Global Pulse

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  • Antisemitic attacks in 2025 led to highest number of fatalities in 30 years, study finds

    Antisemitic attacks in 2025 led to highest number of fatalities in 30 years, study finds

    TEL AVIV, Israel – Ahead of Israel’s annual Holocaust Remembrance Day, which starts Monday evening, Tel Aviv University published its widely cited annual report on global antisemitism Monday, delivering alarming findings: 2025 saw the highest death toll from antisemitic attacks in more than three decades, with 20 people killed across three continents. The uptick in deadly violence extends a sharp surge that began following the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas attacks and the subsequent Israel-Gaza war, the study’s authors confirm.

    This year’s report marks the most lethal period for antisemitic violence since 1994, when 85 people were killed and more than 300 wounded in the bombing of a Jewish community center in Buenos Aires, Argentina – an attack an Argentine court has formally linked to Iran and its Lebanese proxy group Hezbollah. The 20 fatalities recorded in 2025 stem from multiple high-profile attacks targeting Jewish communities: 15 people were killed in a mass attack on a Hanukkah gathering at Sydney’s Bondi Beach last December, two were killed in a Yom Kippur attack at a Manchester synagogue in the United Kingdom, and two additional deaths were recorded in separate antisemitic attacks in Washington, D.C., and Colorado in the U.S.

    Beyond fatal violence, the report documents a steady rise in all categories of antisemitic incidents, ranging from physical assaults, vandalism and stone-throwing to verbal threats and online harassment. Compared to 2024, the total number of recorded incidents saw a moderate increase last year, but the 2025 figure represents a dramatic jump from pre-war levels recorded in 2022, before the outbreak of the Israel-Gaza conflict. Uriya Shavit, the report’s chief editor, warns that the sustained high volume of events suggests a dangerous shift: “The data raise concern that a high level of antisemitic incidents is becoming a normalized reality.”

    Shavit noted that the highest peak of antisemitic incidents occurred in the immediate weeks after the Oct. 7, 2023, attacks, which was followed by a brief downward trend – but that decline failed to continue into 2025. Even after a Gaza ceasefire took effect last October, the number of antisemitic events remained higher than the same period in the previous year, breaking the expected trend of de-escalation. Regional breakdowns included in the report reflect this global pattern: the U.K. recorded 3,700 antisemitic incidents in 2025, a small uptick from 3,556 in 2024; Canada’s total rose from 6,219 in 2024 to 6,800 in 2025, more than triple the 2022 pre-war count; in Australia, 588 antisemitic incidents were recorded between October and December 2025, up from 492 in the same period a year earlier, and already higher than the full-year 2022 total of 472 incidents, logged before the war began.

    Carl Yonker, the study’s director of research, explained that the decentralized nature of most attacks makes prevention exceptionally challenging. “Most physical attacks were carried out by people acting on their own,” Yonker noted. While most attackers are identified as either white supremacist extremist Christians or radical Muslims, Yonker added that many perpetrators also face unemployment and severe financial instability, creating overlapping drivers of radicalization.

    Compiled annually by Tel Aviv University’s Center for the Study of Contemporary European Jewry and the Irwin Cotler Institute for Democracy, Human Rights and Justice, the report’s dataset draws on verified reports from global police forces, national government authorities, and local Jewish community organizations, making it one of the most authoritative annual analyses of global antisemitism trends. The report’s traditional release ahead of Holocaust Remembrance Day, which honors the 6 million Jews murdered during the Nazi Holocaust, adds weight to its call for global action to address the rising trend of anti-Jewish violence.

  • War in the Middle East: latest developments

    War in the Middle East: latest developments

    As the clock ticks down to a planned U.S. naval blockade of Iranian ports scheduled to take effect Monday at 1400 GMT, the Middle East is facing one of its most volatile moments in recent years, with multiple global powers rushing to navigate a crisis that threatens global energy supplies and regional stability. At the heart of the standoff is the Strait of Hormuz, the critical chokepoint through which roughly one-fifth of the world’s daily oil supply passes. In Tehran’s Revolution Square, a towering billboard sums up the Islamic Republic’s defiant posture: “The Strait of Hormuz remains closed” to any hostile incursion.

