The World That Was- Australia, Biden, Canada, China, Iran, Jordan, North Korea, Pakistan, Phillippines, Ukraine, Wall Street.

Adrian Olivier,

Sunday 4 August – Sunday 11 August

On Sunday, Jordan’s foreign minister met Iran’s acting foreign minister in Tehran. Ayman Safadi is the first senior Jordanian official to pay an official visit to Iran in over 20 years. Safadi insisted that the tension in the region would end only with the cessation of the war in Gaza during his meeting with acting Foreign Minister Ali Bagheri Kani, state TV reported, adding that the two discussed bilateral relations, developments in the region and “the Zionists’ heinous act of assassinating the martyr Haniyeh.” After the meeting, Jordan’s foreign ministry said in a statement that Safadi’s visit was to hold discussions on the “dangerous escalation” across the Middle East. “We want our region to live in security, peace and stability, and we want the escalation to end,” Safadi was quoted as saying, calling for an end to the war in the Gaza Strip and a resumption of talks for a Palestinian state. The last time a senior Jordanian official travelled to Iran on an official visit was in 2004 when then-Prime Minister Faisal al-Fayez went to Tehran. Last week, Jordan sent a lower-ranking official to Pezeshkian’s inauguration. Jordan is a close Western ally and helped intercept scores of missiles and drones fired by Iran toward Israel in April. Jordan, which borders Israel to the east, would likely be in the path of any future Iranian retaliatory strike.

On Monday, Wall Street took a tumble, with U.S. stock indexes opening sharply lower. The tech-heavy Nasdaq led the way, falling 3.4%. Every industry segment in the S&P 500 declined, pushing the broad index 3% lower. All 30 stocks in the Dow Jones Industrial Average ended lower and the blue-chip index shed 1,034 points. The Russell 2000 index of small stocks, resurgent in recent weeks, lost 3.3%. Oil, precious metals and bitcoin fell. Wall Street’s fear gauge, the CBOE Volatility Index, or VIX, jumped more than 50% during stock-trading hours to its highest level since 2020. The rout began in Asia, where Japan’s Nikkei 225 tumbled 12% amid a surging yen. It was the worst single-day percentage drop for the Nikkei since Oct. 20, 1987. That was the Tuesday after Black Monday in the U.S., when the Dow industrials fell nearly 23%.

On Monday, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un oversaw the delivery of 250 new tactical ballistic missile launchers to front-line troops, reported state media KCNA. The launchers were described by state media as a modern tactical attack weapon personally designed by Kim and ready to be transferred to Korean People’s Army units on the border with the South. Seoul said the weapons could be used to threaten South Korea.

On Monday, Iran’s newly sworn-in President Masoud Pezeshkian told former defence minister and current Secretary of the Russian Security Council, Sergei Shoigu, that Tehran is determined to expand relations with its “strategic partner Russia,” Iranian state media reported. Shoigu met Iran’s president and top security officials as the Islamic Republic weighs its response to the killing of a Hamas leader. “Russia is among the countries that have stood by the Iranian nation during difficult times,” Mr. Pezeshkian told Shoigu in a meeting, Iranian state media reported. The president said that shared positions between Iran and Russia “in promoting a multipolar world will certainly lead to greater global security and peace.” Russia has condemned the killing of Ismail Haniyeh, leader of the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas, in Iran last week and called on all parties to refrain from steps that could tip the Middle East into a wider regional war.

On Tuesday, a Pakistani man with ties to Iran was charged with plotting assassination attempts against former president Donald Trump and other politicians, law enforcement officials said. Asif Merchant reportedly travelled to New York in April to recruit hit men to carry out his scheme but was foiled when one of the people he approached reported him to the FBI and became an informant, federal prosecutors in Brooklyn said. Merchant spent time in Iran before flying to New York, where he explained to the informant his plot, which included stealing documents and hard drives from a target’s house, planning a protest and killing a politician, the indictment said. The “party back home told him to ‘finalize’ the plan,” Merchant told the informant, according to prosecutors. Attorney General Merrick Garland said Merchant’s arrest underscored the Justice Department’s aggressive work to counter “Iran’s brazen and unrelenting efforts to retaliate against American public officials” for Soleimani’s killing. At Merchant’s request, the informant introduced him to several undercover agents posing as hit men. Merchant told the agents he would give them instructions on who to kill in late August or early September after he had left the U.S., and agreed to pay them thousands of dollars for their work. He told the informant to communicate only in coded language: the word “tee shirt” would mean protest; “flannel shirt” would mean stealing; “denim jacket” would mean sending money; and “fleece jacket” would mean committing murder, the indictment said. Merchant was arrested before he could fly out of the U.S. on July 12, when agents saw him loading his luggage into the trunk of his car. They searched his wallet and found a handwritten note with the code words he had invented to talk about the assassination plot, according to the indictment.

