You're listening to TED Talks Daily, where we bring you new ideas to spark your curiosity

every day. I'm your host, Elise Hugh. Political scientist Ian Bremmer, president and founder of Eurasia

Group and G0 Media, publishes a list of the year's top global risks each January.

Today, we're bringing you a special conversation between Ian and Ted's Helen Walters,

where they dig into the biggest global risks that he sees Happy 2026 wherever you are. I am Helen Walters. I'm the head of media and

curation at TED. It is January the 5th. I am in Brooklyn. I have a cold. So apologies if my voice

gives out. But luckily,

most of the talking today will be done by the one and only Ian Bremer, the president of the

Eurasia group, who often comes to explain what on earth is going on in the world to us.

He's also here today to share the list of global risks that he and Eurasia just published.

So, Ian, thank you so much for being here.

Helen, happy New Year. How else could one possibly celebrate but to talk about the global risk environment? You really are a massive downer, it turns out. But it turns out there is also a lot

to talk about. And so a lot of the report, which is so meaty, relates to the United States.

But I actually think that what we need to do is start with Venezuela, which is wildly in the news at the moment.

It was clear to everybody, I think, last year that something pretty major was going to happen in Venezuela.

But I'm not sure that anyone really anticipated

that that was going to involve essentially kidnapping

a foreign leader and his wife and bringing them to Brooklyn

to stand charges.

Did you anticipate that?

And what do you think happened or what can you tell us about

what has just been going on?

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