Global Pulse

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  • A UK border official and a former Hong Kong cop sentenced for spying on China’s behalf

    A UK border official and a former Hong Kong cop sentenced for spying on China’s behalf

    LONDON – In a landmark national security ruling that has escalated diplomatic tensions between London and Beijing, two men – a former United Kingdom border official and a retired Hong Kong police officer – have received lengthy prison sentences on charges of orchestrating a spy operation targeting Beijing’s critics based on British soil. The convictions mark one of the highest-profile cases prosecuted under the U.K.’s post-Brexit National Security Act, underscoring growing concerns over transnational political surveillance on Western territory.

    Sixty-six-year-old Bill Yuen, a former Hong Kong Police superintendent who went on to work as office manager at the Hong Kong Economic and Trade Office (HKETO) in London – the regional government’s official U.K. representative – and 41-year-old Peter Wai, a former Metropolitan Police officer who later joined U.K. Border Force, were handed down their sentences Thursday at London’s Central Criminal Court. Judge Bobbie Cheema-Grubb imposed a 10-year prison term on Wai and an eight-year term on Yuen, condemning the pair’s actions as deliberate, coordinated and severely damaging to the safety of those they targeted.

    According to prosecution arguments, the two Chinese-British nationals operated a covert surveillance network between 2020 and 2022, posing as legitimate law enforcement or intelligence personnel to monitor and collect intelligence on Hong Kong pro-democracy dissidents and Beijing critics residing in the U.K. Their list of targets included prominent high-profile figures: Nathan Law, a former Hong Kong opposition lawmaker who fled to the U.K. after Beijing’s imposition of the 2020 national security law, and multiple British parliamentarians who have publicly criticized Chinese policy. Prosecutors also revealed that the pair referred to the pro-democracy activists they targeted with the dehumanizing slur “cockroaches”, a term widely adopted by pro-Beijing factions to describe opposition supporters during Hong Kong’s 2019 pro-democracy protests.

    Last month, a jury found both men guilty on charges of violating the National Security Act for providing assistance to a foreign intelligence service. Wai received an additional conviction for misconduct in public office, after he abused his position as a border official to access a secure government computer and pull personal information on individuals of interest to Hong Kong authorities. In her sentencing remarks, Cheema-Grubb emphasized that the pair’s repeated covert operations had inflicted ongoing fear and psychological harm on the people they monitored, who had sought safety in the U.K. after fleeing political persecution.

    Helen Flanagan, commander for Counter Terrorism Policing London, described the defendants’ activities as “truly chilling” in a post-sentencing statement. She noted that the targets of the spy ring were peaceful pro-democracy campaigners who had fled to the U.K. to seek sanctuary, only to be tracked and targeted for their political beliefs.

    The case has sparked immediate diplomatic friction between the U.K. and China. Following the guilty verdict last month, British foreign ministry officials summoned Chinese Ambassador Zheng Zeguang to formally raise concerns over the transnational surveillance operation. In response, China’s Embassy in London denounced the proceedings as a politically motivated “farce” manufactured to provide cover for anti-China forces that had relocated to Britain. The Hong Kong government also issued a statement rejecting all links between the espionage operation and the Hong Kong administration or HKETO, claiming British authorities had launched the investigation on “groundless accusations”, abused legal processes and manipulated judicial proceedings to secure a conviction.

    The verdict comes amid a steady deterioration in Sino-British relations over issues including Hong Kong’s political crackdown, increased Chinese assertiveness in the Indo-Pacific, and repeated allegations of transnational repression targeting dissidents based in Western countries.

  • ‘My brother hid in a rice sack’: The refugee stars playing at the World Cup

    ‘My brother hid in a rice sack’: The refugee stars playing at the World Cup

    As the 2026 World Cup unfolds across North America, three standout players taking the pitch for Australia, Germany, and Canada share a powerful, little-told common bond: all descend from African refugee families who fled devastating conflict to build new lives abroad. For these athletes, their presence on football’s biggest global stage is more than a personal achievement — it is a platform to amplify the stories of displaced people everywhere, even as growing policy shifts around the world roll back access to refugee resettlement.

    For Germany defender Antonio Rüdiger, a 33-year-old Real Madrid stalwart and two-time Champions League winner, the road to the World Cup began long before he was born. His parents fled Sierra Leone’s brutal 11-year civil war in the 1990s, making a treacherous 340-kilometer trek from their home district of Kono to the capital Freetown in search of safety. Rüdiger’s uncle took extraordinary measures to protect his young nieces and nephews from rebel factions that kidnapped thousands of children to serve as child soldiers: he hid the group inside a sack of rice, and on multiple occasions, the family pretended to be dead to avoid gunfire or abduction. After securing refugee status in Germany, Rüdiger was born in Berlin, growing up in a shared government refugee center. That early experience shaped the work ethic that carried him to the top of global football. “Nothing is given in life. You have to work for things, you have to sacrifice a lot to get where you want to go,” he told BBC Sport Africa.