On Tuesday, Vice President Kamala Harris introduced Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz as her running mate. Walz is a former high school teacher and football coach. He is a two-term governor and current chairman of the Democratic Governors Association, previously serving 12 years in the House of Representatives. He is expected to be useful to Democrats in the battleground states of Wisconsin and Michigan. The Harris campaign said Tuesday evening that it had raised more than $20 million since the Walz announcement in the morning.

On Tuesday, a Chinese state-owned enterprise successfully placed 18 satellites into orbit, state broadcaster CCTV reported, as China seeks to create its own version of SpaceX’s Starlink network. The launch of the low Earth orbit (LEO) satellites by Shanghai Spacecom Satellite Technology (SSST) took place at Taiyuan Satellite Launch Centre in the northern Shanxi province. The satellites were carried aboard a Long March 6 rocket and represent the first batch in SSST’s “Thousand Sails Constellation” plan, CCTV reported. The state-backed plan is one of China’s answers to Starlink, SpaceX’s growing commercial broadband constellation that has about 5,500 LEO satellites in space to provide near-global internet to consumers, companies and government agencies. LEO satellites usually operate at altitudes of 300km to 2,000km from the Earth’s surface and have the advantage of being cheaper and providing more efficient transmission than satellites at higher orbits. Control over the satellites that occupy these altitudes has significant military implications.

On Tuesday, Ukraine launched a surprise ground assault into Russia with troops and armoured vehicles, Russian officials and independent military analysts said on Wednesday. This is the largest Ukrainian incursion into Russian soil in the course of the war. The assault, which began on Tuesday in the Kursk region of western Russia, appears to have resulted in heavy fighting, according to images from the battlefield verified by independent military analysts and Russian statements. Russia’s defence ministry said on Wednesday that the fighting was continuing. Russia’s defence ministry said its forces had “prevented the enemy from advancing deep into the territory of the Russian territory,” while pro-Kremlin military bloggers said Ukrainian forces had captured several settlements near the border. “Alarming news is coming from the Kursk region for the second day. The Kyiv regime is attacking our borders,” Igor Artamonov, the governor of the Russian region of Lipetsk, which borders the Kursk region, said on Wednesday. Military analysts said the attack could be an attempt to divert Russian units from the front lines, thus relieving the pressure on Ukrainian troops struggling to contain Russian advances. But they added that Russia’s Army had ample reserves of troops to commit to the fight and that the attack risked further stretching Ukraine’s already outnumbered troops. “Operationally and strategically, this attack makes absolutely zero sense,” said one analyst Pasi Paroinen. “This seems like a gross waste of men and resources badly needed elsewhere.” President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia said on Wednesday that he would meet with his country’s security services to coordinate a military response to the attacks and that instructions had been given to assist residents of the Kursk region. In the subsequent days, the Ukrainian offensive has continued, and Russian forces, despite bringing in reserves, have failed to dislodge the Ukrainians from their positions.

On Wednesday, the U.S., Australia, Canada and the Philippines held air and naval manoeuvres in what they said was a show of force to promote the rule of law in the disputed South China Sea. Admiral Samuel Paparo, who heads the U.S. Indo-Pacific Command and top military and defence commanders from Australia, Canada and the Philippines said in a joint statement that they “stand together to address common maritime challenges and underscore our shared dedication to upholding international law and the rules-based order.” They said they were staging the two-day exercises to uphold unhindered passage in the Indo-Pacific region. “The naval and air force units of participating nations will operate together, enhancing cooperation and interoperability between our armed forces,” the commanders said. “The activity will be conducted in a manner that is consistent with international law and with due regard to the safety of navigation and the rights and interests of other states.” China said it held joint sea and air combat patrols on Wednesday near Scarborough Shoal, a disputed territory in the South China Sea, in an apparent response to the exercises. A short statement from the Chinese military’s Southern Theater Command indicated that it was aware of “military activities that disrupt the South China Sea” and that they were “under control.” China regularly accuses the U.S., the Philippines and others of undermining regional peace and stability though their military activities.

