Category: 2. World

China’s president, Xi Jinping, has been busy on the diplomatic front. China has just hosted the largest annual summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO), followed by an impressive military parade to mark the defeat of Japan in the second world war – all accompanied by key bilateral meetings with heads of state from like-minded countries. You could be forgiven for thinking Beijing is now the diplomatic capital of the world.

But look behind the facade of bonhomie on display in the Chinese capital, and the unity underpinning a new China-led global order looks a lot more fragile than Xi would have you believe.

The most important result of the SCO summit on August 31 and September 1 was not the fact that leaders adopted a lengthy communique and more than 20 joint statements on issues as diverse as artificial intelligence, green industries and international trade. What mattered most was the attendance of India’s prime minister, Narendra Modi, and the rapprochement between New Delhi and Beijing.

This was Modi’s first visit to China in seven years. That his country’s relations with China continue to improve was made clear by Modi’s positive assessment of his bilateral meeting with Xi (“fruitful”) and also their relationship, which he said is based on “mutual respect, mutual interest and mutual sensitivity”.

Another obvious indicator of China trying to pull India closer into the SCO fold was its unequivocal condemnation of the terror attacks in Pahalgam in Kashmir in April 2025. China’s earlier failure to do so had prevented India’s defence minister from signing a similar communique at a meeting of SCO defence ministers in June.

Modi’s attendance also provided the opportunity for him and Xi to demonstrate their continuing support for Russia’s president, Vladimir Putin. As far as alliances go, one between China, Russia and India would be a formidable factor in the remaking of the international order. But while there was an impressive display of solidarity between the three leaders, they are united by little more than their opposition to the current US-dominated order.

There was plenty of talk from Xi at the SCO summit about reforming the current system of international affairs – the latest blueprint of which is his Global Governance Initiative, which aims to transform the UN into a Beijing-led instrument. But the prospects of rapid change are limited.

China and India are both deeply integrated into the current international financial and economic system – as are most other SCO member states and partner countries. They may resent Donald Trump and his tariff policies but – with the partial exception of China’s dominance of the global rare-earth trade – they have little leverage.

Another problem for Xi is the fact his various forays into reshaping the international system are at best complementary. There is some overlap between the SCO and his other signature project, the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). But while the BRI is global and focused primarily on extending China’s reach by economic means, the SCO is much more regional in outlook and focused on security.

Add to that the Brics (Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa) group, and China’s approach to remaking the international system begins to look less like a coherent strategy than a series of trial balloons – with even Xi unsure which will eventually pave the way to China’s global leadership role.

A final issue for Xi is that he is limited in his choice of partners. At the SCO summit in Tianjin, it was all about relations between China, Russia and India. Two days later at the victory parade in Beijing, the fledgling alliance between China, Russia and North Korea seemed to take centre stage. However, the absence of Modi from this event demonstrated that India does not want to be too closely associated with North Korea.

Xi has different options in how he pursues his challenge to the current world order – but some are mutually exclusive. Not everyone in his orbit is comfortable with all the political alignments the Chinese president chooses.

Antipathy to US-led order

This is not to say that China’s quest to replace the US as the global superpower is bound to fail. There is a logic to what Xi is doing. He is building a Chinese-dominated sphere of influence in Asia as a power base from which to reach for global hegemony.

But outside a small circle of similarly autocratic leaders, what has propelled this project so far is less the appeal of a China-led international system than dissatisfaction with the existing liberal international order. And while this dissatisfaction predates the current incumbent of the White House, it has been aggravated over the first six months of Trump’s second term.

More than two decades of careful recalibration of US relations with India, including drawing New Delhi into an alliance pushing back against China in Asia, appear recently to have been sacrificed at the altar of Trump’s insatiable vanity.

When India failed to acknowledge his claim to have mediated in its row with Pakistan after the Pahalgam terror attack and declined to join Pakistan in nominating Trump for a Nobel peace prize, his response was to rekindle relations with Pakistan and impose punitive tariffs on India.

