Category: 2. World

India will not “bow down” and instead focus on capturing new markets, trade minister Piyush Goyal said in his first public remarks since Washington imposed steep tariffs on Indian goods.

The 50% levies on many Indian imports into the United States took effect this week as punishment for New Delhi’s massive purchases of Russian oil, part of US efforts to pressure Moscow into ending its war in Ukraine.

Since his return to the White House this year, US President Donald Trump has wielded tariffs as a wide-ranging policy tool, with the levies upending global trade.

Speaking at a construction industry event in New Delhi on Friday, Goyal said India was “always ready if anyone wants to have a free trade agreement with us”.

But, he added, India “will neither bow down nor ever appear weak”.

“We will continue to move together and capture new markets.”

The latest tariffs salvo from Trump has strained US-India ties, with New Delhi earlier criticising the levies as “unfair, unjustified and unreasonable”.

Trade talks between the two countries have stumbled over agriculture and dairy markets.

Trump wants greater US access, while Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi is determined to shield India’s farmers, a huge voter bloc.

The US was India’s top export destination in 2024, with shipments worth $87.3 billion.

But analysts have cautioned that a 50% duty is akin to a trade embargo and is likely to harm smaller firms.

Exporters of textiles, seafood and jewelry have already reported cancelled US orders and losses to rivals such as Bangladesh and Vietnam, raising fears of heavy job cuts.

Goyal said the government would be coming out with several measures in the coming days to support every sector and boost exports.

“I can say with confidence that India´s exports this year will exceed 2024-25 numbers,” he said.

NEW DELHI: India will not “bow down” and instead focus on capturing new markets, trade minister Piyush Goyal said in his first public remarks since Washington imposed steep tariffs on Indian goods.

The 50-percent levies on many Indian imports into the United States took effect this week as punishment for New Delhi’s massive purchases of Russian oil, part of US efforts to pressure Moscow into ending its war in Ukraine.

Since his return to the White House this year, US President Donald Trump has wielded tariffs as a wide-ranging policy tool, with the levies upending global trade.

Speaking at a construction industry event in New Delhi on Friday, Goyal said India was “always ready if anyone wants to have a free trade agreement with us”.

India says knock-on impact of US tariffs poses economic challenges

But, he added, India “will neither bow down nor ever appear weak”.

“We will continue to move together and capture new markets.”

The latest tariffs salvo from Trump has strained US-India ties, with New Delhi earlier criticising the levies as “unfair, unjustified and unreasonable”.

Trade talks between the two countries have stumbled over agriculture and dairy markets.

Trump wants greater US access, while Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi is determined to shield India’s farmers, a huge voter bloc.

The US was India’s top export destination in 2024, with shipments worth $87.3 billion.

India’s economy unexpectedly picks up steam despite Trump’s tariff threats

But analysts have cautioned that a 50-percent duty is akin to a trade embargo and is likely to harm smaller firms.

Exporters of textiles, seafood and jewelry have already reported cancelled US orders and losses to rivals such as Bangladesh and Vietnam, raising fears of heavy job cuts.

Goyal said the government would be coming out with several measures in the coming days to support every sector and boost exports.

“I can say with confidence that India’s exports this year will exceed 2024-25 numbers,” he said.

Srinagar, India-administered Kashmir – On a sunlit June Friday in Srinagar’s Old City, the Jamia Masjid stands as it always has, ornate and imposing. Its 14th-century wooden pillars have been witnesses to centuries of sermons and struggle.

Inside, about 4,000 worshippers sit in silence.

When Mirwaiz Umar Farooq, the spiritual leader of Kashmir’s Muslims, rises to speak, he does so with grace but caution. Draped in his customary golden-bordered white thobe and crowned with a brown Karakuli hat, he delivers a sermon laced with quiet prayers.

“As we enter the new Islamic year,” he said, “I extend greetings to the entire Muslim Ummah. May Allah grant us peace, unity and strength, protect the oppressed, and guide our leaders with wisdom and righteousness in these testing times.”

His tone is unrecognisable from just a few years ago, when the now 52-year-old mirwaiz – as Kashmir’s chief Muslim leader is known – was a fiery orator, thundering with conviction, his speeches a powerful cocktail of religious messaging and politics.