    Iran’s top military command has issued a scathing rebuke of the planned U.S. action, labeling the proposed restriction on maritime navigation through international waters as an illegal act of outright piracy. If Washington follows through on its threat to blockade Iranian ports, the Iranian military warned in a statement broadcast on state television, no ports across the Persian Gulf will be safe from retaliation. Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, who led Iranian delegations in failed weekend peace talks hosted in Pakistan, doubled down on Tehran’s refusal to concede to external pressure. “We will not bow to any threats,” Ghalibaf stated, adding “If they fight, we will fight, and if they come forward with logic, we will deal with logic.” Iran’s Revolutionary Guards reinforced this stance, confirming that Iranian security forces maintain full control over the strait and warning that any “wrong move” by adversarial powers will leave them trapped in a “deadly vortex.”

    U.S. Central Command clarified the parameters of the coming blockade in a post on X, noting that the measure will be enforced evenly against all vessels entering or exiting Iranian ports along both the Arabian Gulf and Gulf of Oman, but will not block transit through the strait for ships traveling to and from non-Iranian ports. For his part, U.S. President Donald Trump has adopted a cavalier attitude toward the prospect of renewed diplomatic talks with Tehran, telling reporters “I don’t care if they come back or not. If they don’t come back, I’m fine.” Trump also issued a sharp new threat to China over unsubstantiated claims that Beijing plans to supply weapons to Iran, threatening to impose a staggering 50% tariff on Chinese imports if the allegations prove true. China’s foreign ministry spokesperson Guo Jiakun rejected those claims as “baseless smears” during a recent press briefing, and joined the global call for unimpeded commercial navigation through the strait. Guo also urged both Washington and Tehran to return to diplomatic dialogue and honor existing ceasefire agreements, following the collapse of last weekend’s peace negotiations in Pakistan.

    Russia has put forward a potential confidence-building measure to support future diplomacy: Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov confirmed that President Vladimir Putin’s long-standing offer to take in Iran’s enriched uranium as part of a broader U.S.-Iran peace deal remains on the table, though no progress has been made to implement the proposal. Across Europe, leaders are grappling with the looming economic fallout of the crisis. German Chancellor Friedrich Merz warned that Europe’s largest economy will feel the impact of the war-driven energy shock “for a long time to come, even after it is over.” In response, his government has rolled out new relief measures including a cut to fuel taxes. Spanish Defense Minister Margarita Robles called Trump’s planned blockade “makes no sense.” Meanwhile, French President Emmanuel Macron announced that Paris and London will collaborate to organize a conference in the coming days to launch a “peaceful multinational mission” separate from the warring parties, aimed at restoring unobstructed navigation through the strait. The Vatican also found itself drawn into the crossfire: after Pope Leo XIV issued a public plea for peace, Trump said he was “not a big fan” of the pontiff and called him “very liberal.” The Pope responded simply, saying he had “no intention to debate” with the U.S. president.

    On the ground in Lebanon, the Israeli military reported a significant advance in its ongoing invasion of the country’s southern region, confirming that troops have surrounded the key strategic town of Bint Jbeil and launched a ground assault on the area. Over the past week, Israeli forces say they have killed more than 100 fighters from the Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah in the surrounding area.

    The escalating crisis has already sent shockwaves through global energy markets. After the collapse of peace talks and the announcement of the U.S. blockade, oil prices rebounded sharply above the $100 per barrel threshold in Monday trading. West Texas Intermediate, the U.S. oil benchmark for May delivery, climbed roughly 7% to settle at $103.55 per barrel, while Brent crude, the international benchmark for June delivery, also gained 7% to reach $101.83 per barrel.

  • China-Laos Railway handles over 800,000 cross-border passenger trips

    China-Laos Railway handles over 800,000 cross-border passenger trips

    Three years after launching its cross-border passenger service, the China-Laos Railway has hit a major milestone, recording more than 800,000 international trips according to official data from China Railway Kunming Group. As of April 12, 2026 (the most recent reporting Sunday), the service has completed more than 3,190 international journeys, welcoming travelers originating from over 120 countries and regions across the globe. Stretching between southwest China’s Yunnan provincial capital Kunming and the Lao capital Vientiane, the rail line weaves together a string of high-demand tourism spots, including the popular scenic region of Xishuangbanna in China and the UNESCO World Heritage cultural site of Luang Prabang in northern Laos. In total, the route connects more than 560 distinct tourist attractions along its path, earning it a reputation as a premier “golden travel corridor” for cross-border exploration between the two neighboring nations. Since the cross-border passenger service officially launched on April 13, 2023, it has rapidly grown into the preferred mode of transport for both leisure and business travelers moving between China and Laos. To meet sustained rising demand, the rail service currently operates four daily international passenger trains between Kunming South Railway Station and Vientiane Station. Each consist is configured to offer 420 dedicated cross-border seats, and cuts end-to-end travel time between the two capitals to roughly nine and a half hours, a dramatic improvement over pre-rail land transport options that once took more than a day to complete the journey. The milestone comes as cross-border travel and people-to-people exchanges between China and Southeast Asia continue to rebound following the lifting of global pandemic travel restrictions, with the China-Laos Railway emerging as a key driver of regional connectivity and tourism growth across the Mekong subregion.

