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Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras resigned and called for new elections after his party split over the country’s bailout.
In a national address, Tsipras, whose leftist Syriza party was elected on an anti-austerity campaign just this January, said he would resign. “The political mandate of the January 25 elections has exhausted its limits and now the Greek people have to have their say,” he said.
Tsipras’ resignation is more of a procedural move to trigger an election “to decide whether he and his Syriza party should be returned to power with a new mandate, according to the New York Times. It’ll also allow him to “capitalize on his popularity with voters” before the required cuts and tax increases of the new bailout go into effect and “return to power in a stronger position without anti-bailout rebels in Syriza to slow him down,” according to Reuters.
Reports suggest the election may be on September 20 and Tsipras is widely expected to win.
And a little extra.
The early election, or snap election, is Tsipras’ effort to consolidate power following a rebellion within his party. The prime minister effectively lost his parliamentary majority last Friday when a third of his Syriza party rejected a new 86 billion euro bailout, due to the austerity measures tied to it. The vote passed with support from opposition parties. Twenty-five far left Syriza members officially broke away and started a new party, the parliament's deputy speaker announced today, BuzzFeed News’ Francis Whittaker writes.
For more, we recommend this quick backgrounder on Greece’s “financial odyssey” from Bloomberg and this explainer from the New York Times.
Macedonia declared a state of emergency after being overwhelmed by a surge of migrants.
Almost 42,000 refugees fleeing wars in Iraq and Syria have entered the tiny Balkan nation in the past two months. Yesterday, Macedonia, along with Britain and France, announced “added security measures to address the biggest movement of refugees and migrants seen here since the aftermath of World War II,” the New York Times writes.
And a little extra.
Last month, 107,500 migrants entered the European Union. Germany said yesterday it expects 800,000 asylum seekers in 2015 — four times the number the country saw last year. Another estimated 5,000 migrants are gathered at the French port of Calais with the aim of crossing the Channel to Britain.
Germany has proposed that EU countries coordinate to spread out the migrants, while Hungary has said it plans to build a fence to keep migrants out. “So far policy makers have struggled to produce a coherent collective response to the challenge, and efforts to agree on quotas for EU countries to accept refugees have achieved only limited success,” the Times writes.
WE’RE KEEPING AN EYE ON
July 2015 was the world’s hottest month on record and it’s likely 2015 will be the hottest year on record.
July saw the highest average temperatures globally since recordkeeping began in 1880, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said. “The prediction for 2015 becoming the hottest year on record is based on observed temperatures so far, plus the coming El Niño event,” according to CNN. The first seven months of the year also had record high temperatures.
Yesterday’s report “is reaffirming what we already know,” NOAA climate scientist Jake Crouch told CNN. “The world is warming. It's continuing to warm.”
Another report by the American Geophysical Union said “man-made global warming has made California’s historic drought 15% to 20% worse than than it would have been and will likely make future droughts even worse,” according to USA Today.
What’s next?
There are fewer than 100 days to go until the big United Nations Conference on Climate Change in Paris. The goal of the conference, which will take place from Nov. 30 to Dec. 11, is to reach, for the first time, a legally binding international agreement on the climate, applicable to all countries, according to the conference website. Europe’s climate chief has warned that there’s “no plan B” if the Paris conference doesn’t produce an agreement, according to The Guardian.
DID YOU HEAR ABOUT THIS?
New study shows that vaping by teens might lead to tobacco use later in life.
The era of unregulated e-cigarettes — the small plastic and metal pens that vaporize nicotine-laced liquids, which have spurred the creation of roughly 8,000 vape shops across the country — is about to be over. The Food and Drug Administration is continuing its plan of introducing a new set of rules on e-cigs after a study showed they can spur tobacco use in teenagers later in life, BuzzFeed News' Dan Vergano writes.
An Arizona school district told its students to put an anti-abortion sticker in their biology books.
