Back in January, India’s richest man and his wife were in Washington, attending a pre-inauguration dinner thrown for Donald Trump. In a photograph of the event shared by Reliance Industries Ltd., all three beam for the camera.
Seven months on, the US President is locked in a bitter trade skirmish with India, and Reliance boss Mukesh Ambani is caught in the crossfire.
NEW DELHI: India’s state-run refiners Indian Oil and Bharat Petroleum have bought Russian oil for September and October delivery, resuming purchases after discounts widened, two company officials aware of the matter said on Wednesday.
The resumption in Russian oil imports by Indian state refiners could reduce supplies for top buyer China which had stepped up purchases during their absence.
The refiners halted purchases in July due to narrower discounts and after India was criticised by Washington for its purchases of Russian oil. President Donald Trump also threatened an additional 25% levy on Indian goods, effective August 27, to penalize New Delhi for its continued buying of the oil.
Discounts for Russian flagship Urals crude have widened to about $3 per barrel, making the oil attractive for Indian refiners, while China has stepped up purchases, the officials said.
In addition to Urals, IOC has also bought other Russian crude oil grades including Varandey and Siberian Light, they said.
Indian companies do not comment on their crude imports.
On Monday, IOC, the country’s top refiner, told analysts that it would continue to buy Russian oil depending on economics.
In recent weeks, Chinese refineries bought 15 cargoes of Russian oil for October and November delivery, according to two analysts and one trader.
On the other hand, Russia also expects to continue supplying oil to India despite warnings from the United States, Russian embassy officials in New Delhi said on Wednesday, adding that Moscow hopes trilateral talks will soon take place with India and China.
“I want to highlight that despite the political situation, we can predict the same level of oil import (by India),” Roman Babushkin, the charge d’affaires at the Russian embassy in India, told a press briefing.
He predicted India and Russia would find ways to overcome Trump’s latest tariffs in their “national interests”.
Russian First Deputy Prime Minister Denis Manturov said separately that Russia saw scope for supplies of liquefied natural gas to India.
“We continue to ship fuel, including crude oil and oil products, thermal and coking coal. We see potential for the export of Russian LNG,” Manturov was quoted as saying by Interfax news agency.
He also said, according to the RIA news agency, that Russia was counting on expanding nuclear energy cooperation with India.
Trade talks between India and the U.S. broke down over the opening up of India’s vast farm and dairy sectors, as well as its purchases of Russian oil. The total tariff announced on Indian goods entering the U.S. is 50%.
The Indian foreign ministry did not immediately reply to an emailed request for comment.
It has previously said the U.S. decision to single out India for Russian purchases was “extremely unfortunate”.
Russia’s Deputy Trade Commissioner Evgeny Griva on Wednesday said buying oil from Russia is “very profitable” for India, which will not want to change its supplier.
On average Russia gives a 5%-7% discount to Indian buyers, he said, adding that Russia has a “very, very special mechanism” to continue oil supplies to India.
In addition, he said Russia had started accepting Indian rupee payments for its goods after the resolution of issues that had trapped billions of dollars worth of funds in Indian banks.
As tensions between Washington and New Delhi rise, high-profile visits from New Delhi and Beijing in recent weeks have raised hopes on the part of the Asian neighbours that ties damaged by a 2020 border clash can be repaired.
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi plans to visit China for the first time in over seven years later this month.
The planned visit was reported by Reuters last week, even as other high profile exchanges, including Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi’s two-day visit to New Delhi, concluded.
At the same time, Russia is trying to revive long-standing plans for a trilateral meeting with India and China to help them forge a “greater Eurasian partnership”.
“As far as the trilateral is concerned, we are quite hopeful that this format will be resumed sooner rather than later because its importance is not questioned,” Babushkin said.
“This is closely linked to the Russian initiative of the establishment of the greater Eurasian partnership,” Babushkin said.
Russian President Vladimir Putin will meet Modi in New Delhi by the end of year, he said. Putin, Modi and Chinese President Xi Jinping are also expected to all attend the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation starting August 31.
As the longest-serving Israeli prime minister (17 years), Benjamin Netanyahu is famous for his political wizardry and survival skills. But he is also a highly controversial figure with questionable moral standards and legacy.
His latest term in office, beginning in late 2022, has been particularly challenging, thanks to the far-right radical elements of his governing coalition and the unprecedented national disaster Israel experienced at the hands of Hamas on October 7 2023.
Yet, Netanyahu has managed to neutralise almost all immediate domestic threats to his power. At times, he has done this by manoeuvring rivals and partners into postponing moves that could topple his government. Other times, he has reshuffled his Likud Party ranks or realigned with bitter foes.