  • Celebrities and fans pay tributes to Asha Bhosle

    Celebrities and fans pay tributes to Asha Bhosle

    The global entertainment community is in mourning this week after news broke that iconic Indian playback singer Asha Bhosle passed away in Mumbai on Sunday. The 90-year-old musical legend was rushed to a Mumbai hospital earlier last weekend after suffering an acute heart attack, where medical teams worked desperately to stabilize her condition. Despite their best efforts, Bhosle succumbed to the cardiac event, leaving behind a decades-long legacy that transformed Indian film music and captivated audiences across generations.

    Within hours of the official announcement of her death, tributes began pouring in from across the Indian film industry and beyond. A-list celebrities, fellow musicians, and political figures took to social media to share personal memories of Bhosle, praising her unparalleled vocal range, innovative contributions to South Asian music, and warm, generous personality that endeared her to everyone she worked with. Fans from around the world also flooded social platforms with messages of grief, sharing their favorite Bhosle tracks and recounting how her music shaped their own lives.

    Born in 1933, Bhosle began her singing career in the 1940s and went on to record more than 12,000 songs for over a thousand Hindi films over her seven-decade career. She collaborated with some of India’s most famous composers and artists, and her work spanned genres from romantic ballads to upbeat folk and pop tracks, earning her a spot in the Guinness Book of World Records as the most recorded artist in music history. Her influence extended far beyond India, with her samples featured in popular Western music tracks by artists like Boy George and Black Eyed Peas, introducing her work to a whole new global audience.

    As the news of her passing spreads, fans are already organizing virtual listening parties and memorial events to celebrate her life and legacy, with many industry leaders calling for permanent tributes to honor her indelible mark on global music.

  • Hong Kong counts down to National Security Education Day with events rallying public for shared security responsibility

    Hong Kong counts down to National Security Education Day with events rallying public for shared security responsibility

    As Hong Kong enters the final countdown to the annual National Security Education Day, which falls on April 15, 2026, a wide range of official and community events are unfolding across the city to reinforce the core link between national security, sustained development and long-term prosperity, while calling on all sectors of Hong Kong society to take shared responsibility for upholding the country’s territorial and systemic integrity.

    In a public blog post released on Sunday, Paul Chan, Financial Secretary of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (HKSAR) Government, laid out the foundational importance of national security to the country’s overall development, as well as to Hong Kong’s social stability and residents’ quality of life. He highlighted that the overarching principle of “upholding both development and security” is formally inscribed in the outline of China’s 15th Five-Year Plan, and was also reaffirmed in a national white paper on safeguarding national security under the “one country, two systems” framework published this past February.

    As a globally recognized hub for international finance, trade, shipping and innovation and technology, Chan stressed that Hong Kong has a unique need to strike a careful, sustainable balance between expanding development opportunities and maintaining robust security guardrails. He advocated for embedding proactive risk prevention into the city’s ongoing efforts to open up to global markets, pursue technological innovation and consolidate its competitive advantages.

    Using the city’s financial sector as a case in point, Chan noted that Hong Kong’s financial system has long earned a reputation for stability and operational efficiency, supporting the smooth functioning and rapid growth of its global markets. At the same time, the sector has consistently prioritized security, maintaining close, coordinated oversight of cross-market dynamics and systemic interconnections, while building strong reserve buffers to absorb unexpected shocks. Only when innovation is rooted in solid security and risk management frameworks can it deliver a more resilient, dynamic and competitive financial system, he explained, allowing Hong Kong to better withstand external volatility and achieve long-term, inclusive growth.

    Against the backdrop of a shifting global geopolitical landscape, growing great power rivalry, and emerging cross-sector risks and challenges, Chan emphasized that Hong Kong must place security at the center of all development planning, while reinforcing security foundations through high-quality growth. Only by upholding both development and security can Hong Kong seize new opportunities amid global uncertainty and open a new chapter of greater prosperity, stability and accelerated progress, he added.

