分类： politics

The United Kingdom has ignited fresh controversy over its entry policies targeting foreign critics of Israel, after barring two high-profile American political commentators from entering the country just days ahead of their scheduled public appearances.

Cenk Uygur, the founder and lead host of progressive digital news network The Young Turks, announced on social media over the weekend that he was blocked from boarding a commercial flight bound for London. Uygur was scheduled to speak at the inaugural SXSW London festival and deliver a public lecture at the University of Oxford this week. He directly blamed British officials for the decision, saying the ban was a direct response to his longstanding public criticism of the Israeli government. “I’ve been banned from the UK,” Uygur wrote on his social media platform. “I tried to get on a flight to London to attend SXSW London and give a speech at Oxford. I’ve been banned for criticizing Israel.”

Following Uygur’s announcement, his nephew, prominent political commentator and Twitch streamer Hasan Piker, confirmed that British authorities had also revoked his travel authorization. Piker, who was also set to appear as a speaker at SXSW London, claimed the move was made “at the behest of Israel.”

According to a reporting from The Times, UK Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood personally approved the cancellation of Uygur’s Electronic Travel Authorisation (ETA) after concluding that his entry into the country would not be “conducive to the public good.” Multiple factors informed the decision, The Times reported, chief among them concerns that Uygur’s public comments since the October 7, 2023, Hamas attack on Israel could fuel antisemitic sentiment and exacerbate intercommunal tensions across the UK. Uygur has repeatedly denounced Israel’s ongoing military campaign in Gaza, labeling the operation a genocide against Palestinian civilians.

This latest series of entry bans is not an isolated action, but part of a broader escalation of scrutiny by the UK Home Office against foreign speakers deemed to pose a risk to domestic public order. Back in April, the British government launched a dedicated cross-agency task force with the explicit mandate of blocking high-risk individuals from entering the country. That same month, the UK barred American Muslim scholar and preacher Dr. Shadee Elmasry just days before he was set to deliver a series of talks across multiple UK cities. Mahmood revoked Elmasry’s travel authorization over social media posts he made criticizing Western governments’ military and diplomatic support for Israel in the wake of the October 7 attacks.

In his post, Elmasry wrote that Western leaders were feigning shock over the Hamas assault after 50 years of Israeli occupation of Palestinian territories. “They are all in this (fake or real) state of shock that the people of Gaza finally punched back (after 50 years),” Elmasry posted. The scholar has since pushed back against the ban, saying his public messaging has always centered on compassion and intercommunity connection.

The string of entry restrictions has sparked intense debate over freedom of speech in the UK, with critics arguing that the government is prioritizing political alignment over the right to open debate about the Gaza conflict, while supporters of the policy say it is necessary to prevent the spread of division and hate speech.

NEW DELHI – In a move that defies Western efforts to isolate Myanmar’s ruling military junta, India has announced it will maintain open diplomatic and bilateral engagement with Myanmar’s military-backed administration following high-level talks Monday between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and junta leader Min Aung Hlaing, the country’s recently installed president. This meeting comes nearly three years after the 2021 military coup that ousted the democratically elected government led by Aung San Suu Kyi, a development that triggered sweeping Western sanctions, a brutal nationwide crackdown on opposition, and a deepening humanitarian and armed conflict across Myanmar.

Addressing reporters in the Indian capital shortly after the closed-door talks, Indian Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri emphasized that New Delhi’s longstanding policy of engagement with Myanmar is not an endorsement or commentary on the country’s internal political order. Misri argued that cutting ties and isolating Myanmar would backfire, pointing to historical precedent to back New Delhi’s approach: “History has shown that disengagement doesn’t give us any results that are better than engagement,” he told reporters.

This visit marks Min Aung Hlaing’s first trip to India since he was sworn in as president in April, following a general election widely dismissed by international critics as a sham to consolidate the military’s grip on national power. His last official visit to India took place in 2019, when he served as the commander-in-chief of Myanmar’s military.

Western governments have led a global push to isolate Myanmar’s military rulers since the 2021 coup, and human rights organizations and international critics have warned that Min Aung Hlaing’s high-profile trip to New Delhi risks granting unearned legitimacy to a government that came to power through force. The coup ousted Suu Kyi’s civilian administration and sparked a widespread popular resistance movement that has devolved into a prolonged nationwide armed conflict, displacing hundreds of thousands and creating a dire humanitarian emergency.

Geography and strategic interests have long shaped India’s approach to its eastern neighbor. India shares a 1,643-kilometer land border and a shared maritime boundary in the Bay of Bengal with Myanmar, and the country currently hosts thousands of Myanmar refugees who have fled fighting in Chin State and other conflict-hit border regions. For India, Myanmar is also a critical partner for national security: the two countries have a long history of collaboration on border security and intelligence sharing to counter insurgent groups that operate across the shared frontier.

In an unusual departure from standard protocol for visiting heads of state in New Delhi, neither Modi nor Min Aung Hlaing spoke to reporters following their bilateral meeting. Misri however outlined the key topics on the agenda, noting that discussions covered trade, defense and security coordination, border governance, and regional strategic issues, with a particular focus on expanding economic and technological ties. He added that both sides reached agreement to deepen cross-sector collaboration in key areas including trade, energy, and critical mineral supply chains, as well as to speed up work on major cross-border connectivity infrastructure projects.