    Rüdiger is far from alone among World Cup participants in carrying a refugee heritage. Canadian captain and Bayern Munich star Alphonso Davies spent his earliest years in a Ghanaian refugee camp after his family fled civil war in Liberia, a conflict that ravaged the West African nation alongside Sierra Leone in the 1990s and early 2000s. Today, Davies is part of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees’ (UNHCR) symbolic “Game Changing Team,” a group of elite refugee-background athletes assembled to demonstrate what displaced young people can achieve when given safety, opportunity, and a warm welcome. “Canada gave me the opportunity to be who I am and to be what I want to be in life,” Davies told UNHCR, recalling his first days in the country: going to school for the first time, playing the sport he loves, and building new friendships.

    The Australian men’s national squad, the Socceroos, fields three forwards with African refugee roots: 20-year-old Nestory Irankunda of Watford, Mohamed Toure of Norwich City, and Awer Mabil of Spain’s Castellón. All three were either born in African refugee camps or grew up in them before resettling in Australia, and Irankunda recently made history as the Socceroos’ youngest-ever World Cup goalscorer after netting in a 2-0 group stage win over Turkey. Australia’s professional footballers association has leaned into the squad’s extraordinary multicultural identity, releasing a video featuring every player naming their birthplace or family heritage to highlight the tangible benefits of immigration.

    Rüdiger, Davies, Irankunda, and dozens of other participating players have lent their names to the UNHCR campaign, alongside other high-profile athletes such as Rüdiger’s Real Madrid teammate Eduardo Camavinga (whose family fled Angola for France), former Chelsea winger Victor Moses (whose parents resettled in Nigeria from the UK), former Bosnia goalkeeper Asmir Begovic (who found refuge in Germany as a child escaping Balkan conflict), and Iraqi striker Ali Al-Hamadi (whose family fled after his father was imprisoned under Saddam Hussein’s regime).

    UN High Commissioner for Refugees Barham Salih noted that children make up a disproportionate share of the world’s displaced population, with an estimated 48.8 million displaced children globally. Many face family separation, trauma, and abuse while fleeing war, violence, and persecution.

    Despite the widespread celebration of these players’ success at the tournament, Rüdiger and other campaign participants warn that global public and political attitudes toward refugees have shifted dramatically in recent years, with growing stigma targeting displaced people. “The narrative goes a bit more blaming the refugees,” Rüdiger said, arguing that public empathy for those escaping conflict has eroded. “Obviously, you have always the good and the bad. This is life, we all are not perfect. But the thing is, if one person does bad, are all bad? You cannot smear it on everyone, because that’s not fair. Because you have people who come here, they really want to change their life, they’re doing good, they’re trying to learn. They learn the language, they go to school, they achieve something in life.”

    That shifting political landscape is particularly visible in the United States, one of the 2026 World Cup’s three co-hosts. Immediately after his inauguration in January 2025, Republican President Donald Trump signed an executive order suspending the U.S. Refugee Admissions Programme (USRAP), the country’s formal resettlement system that has admitted more than 3.7 million refugees since its launch in 1980, including more than 500,000 from African nations. Later that year, the Trump administration capped annual refugee admissions at just 7,500 for the current fiscal year — a historic low — and rearranged priority rules to favor white South African refugees, based on Trump’s widely discredited claims of a “genocide” against Afrikaners.

    State Department data shows that in the first seven months of the fiscal year (October to April), just 6,069 refugees were admitted to the U.S., and all but three of those resettled people came from South Africa. That marks a stark reversal from the final full year of former Democratic President Joe Biden’s term, when the U.S. admitted 100,034 refugees total, 34,017 of whom came from 32 different African nations. The Democratic Republic of the Congo topped that list with 19,923 resettled refugees, followed by Somalia, Eritrea, and Sudan.

    The Trump administration has defended the cuts, arguing they are “justified by humanitarian concerns or is otherwise in the national interest,” but humanitarian organizations have roundly condemned the policy. Krish O’Mara Vignarajah, president and CEO of resettlement non-profit Global Refuge, told BBC Sport Africa that the policy is a devastating betrayal of the values the World Cup represents. “Sadly, right now, the most vulnerable in Africa and across the world have been shut out entirely,” she said. “What we will see [at the World Cup] is the US spending this summer celebrating, as they should, what humans can achieve when they’re given a chance. US policymakers have spent the past year making sure fewer people get that chance, and it is a stark and deeply troubling contradiction.”

    O’Mara Vignarajah drew a contrast to 1994, the last time the U.S. hosted the World Cup, when the country resettled more than 100,000 refugees. “We knew back then that hosting the world and welcoming the world were not separate ideas,” she said. “But we have seem to have forgotten that.”