For almost three decades, Kashmir’s supreme Muslim leader was also one of the region’s most influential voices arguing for its independence from India through peaceful dialogue, at a time when the valley was a cauldron of violence. An armed secessionist struggle that kicked off in the 1980s led to a massive Indian security presence in Kashmir, and since then, more than 40,000 people have been killed according to Indian government estimates.

Farooq’s speeches would often invoke Kashmir’s right to independence. Seven years ago, on June 2, 2018, for instance, the mosque brimmed with more than 30,000 worshippers. Farooq, visibly impassioned, ascended the pulpit.

“This pulpit will never fall silent,” he proclaimed. “The Jamia mimbar will continue to speak truth and be on the side of justice … Kashmir is our nation, only we will decide its fate.”

The crowd erupted. Chants of “Azaadi [freedom]!” thundered within the mosque.

But Kashmir has since changed: In 2019, the government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi unilaterally revoked Kashmir’s semi-autonomous status, guaranteed at the time under the Indian Constitution, which was followed by a security clampdown and administrative restrictions. Thousands were arrested, including Farooq, who was placed under house arrest. It would be four years before he was released in 2023.

On this Friday, it seems like Farooq has changed, too. Gone is the defiant rhetoric that once defined him. There are no overt political cues in his sermon, only verses from scripture, calls for patience, and appeals for community calm.

The crowd listens. Respectful, but unlike in earlier years, unmoved.

Outside, across Kashmir, a question is beginning to take hold. Few say it out aloud, but the conversations are real: Is the head-priest adapting to survive in a changed Kashmir, or is he fading into irrelevance?

Who is the mirwaiz?

In Kashmir’s complex political and spiritual landscape, few figures embody both reverence and endurance quite like Mirwaiz Umar Farooq. Thrust into public life at the age of 17 after the assassination of his father – the previous mirwaiz – in 1990, allegedly by rebels from a Pakistan-backed armed group, Farooq inherited not just the pulpit, but a legacy.

As the mirwaiz of Kashmir, his official role was rooted in religious scholarship. But in Kashmir, the mimbar is rarely just theological.

Farooq quickly emerged as a distinctive voice – soft-spoken, scholarly and deliberate. Unlike many contemporaries who were drawn towards the growing armed uprising of the 1990s, Farooq chose the path of nonviolence and negotiation. As the valley slipped deeper into militarised conflict, he became a leading figure in the All Parties Hurriyat Conference (APHC), a coalition advocating for a peaceful, negotiated resolution to the Kashmir dispute.

Kashmir is claimed in full by India and Pakistan, though both control parts of it. In Indian-administered Kashmir, meanwhile, pro-independence sentiments have simmered since 1947, when the region acceded to India at the time of partition.

Farooq positioned himself as a moderate, walking the tightrope between street sentiment and diplomatic possibility. “Mirwaiz Umar has always positioned himself as a moderate politician, a believer in the institution of dialogue and someone who has been flexible in his political stance,” said Gowhar Geelani, author-journalist and political analyst. “The head priest has shown willingness to talk with all stakeholders, including the nation states of Pakistan and India, and different civil society coalitions within and outside Kashmir.”

At a time when most separatist leaders rejected talks with the Indian state as betrayal, Farooq broke ranks. In 2004, he led a Hurriyat delegation to meet Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee in Delhi, calling it “a step forward that could open doors to understanding.” He later held several rounds of talks with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, Vajpayee’s successor, raising issues like troop withdrawal, demilitarisation of civilian zones and Kashmir’s autonomy.

“We are not against India,” he said after one such meeting. “We are for Kashmiris. Dialogue is the only way out of this decades-long tragedy.”

Geelani explained that this approach, while distinctive, came with its own political risks: Different sections of the ideological spectrum in Kashmir viewed Farooq with “admiration, caution and suspicion”, he said.

The overtures to the Indian government – bold at the time – cost Farooq support among hardliner separatists but also positioned him as a rare figure willing to negotiate without abandoning the demand for self-determination. His political gamble was seen by many as an attempt to humanise Kashmir’s struggle and push for a peaceful resolution, while retaining the moral authority of the pulpit.

At the heart of the mirwaiz’s ability to play that role was his influence – a stature of a kind that no other pro-independence leaders in Kashmir could boast of. And that influence was centred at Srinagar’s Jamia Masjid.