    On the same day, the Hong Kong Police Force (HKPF) launched its joint “National Security Education Day 2026 cum Hong Kong Police Force Fun Day”, an outreach event designed to boost public understanding of national security, strengthen a sense of national identity among Hong Kong residents, and showcase the force’s work and achievements in upholding national security to the wider community.

    Speaking at the event’s opening ceremony, Cheuk Wing-hing, Deputy Chief Secretary for Administration of the HKSAR Government, praised the HKPF for its unwavering commitment to upholding national security, its fearless response to unrest and its decisive action to curb disorder. Cheuk noted that the force has made enormous, irreplaceable contributions to building an impenetrable line of defense for national security in Hong Kong, which has helped cement the city’s status as one of the safest in the world.

    Chow Yat-ming, Commissioner of Police of the HKSAR, reflected on the city’s recent progress, noting that supported by a comprehensive national security legal framework, enforcement systems and mechanisms, Hong Kong has successfully transitioned from a period of chaos to restored order, and has now entered a new phase of moving from stability to lasting prosperity. This hard-won stability, he emphasized, is a clear demonstration of the strong support and protection the central government provides to Hong Kong.

    Upholding national security is not a responsibility that falls only to authorities — no resident can remain a passive bystander, and every citizen has a role to play in defending national interests, Chow said. He expressed hope that through the events held for National Security Education Day, Hong Kong residents will gain a deeper understanding of the principles laid out in this year’s national security white paper, strengthen their own national security awareness, and work collaboratively to protect both national security and Hong Kong’s hard-won stability.

    The public event featured a dedicated national security education exhibition zone and interactive educational games tailored for attendees, with a particular focus on engaging Hong Kong’s younger generation. It also included a static display of specialized operational equipment from multiple police units, including the Counter Terrorism Response Unit, the Explosive Ordnance Disposal Bureau and the Police Dog Unit, giving attendees a first-hand look at the force’s professional capabilities and the breadth of its work safeguarding the city.

  • A trial in a tent draws crowds as Uganda debuts mobile court for man accused of killing 4 kids

    A trial in a tent draws crowds as Uganda debuts mobile court for man accused of killing 4 kids

    KAMPALA, Uganda – The long-awaited trial of a Ugandan man charged with the brutal murder of four young children opened Monday in an unconventional setting: a large canvas tent pitched just kilometers from the scene of the crime, marking the first live test of the East African nation’s new and divisive mobile court system. The public, on-site proceeding was ordered directly by President Yoweri Museveni to allow local community members to follow the high-profile case that shook the country earlier this year.

    The accused, Christopher Okello Onyum, stands accused of launching a machete attack on children at the Gaba Early Childhood Development Program, a neighborhood nursery school in Kampala’s Gaba suburb, on April 2. According to witness accounts, Onyum gained entry to the facility by posing as a parent, exchanged a short conversation with school administrators, then locked the school’s entrance gate before turning his weapon on the young students. The attack sent shockwaves across Uganda, and investigators have yet to establish a clear motive for the violence.

    When Onyum was detained immediately after the attack, an enraged local crowd attempted to seize and lynch him before police intervened to take him into custody safely. At the opening of trial Monday, Onyum entered a formal plea of not guilty on four counts of aggravated murder. If ultimately convicted, he could be sentenced to death.

    This trial marks the first operational use of Uganda’s mobile court framework, a policy that received formal approval via a government legal notice published in March. Designed to bring judicial proceedings closer to affected communities and allow public access to cases of widespread national interest, the system has sparked heated debate from its rollout. President Museveni’s directive to hold this specific trial in a public, local setting has drawn sharp criticism from legal groups, who argue the order amounts to inappropriate overreach by the executive branch that risks undermining the integrity of the trial.

    The Uganda Law Society, the country’s premier professional body for legal practitioners, issued a public statement condemning the directive, arguing it violates the accused’s constitutional right to a fair trial. In harsh terms, the organization called the proceeding “not justice” but “a judicial lynching rally,” warning that the public, high-pressure setting risks sensationalizing the tragedy inflicted on the victims’ families rather than delivering impartial justice.

    Despite the controversy, hundreds of local residents gathered at the trial site, a tent set up on the grounds of a nearby local church, to observe the opening proceedings. For its part, Uganda’s judiciary has pushed back against critics, defending the mobile court model as an innovative step to expand public access to justice. In a statement defending the decision to hold the trial, the judiciary said the proceeding reflects its ongoing “commitment to taking justice closer to the people through innovative approaches.”