    While U.S. policy has grown dramatically more restrictive, Canada — another World Cup co-host — has seen its annual refugee acceptance numbers rise over the past decade, even as it has shifted toward stricter immigration rules in recent years. Data from Canada’s Refugee Protection Division shows that 9,972 refugee claims were approved in 2016, a figure that grew to 50,067 by 2025. Thirty-eight African nations are represented among recent approved claims, with Nigeria recording the highest number.

    For stars like Rüdiger and Davies, their performances on the World Cup pitch are meant to serve as a reminder of what welcome can achieve: they are playing for the countries that gave their families a second chance at life, and in doing so, they hope to reignite global empathy for refugees around the world.

  • As Hungary’s Magyar joins EU summit, sidelined Orban meets with far-right allies in Brussels

    As Hungary’s Magyar joins EU summit, sidelined Orban meets with far-right allies in Brussels

    BRUSSELS — For the first time in 16 years, one of European politics’ most polarizing figures was absent from the room when European Union heads of state gathered for their flagship summit in Brussels on Thursday. Over nearly two decades, through countless rotations of national leadership across the bloc, Hungarian nationalist Viktor Orbán stood as an unshakable fixture in Brussels’ corridors of power. His political brand of illiberal nationalist populism not only shifted Europe’s ideological center sharply to the right but also became a template for far-right movements across the continent, even earning admiration from America’s Make America Great Again wing.

    Orbán’s exit from the top table of EU summits comes after he lost Hungary’s national parliamentary election in April, which pushed his Fidesz party into the country’s main opposition bloc. For years, Orbán built his political brand around open confrontation with EU institutions: he repeatedly vilified bloc leaders, violated EU regulations, and systematically eroded checks and balances on executive power within Hungary. He also emerged as the most consistent and high-profile barrier to the EU’s core geopolitical priority of integrating Ukraine into the bloc, leveraging his position as Hungarian prime minister to repeatedly veto EU progress on Kyiv’s accession bid.

    Now, with Orbán on the political sidelines for the first time in a generation, his successor as Hungary’s leader, Prime Minister Péter Magyar, is taking his seat at the summit alongside EU heavyweights including French President Emmanuel Macron, Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez and German Chancellor Friedrich Merz — advancing policy priorities that directly contradict Orbán’s long-held agenda. While Orbán was locked out of the main EU summit focused on expanding military and political support for Ukraine, he remained in Brussels to lead a gathering of his new far-right political alliance, Patriots for Europe. The coalition, which unites Euroskeptic and nationalist parties from across the bloc, holds the third-largest number of seats in the European Parliament, giving it significant leverage to shape EU legislation.

    Despite his bruising election defeat — a result widely greeted with relief by EU leaders, who saw it as a popular rejection of Orbán’s hostile stance toward the bloc and his close ties to the Kremlin — the former prime minister shows no sign of abandoning his ideological project. Speaking to reporters on Wednesday ahead of the Patriots for Europe summit, Orbán framed his April loss as a temporary setback, arguing it would do nothing to slow the rise of nationalist forces across the continent. “No one election loss can stop this historical process,” he said. “Anti-migration and sovereigntist political forces in Europe will continue to grow stronger in the coming months and years.”

    Orbán has positioned Patriots for Europe as the vehicle to reshape the EU in his illiberal image. Key policy goals for the alliance include rolling back EU oversight of national rule of law and democratic standards, implementing a harsh zero-tolerance policy on irregular migration, and forging deeper strategic ties with Russia and China. But a major shift is already underway under Hungary’s new leadership: just last week, Magyar’s government lifted Orbán’s long-held veto on the formal opening of Ukraine’s EU accession negotiations, following weeks of bilateral talks with Kyiv that resolved longstanding disputes over minority rights for ethnic Hungarians in western Ukraine.

    The removal of Orbán’s veto clears the biggest single barrier to accelerating Ukraine’s accession path, a process set to pick up speed when Ireland takes over the EU’s rotating six-month presidency in July. “Hungary obviously had issues that they were able to resolve to allow this to happen this week,” said Thomas Byrne, Ireland’s Minister for European Affairs.

    Orbán’s confidence in a far-right breakthrough is not entirely unfounded. The movement has notched notable electoral gains across the bloc in recent months: Marine Le Pen’s National Rally party picked up significant ground in French municipal elections earlier this year, while Germany’s far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) has climbed steadily in national opinion polls. Andrej Babiš, a Czech populist and close Orbán ally, returned to the office of prime minister last year, making him the only leader from the Patriots for Europe alliance to currently hold the reins of government in an EU member state.

    Most recently, the far-right secured a major policy win last week, when a joint voting bloc of Patriots for Europe and the center-right European People’s Party passed sweeping EU migration reform. The legislation, which has been fiercely condemned by human rights groups, expands bloc-wide surveillance powers, increases deportation targets for irregular migrants, and establishes offshore migrant detention centers labeled “return hubs” outside EU borders. When the reform passed the European Parliament in Strasbourg, far-right and center-right lawmakers celebrated with chants of “Send them back.”

