WORLD ROUNDUPThe U.S. Should Not Bail Out Argentina | Inside Lebanon’s Audacious Disarmament Plan | NATO’s Article 4 Alert: The Path to Disentanglement, and more

Russia Is Turning to African Women and Conscripted North Koreans to Tackle Its Defense Worker Shortage  (Jennifer Mathers, The Conversation)
US president Donald Trump has said Ukraine could win back all of the territory it has lost in the ongoing war, but Russia’s president Vladimir Putin shows no signs of wanting a peace deal, or reducing the military offensive.
Instead, night after night Russia continues to launch hundreds of drones and missiles at Ukraine, killing civilians and destroying homes, public buildings and infrastructure.
Russia can only continue this war if it has enough workers. It has one of the world’s largest armed forces (composed of 1.32 million active military personnel), but its military recruiters face a challenging job in outpacing the enormous losses of soldiers who are killed or seriously injured in Ukraine.
However, the staffing needs of Russia’s military are tiny compared with its defense industry. Russian factories that produce weapons and equipment for the war employ approximately 4 million workers – and they have been suffering from a serious labor shortage.
According to a statement made in the Russian parliament in 2024, the country’s defense industry needs approximately 400,000 more workers than it currently employs.
But how can Russia, with a population of 143 million people have a labor shortage in a sector of the economy that is so crucial for the war?

Moldova: Pro-EU Party Wins Majority in Election Dominated by Russian Interference  (Stefan Wolff, The Conversation)
Moldova’s ruling pro-European Party of Action and Solidarity (PAS) won slightly more than 50% of the vote in parliamentary elections on September 28, achieving a slim overall majority. It garnered more than twice the number of votes of the main pro-Russian opposition party, Patriotic Bloc, which received just under 25% of the vote.
This result was by no means a foregone conclusion for Moldova. President Maia Sandu of PAS had warned repeatedly about the high stakes in an election that witnessed unprecedented interference by Russia. This included recruiting orthodox priests to sway voters towards supporting pro-Russian political parties.
The president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, welcomed the result. She wrote on X: “You made your choice clear: Europe. Democracy. Freedom.”
Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelensky, echoed this sentiment. In a social media post, he said the “elections showed that Russia’s destabilizing activity loses, while Moldova in Europe wins”.

The U.S. Should Not Bail Out Argentina  (Rohit Chopra, Foreign Policy)
Why is the Trump administration intent on rescuing a failed foreign leader?

Inside Lebanon’s Audacious Disarmament Plan  (Fin de Pencier,Foreign Policy)
The state faces a stark choice to confront groups such as Hezbollah and Hamas or risk another war with Israel.

A JAAI Economic Corridor Can Anchor Indo-Pacific Economic Security  (Kaush Arha, Mukesh Aghi, Justin Bassi, and Shingo Yamagami, National Interest)
Japan, India, and Australia’s converging interests would be fortified by a Japan-ASEAN-Australia-India economic corridor championed by the United States.

NATO’s Article 4 Alert: The Path to Disentanglement  (Diana Nasreddine, National Interest)
Russia will likely continue testing NATO’s periphery with drones, cyberattacks, and other gray-zone tactics designed to provoke missteps.