  • Following an election earthquake, Hungary ponders life after Orbán

    Following an election earthquake, Hungary ponders life after Orbán

    BUDAPEST – Hungary is entering a new political era after a historic electoral upheaval that ousted long-serving pro-Russian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, leaving the nation navigating what lies ahead for incoming leader Péter Magyar, a pro-European reformer who has pledged to upend the country’s entrenched political landscape.

    Magyar’s decisive victory sparked mass jubilation across Budapest’s streets Sunday night, as tens of thousands of supporters — many of them young Hungarians — gathered to celebrate what they see as a long-awaited turning point. For these citizens, Orbán’s defeat brings new hope that Hungary will grow more free, improve quality of life, and cement its place as a full member of Europe’s democratic community.

    Among the celebrants was Adrien Rixer, who returned to his native Hungary from his current home in London specifically to cast a ballot in the high-stakes vote. “I really wanted to make my vote count, and I’m over the moon,” Rixer said. “Finally I can say that I’m a proud Hungarian, finally after 16 years.”

    Throughout his campaign, Magyar centered his platform on reversing Hungary’s years-long geopolitical shift toward Russia and repairing strained relations with European allies. In the wake of 16 years of increasingly autocratic rule and gradual erosion of democratic checks and balances under Orbán, he has promised to root out systemic corruption and build a “peaceful, functioning and humane” Hungary for all citizens.

    Over his 16 years in power, Orbán leveraged a two-thirds parliamentary supermajority to advance his illiberal agenda: he enacted a new national constitution, rewrote the country’s electoral rules to entrench his power, and reshaped the judiciary to align with his government’s priorities. In a striking parallel, Magyar’s Tisza Party secured exactly that same supermajority in Sunday’s vote, winning 138 of the 199 seats in Hungary’s parliament.

    This broad governing mandate gives Tisza unprecedented authority to roll back the bulk of Orbán-era legislation that enabled his government to stack the courts with political allies, gerrymander electoral districts, restrict independent press freedom, and entrench legal discrimination against the LGBTQ+ community. The outcome has eased widespread anxiety among supporters both in Hungary and across Europe, where many had worried a narrow simple majority would leave Magyar unable to dismantle Orbán’s political system entirely. Still, uncertainty lingers: even some supporters have expressed unease over concentrating that level of governing power in the hands of any new administration.

    “It’s hard to see that with two-thirds that it’s going to be a fair government, but we will see,” said Dániel Kovács, a celebrant at Sunday’s victory rally. “Let’s hope that it’s going to be a promising four years.”

    Magyar has repeatedly criticized Orbán’s administration for mismanaging Hungary’s economy and public social services, while allowing systemic, unchecked corruption that allowed a small circle of politically connected elites to amass extreme wealth at the expense of ordinary Hungarian households. He has vowed to hold corrupt actors accountable, and has proposed creating a new Office for the Recovery of National Assets to reclaim funds and assets that he argues were obtained illegally by Orbán’s closest allies.

    A core campaign promise from Magyar centers on unlocking billions of euros in frozen European Union funding, which Brussels has withheld from Hungary for years over the Orbán government’s persistent failures to address corruption and roll back democratic safeguards. He has also pledged to adopt the euro as Hungary’s official currency by 2030, a policy that Orbán’s government resisted for more than a decade.

    Imre Végh, a long-time Budapest resident, framed the election outcome as a rejection of the illiberal state Orbán built over 16 years. “Orbán had built an ‘illiberal system’ that was against Hungary’s fundamental values,” Végh said Monday. “We are Europeans and we want to stay in Europe.”

  • Europe has trust issues with US: Poll

    Europe has trust issues with US: Poll

    Transatlantic relations are facing an unprecedented crisis of confidence, according to a new cross-European public opinion survey that finds a growing share of European citizens now view the United States as a threat rather than a trusted ally, as Washington’s unilateral policy agenda increasingly clashes with European strategic and economic interests.

    Conducted between March 13 and 21 by independent polling firm Cluster17 for the news outlet Politico, the survey gathered responses from 6,698 adults across six key European nations: Belgium, Germany, France, Italy, Spain, and Poland. The results paint a stark picture of eroding trust: just 12% of respondents currently identify the U.S. as a close ally, while more than three times that share — 36% — now classify the U.S. as an active threat to European stability. That marked a dramatic hardening of anti-U.S. sentiment compared to previous polling, experts note.

    Politico traced the shift in public opinion to a series of controversial actions taken by the second Trump administration after it returned to office in January 2025. These include repeated public questioning of the U.S.’s long-standing mutual defense commitment to NATO, open threats to annex Greenland and Canada, sweeping new tariffs imposed on European exports, and the launch of a new war with Iran that all major European governments refused to join.

