The News You Missed in 2021, From Every Country in the World (Part 2) | Wendover Productions

SPEAKER_1 (0:01)

Now more than ever, Lowe's knows you don't just want a low price, you want the lowest price. And with our lowest price guarantee, you can count on us for competitive prices on all your home improvement projects. If you find a qualifying lower price somewhere else on the same item, we'll match it. Lowe's, we help, you save. Price match applies to same item, current price at qualifying retailers. Exclusions and terms apply. Learn how we'll match price at lowes.com/lowestpriceguarantee.

SPEAKER_2 (0:30)

Ryan Reynolds here from Mint Mobile. With the price of just about everything going up, we thought we'd bring our prices down. So to help us, we brought in a reverse auctioneer, which is apparently a thing.

SPEAKER_3 (0:40)

Mint Mobile Unlimited Premium Wireless. How do you get 30, 30, 30, 30, 30, 20, 20, 20, 20, 20, 15, 15, 15, 15, just 15 bucks a month?

SPEAKER_2 (0:48)

So give it a try at mintmobile.com/switch.

SPEAKER_4 (0:52)

Up from payment of $45 for three months, an equivalent of $15 per month required. New customer offer for first three months only. Speeds low after 35 gigabytes of networks busy.

SPEAKER_2 (0:58)

Taxes and fees extra.

SPEAKER_5 (0:58)

See mintmobile.com.

SPEAKER_4 (1:00)

This episode is brought to you by Greenlight. Get this. Adults with financial literacy skills have 82% more wealth than those who don't. From swimming lessons to piano classes, us parents invest in so many things to enrich our kids' lives. But are we investing in their future financial success? With Greenlight, you can teach your kids financial literacy skills like earning, saving and investing. And this investment costs less than that after school treat. Start prioritizing their financial education and future today with a risk-free trial at greenlight.com/spotify. greenlight.com/spotify.

SPEAKER_6 (1:30)

Welcome to our year-end review, part two. If you're tuning in for the first time, this is a special episode during which we give you one headline from every country in the world from the past year. The caveat is, hopefully, it's a headline you hadn't heard and has little to do with the C word. We did this last year and we organized countries by population size, counting down from largest to smallest. This year, we are doing a count up organized by the Human Development Index, which is a number between zero and one determined by the United Nations, based on a series of metrics including education, longevity, and earnings. We are halfway through the list and will end with a country that has the highest HDI in the world. If you haven't watched part one, we suggest you do that too, where we explain the HDI breakdown in detail. If you're joining for part two, thanks, because it means you like part one. Without delay, here's two.

Distancing themselves is something that a Dutch organization is trying to do with Astrid Roemer, a poet from the former Dutch colony of Suriname, after it awarded her with a prestigious literary prize earlier this year. Recently, she made controversial statements supporting murderous former president of Suriname Desi Boeterse, and the Dutch organizers of the award chose to forgo the ceremony honoring her, and simply gave her the cash prize with little fanfare. Roemer, like any real poet, is sticking to her words. Back underground we go, this time to Petite Mustique, which is part of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, where a human skull was unearthed on this remote, rugged island in 2003 And this year, researchers at the University of Oregon may have uncovered why it was there. Skeletal abnormalities show the female likely had leprosy, and this isolated part of the Caribbean was probably used to keep people with the disease away from the public—something that many have speculated, but this finding actually supports. The skull dates back 200 years, and is possibly the earliest case of leprosy recorded in the Americas. There is also some speculation that Tunisian President Kayis Said's appointment of a female prime minister may have been a way to calm critics who say he's overreaching his power in the Arab Spring's only remaining democracy. Before Najla Boudin Ramadhani's appointment, Said had already suspended parliament, seized power, and fired the previous prime minister, and because Ramadhani doesn't have a lot of political experience, her trajectory could be challenging, but she is already making history as the first female prime minister in the Arab world. The Maldives have the unenvious position of exemplifying climate change's already dire effects on low-lying nations, where 30% of the country's annual government budget is being spent on adapting to climate change. Developed nations have agreed to spend $100 billion to help vulnerable countries adapt, but Maldives Speaker of Parliament wants more. He's asking that rich nations also pay reparations to help the others deal with the consequences they're already suffering, and likely didn't cause. Islands in the Caribbean continue to bet big on tourism, especially countries like Dominica, which offers citizenship by investment through properties like the six-star resort of Secret Bay. For the fifth year in a row, Dominica was named the best country for second citizenship by Professional Wealth Management magazine. The second home citizens had primarily come from Africa, but with a new non-stop flight from Miami running, that could potentially change with Americans starting to look south for another home and passport. Added bonus, Dominican residents now get visa-free access to China. When we say coral reef, you probably say, ugh, that's because a lot of news about the ocean's critical habitat for fish species is generally bad, and that could have been the expectation after tropical cyclone Winston caused more than $1.4 billion in damage to Fiji in 2016 and pummeled the island's reefs. But they've bounced back in a big way as young coral colonies have taken off, much to the delight of researchers, residents, and likely the colorful fish that have found a new home. Also in repair are more than a handful of the 130 precious, historical artifacts that were destroyed in the harbor blast in Lebanon that killed 200 people. While the objects pale in comparison to human lives, their historical significance remains important and that's why the British Museum granted $29,500 in restoration funds to help repair some of the more critical glass vessels which are nearly 2,000 years old. Over on the northwest tip of Africa, an ongoing conflict between Algeria and Morocco might leave Spain in the cold. Spain gets about half of its gas from Algeria, which pumps it through a pipeline in Morocco. Morocco depends on Algeria for about 10% of its gas and Algeria suspended this pipeline to both countries to upset Morocco in an ongoing territorial dispute. It turns out this may affect Spaniards the most who will still be able to get gas through alternate routes but at much higher prices. Moldova is running out of gas, too. At the end of its contract with Gazprom, Moldova declared a state of emergency when the Russian energy company raised its gas prices and slashed supply. Accused of using gas as leverage, allegations have surfaced that contract renegotiations involve discussion of political issues regarding Moldova's separatist region of Transnistria and its connection to the EU. Associated with the EU but reliant on Russian resources, Moldova frequently finds itself in the unenviable position of sitting between East and West. From unenviable to regrettable, a mafia fugitive did himself in by appearing on a YouTube cooking show in his adopted home of the Dominican Republic. Though he never showed his face while flashing his Italian culinary chops, Mark friend Claude Biart's tattoos gave him away to the police. A member of Italy's largest mafia, who fled Europe when accused of trafficking cocaine into the Netherlands, Biart led a quiet, unassuming, and, in hindsight, too comfortable life in the city of Boca Chica. An apocalyptic scene unfolded just off the coast of Azerbaijan as a column of fire blasted out of the Caspian Sea. While the Caspian is dotted by various offshore oil rigs, the assumed culprit for the flare-up wasn't a leaky Soviet-era pipeline, but one of the region's infamous mud volcanoes sparking the blast. Dubbed the Land of Fire, Azerbaijan is home to major oil reserves and hundreds of these mud volcanoes—many of which are active today.