The talks also addressed growing transnational threats that have directly impacted India: cybercrime and human trafficking linked to scam compounds operating in Myanmar that have lured thousands of Indian citizens into forced criminal work. Misri confirmed that joint counter-criminal efforts between the two countries have already resulted in the rescue of more than 2,400 Indian nationals from these scam operations over the past 18 months.

Beyond his meeting with Prime Minister Modi, Min Aung Hlaing held separate talks during his visit with India’s President Droupadi Murmu, Foreign Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar, and National Security Adviser Ajit Doval, covering multiple dimensions of the bilateral relationship.

Following a high-level bilateral summit between Chinese and U.S. leaders in Beijing that opened new space for dialogue on emerging technologies, artificial intelligence has emerged as a promising potential area of collaboration between the world’s two largest technological powers, according to leading international affairs experts, who are also sounding the alarm over the urgent need to address cross-border AI risks before they escalate.

During U.S. President Donald Trump’s official visit to China in May, the two heads of state held productive, constructive discussions on artificial intelligence development and governance, and reached a consensus to launch formal intergovernmental dialogue focused on the topic.

At a May 19 press briefing, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Guo Jiakun emphasized that as the world’s two leading AI powers, China and the United States bear a shared responsibility to work together to advance responsible AI development and strengthen global AI governance frameworks. Such collaboration, he noted, would ensure the technology serves as a driver of human progress and delivers shared benefits to the entire global community.

Fred Teng, president of the America China Public Affairs Institute and a fellow at the U.S. Foreign Policy Association, told China Daily that AI can no longer be framed as a narrow technical issue confined to research labs and tech companies. “AI is now an economic, security, governance and strategic stability issue,” Teng said. He stressed that joint action by China and the United States to mitigate risks stemming from the malicious use of AI is not just beneficial—it is essential.

Teng warned that the pace of AI advancement is already outstripping the development of diplomatic frameworks, regulatory rules, and public understanding of the technology. Capabilities that were once restricted exclusively to national governments, he noted, will soon be accessible to small non-state groups and even individual actors, creating unprecedented risk.

“AI can make cyberattacks more automated, deepfakes more convincing, fraud more scalable, and biological or chemical risks harder to control. These dangers do not respect borders,” Teng said. “AI is not separate from strategic stability. AI is now part of strategic stability.”

Zhiqun Zhu, professor of political science and international relations and director of the China Institute at Bucknell University, echoed Teng’s call for urgent collaboration, noting that unchecked AI progress poses shared global dangers that no single country can address alone.

“AI technologies are progressing rapidly and changing the world enormously, so there is an urgent need to establish some protocol about the usage of AI at the international level,” Zhu explained in an interview. “The United States and China are the two biggest technological powers and should take the leadership in developing such protocols.”

Even so, Zhu acknowledged that turning shared interests in responsible AI into tangible, concrete cooperation will present significant challenges. Reaching consensus on the boundaries and appropriate uses of AI, especially in sensitive domains tied to national security, will be “a tall order,” he said.

Despite these hurdles, experts say the two countries are uniquely positioned to lead global AI risk mitigation, even amid ongoing bilateral competition. Kyle Chan, a fellow in the John L. Thornton China Center at the Brookings Institution, argued that large-scale collaboration on AI risk reduction does not require broad bilateral trust, full strategic alignment, or compromise on core national interests.

“The United States and China can continue to compete vigorously in AI while taking practical steps to reduce shared risks,” Chan wrote in a recent Brookings Institution commentary.

Teng, who also serves as an adviser to the George H. W. Bush Foundation for US-China Relations, outlined a series of practical, low-barrier starting points for cooperation that focus on shared risk reduction rather than broad systemic alignment. First, he called on both governments to align AI safety standards for advanced AI models that could impact cyber operations, biological research, global financial systems, critical national infrastructure, and military decision-making processes.

Teng also proposed that the two sides build dedicated AI risk-reduction mechanisms, including secure emergency communication channels that can be activated in the event of an AI-enabled attack on critical infrastructure. Additionally, he said cross-border information sharing on malicious AI use—ranging from AI-powered cybercrime and deepfake disinformation to threats against critical public services like hospitals and power grids—should be a core priority for early dialogue.

In the military domain, Teng said the two governments must agree on foundational ethical and operational principles, most importantly that human actors must retain full responsibility for all life-or-death strategic decisions, even as AI systems grow more autonomous and capable.

Teng drew a parallel to Cold War-era nuclear risk reduction cooperation between the United States and the Soviet Union, where the two geopolitical rivals maintained fierce systemic competition while collaborating on practical measures to reduce the risk of accidental conflict. The same logic, he argued, applies to AI governance today.

“Cooperation can be limited to areas of shared risks, such as AI-enabled cybercrime, attacks by non-state actors, crisis communication, model safety testing and protection of critical infrastructure,” Teng said. “Cooperation is not a concession; it is responsible self-protection.”