    Still, the European far-right is not without internal rifts. Fractures have emerged in recent months over key geopolitical issues, including conflicting stances on the Israel-Hamas conflict and reactions to former U.S. President Donald Trump’s repeated threats to annex Greenland, an autonomous territory belonging to EU member Denmark. For the EU and Ukraine, however, one major barrier has already been removed: with Orbán no longer holding the Hungarian prime ministership, he can no longer use veto power over EU policy to block Kyiv’s accession path, opening a new chapter in the bloc’s expansion and geopolitical direction.

  • Hegseth announces US review of Europe forces, says some allies will fail

    Hegseth announces US review of Europe forces, says some allies will fail

    At a recent gathering of NATO defense ministers in Brussels, U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth delivered a sharp rebuke to alliance members he accuses of free-riding on American security investment, while unveiling a sweeping six-month review of U.S. military posture across Europe. The announcement comes on the heels of Washington’s decision to scale back its commitments to the NATO Force Model (NFM), the alliance’s high-readiness rapid-response force.

    Hegseth drew a clear line between compliant and non-compliant allies during his address, stating bluntly: “Some countries will fail, and others will pass with flying colours.” He saved particular criticism for NATO members that restricted operational support for U.S. forces during the ongoing conflict with Iran, a point of tension that has already roiled U.S. diplomatic relations with multiple European allies. The six-month review, branded by Hegseth as “NATO 3.0”, is framed as a push to accelerate a shift toward European-led security on the continent.

    At the core of the standoff is defense spending: Washington is demanding all NATO members meet a binding target of allocating 5% of gross domestic product to defense by 2035, with 3.5% earmarked for core defense capabilities and 1.5% for defense-related infrastructure. Hegseth warned that U.S. financial contributions to NATO’s annual budget would now be tied directly to progress on this target. “Where other allies do not spend with urgency, our dues contributions will go down,” he said, calling out wealthy major economies that continue to pay lip service to the rules-based international order while clinging to decades of free-riding on U.S. security. He declined to name specific countries facing criticism.

    The fissures within the alliance were on clear display throughout the meeting. UK Defense Secretary Dan Jarvis attended the summit without a finalized British defense investment plan, following the resignation of his predecessor John Healey, who stepped down after warning the draft plan fell “well short” of the UK’s required commitments under the 5% target.

    NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte pushed back on the most severe U.S. criticism, noting that alliance members already increased collective defense spending by €90 billion ($103 billion) in 2025, an almost 20% year-over-year rise. He emphasized that European allies are already “backfilling” the air and naval capabilities the U.S. plans to withdraw from the NFM, though senior NATO officials have conceded that not all withdrawn U.S. capabilities can be fully replaced immediately. Rutte confirmed that the U.S. drawdown is already in effect, and he called on all members to present clear, credible roadmaps to hit the 5% target ahead of the alliance’s July summit in Ankara.

    Tensions between Washington and European capitals have been building for months over the Iran conflict. In May, the Trump administration announced it would withdraw 5,000 U.S. troops from Germany amid a public dispute with German Chancellor Friedrich Merz over German policy on the Iran war. The same month, Washington initially announced a 4,000-troop withdrawal from Poland, before President Trump reversed the decision and pledged instead to deploy an additional 5,000 troops to the country. Poland currently hosts up to 10,000 rotational U.S. troops, and Polish Defense Minister Władysław Kosiniak-Kamysz confirmed Thursday that Washington is actively considering Warsaw’s offer to host a permanent U.S. military base, with a final decision pending negotiations on agreement terms.

    Earlier this year, President Trump also threatened to cut off all trade with Spain after Madrid refused to allow U.S. forces to use Spanish air bases for strikes on Iran, where the U.S. maintains two key military installations: Naval Station Rota and Morón Air Base.

    A NATO official explained the role of the NFM, noting it is a pre-allocated set of high-readiness forces that the alliance’s Supreme Allied Commander in Europe can rely on for rapid deployment in crisis scenarios. The U.S. drawdown from this framework marks one of the most significant shifts in transatlantic security burden-sharing in modern alliance history.

  • Men jailed over work for Chinese intelligence in UK

    Men jailed over work for Chinese intelligence in UK

    On Thursday, a landmark sentencing at London’s Old Bailey delivered severe punishment to two men convicted of working on behalf of Chinese intelligence to target Hong Kong pro-democracy dissidents on British soil. After a month-long trial, 40-year-old Chi Leung “Peter” Wai received a total 10-year prison term, while 65-year-old Chung Biu “Bill” Yuen was sentenced to eight years behind bars. Both were found guilty of assisting a foreign intelligence service under the UK’s National Security Act, marking one of the most high-profile foreign interference cases in recent British legal history.

