The week that was in international affairs

Welcome back to another edition of My Take 5. This week we are covering the just-concluded Trump-Xi summit, the renewed focus on Taiwan, Russia’s large-scale attack on Kyiv and Ukraine’s response, the collapse of the Latvian government due to a drone incident, and the elimination of the Islamic State terror group’s No.2 in Nigeria. So, let’s get to it:  

Trump-Xi meet: Trump’s summit with Xi in China this week was underwhelming to say the least. While the world waited for some kind of a breakthrough, particularly on the situation with the Strait of Hormuz, what it got was two major powers sizing each other up and sticking to their guns on their respective strategic interests.

This was amply clear by the very different readouts of the Trump-Xi meetings that the American and Chinese teams put out. They appeared to be talking past each other.

The American readout mentioned that the leaders discussed Iran and China’s acknowledgement that Hormuz should be open, the Strait shouldn’t be militarised, and Tehran must not have a nuclear bomb. But the Chinese readout was completely silent on this point.

Similarly, the Chinese readout – and Xi himself – strongly centred the Taiwan issue, warning the US that unless handled properly, Taiwan could become a source of tensions, clashes and even conflict between Washington and Beijing.

Read the full story here.

END OF ARTICLE