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Europe
Russia
April 30, 2025 Talk about negotiations to end the Russia-Ukraine war is finally in vogue, as the battlefield continues to tally losses. But diplomacy has casualties, too. A Russian Orthodox leader's diplomacy with Rome became a casualty of Ukraine war. The story of the Rev. Alfeyev captures how a once robust effort to bring Russian Orthodox Christianity and the Catholic Church together has foundered. Metropolitan Alfeyev, once chairman of the Russian Orthodox Church’s powerful department for external church relations, was effectively Patriarch Kirill’s foreign minister. Between 2009 and 2022, it was Hilarion’s job, among other unique responsibilities, to manage reconciliation with the Catholic Church. Under his guidance, the two Christian institutional giants genuinely deepened bonds, and Hilarion became personally close to both Pope Benedict XVI and Pope Francis. With the start of the war, Hilarion lost his job. Staff at the Vatican’s Dicastery for Promoting Christian Unity mourn Hilarion’s absence. Positive institutional collaboration between the two faiths has shrunk drastically since the war began. Earlier this year, Hilarion in Hungary recalled the church and state breakthroughs that began the year 2009 for Russia and the Vatican. In January (2009), Kirill’s election as patriarch, succeeding Alexy II, known to be suspicious of the Catholic Church, was read as a positive augur for greater cooperation between Western and Eastern Christendom. Having served as chairman of external church relations for 20 years, he was already friendly with Vatican actors. Hilarion, age 42, bishop of Vienna and Austria, was appointed to replace Kirill in his foreign minister role. By December (2009), the Holy See and Russia agreed to establish full diplomatic relations. Evidence of the new spirit was displayed in May 2010 when Kirill sponsored a concert in Vatican City, prepared by Hilarion, to honor Benedict’s birthday and fifth anniversary as pope. “I wholeheartedly thank Metropolitan Hilarion, for … his constant commitment to ecumenism,” Benedict said at the time. “I congratulate him on his artistic genius, which we have just had the opportunity to appreciate.” They became very good friends because they discovered a common passion for theology, first, and second, a common passion for music. Hilarion was so inspired by Benedict’s “Jesus of Nazareth” trilogy that he wrote his own six-volume “Jesus Christ: His Life and Teaching,” which the pope emeritus called “a work of great importance.” Hilarion’s first meeting with Francis occurred the day after his enthronement, a sign of how important the Vatican considered its relations with the Russian Orthodox Church. He was thinking: Here’s a cardinal who was always in Argentina, never exposed to Orthodox-Catholic relations. „Probably, I’ll have to explain some things to him from scratch,” Hilarion recalled. “But that was not the case at all. He knew so much. He knew everything.” Hilarion went on to lay the groundwork for the historic February 2016 meeting between Francis and Kirill in Havana - the first ever between leaders of these two faiths. The Havana meeting, Hilarion said, “was not just a meeting of two heads of churches, it was also a meeting of two people, each with his own charisma, his own character, his own smile. It was clear that they liked each other, that they felt quite comfortable with each other.” Hilarion soon brokered the temporary transfer to Russia of relics from St. Nicholas, patron saint of Russia and Greece, that had been kept in the Pontifical Basilica of Saint Nicholas, in Bari, Italy, since 1087. Part of the saint’s rib was sent. Despite escalating frictions in Ukraine from 2014 on, the Catholic-Russian Orthodox bond remained strong, and in December 2021, Hilarion visited Francis to discuss a second meeting between the pope and patriarch. Hilarion brought a special gift: the pope’s book “Prayer, the Breath of New Life,” in Russian, with a preface by Kirill. With the outbreak of war in February 2022 came rupture. „Hilarion’s public statements centered on the human cost of conflict, but his statements contrasted with Patriarch Kirill’s, which were more deferential to political decision-makers”. In an Austrian TV documentary released in May of that year, Hilarion emphasized that Russian Orthodox faithful live in Ukraine as well as Russia. He warned the two sides to communicate, saying that otherwise “the conflict will not only deepen, but will be transformed into a global conflict, because the world became a powder keg.' On June 7, the ROC’s Holy Synod abruptly removed Hilarion from his high-level post and transferred him to Budapest to lead a small diocese of approximately 3,000 believers. Hilarion maintained contact with his global network, traveling on a Hungarian passport. In April 2023, he met Francis in Hungary. Hilarion explained: “No political issues were discussed. The meeting was personal, between two old friends.” Francis told the media, “Hilarion is someone I respect very much, and we have always had a good relationship. And he was kind enough to come and see me, then he came to the Mass, and I saw him here at the airport as well.” Last year, a 21-year-old Russian-Japanese Orthodox subdeacon, working in the Budapest diocese, Suzuki, left Hungary abruptly after complaining of sickness. At the time, the subdeacon’s illness didn’t appear sinister. But shortly after he left, his Russian “mother” - a guesthouse manager in Okinawa, Japan (location of the largest U.S. air base in East Asia) - contacted the bishop’s office seeking almost 400,000 euro, allegedly for his treatment. Meanwhile, a church safe was discovered empty, missing money and valuables. Hungarian police reported that they had found Suzuki’s fingerprints and DNA. Months after charges were filed, a Western, anti-Putin media outlet began publishing Suzuki’s accusations against Hilarion, including sexual harassment, supposedly backed by short audio and video clips - determined by Russian experts to be fabricated. Although the priests of Budapest diocese rallied around Hilarion, extolling his virtue, last December he was sidelined again: assigned to serve as a priest in a remote, albeit beautiful, Czech resort, forcing his retirement as bishop. Hilarion told RIA Novosti recently: “The past year was difficult for me. Enormous efforts were made to deprive me of the opportunity to serve the Church. Slander, blackmail, threats, and falsified evidence were used. But the Church protected me. I can continue to serve, preach, perform sacred sacraments, and stand before the throne of God. For this, I am grateful.” Hilarion periodically returns to Moscow. On Feb. 1, he concelebrated the Divine Liturgy with Kirill to mark the 17th anniversary of the patriarch’s enthronement. He maintained contact with Francis until the pope’s final days. /Source: Religion News Service (RNS) - U.S./
By Gaetan, a senior correspondent for the National Catholic Register, the author of “God’s Diplomats: Pope Francis, Vatican Diplomacy, and America’s Armageddon” and a contributor to Foreign Affairs magazine.