Before 2019, when Kashmir still held its special status, Fridays at the mosque were charged events. Farooq’s sermons, laced with Islamic insight and political longing, moved overflowing congregations.

After August 2019, when India revoked Kashmir’s special status and the mirwaiz was arrested alongside thousands of others, the 600-year-old mosque too has occasionally been closed under security orders. Sermons were replaced by silence.

The return in 2023

On a grey September morning in Srinagar in 2023, the air hung heavy with a mix of apprehension and subdued hope at Jamia Masjid, as Mirwaiz Umar Farooq returned to the pulpit – gentler now. His shoulders, once firm with certainty, seemed slightly stooped. His gaze, formerly sharp and searching, now lingered, softer, more introspective. The fire was gone.

Tight security manned every alley; worshippers queued in long lines, many weeping silently as they glimpsed the mirwaiz step forward.

“This is the time for patience,” he said, pausing often, his tone deliberate. Gone were the calls for a plebiscite for Kashmiris to decide on their future, for resistance to what he once called “Indian occupation”.

Instead, there was a softened plea – for dialogue, not between nations, but with Kashmiris.

Once, he thundered, “Nobody can silence us.” That day on his return to the mosque in September 2023, he said: “Perhaps no one is ready to listen to us.”

Fast forward two years, and last month, as tensions peaked between India and Pakistan following India’s retaliation over the Pahalgam attack, he spoke to mourn the war’s youngest victims, Zain and Urwa. The twin children had been killed in Pakistani shelling. The mirwaiz said that their “smiling image will haunt us”.

“Kashmir is a bleeding wound,” he said. “A flashpoint that can explode anytime.” His audience, which would once erupt into chants, listened silently.

In January, Farooq travelled to New Delhi to attend a meeting of a parliamentary panel on amendments to a law that governs Muslim endowments – known as waqf – across India and Indian-administered Kashmir. It was his first formal engagement with the Indian state since 2019, prompting speculation about – as yet unconfirmed – renewed communication between the mirwaiz and Delhi.

A separate meeting with a member of parliament from the National Conference, a mainstream Kashmiri party that swears by the Indian Constitution and won last year’s state legislature election, further fuelled chatter that the mirwaiz might be exploring a political compromise with New Delhi.

Al Jazeera reached out to the mirwaiz for an interview, but has not received any response.

Analysts suggest that Farooq’s recent public engagements – including appearances at interfaith and national events in Delhi – reflect a cautious recalibration rather than a clear ideological shift. The mirwaiz now appears to be navigating a drastically altered political terrain, where symbolism and strategic networking – particularly with Indian Muslims facing their own constraints under the rule of Modi’s Hindu majoritarian Bharatiya Janata Party – may be the only forms of relevance still available.

“This is not so much a shift in ideology as it is a response to shrinking space,” said Anuradha Bhasin, senior journalist and political analyst. “He has always been a symbolic figure, straddling the religious and the political. In this charged political climate, not just separatists but even mainstream political actors have been left with very little room for articulation.

“What we’re seeing now is survival within that narrow space. He has been mostly under house arrest for the last six years, and the Hurriyat has completely disappeared – so he’s isolated.”

Still, questions about the mirwaiz and his careful sermons are dividing young Kashmiris.

Silence or strategy?

Conversations with young Kashmiris, from college campuses to downtown Srinagar cafes, reveal a quiet disillusionment with the mirwaiz among some. “He’s more a preacher now than a leader,” said Aqib Nazir, a journalism student, about a man once seen as among Kashmir’s most prominent political voices.

His moderation, once seen as a strength, is increasingly interpreted as powerlessness by this set of Kashmiris – as quiet capitulation.

But for others, the Mirwaiz still holds symbolic significance. They interpret his more restrained sermons as a sign of maturity and pragmatism – a conscious effort to protect the mosque’s role as a vital space for spiritual continuity and communal gathering.

In a context where public life is closely monitored and expressions of dissent are often scrutinised, some believe this approach helps maintain a space for religious life without drawing undue attention or risking further restrictions.

“He’s the last moral voice we’ve got,” said Asif, a Srinagar resident who’s listened to the Mirwaiz for more than 10 years.

“His restraint isn’t weakness – it’s survival.”