Netanyahu is also facing increased criticism from the Israeli public, with hundreds of thousands of people taking part in marches in support of a hostage deal, as well as from former senior politicians and ex-security officials.
And he has clashed with Eyal Zamir, the Israel Defence Force’s (IDF) chief of staff, who argued against the plan to expand the war into Gaza City. Zamir received clear messages to fold or resign, and chose to stay.
Yet, Netanyahu chooses to ignore all of this noise, sending his entourage and loyalists to attack anyone with dissenting views. This week’s spray at Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese is just one example.
As a long term political survivor, he does all of this with an eye on the next Israeli elections, due at the end of 2026.
Over the past two and a half years, Israel has faced unprecedented crises that have left society deeply divided.
Under Netanyahu’s leadership, the government introduced a highly controversial judicial reform plan in early 2023, clashing with the Supreme Court and attorney general. This resulted in mass street protests against it.
Then came the Hamas attack of October 7, 2023, which triggered an ongoing multi-front war with severe long-term social, economic and humanitarian consequences.
Netanyahu has claimed credit for successes during this time, such as the 12-day war against Iran in June, while deflecting responsibility for any failures.
Though stretched in many directions, Netanyahu is at his best in such conditions, pitting the conflicting sides around him against each other and playing them.
His coalition relies on hard-right partners, especially National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir and Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich. Despite the massive protests to agree to a hostage deal and international demands to end the war, Netanyahu has chosen to prioritise ensuring the stability of his coalition.
He has acceded to Ben Gvir and Smotrich’s demands to reject ceasefire agreements with Hamas, and instead ordered increased military action against the terrorist group to try to achieve what he has called a “total victory”.
Netanyahu has also indulged Ben Gvir and Smotrich’s talk of resettling Gaza and has enabled their moves to gradually expand Israeli settlements deeper into the West Bank and block any geographically feasible Palestinian state.
Proving Henry Kissinger’s famous observation that “Israel has no foreign policy, only domestic politics,” Netanyahu has also angrily rebuked the wave of Western countries recognising, or preparing to recognise, a Palestinian state.
His defiant letters to French President Emmanuel Macron and social media outbursts about Albanese are aimed less at diplomacy and more at cultivating his image as “a strong leader for Israel” among his base.
Supported by the Trump administration’s sanctions against the International Criminal Court (ICC), Netanayhu has also felt confident attacking it for issuing warrants against him.
The government’s biggest domestic challenge has been passing a draft law addressing the decades-long exemption of tens of thousands of ultra-Orthodox (Haredi) men from army service.
Following a Supreme Court ruling that the previous exemptions could not continue, religious parties in Netanyahu’s coalition demanded a bill to formally exempt the men from army service or they would bring down the government.
In response, Netanyahu enticed old rival Gideon Sa’ar from the opposition into joining his government, shoring up the coalition’s previously tiny majority.
Since then, he has bought time through broken promises, successfully persuading the ultra-Orthodox parties to wait until parliament’s return in October of this year. Meanwhile, he replaced Yuli Edelstein, the committee chair who had sought a strong bill with personal sanctions for draft evaders, with a more pliant loyalist, Boaz Bismuth.
Now Netanyahu has his eye on the next general elections, officially set for late 2026 — though he would prefer they take place before the third anniversary of the October 7 attacks.
For two years, polls have consistently predicted his defeat. As such, he is working to reshape his image. He wants Israelis to forget his central role in the October 7 catastrophe, as well as the questions surrounding the war’s management.
He also hopes to continue diverting attention from his ongoing trial on bribery and breach of trust charges.
But Netanyahu faces a dramatic dilemma over the war. On the one hand, he may decide to sign a ceasefire deal with Hamas and secure the release of the hostages. This would win the cheers of most Israelis, but risk the loss of his government, given the far-right ministers’ threats to dissolve the coalition if he accepts any deal without fully conquering the strip.
On the other hand, he could proceed with the military operation in Gaza City, which may well result in the killing of the remaining hostages – either by Hamas or as a consequence of IDF attacks.
A third option would be to continue negotiations while escalating preparations for the attack, in the hope of achieving a better deal. We will soon know what direction he will take – and what it will mean for his political future.
India has successfully test-fired an indigenously developed intermediate-range ballistic missile capable of carrying a nuclear warhead deep into the territory of its geopolitical rival, China, just as Prime Minister Narendra Modi prepares for his first visit there in years.
The Agni-5 was launched in India’s eastern Odisha state and “validated all operational and technical parameters,” the country’s defense ministry said in a statement on Wednesday.
The missile has a range of more than 5,000 kilometers (3,100 miles), according to the Center for Strategic and International Studies Missile Defense Project. That puts India’s rivals like China and Pakistan well within range of the weapon.