    The poll also exposes a critical contradiction at the heart of modern European security politics. As trust in Washington declines, a majority of voters now back calls for a stronger, more strategically autonomous Europe. But that support evaporates when proposals require higher defense spending or long-term security commitments to Ukraine, the survey found.

    On collective defense, the survey found broad top-level political support for mutual protection: 76% of respondents backed sending troops to defend an allied nation that came under attack, a figure that rose to 81% when the question specifically referenced defending a fellow European Union member state. However, when asked if they would personally take up arms to fight if their own country was attacked, just 19% of respondents said they would agree. Politico noted this gap exposes a major structural challenge for European governments: high public support for stronger defense institutions on paper, paired with low individual willingness to serve, which will exacerbate existing European troop shortages.

    Chinese foreign policy analysts say the poll results reflect a growing and deepening sense of disappointment among ordinary European citizens toward the current U.S. administration. Liu Le, an associate researcher at the National Institute of International Strategy of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, explained that repeated unilateral actions by the U.S. on issues ranging from Greenland’s status to the Russia-Ukraine conflict and the new Iran war have directly conflicted with core European interests, while also eroding the shared ideological foundations that long sustained the transatlantic alliance.

    Liu noted that the current U.S. administration has shifted beyond the long-standing ‘America First’ doctrine to a far more extreme ‘America Only’ strategic orientation. This shift has severely damaged European confidence in the U.S.’s strategic credibility and long-term policy consistency, he added. The escalating conflict with Iran has also forced the U.S. to draw down its security engagement in the Russia-Ukraine conflict, effectively stepping back from its core security commitments to Europe — a shift that has prompted the European Union to launch a full reassessment of its relationship with Washington.

    Chen Hong, director of the Asia Pacific Studies Centre at East China Normal University in Shanghai, added that the current U.S. administration has increasingly treated long-standing security commitments to allies as a bargaining chip, repeatedly threatening European governments to advance U.S. interests. This behavior has laid bare the fundamentally hegemonic nature of U.S. strategy for many European observers, he said.

    In addition to security frictions, Chen noted that economic policy has become a major source of resentment in Europe in recent years. The U.S. has repeatedly threatened European allies with tariffs, pursued exclusionary trade and supply chain policies, and forced European nations to align with its great-power economic competition agenda, often against their own economic interests. ‘By turning economic relationships that were once built on shared rules and mutual benefit into tools to advance U.S. national interests, the United States has directly undermined the core interests of European partners,’ Chen explained.

    Chen added that the U.S. has sought to shift the costs of manufacturing overseas while retaining tight control over critical technologies and key resources, a dynamic that has made clear to European governments and publics alike that the U.S. does not see Europe as an equal partner. Instead, Europe is increasingly viewed by Washington as a strategic asset to be mobilized, leveraged, and even sacrificed when it serves U.S. goals, he said.

    Notably, the survey found that the share of Europeans who view the U.S. as a threat now exceeds the share who hold the same view of China by 7 percentage points (36% vs 29%). In four of the six surveyed nations, more respondents named the U.S. as a greater threat than China, with Spain recording the widest gap at 51% of respondents identifying the U.S. as a threat.

    Despite the sharp decline in trust, experts agree that a full breakdown of transatlantic ties and a complete end to Europe’s reliance on the U.S. is unlikely in the near term. Instead, Chen noted, Europe is increasingly pursuing a realistic, balanced approach that prioritizes greater strategic autonomy. ‘It is precisely the U.S.’s erosion of allies’ interests and the institutional foundations of the transatlantic order that has forced Europe to pursue more independent strategic decision-making,’ Chen explained. This shift does not mean Europe plans to abandon the transatlantic alliance entirely; rather, it is a structural adjustment and defensive response to repeated U.S. unilateralism and violation of established international rules.

    For European policymakers, deeper cooperation with China has become a strategic necessity rather than a discretionary choice, Liu noted. Despite ongoing differences between Brussels and Beijing, the two sides share broad overlapping interests on issues ranging from trade to climate change to multilateral governance. Europe’s push to deepen ties and expand cooperation with China reflects its core strategic need to pursue more independent, self-reliant development, he added.

  • Sweeping US tariffs fail to deliver on stated goals

    Sweeping US tariffs fail to deliver on stated goals

    Twelve months have passed since the United States rolled out sweeping protectionist tariffs across a wide range of trading partners, and new official data confirms what many economic analysts predicted: the policy has failed to deliver on nearly all of its core stated objectives, while triggering a cascade of unintended negative consequences for both the US economy and the global trading system.