Simultaneously, Trump’s wholly misguided America-first foreign policy has undermined the very relationships in Europe and Asia that underpinned the liberal international order and secured US dominance. At least his latest insight – that China, Russia and North Korea “conspire against the United States” – gives a glimmer of hope for America’s concerned allies in the west that the US president will change course in how he deals with Beijing, Moscow and Pyongyang.

If Trump doesn’t recognise the value of his country’s allies in managing the challenge that China clearly poses to the US, Xi’s sphere of influence may quickly extend far beyond Asia. This could relegate the US to a second-order power confined to – but not necessarily secure in – a diminishing sphere of influence.

QUETTA, Pakistan: A suicide bombing ripped through a political rally in Pakistan’s restive southwestern province of Balochistan on Tuesday night, killing at least 15 people and injuring 32, a senior administration official said on Wednesday, in one of the deadliest attacks in recent months.

No group immediately claimed responsibility for the bombing, but Balochistan, Pakistan’s largest yet most impoverished province, has been grappling for decades with a separatist insurgency that has escalated in recent years. Militants frequently target security forces, officials and non-local residents they accuse of exploiting the province’s resources. The province is also of strategic importance for Beijing’s Belt and Road Initiative, with China investing heavily in ports, roads and energy projects.

Police said the blast was caused by a suicide bomber who detonated about 10 kilograms of explosives as supporters and senior leaders of the Balochistan National Party-Mengal (BNP-M) left a stadium after a rally to mark the fourth death anniversary of party founder Attaullah Mengal.

“The suicide attack occurred at 9:40 p.m. outside the Shahwani Stadium when people were coming out,” Hamza Shafqaat, Additional Chief Secretary Home, said during a news conference wherein he confirmed the latest toll.

“A total of 112 policemen were deployed to protect the venue of Balochistan National Party Mengal’s rally,” he continued. “The body of the suicide bomber was recovered from the crime scene. His age was less than 30, but his ethnicity is yet to be confirmed as investigations continue.”

Shafqaat added the provincial government had already imposed Section 144 in the province following the high-level threat alert until September 15.

“Despite the threat alert, the government allowed BNP-Mengal to hold a public rally and issued a no-objection certificate with 17 to 18 clauses, including maintaining time restrictions,” he continued.

Shafqaat said law enforcement agencies had shared 22 threat alerts with the Balochistan administration related to processions marking the birth anniversary of Prophet Muhammad (PBUH), which will be observed on Saturday.

“We are on high alert,” he added.

BNP-M, an ethnic Baloch nationalist party that campaigns for greater provincial autonomy and control over natural resources, is headed by former parliamentarian Sardar Akhtar Mengal and remains a key political force in Balochistan’s majority-Baloch districts.

Mengal said the explosion struck shortly after he escorted political allies out of the rally.

“After the rally, I was escorting our guests, including the opposition leader, Mehmood Khan Achakzai. As we left and moved a little ahead, the blast occurred,” Mengal told Arab News.

Mengal declared a three-day mourning period and a “black day” across Balochistan.

“The government didn’t inform us of any threat alert before the rally,” he said. “Further actions will be announced after discussions with our aligned political parties.”

Eyewitnesses described scenes of chaos.

“We looked back and saw flames rising up … several people were injured and some had already been martyred. We immediately picked up people and left for Civil Hospital,” Bilal Ahmed told Arab News.

Party member Agha Hassan Baloch said he and other leaders were just steps away when the bomber struck.

“We were approximately 15 to 20 feet away from the site of the explosion … it happened next to our party’s central leader Nawab Niyaz Zehri’s car, which was a suicide blast,” he said.

Provincial health officials said eight of the injured were in critical condition and had been shifted to the Combined Military Hospital.

“Teams are working around the clock to treat the wounded,” Dr. Waseem Baig, spokesperson for the provincial health department, said.

The authoritarian strongmen Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping have mused on how organ transplants might lead to immortality, during a brief exchange of small talk caught on a hot mic at a military parade.

The Russian president was in Beijing on Wednesday with the Chinese leader, who hosted allies for a ceremony to mark the 80th anniversary of the end of the second world war.

