The Evening: Another Seized Tanker, Ebola Emergency, Digging Deep, and More

Iran Claims it Aided Foreign Oil Tanker

The Panama-flagged Riah, an oil tanker based in the United Arab Emirates, disappeared in Iranian waters late Saturday. Four days later, Iran now claims it came to the assistance of the oil tanker after receiving a distress call. Both Emirati and U.S. officials said the tanker did not send a distress call, as the Washington Post's Erin Cunningham reports.

Dive Deeper: "The Strategic Threat from Iranian Hybrid Warfare in the Gulf," by CSIS's Anthony Cordesman.

May Offers Advice for Successor

In her last major speech as prime minister, Theresa May advocated for a pragmatic approach to politics rather than what she called a tendency toward “absolutism,” a message seemingly targeted at Britain’s probable next leader Boris Johnson and President Trump, as Reuters reports.

Dive Deeper: “Five Foreign Policy Questions for the UK’s Next Prime Minister,” by Thomas Raines at the Chatham House.

Global Ebola Emergency Declared

The World Health Organization (WHO) has declared the Congo's Ebola outbreak a global health emergency. As of Monday, the outbreak had infected 2,512 people and killed 1,676 of them, as the NYT's, Denise Grady reports.

Dive Deeper: Listen to "Unpacking the DRC Ebola Crisis with Jason Stearns," an episode of CSIS's Take as Directed podcast.

Enroll for Fall

Now enrolling for the Fall, CSIS & Syracuse University's Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs offer a new Executive Master's in International Relations. Information here.

Video Shorts

Check out CSIS’s new series of video shorts: “Testify” and “High Resolution.” And don’t forget to subscribe to the CSIS YouTube Channel!

In That Number

216.9%

The total number of weapons released by both manned and remotely piloted aircraft in Afghanistan has increased 216.9 percent since 2013.

Source: CSIS

Critical Quote

“Ebola is not rocket science, it’s very simple” 

— Oly Ilunga, Congo’s health minister

iDeas Lab

CSIS
Twice in the last six weeks, the same China Coast Guard (CCG) vessel has harassed oil and gas operations by its neighbors in the South China Sea.

The Andreas C. Dracopoulos iDeas Lab at CSIS enhances our research with the latest in cutting-edge web technologies, design, and video.

Optics

CSIS
(Photo credit: Johannes Eisele/AFP/Getty Images). U.S. Marshal security police stand guard at the Brooklyn Federal Court as Mexican drug lord Joaquin "El Chapo" Guzman received a life sentence.

Recommended Reading

"The Case for Humanitarian Aid to North Korea," by Victor Cha and Lindsay Lloyd in Foreign Policy.

This Town Tomorrow

At 8:45 a.m., CSIS will host a conference on energy investment and infrastructure in Asia, featuring a keynote address from Senator Cory Gardner (R-CO).

At 9:00 a.m., CSIS will hold a dialogue on U.S. counterterrorism strategy with Representatives Abigail Spanberger (D-VA) and Michael Waltz (R-FL).

At 2:00 p.m., CSIS’s Thomas Karako, director of the Missile Defense Project, will moderate a discussion with Colonel John Rafferty about the future of long-range precision fires.

Video

In the latest episode of “Trade: What you Need to Know” CSIS breaks down how tariffs work and who actually pays tariffs. Watch the video here.

Podcasts

Die Welt
Andrew and the Trade Guys talk with Chris Padilla, VP for government and regulatory affairs at IBM, about how the company has navigated the global economy for over 100 years.

Listen on SoundCloud, Spotify, & Apple Podcasts.

Smiles

Robert Plant is brilliant. And not just as a musician. His new podcast “Digging Deep with Robert Plant” shows that he’s an adroit modern communicator as well.

The cool thing about the podcast is that Plant talks about the music he’s made over his career, both in Led Zeppelin and out. And if it makes you wonder what he’s doing these days, he tells you: he records and performs with a backing band called the Sensational Space Shifters. It’s not the hammer of the gods rock of Zeppelin, but it’s finely tuned rhythmic rock and roll. Check it out.