Shutdown looms in DC and US Diplomats in Damascus

Andrew Sheves Good morning and Happy Friday. Two quick updates to kick us off.

The US government seems headed for a shutdown as House Republicans scuttled their own stopgap bill on Thursday night. This follows their rejection of a long-negotiated bipartisan spending bill after opposition from Elon Musk and Donald Trump. Government funding runs out at midnight. [SOURCE - Bloomberg]

In another positive step in Syria’s transition, US representatives have met with the HTS-led interim government in Syria. [SOURCE - BBC]

Need Help Crisis Planning?

It’s the end of the year, and everyone is writing their ‘Top Risks of 2025,’ which means we’ll be hearing terms like poly-crisis and permacrisis far too much.

The problem is that these terms can be paralyzing: the problems are so big, it’s hard to know where to start.

So keep things simple: start with the things that might affect your organization specifically because you won’t tackle climate change by yourself.

And if you aren’t sure what those threats might be, here’s something to help.

I just rebuilt the scenario planner in CrisisDojo and put it outside of the paywall so you can use it to generate likely scenarios for your organization. Plus, it can help outline basic contingency plans and actions to put into place.

So ignore the noise: focus on your organization.

Just go to app.crisisdojo.ai to try it out.

No login or credit card required.

Africa Stability Ratings and News Summary

More Unstable

🇦🇴 Angola, 🇧🇯 Benin, 🇧🇫 Burkina Faso, 🇧🇮 Burundi, 🇨🇲 Cameroon, 🇨🇫 Central African Republic, 🇹🇩 Chad, 🇰🇲 Comoros, 🇨🇩 Democratic Republic Of The Congo, 🇬🇶 Equatorial Guinea, 🇪🇷 Eritrea, 🇸🇿 Eswatini, 🇪🇹 Ethiopia, 🇬🇦 Gabon, 🇬🇳 Guinea, 🇬🇼 Guinea-Bissau, 🇨🇮 Ivory Coast, 🇰🇪 Kenya, 🇱🇸 Lesotho, 🇱🇷 Liberia, 🇲🇬 Madagascar, 🇲🇼 Malawi, 🇲🇱 Mali, 🇲🇷 Mauritania, 🇲🇺 Mauritius, 🇲🇿 Mozambique, 🇳🇪 Niger, 🇳🇬 Nigeria, 🇨🇬 Republic of the Congo, 🇸🇱 Sierra Leone, 🇸🇴 Somalia, 🇿🇦 South Africa, 🇸🇸 South Sudan, 🇸🇩 Sudan, 🇹🇬 Togo, 🇺🇬 Uganda, 🇪🇭 Western Sahara, 🇿🇲 Zambia, 🇿🇼 Zimbabwe

More Stable

No countries were more stable over this period

Unchanged

🇩🇿 Algeria, 🇧🇼 Botswana, 🇨🇻 Cape Verde, 🇩🇯 Djibouti, 🇬🇭 Ghana, 🇲🇦 Morocco, 🇳🇦 Namibia, 🇷🇼 Rwanda, 🇸🇳 Senegal, 🇸🇹 São Tomé and Príncipe, 🇹🇿 Tanzania, 🇬🇲 The Gambia

Regional News Summary

In the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), fighting between the army and rebel groups has intensified, raising concerns about the upcoming peace talks. Scheduled negotiations with Rwanda were recently canceled, further complicating efforts to stabilize the region [SOURCE - Japan Today]. Amidst this turmoil, a mysterious illness, later identified as severe malaria, has led to numerous deaths among vulnerable populations, partic

Carpe tomorrow!