India and China are locked in a fierce battle for influence across the Asia-Pacific. Both have navigated a frosty relationship after deadly clashes at their shared Himalayan border in 2020 pushed the two further apart than at any time in decades.
India is playing catch-up as the People’s Liberation Army expands its arsenal and tensions continue to simmer along their disputed border. A report published in June by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) estimates that China now has around 600 nuclear warheads, while India has 180.
The Agni-5 test comes on the heels of a visit to New Delhi by Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi, a trip that set the stage for Modi’s own late-August visit to China for a summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) a security grouping that includes Russia and Pakistan.
Ties have shown signs of warming since Modi met Chinese leader Xi Jinping on the sidelines of the BRICS summit in Russia last October.
India and China have agreed to resume direct commercial flights cancelled in 2020 during the Covid-19 pandemic, Beijing recently agreed to reopen two pilgrimage sites in western Tibet to Indians for the first time in five years, and both started re-issuing tourist visas for each other’s citizens.
“Stable, predictable, constructive ties between India and China will contribute significantly to regional as well as global peace and prosperity,” Modi said in a statement Tuesday after his meeting with Wang. He also acknowledged his impending trip for the SCO summit in Tianjin.
India’s relationship with the US, meanwhile, has been strained after President Donald Trump threatened New Delhi with 50% tariffs as punishment for its purchases of Russian oil.
Washington, which has been courting India as a strategic counterweight to China, is inadvertently pushing the two Asian giants closer together with its economic policies, analysts say.
The Agni-5 missile is also part of India’s defense strategy against nuclear-armed rival Pakistan.
The two neighbors engaged in a brief but deadly conflict earlier this year – their worst in decades – with both sides striking deep into the other’s territory. The conflict sparked an international diplomatic scramble to stop hostilities between two nuclear armed powers escalating further.
Pakistan’s Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif is also expected to be in Tianjin for the SCO meeting. China and Pakistan have deepened ties in recent decades, with Islamabad participating in Xi’s signature infrastructure project, the Belt and Road initiative.
China is also a major supplier of weapons to Pakistan, providing the nation with 81% of its imported weapons, according to data from SIPRI.
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ASTANA, Aug 21 (Kazinform/APP) : Egypt opened on Wednesday an exhibition for sunken antiquities at the Alexandria National Museum, showcasing treasures from the Mediterranean seabed, Xinhua reports.
Dubbed the “Secrets of the Sunken City Exhibition,” the exhibition showcased 86 rare artifacts recovered from several sites in Alexandria, including the two submerged cities of Thonis-Heracleion and Canopus, and the submerged Royal Quarter in the Eastern Harbor of ancient Alexandria.
According to the Egyptian Tourism and Antiquities Ministry, Thonis-Heracleion, a once-flourishing port city active between the 6th century BC and 4th century AD, gradually sank over the centuries due to earthquakes, land subsidence and rising sea levels. It was known for its multiple harbors and Egyptian and Greek temples, including Amun, Khonsu and Heracles.
The submerged city of Canopus was renowned for its sacred sanctuaries dedicated to Osiris and Serapis. The city was also known for its extravagant celebrations during the Roman era, the ministry said.
PodcastPodcast, The Take
Israel pushes into Gaza City as Hamas accepts a ceasefire. What does this reveal about Israel’s broader Gaza plan?
Israel’s ground push into Gaza City comes as Hamas accepts a ceasefire deal brokered by Egypt and Qatar. Palestinians are being forced south in the Gaza Strip, where tent camps are rising and aid remains scarce. What does this move reveal about Israel’s broader plan?
In this episode:
Episode credits:
This episode was produced by Tamara Khandaker, Sonia Bhagat and Marcos Bartolome, with Phillip Lanos, Spencer Cline, Melanie Marich, Farhan Rafid, and guest host, Kevin Hirten. It was edited by Kylene Kiang, Amy Walters and Sari el-Khalili.
Our sound designer is Alex Roldan. Our video editors are Hisham Abu Salah and Mohannad Al-Melhem. Alexandra Locke is the Take’s executive producer. Ney Alvarez is Al Jazeera’s head of audio.
Frank Caprio, the longtime Chief Judge of Providence Municipal Court and star of the reality series Caught in Providence, has died aged 88 after battling pancreatic cancer, his family has confirmed.
He passed away peacefully on Wednesday, August 20.
“Judge Frank Caprio passed away peacefully at the age of 88 after a long and courageous battle with pancreatic cancer,” his family said in a statement posted on Facebook.
“In his honour, may we each strive to bring a little more compassion into the world – just as he did every day.”
