Globe Trot 06.18

Egypt elected its first Islamist president, as Mohammed Morsi of the Muslim Brotherhood claimed victory in runoff elections over the weekend. But a live tally of votes across Egypt's 27 districts showed results in some areas too close to call, and challenger Ahmed Shafiq, the former prime minister, has yet to concede defeat. The military that backs Shafiq also took steps, even as elections were underway, to shore up its power ahead of an expected Islamist takeover: It passed yesterday a controversial addendum to the constitution (enacted in March 2011) that gives the Supreme Council of the Armed Forces broad powers to determine military affairs, and prohibits a head of state from declaring war on any nation without approval from the council.

In a surprise vote for Greece, the country's right-of-center New Democracy Party won a slim victory in Sunday's election, beating the leftist Syriza Party that was favored to win and has opposed European Union bailout measures. The victory means that New Democracy and a smaller party can form a coalition government-what New Democracy leader Antonis Samaras is calling "a salvation government"-against those who wanted to roll back austerity measures necessary to keep Greece economically afloat.

In Nigeria three churches were bombed yesterday, killing at least 24 and wounding more than 125 (another report has a much higher death toll). The churches-evangelical, Catholic, and Pentecostal-are in a predominantly Christian area of northern Kaduna state, which is largely Muslim. But as The Christian Science Monitor illustrates, whenever "Christians retaliate," never mind the journalistic axiom "what bleeds leads." Christians living in the north have mostly resisted retaliatory strikes (and nearly all churches warn against them), but the persistent lack of security at churches and failure of the government to bring attackers to justice has fueled reprisals.

President Obama is in Mexico for the G-20 summit meeting today. Look for headline topics to be Europe's ongoing debt crisis and a meeting (perhaps) between Obama and Russian President Vladimir Putin that could be part showdown over Syria.

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