    Wai, a former Metropolitan Police officer who joined UK Border Force at Heathrow Airport in December 2020 after years of public service roles including eight years in the Royal Navy and a volunteer constable position with City of London Police, abused his official access to the Home Office’s national database of foreign nationals to track Hong Kong residents who fled the territory’s crackdown on pro-democracy activism. Beyond the charge of assisting a foreign intelligence service that carries a six-year sentence, he was also convicted of misconduct in public office, which added an extra four years to his punishment. In one message sent to Eddie Ma, a former chief superintendent of Hong Kong Police’s Criminal Intelligence Bureau who maintained ties to Chinese authorities, Wai infamously wrote, “Will not let any cockroaches in,” referencing the dissidents he was tasked to monitor.

    Yuen, a former Hong Kong police officer who served as office manager at the Hong Kong Economic and Trade Office in London, acted as the critical liaison between Wai and Chinese state authorities, coordinating the illegal surveillance network that prosecutors described as a coordinated “shadow policing operation” run for Hong Kong authorities and ultimately the Chinese government. During the trial, the court revealed that the operation did not only target exiled dissidents – it also extended special surveillance attention to high-profile British politicians, including senior Conservative MP Sir Iain Duncan Smith.

    The court also heard that Wai recruited another Border Force officer, former Royal Marine Matthew Trickett, to participate in the surveillance. In November 2023, Trickett was ordered by Wai to follow prominent exiled Hong Kong activist Nathan Law – one of eight dissidents that Hong Kong chief executive John Lee placed a HK$1 million (£100,000) bounty on that year – while Law spoke at the Oxford Union. Shortly after the pair were apprehended by counter-terrorism police, Trickett was found dead in an apparent suicide, with an official coroner’s inquest scheduled for November this year.

    Delivering the sentencing remarks, Mrs Justice Cheema-Grubb emphasized the severity of the men’s crimes, stating their actions “threaten the sovereignty of the state.” Several Hong Kong pro-democracy activists, including one who currently has a HK$1 million bounty placed on her by Hong Kong authorities, attended the sentencing in the Old Bailey’s public gallery to observe the ruling.

    While the jury returned guilty verdicts on the main charges, it could not reach a consensus on an additional count of foreign interference linked to an alleged break-in at the West Yorkshire home of a Hong Kong-origin fraud suspect.

    UK law enforcement and prosecution officials have framed the convictions as a stark warning against any foreign interference activity on British territory. Commander Helen Flanagan, Head of Counter Terrorism Policing London, made clear in an official statement that this kind of covert activity will not be tolerated. “I want to be really clear that if you are working on behalf of a foreign state, that we in counter-terrorism policing and with our partners will identify who you are and bring the full force of the National Security Act upon you,” Flanagan said.

    Bethan David, Head of the Counter Terrorism Division at the Crown Prosecution Service, echoed that sentiment, noting that Wai and Yuen’s actions were “deliberate, coordinated and carried out with full knowledge of who it would benefit.” She added that the convictions send an unmistakeable message: “transnational repression, foreign interference, unauthorised surveillance, and attempts to operate outside the law will not be tolerated on British soil.”

    The case has sparked renewed official and public scrutiny of transnational repression operations run by hostile states within UK borders, raising urgent questions about the vulnerability of sensitive government systems and the safety of exiled dissidents who have relocated to Britain to escape persecution.

  • The European Union has quietly sought to reopen communication with Russia

    The European Union has quietly sought to reopen communication with Russia

    Four years into Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, the European Union has initiated quiet, low-level diplomatic contact with Moscow to reestablish communication channels, multiple senior anonymous EU officials confirmed Thursday. The tentative move comes as the bloc aims to ensure it is not sidelined from any future negotiations to end the devastating ongoing war.

    The disclosure of the EU’s outreach coincided with fresh developments on the battlefield: Russian officials announced Thursday that Ukraine had carried out one of its largest drone assaults since the 2022 full-scale invasion. The attack targeted a key oil refinery outside Moscow, marking the second strike on the facility in just seven days, and forced widespread disruptions to commercial flight operations at multiple Moscow-area airports.

    This quiet diplomatic opening unfolds against a complex geopolitical backdrop. The 27-nation bloc has simultaneously ramped up its military, political and humanitarian support for Kyiv, even as Russian President Vladimir Putin has worked to cut European leaders out of talks, prioritizing direct negotiations with Washington over Ukraine’s future.

    Two EU officials, speaking on condition of anonymity due to the sensitivity of the diplomatic maneuver, confirmed the contact had occurred in recent weeks. “In the past few weeks, brief contacts were made at diplomatic level to open communication channels but nothing was discussed on substance,” the first official stated. The official clarified that the bloc is not seeking to act as a mediator, but rather to protect its own strategic interests in any future peace process: “In any future scenario, the EU has specific interests that will need to be defended, therefore it is important to have established diplomatic channels with Russia. The EU is not a mediator. It supports Ukraine in its efforts to achieve a just and lasting peace.”