Tianjin, China
 — 

Autocrats, populists, friends and foes, a strongman waging a war in Europe and the leader of the world’s biggest democracy will all be hosted by Chinese leader Xi Jinping this weekend at a summit designed to showcase Beijing as a global leader capable of providing a counterweight to Western institutions.

Heads of state and delegations from across Asia and the Middle East will meet from Sunday in the Chinese port city of Tianjin for the two-day summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), a regional security grouping that has emerged as a cornerstone of Xi and Russian President Vladimir Putin’s drive to rebalance global power in their favor.

Chinese officials have billed the summit as the SCO’s largest yet, with the diplomacy and pageantry setting the stage for Xi to tout his country as a stable and powerful alternative leader at a time when ruling superpower the United States under President Donald Trump is shaking up its alliances and waging a global trade war.

The gathering also comes days ahead of a major military parade in Beijing that will offer a different message – that of China’s rapidly developing military might, and draw autocrats like North Korea’s Kim Jong Un and Myanmar’s Min Aung Hlaing alongside Putin and Russia-friendly European leaders Aleksandar Vucic of Serbia and Slovakia’s Robert Fico.

The summit also gifts Russia’s Putin some international spotlight, just two weeks after his Alaska summit with Trump, and as he continues to ignore international pressure to end his onslaught in Ukraine. Earlier this week Russia’s forces carried out the second-biggest aerial attack since its full-scale invasion of its neighbor.

Ahead of his arrival Putin praised the China-Russia partnership as a “stabilizing force” for the world. In a written interview for Chinese state news agency Xinhua, he said they were “united in our vision of building a just, multipolar world order” – an allusion to the two countries’ efforts to revise what they see as a US-led world order unfairly stacked against them.

SCO members – which include China, Russia, India, Iran, Pakistan, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan – preside over vast swaths of global energy reserves and govern some 40% of the global population.

‘Architect and host’

The guests at the summit have national rivalries between them and vast differences in political systems. And while this has sparked criticism of the group as too disparate to be effective, it also may serve to underscore Xi’s message.

“Beijing wants to signal that China is the indispensable convener in Eurasia, capable of seating rivals at the same table and translating great-power competition into managed interdependence,” said Rabia Akhtar, director of the Centre for Security, Strategy and Policy Research at the University of Lahore in Pakistan.

“The optics are straightforward: China is not just a participant in regional order-making – it is a primary architect and host.”

Modi’s attendance at the gathering also adds heft to Xi’s guest list. The Indian prime minister skipped last year’s summit in Kazakhstan. He now arrives in Tianjin against a backdrop of souring relations with Washington – and as Beijing and New Delhi have moved to ease their own frictions, a nascent realignment that could imperil US efforts to cultivate India as a counterweight against a rising China.

Delegations are also expected from the SCO’s 16 official partner and observer countries, which include Cambodia, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Qatar, and Kuwait, as well as NATO member Turkey, among others, Chinese officials said ahead of the gathering.

Beijing additionally invited a handful of Southeast Asian leaders. UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres is also expected to attend.

Across the city of Tianjin, banners in English, Russian and Chinese heralding the gathering lined highways. Officials heavily restricted traffic in the city center as Chinese leaders prepare to welcome their guests with the ceremony and pomp typical of Chinese diplomacy at the highest level.

The location has pointed symbolism for China, as a port that was forced open by colonial powers in the 19th century, with those from Europe and Imperial Japan receiving land concessions – and a key city occupied by Japan during World War II.

Some guests, including Putin, Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian and Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, are slated to stay for the military parade in Beijing, where the ruling Communist Party will show off its military might and play up its role fighting Imperial Japan as part of the Allied Forces in World War II as the globe marks 80 years since the end of that war.

Since its formation in 2001 as a group focused on regional security cooperation between China, Russia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan, the Shanghai Cooperation Organization has expanded in its size and scope.

SCO members conduct joint counter-terrorism drills, share intelligence on combatting “terrorism, separatism, and extremism,” and work to expand coordination across areas like education, trade and energy. They’re also united in a call for a “just” international order – or one not led by a single superpower and its allies.

Iran’s inclusion in the group in 2023 and Belarus’ a year later have been widely seen as an effort by Beijing and Moscow to the make the body more explicitly anti-West. It also is one facet of a tightening of bonds between Moscow, Beijing and Tehran that’s raised alarm in Washington.