As Putin and Xi walked at the head of a delegation of foreign leaders, state media aired live footage that captured parts of what appeared to be a private conversation. While they made their way towards a raised platform in Tiananmen Square, Putin’s interpreter could be heard saying in Chinese: “Biotechnology is continuously developing.”

After a brief inaudible passage, the interpreter added: “Human organs can be continuously transplanted. The longer you live, the younger you become, and [you can] even achieve immortality.”

Xi, who was off camera, could be heard responding in Chinese: “Some predict that in this century humans may live to 150 years old.”

Putin confirmed later to reporters he had discussed prospects for significantly increasing human life expectancy with Xi.

Both leaders have shown little intention of relinquishing power in their lifetimes. In 2018, Xi abolished presidential term limits, paving the way for him to rule indefinitely. Putin has also changed Russian law to allow him to remain in high office.

Sections of Russia’s elite, including Putin, have long been fascinated with longevity and the science of extending life.

In 2024, Putin instructed lawmakers to establish a research centre called New Health Preservation Technologies, dedicated to combating ageing. The project focuses on developing “technologies that prevent cellular aging, neurotechnologies, and other innovations aimed at ensuring longevity”.

According to an earlier investigation by the independent Russian outlet Meduza, Mikhail Kovalchuk, a longtime family confidant of Vladimir Putin, is leading Russia’s research into immortality, a subject that he and other influential figures close to the Kremlin are reportedly “obsessed” with. Meduza reported that Kovalchuk has invested in organ-printing technology that uses lab-grown cells to produce replacement organs.

Putin’s eldest daughter, the endocrinologist Maria Vorontsova, has received multimillion-dollar Russian government grants to study cell renewal and ways to extend human health and longevity and is involved in a genetic research programme linked to Kovalchuk. When sanctions were passed on her by the US in 2022, the State Department said she was leading Kremlin-funded genetics programmes worth billions.

Putin and Xi walked alongside the North Korean dictator, Kim Jong-un, during their conversation, who was smiling and looking in the direction of Putin and Xi. It was not clear if their chat was being translated for him.

Later footage showed the three leaders walking up the steps towards the viewing platform for the parade.

The moment was carried on the livestream provided by the state broadcaster CCTV to other media, including the international newswires AP and Reuters.

China’s largest-ever military parade included 50,000 spectators and a big display of military hardware, from tanks and drones to nuclear-capable missiles, fighter jets and stealth aircraft.

The performance was seen as a show of defiance to the west. Other attenders included the president of Belarus, Aleksander Lukashenko, the Iranian president, Masoud Pezeshkian, and Myanmar’s junta chief, Min Aung Hlaing.

In his formal address, Xi told the crowd that the Chinese people stood firmly “on the right side of history”. He said China was a great nation that was “never intimidated by any bullies” – in an apparent veiled reference to the US and its allies – and added that China was “unstoppable”.

ABU DHABI, United Arab Emirates — A top United Arab Emirates official warned Israel on Tuesday that annexing the West Bank would cross a “red line” that would “end the vision of regional integration,” just two days before Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was slated to hold a major ministerial consultation on whether to advance the highly controversial move.

“Annexation would be a red line for my government, and that means there can be no lasting peace. It would foreclose the idea of regional integration and be the death knell of the two-state solution,” Emirati special envoy Lana Nusseibeh told The Times of Israel in an interview conducted in the UAE Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Abu Dhabi.

It was a shocking alarm bell from Abu Dhabi ahead of the fifth anniversary of the Abraham Accords, which the UAE initiated by becoming the first Arab country to normalize relations with Israel in over a quarter-century.

Since then, Emirati officials have insisted that the move was an all-but-irreversible strategic choice, making Nusseibeh’s warning particularly dramatic, as it highlighted how averse the Gulf country is to Israel again considering annexation.