Rhode Island Governor Dan McKee ordered flags at state buildings and agencies to be flown at half-mast until Caprio’s burial.
“Judge Caprio was a Rhode Island treasure,” he said. “On a personal level, he was a friend who faced his illness with bravery, and I will miss him dearly. My thoughts are with his family and loved ones during this difficult time.
“Judge Caprio not only served the public well, but he connected with people in a meaningful way. He showed us all what justice with humanity can look like.”
Caprio became widely recognised through Caught in Providence, the long-running reality television show that highlighted his compassionate way of dealing with minor traffic offences. With humour and empathy, he often brought both laughter and comfort to people appearing in his courtroom.
The programme aired locally for more than 20 years before being broadcast nationally. Later, clips of his rulings found a huge following on YouTube, where new videos continued to appear even after he stepped down from the bench.
“I don’t wear a badge under my robe,” Caprio often remarked. “I wear a heart.”
Earlier this year, he published his memoir, Compassion in the Court: Life-Changing Stories from America’s Nicest Judge.
Caprio revealed in December 2023 that he had been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. He praised the “wonderful team of doctors” treating him in Boston and Providence, but admitted he was facing “an insidious form of cancer”.
He kept his 1.7 million Instagram followers updated, sometimes posting videos during chemotherapy sessions. In one, he listened to the singer-songwriter Jewel, who later said she was “honoured to bring a small amount of comfort” to him.
Judge Frank Caprio is remembered in Rhode Island and far beyond as a man who brought kindness and compassion to the courtroom.
TEL AVIV: The Palestinian Authority has slammed Israel’s approval of a key settlement project in the occupied West Bank, saying it undermined the chances of a two-state solution.
The approval of the project in the area known as E1 “fragments … geographic and demographic unity, entrenching the division of the occupied West Bank into isolated areas and cantons that are disconnected from one another, turning them into something akin to real prisons,” the Palestinian Foreign Ministry said in a statement.
Israel gave final approval Wednesday for the controversial settlement project that would effectively cut the territory in two, and that Palestinians and rights groups say could destroy hopes for a future Palestinian state.
Settlement development in E1, an open tract of land east of Jerusalem, has been under consideration for more than two decades, but was frozen due to US pressure during previous administrations.
The international community overwhelmingly considers Israeli settlement construction in the West Bank to be illegal and an obstacle to peace.
Far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich, a former settler leader, cast the approval as a rebuke to Western countries that announced their plans to recognize a Palestinian state in recent weeks.
“The Palestinian state is being erased from the table not with slogans but with actions,” he said on Wednesday.
“Every settlement, every neighborhood, every housing unit is another nail in the coffin of this dangerous idea.”
A German government spokesperson commenting on the announcement said that settlement construction violates international law and “hinders a negotiated two-state solution and an end to the Israeli occupation of the West Bank.”
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu rejects the idea of a Palestinian state alongside Israel and has vowed to maintain open-ended control over the occupied West Bank, annexed east Jerusalem, and the war-ravaged Gaza Strip — territories Israel seized in the 1967 war that the Palestinians want for their state.
Israel’s expansion of settlements is part of an increasingly dire reality for Palestinians in the occupied West Bank as the world’s attention focuses on the war in Gaza.
There have been marked increases in attacks by settlers on Palestinians, evictions from Palestinian towns, Israeli military operations, and checkpoints that choke freedom of movement, as well as several Palestinian attacks on Israelis.
More than 700,000 Israeli settlers now live in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.
The location of E1 is significant because it is one of the last geographical links between the major West Bank cities of Ramallah, in the north, and Bethlehem, in the south.
The two cities are 22 km apart, but Palestinians traveling between them must take a wide detour and pass through multiple Israeli checkpoints, spending hours on the journey.
The hope was that, in an eventual Palestinian state, the region would serve as a direct link between the cities.
“The settlement in E1 has no purpose other than to sabotage a political solution,” said Peace Now, an organization that tracks settlement expansion in the West Bank.
“While the consensus among our friends in the world is to strive for peace and a two-state solution, a government that long ago lost the people’s trust is undermining the national interest, and we are all paying the price.”
If the process proceeds quickly, infrastructure work in E1 could begin within the next few months, and construction of homes could commence around a year later. The plan includes around 3,500 apartments that would surround the existing settlement of Maale Adumim. Smotrich also hailed the approval, during the same meeting, of 350 homes for the settlement of Ashael near Hebron.
Israel’s government is dominated by religious and ultranationalist politicians, like Smotrich, with close ties to the settlement movement.
The finance minister has been granted Cabinet-level authority over settlement policies and vowed to double the settler population in the West Bank.