    The Kremlin has not yet issued an official response to requests for comment on the EU outreach. Putin has previously pushed back against European mediation efforts but has not closed the door entirely on communication with the bloc. Earlier this month, he noted, “We have never refused contacts with representatives of the European Union in any format. We are not rejecting contacts. If they want to talk, they know how to reach us. They can pick up the phone and call. If they want to come, they are welcome to do so. It is not Russia that is refusing engagement.”

    According to EU insiders, European Council President Antonio Costa has been leading coordination across EU member states on the framework for potential future engagement with Moscow, aligning on core issues to be addressed when conditions for substantive talks are deemed appropriate.

    The revelation comes just as EU leaders gather in Brussels for their annual summer summit, where Ukraine’s war and its long-term relationship with the bloc will top the agenda. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy is scheduled to address the gathering of leaders, who are expected to advance discussions on deeper political and economic integration with Kyiv. Just weeks ago, Ukraine officially launched accession negotiations with the EU, a years-long process that will require sweeping political and governance reforms even as the country continues to fend off Russian aggression.

    The EU move also follows this week’s G7 summit in Evian-les-Bains, France, where European negotiators secured a joint commitment from former U.S. President Donald Trump to join other G7 leaders in reaffirming unwavering support for Ukraine. Zelenskyy, who attended the summit, hailed the gathering as a success, saying Ukraine had secured key new pledges of military and political support from attending leaders, including the United States.

  • Why dropping ‘Indo-Pacific’ clarifies the Pentagon’s China strategy

    Why dropping ‘Indo-Pacific’ clarifies the Pentagon’s China strategy

    On June 16, the U.S. Department of Defense made a consequential announcement: the U.S. Indo-Pacific Command (INDOPACOM), America’s largest regional combatant command, will officially revert to its original name — U.S. Pacific Command (PACOM). This decision undoes a 2018 rebranding ordered during Donald Trump’s first presidential term, a change that was framed at the time as a deliberate acknowledgment of India’s growing importance to Washington’s regional strategic planning and a formal step to reincorporate New Delhi into Washington’s core “Asia Nexus” of key partners.

    Today, however, analysts read the name reversal as a clear signal of the opposite: a sharp downgrade in India’s standing in U.S. strategic thinking, and a quiet removal of India from that core Asia-focused partnership framework. Clues of this shifting posture had already emerged in late May, during U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s keynote address at the Singapore-based Shangri-La Dialogue, the Asia-Pacific’s premier annual defense security summit. One Asian diplomat in attendance noted that Hegseth reserved India for last in his roll call of regional partners, after singling out for praise South Korea, the Philippines, Japan, Australia, Singapore, Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand and Vietnam. Even when Hegseth did address New Delhi, his remarks were lukewarm: he only stated that a strong India acting in its own self-interest would help advance a general goal of regional balance of power — far from the language used to describe a close, core strategic ally.

    Importantly, this name change does not signal any reduction in U.S. competition with Beijing. Instead, it brings much-needed clarity to where Washington will focus its efforts and resources when countering China, and which regions it will deprioritize. For observers and policymakers alike, the Pentagon’s decision yields three key, revealing takeaways about the new direction of U.S. Indo-Pacific strategy.

    First, the fact that this major adjustment was made without any immediate crisis triggering it confirms it is a deliberate, calculated messaging move. By rolling back the “Indo-Pacific” rebranding, Washington is making clear that the Indian Ocean is not a central front in its competition with China. This message is intended for both U.S. allies and Beijing. For partner nations, it signals that in any potential conflict over Taiwan, the U.S. will center its operations on the Taiwan Strait, drawing primarily on infrastructure and support from Japan and the Philippines. All other regions will see local allies and partners take primary responsibility for conventional defense: South Korea will manage deterrence against North Korea, European allies will confront Russian aggression, and the Indian Ocean will fall largely to India to monitor and secure. Symbolically, Hegseth did not even utter the phrase “Indo-Pacific” during his Shangri-La address, nor did he acknowledge Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s ongoing push to update the “Free and Open Indo-Pacific” framework first championed by former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe — a hint that Japan’s long-held regional strategic framing may soon need a major rethink.

    For Beijing, the message is equally unambiguous: the U.S. is now laser-focused on the Taiwan Strait as its top priority in great power competition.

    The second takeaway is that India is being formally written out of the core contingency planning for the scenario that matters most to Washington: a potential conflict over Taiwan. Current U.S. intelligence assessments hold that Chinese President Xi Jinping has instructed the People’s Liberation Army to be prepared to seize Taiwan by force if required by 2027, and the current U.S. administration has little patience for regional powers that refuse to take a clear side. Washington is now prioritizing frontline allies such as South Korea and the Philippines, which Hegseth characterized as partners that recognize they exist on the immediate front lines of competition with China. India has long maintained a policy of strategic non-alignment on the Taiwan issue, and the U.S. has abandoned its long-held hope that New Delhi will eventually align firmly with Washington against Beijing.

