Conservationist Morad Tahbaz among prisoners to be swapped in deal involving unfreezing of Iranian oil money
The US and Iran are expected to pull off a controversial prisoner swap on Monday involving the unfreezing by the Biden administration of $6bn (£4.8bn) of Iranian oil money held in South Korea since 2018.
Tehran and Washington are due to swap five prisoners each, including the conservationist Morad Tahbaz, a British-American citizen.
Continue reading...‘Candid, substantive and constructive’ talks were held as a possible prelude to a Joe Biden-Xi Jinping meeting in November
Top US and Chinese diplomats met in Malta over the weekend as the world’s two largest economies attempted to smooth strained relations and clear a path for their respective presidents – Joe Biden and Xi Jinping – to meet in November.
According to both Beijing and Washington, White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan met multiple times with China’s foreign minister, Wang Yi, in Malta, where – according to separate statements – “candid, substantive and constructive” talks were held.
Continue reading...US president agrees to talks at general assembly despite deep unease over policies of Israeli PM’s hardline coalition
Nine months after returning to office, Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, is finally getting his long sought-after meeting with Joe Biden – but an awkward rapprochement at the UN general assembly is unlikely to improve the strained relationship between the two leaders.
The US president is scheduled to meet Netanyahu in New York on Wednesday, the White House said on Friday. The US national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, said the two leaders would “discuss a range of bilateral and regional issues focused on the shared democratic values between the United States and Israel and a vision for a more stable and prosperous and integrated region, as well as to compare notes on effectively countering and deterring Iran”.
Continue reading...Ukraine claims to have seized the village of Andriivka in Donetsk; Lukashenko says Belarus has been supplying Russia with fuel
Continue reading...Sanctions waiver will allow transfer of $6bn in frozen Iranian assets from South Korea to Qatar, in effort to win release of quintet
The Biden administration has issued a waiver to allow the transfer of $6bn in frozen Iranian funds from South Korea to Qatar as part of a deal to free five Americans detained in Iran.
The waiver was a necessary step towards advancing a previously announced deal, which also involves the freeing of five Iranian citizens imprisoned in the US, mostly for sanctions-busting offenses.
Continue reading...The US president’s remarks came after after meeting in Vietnam with Communist party official to secure global supply chain
Joe Biden’s national security tour of south-east Asia reached Hanoi, Vietnam, on Sunday, where the president called for stability in the US-China relationship against an increasingly complex diplomatic picture in the region for his country.
“I don’t want to contain China,” Biden said. “I just want to make sure that we have a relationship with China that is on the up and up, squared away, everybody knows what it’s all about.”
Continue reading...Joe Biden’s need to nurture alliances to contain China sees Ukraine perceptibly slipping down list of priorities
It took exhausted Indian diplomats 200 hours of non-stop negotiations, 300 bilateral meetings and 15 drafts, but in the end the G20 countries reached a consensus declaration on the war in Ukraine – one that largely retreated into generalised principles rather than the specific condemnation of Russia that the same group of leaders agreed when they met in Bali a year ago.
Moreover, no invitation was extended to Ukrainie’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, to address the gathering, meaning the only direct combatant around the table was Russia, represented by its foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov.
Continue reading...Meeting in Delhi overshadowed by press freedom questions as US journalists kept away
Joe Biden took fresh steps on Friday to lure India’s prime minister, Narendra Modi, into an alliance designed to contain China, at a bilateral meeting in Delhi where the pair struck a series of commercial and defence deals covering remote-controlled aircraft, semiconductors and quantum computing.
However, the question of press freedom also dominated the agenda on the eve of the full G20 summit as journalists were blocked from covering the event. Before the bilateral at the prime minister’s residence, the US press corps, used to being given privileged access to the president, were told to remain outside in a van, out of eyesight of the two leaders.
Continue reading...Talks include Europe and UAE as Joe Biden flies to Delhi with aim of rivalling China’s Belt and Road
The US, Saudi Arabia, India and other nations are discussing a possible infrastructure deal that could reconfigure trade between the Gulf and south Asia, linking Middle Eastern countries by railways and connecting to India by port, according to US officials aware of the conversations.
The talks, which have also included the United Arab Emirates and Europe, may or may not yield a concrete result in time for an announcement on the sidelines of this week’s G20 leaders’ meeting, the officials said.
Continue reading...Apple shares fall as local government and state-owned firms latest to face restrictions on devices at work
China’s government has reportedly expanded its ban of iPhones to local government workers and state-owned companies, a day after it emerged central government employees were forbidden from bringing the devices to work.
Several agencies had begun instructing employees not to bring iPhones to work and the ban was expected to be further extended, Bloomberg reported. Nikkei reported at least one state-owned company had told its employees that anyone working with trade secrets could not bring their iPhones, Apple Watches or AirPods into work from next month.
Continue reading...There will be pressure on rich countries to fulfil a commitment to provide climate finance to poorer nations
The run-up to this weekend’s G20 summit in Delhi has largely been dominated by two issues: the host’s efforts to project India as a superpower; and the intriguing decision of Xi Jinping not to attend. The substance of what world leaders will discuss during their two days together has struggled to surface.