Africa
Burkina Faso
28 April 2025 Burkina Faso has granted an industrial mining licence to Russian miner Nordgold for a gold project, the military-led West African government said. Jilbey Burkina will retain an 85% stake in the project, while the Burkinabe government will hold the remaining 15% without financial contribution. Nordgold already operates the Bissa and Bouly mines. Burkina Faso, which has been fighting Islamist militants since 2015, is a major gold producer. According to non-governmental organisation Swissaid, which analyses mining, the country produced over 57 tons in 2023. Mining companies operating there include Canada's IAMGOLD and Endeavour Mining, and Australia's West African Resources Ltd. (Source: TimesLive - South Africa / Reuters - United Kingdom)
Ghana
April 30, 2025 Ghana emerges as global leader in digital currency and blockchain innovation. Ghana’s experience may offer important lessons for emerging economies seeking to balance technological innovation with robust regulation and economic stability. (Source: bne IntelliNews - Germany)
Asia
India
April 30, 2025 Pakistan has credible intelligence that India intends carrying out military action against Pakistan in the next 24-36 hours on the pretext of concocted and baseless allegations of involvement in the Pahalgam incident, Pakistan's Information Minister Tarar said at a midnight news conference. The remarks came hours after Indian media reported that Prime Minister Narendra Modi had met with senior government ministers and military commanders behind closed doors on yesterday evening to discuss the response to the attack and had given the country's armed forces complete operational freedom to decide on the mode, targets and timing of response to the terror attack. Modi was meeting again with his cabinet tosday. Kashmir is claimed in full by both India and Pakistan, but each nation has controlled its own portion of the mountainous region for decades. The two nations have fought three wars over the region, which is now divided by a de-facto border called the Line of Control (LoC). Indian and Pakistani military forces in the region have exchanged gunfire across the LoC repeatedly over the last six days. (Source: CBS - U.S.)
Syria
April 29, 2025 Clashes broke out in the southern Damascus suburb of Jaramana early today between local gunmen belonging to the minority Druze sect and pro-government fighters, leaving at least 10 people dead. The fighting began after an audio clip circulated on social media of a man criticizing Islam’s Prophet Muhammad. The audio which angered many Sunni Muslims was attributed to a Druze cleric. „I did not say that, and whoever made it is an evil man who wants to incite strife between components of the Syrian people,” cleric Kiwan said. The Interior Ministry said it was investigating the audio clip, adding that its initial probe showed the cleric was not responsible. Syrian Druze gunmen have clashed in recent weeks with government security forces in Jaramana. On March 1, Israel’s Defense Ministry said the military was instructed to prepare to defend Jaramana, asserting that the minority it has vowed to protect was under attack by Syrian forces. The Druze religious sect is a minority group that began as a 10th-century offshoot of Ismailism, a branch of Shiite Islam. Over half of the roughly 1 million Druze worldwide live in Syria. Most of the other Druze live in Lebanon and Israel, including in the Golan Heights, which Israel captured from Syria in the 1967 Mideast War and annexed in 1981. (Source: The Washington Times / Associated Press = U.S.)
Yemen
Monday, April 28, 2025 The U.S. has struck more than 800 targets over the past six weeks as part of the Trump administration’s military campaign against Yemen’s Houthi rebels, the Pentagon said late yesterday. CENTCOM earlier this month struck Yemen’s Ras Isa fuel port. (Source: The Washington Times - U.S.)