Now, growing frictions and uncertainties between some countries and the US under Trump will loom over the gathering – a reality sure to be referenced prominently if indirectly in remarks by Xi to his guests in the days ahead.

Observers will be watching whether this summit will produce momentum toward further economic integration between member countries, especially when it comes to regional trade or development finance, but expectations for practical developments are low.

“Without deeply addressing what the mission of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization should be and how it can resolve internal sources of conflict both between members and between members with external countries, the SCO is just a showcase,” said Shanghai-based foreign affairs analyst Shen Dingli.

Even as the group regularly calls for “avoiding bloc, ideological or confrontational approaches” to addressing security threats, its summits have yet to produce a joint statement mentioning the war in Ukraine.

SCO – and its lead members China and Russia – also appeared to have little role in de-escalating a four-day conflict between members India and Pakistan earlier this year.

The group did, however, “strongly condemn” the military strikes carried out by the US and Israel on Iran this past June.

The Trump administration’s proposed new rule to tighten international student visa norms, including limiting its duration to four years, is set to impact Indian students considering the US as a study abroad destination more than their Chinese peers, experts said.

Over half of the international students studying in the US are from India and China. While most Indian students studying there are keen to take up jobs in the US, a large chunk of Chinese students want to go back home, they said.

Chinese students want to be studying at the absolute top-ranked 100 or so programs, as this decides what cities they will live and work once back home – tier-1 cities like Beijing, Shanghai, and Shenzhen, or tier-2 cities like Chengdu, Hangzhou, etc, according to Akshay Chaturvedi, chief executive of study abroad platform LeverageEdu.

“This combination, of where they go and what they want to do after, is aligned with what the homeland security/Trump administration is saying right now,” Chaturvedi said.

India, in recent weeks, has faced several strict measures from the US, ranging from heavy tariffs and restrictions on visas and immigration. In comparison, Trump seems to have taken a much softer stance on China.

While the US visa regulations apply equally to all international students, the proposed move to cut visa duration is set to make the US less appealing to Indian students.

In comparison, Chinese students at the undergraduate level often have stronger institutional pipelines and family funding, which cushions them from immediate visa or job market worries, noted Adarsh Khandelwal, cofounder of Collegify.

Also, at the postgraduate level, Chinese students dominate in funded PhD and research-heavy STEM programmes, where assistantships cover tuition and living costs.

“Indian students, by contrast, are concentrated in self-funded master’s programs, where return on investment depends heavily on post-study work opportunities,” Khandelwal said.

This makes them rely more on OPT (optional practical training), which allows students to work in their field of study in the US up to 12 months after their studies, with STEM graduates eligible for a 24-month extension, after which many transition to an H-1B work visa through employer sponsorship.

“Any potential changes in H-1B or OPT policies would not impact the Chinese students as these categories are more in demand among Indian students,” said Piyush Kumar, regional director, South Asia, Canada and Latin America, at IDP.

These study abroad experts see the US taking a softer stance on students coming from China than India.

“Trump recently made a specific comment welcoming Chinese students to the US universities,” Kumar said.

Keshav Singhania, head – private client at law firm Singhania & Co, said, “The Trump administration is attempting to narrow down this pathway, as evidenced by the coming up of tariffs, stricter visa rules, and rhetoric branding the H-1B visa as a ‘scam’.”

As a result, in the past few months, study abroad consultants have seen many Indian students, especially non-STEM ones, opt for Germany, the UK, Australia, and New Zealand instead of the US.

For STEM courses, the US still remains a strong bet for Indians.

“Many pursuing non-STEM courses have opted to study in countries like the UK and Germany as universities here are actively improving their support for international students,” said Sonal Kapoor, global chief business officer at fintech study abroad platform Prodigy Finance.

“The proposed rule is to curb student visa overstay by replacing the flexible ‘duration of status’ model with fixed-term visas, typically capped at up to four years for students,” she said.

Indian students seeking post-graduate employment will face a stricter regulatory environment in the US.

“This proposal doesn’t specify OPT rules but states that four years is the maximum. It doesn’t talk about OPT for undergraduate studies,” said Naveen Chopra, founder chairman of study abroad platform The Chopras Group. “The lack of interview slots was already a dampener, and now this will reflect on the spring intake,” he said.