    When the tariffs were first announced on April 2 last year, the US government framed the measures as a bold solution to long-running economic challenges, promising to bring manufacturing jobs back to American shores, shrink the persistent US trade deficit, and drive stronger domestic economic growth. A full year later, results have fallen drastically short of these promises.

    Official federal data on manufacturing reshoring paints a particularly bleak picture: since the tariffs took effect, US manufacturing has cut jobs in nearly every month, with only small, temporary gains recorded in January and March of this year. Progress on narrowing the trade deficit has also stalled. 2025 full-year government figures show the US goods trade deficit widened by 2.1% to hit an all-time high of $1.24 trillion. The overall US trade deficit shrank by just $2.1 billion for the entire year, a negligible change driven almost entirely by a growing surplus in services trade, not the manufacturing gains the tariffs were meant to deliver.

    Economic experts across academic and policy institutions say these outcomes were entirely predictable, arguing that tariffs are structurally ill-suited to solve the deep-rooted domestic economic problems the US claims to be addressing, from industrial decline to persistent trade imbalances.

    Luo Zhenxing, an associate research fellow at the Institute of American Studies under the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, explained that decades of hyper-globalization have built an intricate, deeply integrated global division of labor that cannot be unwound by tariffs alone in the short term. “Even if policymakers wanted to reshore manufacturing, US domestic production costs remain far higher than most emerging market economies, so low and mid-end manufacturing is extremely unlikely to return,” Luo noted. He added that large-scale reshoring requires long-term capital investment and a stable policy environment, but constant shifts in US tariff policy have created widespread uncertainty that makes long-term corporate planning nearly impossible.

    Song Guoyou, deputy director of the Center for American Studies at Shanghai’s Fudan University, echoed this critique, saying the US government has drastically overstated what tariffs can achieve. “The economic problems the US is trying to fix are primarily internal and structural,” Song explained. “Attempting to use trade barriers and tariffs to force an adjustment is fundamentally wrong-headed — it is simply a way to avoid doing the hard work of passing the necessary domestic reforms that would actually address these issues.”

    Beyond failing to meet their core goals, the tariffs have already caused measurable harm to multiple sectors of the US economy. Data from the US Commerce Department’s National Travel and Tourism Office shows that through November of last year, total international visitor arrivals to the US fell by 5.4% compared to the previous year, as protectionist trade policies damaged the country’s global standing and appeal. The sharpest drop came from Canadian travelers, who visit the US in large volumes for tourism and business — arrivals from Canada plummeted 22%, or 4 million fewer visits, a decline that Forbes estimates cost the US economy roughly $4.5 billion in lost revenue.

    The tariffs have also thrown global supply chains into disarray, raising costs for American businesses and consumers alike. Neil Bradley, executive vice president and chief policy officer at the US Chamber of Commerce, emphasized in a recent statement that after a full year of elevated tariffs, the costs are impossible to ignore. “Tariffs have increased prices, disrupted supply chains and added uncertainty for the very families and businesses they are meant to help,” Bradley said.

    A February analysis from the Yale Budget Lab projects that the tariffs will push the US unemployment rate 0.3 percentage points higher by the end of 2026, and forecast that in the long run, the total size of the US economy will be a persistent 0.1% smaller than it would have been without the tariffs.

    Luo explained that tariffs erode US economic performance by discouraging domestic investment and raising prices for imported goods, which directly cuts into household purchasing power. “Tariffs also drive up input costs for US manufacturers that rely on imported materials and components, forcing them to raise prices and making US exporters less competitive in global markets,” he added.

    The damage extends beyond immediate economic costs to eroding international investor confidence in US assets, experts warn. By weaponizing mutually beneficial trade relationships for political gain, the US has amplified foreign investors’ concerns about persistent policy unpredictability in the country, Song said. “The long-held idea of American exceptionalism — that global capital always flows to the US for safety during crises — is being undermined by this self-inflicted tariff crisis,” he noted.

    Early signs of this shifting confidence are already visible. Financial newsletter The Kobeissi Letter reports that the US Dollar Index dropped 9% in 2025, its worst annual performance since 2017. Goldman Sachs forecasts the dollar will continue to weaken through 2026 as global demand for US assets declines. US media also notes that European and Asian stock markets outperformed US markets by a significant margin in 2025, a clear indication that international investors are beginning to diversify their holdings away from US assets.

