacks in several areas. These include Kupiansk near Kharkiv, retaken by Ukraine in a drive through the northeast a year ago.

Russian occupying forces have built solid fortifications and minefields of their own in areas they have held since pouring over the border in February 2022.

Those defences have been a key factor in holding back a Ukrainian counteroffensive under way since June. Ukrainian troops have made only incremental gains in the east and south.

Russian forces have focused attention since mid-October on the devastated town of Avdiivka, known for its vast coking plant and its position as a gateway to the Russian-held regional centre of Donetsk, 20 km (12 miles) to the east.

Military spokesperson Oleksandr Shtupun said Ukrainian forces had rebuffed Russian attacks on the coking plant.

"The plant is under our control. The enemy is suffering significant losses there," Shtupun told Espreso TV, noting Russian artillery and air attacks inside and around the town.

"The Russians are actively pressing ground attacks, sometimes using armoured vehicles."

Reuters could not verify accounts of fighting from either side.

Avdiivka was briefly seized by Russian-financed separatists who took control of larges stretches of eastern Ukraine in 2014. It has held out since thanks to a considerable extent to fortifications put in place by its Ukrainian defenders.

RUSSIAN DRIVE AROUND BAKHMUT

Russian forces have also been pressing near contested villages surrounding the equally shattered town of Bakhmut, captured by Russian forces in May after months of fighting.

Russia's Defence Ministry on Wednesday announced the capture of Khromove, one such village, but unofficial Ukrainian accounts dispute that claim.

The office of Ukraine's general prosecutor said a Russian attack on the city of Toretsk, south of Bakhmut, had killed one person. Three others were pulled alive from underneath the rubble of a house.

Initial investigation showed Russian forces had dropped two bombs, in the second assault on the town throughout the day.

Ukrainian military analyst Serhiy Hrabskyi said the Russians sought to capitalise on their capture of Bakhmut to advance on at least three cities to the west.

"It is crucial for the enemy to develop things in tactical terms with an eye to possibly advancing on Kostyantynivka, as well as Sloviansk and Kramatorsk," Hrabskyi told Radio NV.

RUSSIAN PERSPECTIVE

Zelensky doubts if Ukraine ever joins NATO

Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky expressed his doubts that Ukraine will ever become a NATO member state.

During his meeting with students in Nikolayev, Zelensky noted that the issue of further perspectives of strengthening of national security will be a priority, but said that he is unsure if Ukraine will ever join NATO.

"We do not know for sure how it will be. […] No one will tell you with certainty, whether we will be in NATO or whether we will not. We want to, but…," he said in a video, published on his Telegram channel.

Meanwhile, Zelensky reiterated that Kiev acts to achieve NATO standards and must do everything to "keep national security at top level."

Reuters/Tass

Liberia and Sierra Leone have a common historical legacy and often tend to imitate each other in war and peace. But events in the last two weeks suggest that while Liberia may be turning a new, refreshing page, Sierra Leone remains trapped in its troubled past.

First, the good news from Liberia, whose capital, Monrovia, was named in honour of America’s fifth president, James Monroe. After one six-year term, President George Weah announced that he was done, even before Liberia’s electoral commission finished counting the votes in the November 17 run-off elections. The football legend didn’t wait for the referee’s final whistle.

He called the leader of the opposition, 78-year-old Joseph Boakai, to congratulate him in an election that finished with a narrow 49.36 percent to 50.64 percent margin that a crooked sitting president could have upturned.

Meanwhile, Liberia’s neighbour, Sierra Leone, is boiling after an attempted coup on Saturday night forced the government of President Julius Maada Bio to impose a nationwide curfew. Some unofficial reports have blamed last June’s shambolic elections as the trigger, threatening the moment of relief that Weah’s gracious concession had offered West and Central Africa, which have been the theatres of nine military coups or attempted power grab in three years.

Fresh air

It would be a huge disservice to allow the mutineers in Freetown or elsewhere on the continent to rain on Weah’s parade. In a region blighted by instability and sit-tight leaders, the Weah moment is a breath of fresh air.

In the last three and a half decades, Liberia suffered two civil wars, 1989-1997 and 1999-2003. In both, about 250,000 persons were killed and more than a million displaced in what have been referred to as Africa’s bloodiest conflicts.

The conflicts, fueled by diamonds, were deeply rooted in the country’s ghastly identity politics. Liberia was one of the four independent African states by 1945; the others being Egypt, Ethiopia and the Union of South Africa.