According to Singhania, the proposed changes will introduce new challenges for international students, exchange workers, and foreign journalists. “They would now have to apply to extend their stay in the US rather than maintaining a more flexible legal status,” he said.

Many Indian students pursue master’s and PhDs in the US and transition to the H-1B visa system through the OPT programme.

As the worshippers streamed into the vast Grand Mosalla mosque in central Tehran to hear a call to prayer, the mood was one of determination, and some trepidation, as they faced the real prospect of UN sanctions in 30 days and even a rerun of the 12-day war with Israel.

With guards watching, a worshipper giving his name simply as Mousavi said: “The reality is that many countries have nuclear power and are not subject to these rules but Iran is singled out for controls because we oppose Israel. We are dealt with in a different way because of our foreign policy.

“But an economic avalanche is looming with these UN sanctions – they are very different from what has happened before – and that means even more economic adversity will only impoverish us more. So I think we have to relent a little. We have to let the UN inspectors in. There is probably not much nuclear material for them to see.”

But that is far from the universal view, reflecting the politics of a mosque associated with hardliners and closely involved in the burial ceremonies of the previous president Ebrahim Raisi, who was killed in a helicopter crash that some Iranians still insist was not caused by bad weather but by sabotage by the Mossad.

Rajabi Seddequi, also fatalistic as he headed across the boiling and dusty car park towards the mosque, said: “For 40 years we have become familiar with sanctions. They did not break us. They made us more resilient. Life has gone on. It does not bother us whether they are UN or US sanctions. If we have to choose between war and the entry of the UN inspectors, we will choose war. We will protect Iran and Islam.”

A third worshipper, Ibrahim Heshmati, smiled as he insisted: “If there is a second war, this time it will be all the way to Israel. We stopped too early last time and we have the missiles to do this.

“How can we trust a country like the US since we were in the middle of negotiations when they allowed Israel to attack us? If they did not claim we were making nuclear weapons they would find another pretext,” he added. “If there is a war we have to face the consequences. This is both a war of religion and war between states. We have nothing to fear.”

Akbar Babaye, a veteran of the Iran-Iraq war, remembered: “Iran was alone before, facing US Awacs, French Mirage jets, T-72 tanks from Russia. We had 22 countries against us and alone we won.

“Every government has underestimated our resilience. We are not going to back down. Next time Israel is going to be completely destroyed. A third of the population of 90 million are ready to go to war, and we are not afraid of death because when we die we will go to heaven because we are oppressed by the oppressors. The Israelis will not.”

In Qom, Hashem Hosseini Bushehri, the Friday prayer leader, denounced Israeli oppression at length. He said: “We too must stand against Israel’s crimes with initiative and resistance, just like the people of Yemen, so that life in Gaza can continue.”

The sentiments expressed show how hard domestically it will be for a divided Iranian government to make the kind of concessions the European governments are demanding. Radicals in the parliament are planning to table new laws calling for Iran to withdraw from the nuclear non-proliferation treaty, but that decision in practice may be the prerogative of the supreme leader, and would lead to a massive internal political battle about the direction of Iran.

Iran has been in a state of neither war nor peace since the 12-day war ended with a ceasefire that left the Iranian nuclear programme largely destroyed.

Europe has given notice that it will snap back the sanctions unless the UN nuclear inspectorate is readmitted to all of Iran’s nuclear sites, and not just those that were not attacked by Israel.

Tehran has said it is willing to negotiate the modalities of the inspector’s return, but western diplomats, confident they have the legal and political base to act, say they have been given nothing substantive about how these inspections will work in practice. The Iranian foreign ministry insisted the European powers had no legal basis to act.

The European diplomats believe Iran fears independent confirmation that its 30-year nuclear programme has been destroyed by Israeli bombing, which could prompt a backlash from a population angry at the sacrifice of withstanding sanctions for no purpose.

Iranian diplomats say they will spell out their likely reprisals if the UK, France and Germany press ahead with reimposing sanctions.

Separately, behind closed doors, at the UN headquarters in New York, the UK and French delegations were briefing fellow diplomats about how the unprecedented snapback procedure would work.

Some politicians say the impact of the sanctions will be limited since they were foreseen.

Shirin Ebadi, the lawyer and Nobel peace prize winner, wrote on Instagram that the consequences of sanctions will be “far more dangerous than war” for Iran.