North America
United States
April 30, 2025 Usually, U.S. free trade agreement negotiations involve significantly more transparency - in anticipation for when they will need to be ratified by Congress. This is not the case for the much more limited, transactional deals that the president appears to be pursuing. The decision-making process is a black box. A typical trade agreement consists of two main elements: the specific commitments that each side makes to the other and the general commitments that apply to both sides. The two sides will exchange what are essentially idealized versions of the agreement, roughly following the following steps: Here is my initial offer: all the things that I’m happy to give you. This is what my ideal outcome would be if you never asked me for anything else; Here is my initial demand: all the things that I would, in an ideal world, love for you to give me; Here is my initial draft of the text: how the agreement would look if I were solely in charge of writing all the paragraphs that I care about.The negotiators then take all of these factors and put them side by side before trying to create a single, consolidated version of a draft final agreement, in which any language that is proposed but not yet agreed is surrounded by square brackets. From here, talks usually fragment into a range of parallel conversations that are grouped both thematically and by political weight. Ultimately, nothing is agreed until everything is agreed. This creates a confusing dynamic in how secretly conducted negotiations are communicated. It is semantically correct to say that negotiations are making progress when the technical work is moving ahead nicely but the big issues are hopelessly stalled. It could also be (very narrowly, dubiously, and misleadingly) semantically correct to describe the smaller compromises reached at the technical level as deals made. Yet neither term is necessarily informative. In a trade negotiation, especially an ad hoc and highly politicized one such as those currently being conducted by the Trump administration, the outstanding question is whether leaders can find a landing zone on the major issues - what is Trump asking countries to give, and are they willing to give it in exchange for what he’s offering? At the moment, much of the frustration from U.S. trading partners seeking to negotiate is the absence of a specific request from Washington that they can treat as definitive. Negotiators are being asked to effectively bid against themselves, tabling offers based on their best guess of what the United States might want from them and what it might consider sufficient. If that changes, and if the United States is realistic in what it seeks, then a flurry of so-called deals could come. No country wants to be left out of the U.S. market, especially if its competitors manage to find a way in - but at the same time, countries are very much aware that many of Trump’s tariffs have proved to be as fleeting as Washington’s commitment to past agreements. That means that there’s appetite for a deal that puts these tariffs in the rearview mirror - but not at any price. Until we start seeing indications of actual progress being made on major issues - and indeed, until we start seeing signed texts - grand pronouncements of progress are probably meaningless. (Source: Foreign Policy - U.S.)
by Grozoubinski, a senior advisor with Aurora Macro Strategies and the author of the 2024 book Why Politicians Lie About Trade.
Tuesday, April 29, 2025 The polls are wrong (again) on Trump. The ABC News/Washington Post poll, conducted by Ipsos to mark Trump’s 100th day in office, was one of a handful that have shown Trump’s approval rating dipping below 40 percent for the first time. The pollsters who are showing the worst numbers for Trump are the ones who got the election most wrong: In their final poll of the 2024 cycle, they found a three-point lead for Harris. Ipsos’s other poll for Reuters had a two-point advantage for Harris nationally. Trump ended up winning the popular vote by one and a half points. CNN, whose polling is conducted by SSRS, puts Trump on a paltry 41 percent approval rating this week. But at the election they had Harris ahead in the state of North Carolina, six points ahead in Wisconsin and five points ahead in Michigan. The New York Times/Siena College poll, often more respected, have Trump on 42 percent approval. In the swing states just six months ago they had Harris leading by three points in Nevada, two points in North Carolina, two points in Wisconsin, and one point in Georgia. In fact, he won every swing state. You would think the editors of these esteemed media outlets would have thought twice about re-hiring their pollsters after November. But the mainstream media continues to reward pollsters who have singularly failed at predicting elections. (Source: The Spectator – United Kingdom)
Globalization
April 28, 2025 According to data published today by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), 'more than 100 countries increased their military spending in 2024, including all European countries' except Malta. $997 billion was spent by the United States. Washington increased defense spending by 5.7 percent last year. China is the world’s second-largest military spender, allocating $314 billion, which accounts for 50 percent of all defense expenditure in Asia and Oceania. '$454 billion was spent by NATO’s European allies'. 'Germany increased its military spending by 28 percent last year, reaching $88.5 billion'. 'Poland's military spending rose by 31 percent to $38 billion', representing 4.2 percent of the country's GDP. Russia increased military spending by 38 percent, reaching $149 billion, making Moscow the world's third-largest military spender at 7.1 percent of its GDP. Ukraine's military spending grew by 2.9 percent compared to 2023. The $64.7 billion spent on its military represents 34 percent of the country's GDP, making it the largest military burden borne by any country. Saudi Arabia had a $80.3 billion defense budget. Israel increased its defense spending by 65 percent to $46.5 billion. Iran’s spending fell by 10 percent to $7.9 billion due to sanctions. (Source: Politico - U.S.)
See also: 28 April 2025 'Unprecedented rise in global military expenditure' /Source: Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) - Sweden/
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