For every Arab capital you talk to, the idea of regional integration is still a possibility, but annexation to satisfy some of the radical extremist elements in Israel is going to take that off the table

The carefully crafted Emirati message about the potential “strategic loss” was voiced on the record for the first time since the Abraham Accords were signed. It came as Netanyahu geared up to discuss the matter of annexation with a small group of ministers on Thursday, in response to the plans of several major Western countries to recognize a Palestinian state at the United Nations General Assembly later this month, an Israeli official told The Times of Israel.

The decision to speak directly to an Israeli audience harked back to an op-ed UAE Ambassador to the United States Yousef Otaiba had published on the front page of a top Israeli newspaper just two months before the two countries signed a normalization agreement.

Then too, Abu Dhabi laid out a choice for Israelis as a previous Netanyahu government threatened to annex large parts of the West Bank within weeks.

“Recently, Israeli leaders have promoted excited talk about normalization of relations with the UAE and other Arab states. But Israeli plans for annexation and talk of normalization are a contradiction,” Otaiba wrote in June 2020.

The op-ed proved critical in laying the groundwork for the Abraham Accords, resonating overwhelmingly with Israelis — 80 percent of whom were shown to back forgoing annexation in favor of a normalization deal.

Netanyahu ultimately walked back from the annexation threat in exchange for diplomatic ties with Abu Dhabi in a deal brokered by US President Donald Trump’s first administration.

But The Times of Israel later revealed that the UAE only secured a US commitment not to back Israeli annexation until the end of Trump’s term.

Apparently recognizing the move would carry less weight without US backing, Netanyahu hasn’t gone ahead with it since.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu speaks before a map of the Jordan Valley, vowing to extend Israeli sovereignty there if reelected, during a speech in Ramat Gan on September 10, 2019. (Menahem Kahana/AFP)

The US commitment’s expiration coincided with the start of the Biden administration, which restored traditional US policy in favor of a two-state solution and adamantly against annexation.

With Trump now back in office, though, Netanyahu’s far-right coalition partners are increasingly adamant that a potential historic window has opened to declare Israeli sovereignty over West Bank settlements, given that the new administration appears either indifferent or supportive of the move.

Those hardliners have identified the recently announced plans of France, the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia and Belgium to recognize a Palestinian state as a unique opportunity to finally annex the West Bank, as Jerusalem weighs its response to the unilateral steps, which it deems a “reward” for Hamas’s October 7 onslaught. On Wednesday, indeed, Israel’s Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich issued a proposal to annex 82% of the West Bank, and urged Netanyahu to adopt it.

Accordingly, Nusseibeh also voiced a not-so-subtle message directed at the Trump administration, with which her government has quickly cultivated a close relationship.

We trust that President Trump will not allow the Abraham Accords tenet of his legacy to be tarnished, threatened or derailed by extremists and radicals

“We believe that President Trump and his administration have many of the levers to lead the initiative for a wider integration of Israel into the region,” said the Emirati official, who serves as assistant minister for political affairs and special envoy for UAE Foreign Minister Abdullah bin Zayed.

Nusseibeh most recently was the UAE’s ambassador to the UN. She is seen as a particularly influential Emirati diplomat with close ties to the royal family.

UAE Ambassador to the US Yousef Otaiba (L) attends a business forum in the presence of the US president in Abu Dhabi on May 16, 2025. Trump capped his Gulf tour in Abu Dhabi after signing another raft of multi-billion-dollar deals, while also securing a $1.4 trillion investment pledge from the UAE. (Photo by Brendan SMIALOWSKI / AFP)

“We trust that President Trump will not allow the Abraham Accords tenet of his legacy to be tarnished, threatened or derailed by extremists and radicals,” she added.

Like Otaiba, the Emirati special envoy appeared to try to direct her message toward the Israeli public, not the government, which polls indicate only has the support of a minority.

Arguing that annexation would effectively amount to a rejection of the Abraham Accords, Nusseibeh maintained “that choice should be put directly to the Israeli people.”