She predicted the value of the national currency would fall even further, infrastructure would fail, poverty would increase, and social crises would spread, adding that the Islamic republic was the main culprit of this situation.

Iran is also debating the impact of the return of the sanction resolutions that do not directly target Iran’s oil, gas and petrochemical industries or even banks and financial institutions. Most of these resolutions impose restrictions in the military and nuclear industries, especially on the buying and selling of weapons, and call on governments to exercise greater oversight and monitoring of Iran’s transactions and shipments to prevent their use in developing Iran’s nuclear and missile industries.

In a wider political change, if the sanctions are reinstated Iran will be recognised as a country violating international laws and subject to chapter seven of the UN charter. Iran’s entire nuclear programme will be declared illegal.

WASHINGTON:

India once united US policymakers like few issues. For nearly three decades, US presidents of both parties courted New Delhi as an emerging ally, politely overlooking disagreements for the sake of larger goals.

Donald Trump has abruptly changed that.

The US administration on Wednesday slapped 50 percent tariffs on many Indian products as Trump seeks to punish India for buying oil from Russia.

India was a Cold War partner of Moscow but since the 1990s US leaders have hoped for a joint front with fellow democracy India in the face of the rise of China, seen by Washington as its top long-term adversary.

In striking timing, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi heads to China this weekend, the latest meeting between the world’s two most populous nations as they explore areas of common ground.

Trump has accused India of fueling Moscow’s deadly attacks on Ukraine by purchasing Russian oil. Trump trade advisor Peter Navarro even called Ukraine “Modi’s war” in a Bloomberg TV interview Wednesday.

Yet Trump has refrained from tougher US sanctions on Russia itself, saying he still hopes for a negotiated settlement despite wide pessimism.

“This is not just about tariffs, not just about Russia, not just about oil,” said Tanvi Madan of the Brookings Institution.

“There seems to be something broader going on here — personal on Trump’s side, piqued as he may be at India,” she said.

“And then on the Indian side, for Modi, it becomes a political issue.”

Trump and Modi, both right-wing populists, appeared to forge a strong bond during Trump’s first term.

In 2020, Trump rejoiced as Modi invited him to inaugurate the world’s largest cricket stadium in front more than 120,000 people.

But Trump has since appeared irritated as he seeks credit for what he said was Nobel Prize-worthy diplomacy between Pakistan and India, which struck its neighbor in May in response to a massacre of Indian civilians in IIOJK.

India, which adamantly rejects any third-party mediation on Kashmir, has since given the cold shoulder to Trump as he muses of brokering between New Delhi and Islamabad.

Pakistan by contrast has embraced Trump’s attention, with its powerful army chief meeting him at the White House.

US policymakers have long skirted around India’s sensitivities on Kashmir and sought to contain fallout from disagreements on other issues.

Jake Sullivan, national security advisor under Trump’s predecessor Joe Biden, said that Trump had broken a bipartisan consensus with his “massive trade offensive” against India.

India is now thinking “I guess maybe we have to go show up in Beijing and sit with the Chinese because we’ve got to hedge against America,” Sullivan told news and opinion site The Bulwark.

Madan said that for the Indian establishment, the tariffs contradicted US assurances that unlike China, Washington would not use “economic ties to coerce India”.

“If you’re India, even if you sort this particular issue out, you’re now saying, we used to see this increasing interaction with the US across many domains as an opportunity,” she said.

“And now Trump has made us realize that we should also see that integration or dependence as a vulnerability.”

For China, Modi’s trip is an opportunity “to drive a wedge between India and the US,” said William Yang, an analyst at the International Crisis Group.

“Beijing won’t miss the opportunity to present itself as a ‘reliable partner’ that is interested in deepening relations with New Delhi,” he said.

But he noted that India and China still had fundamental differences, despite recent efforts to resolve a longstanding border dispute.

UNITED NATIONS (Agencies) – Amid reports of increased Israeli military attacks across Gaza City on Friday, UN aid agencies repeated urgent warnings of ongoing famine and a likely rise in preventable disease, linked to the dire living conditions in the war-shattered enclave.

“We are on a descent into a massive famine,” said Jens Laerke, spokesperson for the UN aid coordination office, OCHA, “and we need massive amounts of food getting into the Strip and safely distribute it across the Gaza Strip”.