    Third, and most surprisingly, by repositioning India as an ordinary regional partner rather than a central strategic pillar, Washington gains far more flexibility in its engagement with Pakistan, India’s long-standing archrival. The current Trump administration has already built close ties with Pakistan’s Chief of Army Staff Field Marshal Asim Munir, tapping him as a critical backchannel to Iran, relying on his mediation to defuse the 2025 military crisis between India and Pakistan, and including him in high-level talks about expanding the Abraham Accords. Pakistan has grown in strategic relevance to the U.S. not because of its rivalry with India, but because of China’s ongoing westward strategic and economic pivot. Over the past 15 years, China has steadily reduced its dependence on vulnerable maritime energy routes that pass through Indian Ocean chokepoints such as the Strait of Malacca and the Strait of Hormuz, shifting instead to overland energy pipelines that cross Central Asia. As the U.S. adapts to this Chinese reorientation toward Eurasia, Pakistan, not India, has emerged as the more strategically valuable partner for Washington.

    In the view of analyst Ken Moriyasu, a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute and former correspondent for Japan’s Nikkei newspaper, the return to the PACOM name simply reflects these new strategic realities. It is a recognition that clear, focused prioritization — rather than vague geographic expansions or ill-defined values-based alignment frameworks — will define how the U.S. competes with China, and that this shift is the right strategic adjustment for current conditions.

  • Phillips’ maiden test century leads priceless morning for New Zealand at The Oval

    Phillips’ maiden test century leads priceless morning for New Zealand at The Oval

    On a sun-drenched Thursday morning at London’s iconic Oval cricket ground, New Zealand pulled off a stunning lower-order batting performance, headlined by Glenn Phillips’ first career test century, that pushed the Black Caps to a far higher first innings total than most analysts predicted against England.

    Resuming day two at 291 for seven wickets – a position where New Zealand’s coaching staff privately targeted 350 runs as a strong outcome, with the tail exposed and England poised to take the new ball – the visitors compiled an overall total of 391 all out. Phillips was the final wicket to fall, finishing unbeaten? No, out for an even 100, capping a remarkable comeback for the lower order.

    England’s chances of a swift wrap-up of the New Zealand innings were derailed by two key factors: an over-reliance on short-pitched bowling that failed to trouble the New Zealand batters, and the delayed return of their most potent fast bowler, Jofra Archer. Archer, playing his first test match since December, had delivered a blistering spell of eight consecutive overs on day one that left spectators breathless, but the effort left him fatigued heading into the second morning.

    Archer did not appear until the 19th over of the morning, just before the lunch break. By the time he entered the attack, Phillips and tailender Kyle Jamieson had already turned the game on its head. The pair shared an 87-run partnership from just 96 balls, with 74 of those runs coming in 12 overs in the first hour of play that saw New Zealand sail past the 350 benchmark.

    Jamieson, New Zealand’s 2.07-meter tall pace bowler, capitalized on a dropped catch when Ben Duckett, fumbling into bright sun with sunglasses perched on his cap, put him down at 15. Despite being hit twice on the helmet by short deliveries, Jamieson batted with remarkable confidence, growing his overnight score of 6 to 41 off 48 balls – his highest test score in six years of international cricket. He struck six new boundaries after play resumed, including two beautifully timed cover drives, before being bowled by part-time spinner Jacob Bethell, who finished with England’s best bowling figures of three wickets.

    Phillips, who resumed the day on 49, brought up his half-century from just the second delivery of the morning with a top edge that cleared the wicketkeeper. With Archer resting on the sidelines, Phillips ruthlessly punished wayward short deliveries from England’s seamers Sonny Baker and Josh Tongue. He surpassed his previous highest test score of 87, set against Bangladesh in 2023, and brought up his milestone century off 133 deliveries, decorated with 18 boundaries, adding to his existing record of two centuries each in ODI and T20 international cricket.

    In a moment of good sportsmanship, Phillips reached his hundred with two runs and a single off the returning Archer, who responded with a warm congratulatory tap on the back. Shortly after, Archer claimed the wickets of Matt Henry and Phillips to end the New Zealand innings. In the three overs remaining before lunch, England moved to 15 without loss, setting the stage for an absorbing second innings battle.

  • British man dies in paragliding accident in Spain

    British man dies in paragliding accident in Spain

    A tragic paragliding incident in Spain’s northeastern Catalonia region has claimed the life of a 63-year-old British citizen, regional authorities confirmed this week. The fatal crash was reported to emergency responders at approximately 1:30 p.m. local time (2:30 p.m. BST) on Wednesday, in the Palau de Noguera area just outside the small town of Tremp.

    When first responders arrived at the remote crash site, they found the man with critical, life-threatening injuries. Rescue teams administered urgent on-site first aid ahead of the arrival of advanced medical teams, but the victim could not be saved and was pronounced dead shortly after.