UN Ambassadors from Israel Gilad Erdan, from the UAE Lana Nusseibeh, from the US Linda Thomas-Greenfield, from Morocco Omar Hilale, and from Bahrain Jamal Al Rowaiei at a New York event marking the one-year anniversary of the signing of the Abraham Accords, September 13, 2021. (Jacob Magid/ Times of Israel)

While the senior Emirati official warned about what Israel stood to lose if it proceeded with annexation, she also made a point of highlighting what Jerusalem could gain if it again shelved the plan.

Arab countries, including Saudi Arabia, are still open to normalizing ties with Jerusalem, she indicated.

But they are conditioning such a move not just on the withdrawal of annexation plans but on Israel agreeing to establish a credible, irreversible pathway to a future Palestinian state. Still, they haven’t foreclosed the idea entirely, despite massive opposition to Israel’s prosecution of its nearly two-year war against Hamas.

Palestinian artists draw murals depicting the Dome of the Rock and the West Bank as part of an awareness campaign against Israel’s West Bank annexation plans, in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip, on July 1, 2020 (SAID KHATIB / AFP)

“For every Arab capital you talk to, the idea of regional integration is still a possibility, but annexation to satisfy some of the radical extremist elements in Israel is going to take that off the table,” Nusseibeh said.

She asserted that Abu Dhabi did not come to this conclusion lightly.

“When Hamas tried to derail the Abraham Accords vision of regional integration with the October 7 terror attacks, we were firm in our response,” the special envoy said, highlighting the UAE’s immediate condemnation of the assault and recognition of Israel’s security concerns, while also “closely coordinating” to deliver more aid to Gaza than any other country.

“Over the last two years… our view was that the vision of the Abraham Accords remains pertinent — that you can’t let extremists set the trajectory of the region,” she said.

Permanent Representative of the United Arab Emirates to the United Nations Lana Nusseibeh speaks during a Security Council meeting at United Nations headquarters, December 22, 2023. (Yuki Iwamura/AP)

But with Israel taking increasingly far-reaching steps to entrench its presence in the West Bank and Gaza, she said, “we are worried that all of us in the Middle East are moving toward a point of no return” and that now is the time to reach out to Israelis before efforts to maintain Israel’s ties to regional partners are “irreparably damaged.”

“The Abraham Accords’ tenets of prosperity, coexistence, tolerance, integration and stability” have “never looked more under threat than [they are] today,” she said.

Nusseibeh assured Israelis that an off-ramp exists. “There is an outstretched hand, despite all of this misery, in the region to Israel. But, “annexation would withdraw that hand,” she said.

Israel is stepping up efforts to take over Gaza City this month, calling up tens of thousands of army reservists and planning to order 1 million Palestinians from their homes, despite widespread global opposition.

While global outcry soars at the war’s toll on Palestinian civilians and a recent United Nations body’s declaration of famine in the enclave, opposition is also growing within Israel, where the strain on the military has compounded concern that troops, as well as hostages, will be endangered. Soldiers are already operating on the Gaza City periphery, but they will storm its center in mid-September, according to an Israeli official who requested anonymity discussing military strategy.

Published on: September 3, 2025 5:16 PM

Russia has pledged to fully support China in its quest to surpass the United States in nuclear energy dominance. The statement came from Alexey Likhachev, head of Russia’s state nuclear agency Rosatom. He said China aims to overtake the US in the total capacity of nuclear reactors and is working aggressively toward that goal.

According to international reports, the United States currently leads the world in nuclear reactor capacity, with around 97 gigawatts. China ranks second, with 53.2 gigawatts as of April 2024. However, China plans to expand its capacity to 100 gigawatts, which would make it the new global leader.

Likhachev confirmed that Russia has already helped China build four nuclear reactors. He also said that four more are in the works, requiring large quantities of uranium and nuclear fuel. Russia will continue supplying its technology and expertise to support China’s nuclear expansion.

He emphasized that this cooperation will help China establish an entirely new nuclear fuel cycle. The development is based on Russian technology and material support. This signals deepening strategic cooperation between Moscow and Beijing in the energy and defense sectors.

Analysts view this move as part of a broader geopolitical alignment between Russia and China. It also reflects their shared ambition to challenge US dominance in critical global sectors, including nuclear technology.