Yet this year’s G20 – the 24th since the format was inaugurated in 1999 – is potentially a make or break moment for the organisation that includes the world’s 19 wealthiest nations plus the European Union as a bloc. With one part of the world increasingly gathering in the now expanded Brics format where China has a leading role, and the west comfortable with its annual G7 summitry, the G20 is the best remaining hope of keeping the principle of multilateralism alive. The United Nations secretary general, António Guterres, spoke on Thursday of a real risk of fragmentation of the world order, while his own organisation is paralysed by the war in Ukraine.
Continue reading...US secretary of state expected to announce initial package of military aid for Kyiv of up to $200m
The US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, has arrived in Kyiv for an unannounced visit that is his first for a year to the Ukrainian capital.
He is expected to announce a new package of US assistance of $175m-$200m during the two-day visit, AP reported, with a larger package worth more than $1bn expected later this week, according to a senior state department official.
Continue reading...Republicans showcase range of hawkish policies designed to counter perceived threat amid diplomatic push by Biden
The United States’ tangled and increasingly fraught relationship with China is emerging centre stage in the 2024 presidential campaign in a rare case of foreign policy capturing the limelight in the race for the White House.
Half a century since a Republican president, Richard Nixon, made a historic visit to communist China to carve out a lauded strategic opening in the election year of 1972, Republican candidates vying to succeed him in the Oval Office are showcasing a range of hawkish policies designed to counter the perceived threat from Beijing.
Continue reading...Lawsuit says network discloses user data at request of Saudi authorities at much higher rate than for US, UK and Canada
The social media company formerly known as Twitter has been accused in a revised civil US lawsuit of helping Saudi Arabia commit grave human rights abuses against its users, including by disclosing confidential user data at the request of Saudi authorities at a much higher rate than it has for the US, UK, or Canada.
The lawsuit was brought last May against X, as Twitter is now known, by Areej al-Sadhan, the sister of a Saudi aid worker who was forcibly disappeared and then later sentenced to 20 years in jail.
Continue reading...Statement comes amid concern about allegations Saudi forces have killed hundreds of migrants
Germany ended a training programme for Saudi border forces, who have been implicated in the mass killing of migrants at the country’s border with Yemen, after it was alerted to reports of “possible massive human rights violations”, the German interior ministry has said.
In a statement to the Guardian, the ministry said training undertaken by the federal police service for the Saudi border force had been “discontinued after reports of possible massive human rights violations became known and, as a precaution, are no longer included in the current training programme [for Saudi security forces]”.
Continue reading...Hardline Aipac – condemned for unquestioning support of PM – calls liberal rival J Street ‘grave threat’ to Israel’s security
A public feud has broken out between the US’s leading pro-Israel lobby groups over who represents the true interests of the Jewish state in Washington under the most rightwing government in its history.
The hardline American Israel Public Affairs Committee (Aipac) has called its smaller and more liberal rival, J Street, a “grave threat” to Israel’s security and accused it of endorsing the country’s “most virulent critics” in Congress.
Continue reading...UK’s James Cleverly is latest to travel to Beijing hoping to improve ties and change Chinese foreign policy
The UK foreign secretary, James Cleverly, on Wednesday described his government’s relationship with Beijing as “complicated and sophisticated”. He said the UK’s approach was “clear-eyed” and pragmatic, neither seeking to isolate the world’s second largest economy nor shying away from raising disagreements.
The balancing act may prove difficult. Cleverly is the latest in a series of western government officials – from the US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, to the French president, Emmanuel Macron – to have visited China in recent months hoping to repair soured relations and trade ties. Few have had much success.
Continue reading...State department says allegations against Robert Shonov are ‘wholly without merit’, as rare footage of detained US citizen Paul Whelan emerges
The United States has accused Moscow of attempting to intimidate and harass US employees, after Russian state media reported that a former US consulate worker had been charged with collecting information on the war in Ukraine and other issues for Washington.
The FSB security service has accused Robert Shonov, a Russian national, of relaying to US embassy staffers in Moscow information on how Russia’s conscription campaign was affecting political discontent ahead of the 2024 presidential election in Russia, according to Russian state news agency Tass.
Continue reading...Two US residents, one of whom is on death row, are being unfairly excluded, says Richard Ratcliffe
Two US residents, one in fear of execution, are being unfairly excluded from an imminent deal between US-Iran to release prisoners, the husband of Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe has claimed.
Richard Ratcliffe, whose wife was freed after five years in a Tehran prison
in 2022, said there was no legal reason why the two residents were not included in a deal to release five US citizens in return for the unfreezing of $6bn (£4.8bn) of Iranian assets in South Korea. It is also expected that four Iranians will be released from US jails.
Papers reveal how Richard Nixon was briefed on impending military takeover in Chile that ushered in 17-year dictatorship
Two more US Department of State documents relating to Augusto Pinochet’s coup d’état in Chile have been declassified, revealing how President Richard Nixon was briefed on the impending military takeover.
The president’s daily brief from 11 September 1973, the morning of the US-backed military coup, informed Nixon that Chilean military officers were “determined to restore political and economic order”, but “may still lack an effectively coordinated plan that would capitalize on the widespread civilian opposition”.
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