    “The unpredictability of US government policy is heightening uncertainty around US assets and eroding international confidence in them,” Luo said. “This will undermine long-term US economic growth and may even put the global reserve currency status of the US dollar at risk.”

    Even after the US Supreme Court ruled in February that the legal basis for the administration’s reciprocal tariffs was unconstitutional, the White House moved quickly to implement replacement tariffs and launch new investigations into alleged unfair trade practices. Experts warn that this persistence indicates protectionist “America First” trade policies could become a permanent feature of the global economic order, with far-reaching negative implications for global economic integration.

    “US tariff policies will lead to a fragmentation of the global trading system,” Song said. “In response to US protectionism, other countries are ramping up their own efforts to defend free trade, which is creating two distinct blocs: one US-centered protectionist camp, and another that remains committed to upholding the rules-based global free trade system.”

    Luo added that prolonged US protectionism has already disrupted the existing global economic order. “The world is facing major uncertainty and undergoing a period of rapid adjustment, with fragmentation risks rising quickly,” he said. “In the end, this will only hold back shared global economic development.”

  • Suspected militants kill police officer assigned to guard polio team as nationwide campaign begins

    Suspected militants kill police officer assigned to guard polio team as nationwide campaign begins

    A deadly militant attack targeted a police convoy assigned to protect polio vaccination workers in northwestern Pakistan on Tuesday, leaving one officer dead and four more injured, local law enforcement confirmed. Two assailants were fatally shot by responding officers before the remaining attackers fled the scene, according to initial reports.

    The shooting unfolded in Hangu District, located in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province along Pakistan’s border with Afghanistan, just days after Pakistan kicked off its second nationwide anti-polio vaccination drive of 2026, said Mahmood Alam, a local senior police official. As of Wednesday, no militant organization had issued a public claim of responsibility, but investigators widely point to the Pakistani Taliban and regional extremist groups, which have a long history of targeting polio immunization efforts across the country.

    The World Health Organization designates Pakistan and Afghanistan as the only two nations on Earth where wild poliovirus transmission has never been stopped, making the coordinated cross-border campaigns a critical global public health priority. Pakistan’s weeklong initiative aims to deliver life-saving polio vaccines to more than 45 million children under the age of 5 across all of the country’s provinces and administrative regions. Aseefa Bhutto Zardari, Pakistan’s first lady and daughter of President Asif Ali Zardari and assassinated former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto, has spearheaded public outreach for the current drive.

    Benazir Bhutto, who was killed in a 2007 militant attack, personally led national polio eradication efforts during her time in office, carrying forward the family’s longstanding commitment to ending the disease. In an official statement marking the campaign’s launch, Aseefa Bhutto Zardari noted that Pakistan stands at a pivotal juncture in its decades-long fight against polio. While the country has made unprecedented progress, she emphasized, the final push to eradication remains the most dangerous and challenging phase.

    Citing recent public health data, Aseefa pointed to 31 confirmed wild polio cases recorded across Pakistan in 2025, with only one case documented so far in 2026. Even with this dramatic progress, she warned against public complacency, stressing that a single undetected case can reignite widespread transmission. The first lady also highlighted the unprecedented coordination between Pakistan and Afghanistan for this round of campaigns, a measure designed to block cross-border virus spread and close immunization gaps along the shared frontier.

    The two neighboring nations employ different approaches to reach vulnerable children: Pakistan relies heavily on door-to-door teams that administer vaccines directly in family homes, while Afghanistan’s strategy centers on fixed immunization sites at health facilities, where parents are encouraged to bring their children for doses. Afghanistan launched its own first national anti-polio drive of 2026 in parallel with Pakistan’s effort, in partnership with global health organizations. The campaign targets 12.6 million children under age 5 across the country, though Sharafat Zaman, spokesperson for Afghanistan’s Ministry of Public Health, confirmed that rollout has been delayed in some high-altitude regions due to unseasonably cold weather.

    Zaman called on parents, religious leaders and local community influencers to encourage full participation in the drive, stressing that vaccination remains the only proven preventive measure against the paralytic disease. For decades, Pakistan’s national polio eradication program has faced violent opposition from militant groups, which spread false conspiracy theories claiming immunization drives are a Western plot to sterilize Muslim children. Since the 1990s, more than 200 polio workers and security personnel assigned to protect them have been killed in targeted attacks across Pakistan, official data shows. In response to intelligence warnings of potential attacks ahead of this latest campaign, Pakistani authorities have deployed thousands of additional police officers to guard vaccination teams as they work across high-risk regions.