Earlier this month, Chinese President Xi Jinping made a very public state visit to Egypt. Officially, the three-day trip, the first of its kind by a Chinese leader in at least a decade, was intended to commemorate 70 years of bilateral ties between Cairo and Beijing.
On Oct. 1, a new mobilization law will take effect in China — one that puts Xi Jinping’s stamp on mounting war preparations.
"President Putin, thank you so much for having us,” U.S. Special Envoy Steve Witkoff gushed recently in Moscow, where he and fellow U.S. Special Envoy Jared Kushner sought to coax Putin into making peace with Ukraine by offering more economic cooperation and the lifting of sanctions. “When we retire,” Witkoff added, “we’ll have all these incredible stories and memories, and yours will be right at the top of it all.”
On February 24 Vladimir Putin began the fifth year of his disastrous war against Ukraine. It has sacrificed a million men killed or wounded in order to gain a fragile hold on only a fifth of Ukraine’s territory.
In recent weeks, authorities in Tehran have stepped up the execution of political opponents, deepened the persecution of religious minorities and imbued the country’s domestic repression apparatus with new authority and freedom.