But it was only independent in name. Liberia was a vassal of the American Firestone Company, the tire and rubber manufacturer that owned plantations there. Like Sierra Leone, Liberia later became home to blacks who worked in these plantations or those repatriated from America.

Tyranny cycle

But that’s not the whole story. The Americo-Liberian elite, a small but powerful group, held economic and political power for over 100 years until they were brutally overthrown in the 1980s by a barely literate master sergeant, Samuel Doe, with the backing of the United States of America.

To the consternation of the US and the shock of the world, Doe ruled with an iron hand, which got more vicious as the years went by. He replaced Americo-Liberian oppression with that of his own Krahn ethnic group. The Gios and Manos in Nimba County were his most horrific victims. They were haunted down and murdered for sport.

It was in these circumstances that Charles Taylor rose up as defender and ethnic champion. Most of his early recruits were from the Nimba County from where he later launched a countrywide rebellion that led to the murder of Doe in 1990 and the wrecking of Liberia with serious destabilising consequences for Sierra Leone and west Africa. Liberia is still struggling with the effects of that brutal war.

Weah pause

Sirleaf Johnson’s presidency from 2006 to 2018, was thought to be Liberia’s best chance at a reset. Weah was determined to launch an earlier presidential bid that may have disrupted Johnson’s presidency.

Regional leaders fearing Liberia’s fragile state, prevailed on him to wait. After watching bands of mostly jobless and potentially vulnerable rural youths fall under the spell of Weah’s star power, Nigeria’s president at the time, Olusegun Obasanjo, advised the former World Footballer of the Year to suspend his ambition and return to school.

That decision may have been unpleasant then, but it seasoned Weah and prepared him, when he finally took the helm in 2017, to manage the fraught and delicate balance in a country that has suffered some of the worst depredations of Ebola and COVID-19. Over half of the 5.4million population live below the poverty line, a perfect excuse for political instability.

But waiting may have done more for Weah than giving him a chance to return to the classroom. Given the slight margin of defeat in the last elections, for example, had he not grown older and wiser, he might have yielded to the temptation to unleash the capricious hand of the state against Boakai, his relentless second-time challenger. Waiting has also taught Weah to manage Liberia’s cauldron of ethnic politics, its weakest inflexion point. All it would have taken to plunge Liberia into another round of crisis was for Weah to stoke the ethnic fire. He didn’t.

Of course, drugs and corruption were also major election talking points, with the opposition Unity Party mocking Weah whose chief of staff, solicitor general and head of ports authority were reportedly sanctioned by the US on corruption charges in 2022.

A university professor told Al-Jazeera that, “Corruption is an unending story and will influence votes, however the deciding factor will be issues around the economy which affect Liberians directly.”

Yet, the ethnic fault lines in the voting pattern, heightened by politics, also explain the government’s inability to implement the report of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission since 2009. The country is still deeply divided.

And no one knows this more than Weah, who picked Taylor’s wife as running mate to boost his electoral fortunes among sections of native Liberians. Conceding to Boakai even before counting closed defused tensions and gave the country hope for stability in a blighted region.

Bucking a trend

Weah wasn’t lacking in bad examples to follow. Guinea, Liberia’s northern neighbour, is under military rule, as are nearby Mali and Burkina Faso. Except for late Jerry Rawlings of Ghana who exited at 53, African statesmen hardly retire at 57 or even 75 for that matter. The relics in Cameroon, Uganda and Equatorial Guinea are worth counting.

All it would have required was for Weah to use the familiar playbook: denounce the election, alter the constitution, sack some people in high places as a warning, or just improvise any subterfuge to undermine the elections. And he would be sitting pretty calling the shots and daring the world to remonstrate – knowing he was never the first, and may not be the last.

If he had chosen this path, there is little evidence that the AU or even the ECOWAS would have lost sleep. They were silent when Senegal’s Macky Sall toyed with extending his tenure, before he pulled back from that travesty, which in any case, Cote d’Ivoire’s Alassane Ouattara has managed to get away with.

The regional bodies made all the right noises about coups in Guinea, Niger, Sudan, Gabon and Mali and even threatened military action, only to leave Nigeria’s President and ECOWAS leader, Bola Ahmed Tinubu, eating his own words.

Weah has chosen a different path, he has done the honorable thing. Even though conceding defeat doesn’t immediately solve Liberia’s deep, underlying problems, it gives the country a good chance to continue the hard work of rebuilding. And just as important, it offers Liberia’s neighbours and the continent as a whole a redeeming example.

** Ishiekwene is Editor-In-Chief of LEADERSHIP. To read more visit: www.azuishiekwene.com