    Palau de Noguera sits in close proximity to Àger, a well-known destination for paragliding and hang gliding enthusiasts that sits on the southern edge of the Pyrenees mountain range, drawing hobbyists and professional pilots from across Europe each year. According to early unconfirmed reports from local Spanish media outlets, the paraglider became entangled in overhead power lines before crashing to the ground. Official investigators have not yet verified this account or released any formal conclusion on the root cause of the accident.

    A large multi-agency response was deployed to the scene following the incident: three Catalan fire brigades and two separate medical teams arrived to secure the site and provide care, while the region’s primary law enforcement agency, Mossos d’Esquadra, deployed five specialized teams from its citizen security and criminal investigation divisions to process the scene. Local media reports indicate that authorities will coordinate with British consular officials to formally notify the victim’s next of kin and support repatriation efforts. The UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office has confirmed it is providing consular assistance to the man’s family in the wake of the tragedy.
    “We are supporting the family of a British man who has died in Spain,” a Foreign Office spokesperson said in a brief statement Thursday.

  • First Russian shadow fleet vessel enters Channel since Smyrtos boarding

    First Russian shadow fleet vessel enters Channel since Smyrtos boarding

    Weeks after a dramatic UK interception of a sanctioned Russian shadow fleet tanker upended the routing of Moscow’s energy shipments to global markets, one vessel has broken ranks, sailing through the English Channel for the first time since the operation, according to ship-tracking data analyzed by BBC Verify.

    The tanker in question, the Forwarder, is a Russian-flagged vessel already sanctioned by the United Kingdom, United States, and European Union. It departed the Russian Baltic port of Primorsk on June 12 after loading crude from the region’s largest refinery, a key export hub for Russia’s energy sector, and entered the English Channel Wednesday evening en route to Dongying Port in China. The ship is currently sailing south through the waterway.

    The development marks a sharp break from the pattern that emerged after early Sunday morning’s UK commando operation to board and seize the Smyrtos, another sanctioned shadow fleet tanker. In the days following that interception, tracking data shows dozens of Western-sanctioned Russian oil tankers altered their planned routes to bypass the Channel entirely, rerouting around the west coast of Ireland to avoid any risk of interception.

    As of Thursday, ship tracking data also indicates a British Royal Navy patrol ship, HMS Tyne, is operating in the immediate vicinity of the Forwarder. A NATO official previously confirmed to BBC Verify that Russia has assigned the frigate Admiral Grigorovich to escort sanctioned shadow fleet tankers transiting the region, though it remains unclear if the warship is accompanying the Forwarder. The Admiral Grigorovich made headlines earlier this week when it fired warning shots at a British civilian yacht that approached its position in the Channel, and as of Wednesday evening, it had not moved far from the site of that encounter.

    The legal and strategic context for any potential interception of the Forwarder differs dramatically from that of the Smyrtos, maritime analysts note. In March, UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer announced a new policy allowing British armed forces to board sanctioned vessels transiting UK waters that violate international law. The Smyrtos was sailing without a registered flag after Cameroon delisted the vessel from its registry before the voyage, giving UK authorities clear legal grounds to act. The ship is currently held off Weymouth, and its captain faces charges for violating UK sanctions.

    By contrast, the Forwarder is officially flagged to Russia, and analysts say there is no publicly available evidence to prove it is flying a false flag. That legal distinction changes the risk calculus for Western nations, experts argue. Intercepting a vessel that is clearly Russian-flagged, particularly if it is accompanied by a Russian military escort, would represent a major escalation of tensions between the West and Moscow, making an interception unlikely according to most observers.

    “Going after vessels that are falsely flagged or misusing a flag of convenience is one thing, but this would be going after Russia directly which would be a further step up in escalation,” explained Frederik Van Lokeren, a former Belgian naval officer and maritime security analyst. “Since this is a Russian-flagged vessel, possibly escorted by a Russian warship, I don’t expect the UK, or any other Western country, to attempt to board her.”

    Mark Douglas, an analyst with New Zealand-based Starboard Maritime Intelligence, echoed that assessment, noting the unique legal standing of the Smyrtos operation. “Given that the Cameroon registry had delisted Smyrtos before she sailed through the Channel there were definitely reasonable grounds to suspect the vessel was without nationality,” he said. “Forwarder, on the other hand, is flagged by Russia and despite the opaque ownership structure we have no information to suggest that is a false flag.”

    BBC Verify has reached out to the UK Ministry of Defence for comment on the Forwarder’s transit and HMS Tyne’s deployment near the vessel.

    The shadow fleet of anonymous, aging tankers has emerged as a critical lifeline for the Kremlin after Western nations imposed sweeping sanctions on Russian energy exports following Moscow’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022. According to UK Ministry of Defence estimates, the fleet now numbers more than 700 vessels and carries roughly 75 percent of all Russia’s sanctioned oil exports. Data from BBC Verify collected in May found that nearly 200 shadow fleet vessels had passed through the English Channel in the months after Starmer’s interception policy announcement, with at least 94 crossing briefly into UK territorial waters.