Let me tell you about the birds and the bees and... abstinence and adoption? A mother in Gilbert, Arizona, was shocked to find a note pasted in her 14-year-old son's biology textbook that stated that the school district “supports the state of Arizona's strong interest in promoting childbirth and adoption over elective abortion. The District is also in support of promoting abstinence as the most effective way to eliminate the potential for unwanted pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases,” according to BuzzFeed News. Now, try explaining that to a teenager.
Quick things to know:
North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un has ordered his troops to “enter a wartime state” as tensions with South Korea escalate. Technically, the two countries have been at war since the 1950-1953 war, which ended in an armistice, bringing the fighting to an end but not a peace agreement. (BuzzFeed News)
Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter said cancer was discovered in his brain, but he’s “perfectly at ease with whatever comes.” (Associated Press)
Turkey will hold snap elections in November after Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu walked away from negotiations to form a coalition government, the country's president Recep Tayyip Erdogan announced. (BBC News)
The Ashley Madison hack just got much, much bigger as the group behind this week’s massive leak, claims to have released another larger dump of private data. (BuzzFeed News) And disgraced reality TV star Josh Duggar admitted to having an affair after the hack. (BuzzFeed News)
Two more women came forward to accuse Bill Cosby of sexual assault. (BuzzFeed News)
Caitlyn Jenner could face a manslaughter charge in a Feb. 7 car crash in Malibu, which left one woman dead. (BuzzFeed News)
Thousands of dead fish are floating ashore close to the site of last week’s massive warehouse explosion in Tianjin, China. The incident killed 114 people. (BuzzFeed News)
Sprout Pharmaceuticals, the maker of the newly approved “female Viagra,” will be acquired by fellow pharma giant Valeant for $1 billion. The new drug, which is supposed to enhance sexual desire in women, was approved on Tuesday. (Reuters)
Same-sex married couples in all 50 U.S. states are eligible for Social Security benefits, the government has decided. (New York Times)
Gray wolves were spotted in California, the first time the endangered species has officially called the state home since 1924. (BuzzFeed News)
So earlier this week, the most talked about candidate (step aside, Donald Trump) filed his candidacy. Now, it’s time to learn about Deez Nuts. Spoiler: The kid behind the candidate is 15 years old, so he’s ineligible to actually run. (Digg)
Should you go to graduate school? Yes. Maybe. Definitely not. (Quartz)
Do you know what happened in the news this week? Take the BuzzFeed News quiz!
WEEKEND READS
Our special guest this week is BuzzFeed culture writer Doree Shafrir sharing some of her favorite stories recently.
In Grantland, Molly Lambert explores why it’s rough for women in Hollywood (or, maybe, anywhere) who are more successful than their partners. Favorite line: “The Hollywood dating pool is apparently so small that even Taylor ‘Ain’t No Fun (If The Homies Can’t Have None)’ Swift has decided it’s cool to let besties recycle dick.”
Danez Smith is one of the most searing, beautiful writers out there. He's written a poetic essay for Gawker that got me right in the heart: “You don’t know what you are but you know you shouldn’t be. but you know that when D’Angelo sings how he sings looking how he looks, inside you something breaks open & then that odd flood of yes, a storm you can’t call a storm but the wind sounds like your name.”
In New York Magazine, Alexis Swerdloff has written one of the most delightful profiles I've read in awhile, about the wild genius Erin Yogasundram, the 23-year-old founder, CEO, and public face of teen fashion company Shop Jeen. The store's aesthetic, Swerdloff writes, is “a twisted combination of a vintage Oriental Trading catalogue, some sort of high-concept New Museum Triennial commission, and one of those stores on Canal Street that sells FUCK YOU YOU FUCKING FUCK T-shirts.”
Happy Friday
Say cheese for the GIPHY CAM! Giphy has launched a new iOS app that helps you to giphy-fy yourself. The app is free to download. “You can send a GIF way faster than you can write all the things you have to say,” Adam Leibsohn, Giphy's chief operating officer told BuzzFeed News. If a picture speaks a thousand words, a GIF is basically the equivalent of a million exclamation marks. Good luck getting anything done today!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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Correction
FDA regulations of e-cigarettes have been in the works for more than a year. A previous version of this post implied that the new study prompted plans for regulations.