Referring to the latest catastrophic assessment of food insecurity in Gaza from the UN-backed IPC group of experts, Laerke noted that 500,000 people are in the worst possible situation today, with another 160,000 expected to be added to that number in the coming weeks.

“They all need food,” he told reporters in Geneva. “The entire Gaza Strip needs food. There would not have been declared famine had there been sufficient amounts of food.”

Gaza’s Health Ministry has recorded five deaths “due to famine and malnutrition” in the past 24 hours, including two children, bringing the total number of hunger-related deaths to 322, including 121 children.

At least 67 Palestinians, including children and aid seekers, have been killed since dawn on Friday in Israeli attacks across Gaza, including several in the al-Mawasi area -– a so-called “humanitarian zone” designated by Israel – in the south.

The number of people killed by the Israeli army in the Gaza Strip since Oct. 7, 2023, has now surpassed 63,000.

In a related development, the UN World Health Organization (WHO) highlighted the growing risk of communicable diseases in Gaza, with 94 suspected cases of Guillain-Barré Syndrome now reported.

The disease can cause paralysis and is treatable in hospital with intravenous immunoglobulin or plasma exchange, according to WHO. “But these two [treatments] are at zero stock, as are anti-inflammatories,” said WHO spokesperson Christian Lindmeier, referencing ongoing Israeli aid restrictions impacting humanitarian relief supplies entering Gaza. “These deliveries must be urgently expedited as much as surveillance and testing capabilities.”

Between 20 and 26 August, out of 89 attempts to coordinate relief missions with Israeli authorities across Gaza, 53 were facilitated, 23 were initially approved but then impeded on the ground, seven were denied and six had to be withdrawn by the organizers, OCHA said in an update.

 

ISTANBUL (AFP) – Turkey’s top diplomat said Friday that Ankara had closed its ports and airspace to Israeli ships and planes, with a diplomatic source telling AFP the ban applied to “official” flights.

Ties between Turkey and Israel have been shattered by Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza, with Ankara accusing Israel of committing “genocide” in the tiny Palestinian territory — a term roundly rejected by Israel — and suspending all trade ties in May last year.

“We have closed our ports to Israeli ships. We do not allow Turkish ships to go to Israeli ports…. We do not allow container ships carrying weapons and ammunition to Israel to enter our ports, nor do we allow their aircraft to enter our airspace,” Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan told lawmakers in a televised address.

Asked for clarification about the minister’s remarks, a Turkish diplomatic source said its airspace was “closed to all aircraft carrying weapons (to Israel) and to Israel’s official flights”.

It was not immediately clear when the airspace restrictions were put in place.

In November, Turkey refused to let the Israeli president’s plane cross its airspace, forcing him to cancel a planned visit to the COP29 climate conference in Azerbaijan.

And in May, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu cancelled a visit to Baku after Ankara reportedly refused overflight rights.

TRADE CUT OFF

On Monday ZIM, Israel’s biggest shipping firm, said it had been informed that under new regulations passed by Ankara on August 22, “vessels that are either owned, managed or operated by an entity related to Israel will not be permitted to berth in Turkish ports”.

The information was made public in a filing to the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) in which ZIM warned the new regulation was expected to “negatively impact on the company’s financial and operational results”.

The ban also extended to other ships carrying military cargo destined for Israel, it said.

“Separately.. vessels that are carrying military cargo destined to Israel will not be permitted to berth in Turkish ports; in addition, Turkish-flagged vessels will be prohibited from berthing in Israeli ports.”

Fidan’s remarks were the first public acknowledgement of the ban.

“No other country has cut off trade with Israel,” he told Turkish lawmakers at an emergency session on the Gaza crisis.

Turkish officials have repeatedly insisted that all trade ties with Israel have been cut, vowing there would be no normalisation as long as the Gaza war continues.

But some Turkish opposition figures have accused Ankara of allowing trade to continue, notably by allowing oil shipments from Azerbaijan to pass through the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan (BTC) pipeline running through Turkey — claims dismissed by Turkey’s energy ministry as “completely unfounded”.

Although Azerbaijan has long been one of Israel’s main oil suppliers, data published on its state customs website this year no longer showed Israel as one of the countries that purchase oil from Baku, Israel’s Haaretz newspaper reported earlier this year.