On Wednesday, Stealthy F-22 fighters were deployed to a base in the Middle East, the U.S. Central Command said Wednesday.

On Thursday, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing unnamed U.S. officials, that the U.S. has warned Iran that its newly elected government and economy could suffer a devastating blow if it were to mount a major attack against Israel, a U.S. official said. The warning has reportedly been communicated to Tehran directly as well as through intermediaries, said the official, who declined to provide specifics. “The United States has sent clear messaging to Iran that the risk of a major escalation if they do a significant retaliatory attack against Israel is extremely high,” said the official. Those messages have also put Tehran on notice “that there is a serious risk of consequences for Iran’s economy and the stability of its newly elected government if it goes down that path,” the official added.

On Thursday, the S&P 500 posted its best day in nearly two years after a better-than-expected jobless claims report helped ease fears that the labour market is weakening. U.S. stock futures and Treasury yields rose immediately after the release of data showing initial jobless claims, a proxy for layoffs, were 233,000 during the week ended August 3, down from the prior week’s recent high of 250,000. That helped alleviate some of the concern about a U.S. labor-market slowdown that rattled markets after last week’s weaker-than-expected jobs report. The benchmark 10-year Treasury yield climbed back near 4%, closing at 3.997%. The S&P 500 closed up 2.3%, its biggest single-day gain since November 2022. The Nasdaq jumped 2.9%, while the Dow Jones Industrial Average was 1.8%, or 683.04 points, higher. Thursday’s gains were broad-based, with every S&P 500 sector closing green. The index was down just 0.5% on the week at Thursday’s close, recovering most of its sharp losses.

On Friday, a plane carrying 61 people crashed outside the Brazilian city of Sao Paulo, killing all onboard, local officials said. The Brazilian airline Voepass confirmed that the plane crashed northeast of the city of Sao Paulo. “The company regrets to inform that all 61 people on board flight 2283 died at the site,” Voepass said in a statement. “At this time, Voepass is prioritising provision of unrestricted assistance to the victims’ families and effectively collaborating with authorities to determine the causes of the accident.” The airline said earlier that 62 people were aboard the flight before updating the number. Officials in the town of Valinhos also said there were no survivors and only one home in a local residential complex had been damaged in the area where the plane fell, but none of the residents were hurt. The air traffic tracker Flightradar24 said in a social media post that the aircraft was an ATR72-500 built in 2010 and was en route to Sao Paulo from the Cascavel airport in the southern state of Parana.

On Saturday, the Trump campaign said that some of its internal communications had been hacked and suggested Iran was responsible as the country seeks to undermine the former president’s prospects in the November election. Documents belonging to the campaign “were obtained illegally from foreign sources hostile to the United States, intended to interfere with the 2024 election and sow chaos throughout our Democratic process,” Steven Cheung, a Trump campaign spokesman, said in a statement. He cited recent statements from the U.S. government that accused Iran of seeking ways to prevent Trump from returning to the White House, including an alleged assassination plot. Cyber-threat research published on Friday by Microsoft has also detailed Iran’s election hacking operations. The Trump campaign didn’t provide direct evidence that Iran was responsible for the hack. Instead, it tied the hack to the new Microsoft cyber-threat research that laid out a range of election interference operations it said were linked to several different Iranian cyber groups, noting an observed increase in Iranian activity in recent months. The Federal Bureau of Investigation in a statement said it was “aware of the media reporting. We decline to comment further.”  On Sunday, the Wall Street Journal reported that the U.S. has discussed pardons for Venezuelan leader Nicolàs Maduro and top lieutenants of his who face Justice Department indictments in return for giving up power, said three people familiar with the Biden administration deliberation. One of the people said the U.S. has put “everything on the table” to persuade Maduro to leave before his term ends in January. The U.S. reportedly made an amnesty offer to Maduro during secret talks in Doha last year, but the strongman declined to discuss arrangements where he would have to leave office, said people familiar with the matter. One person close to the regime said Maduro’s position hasn’t changed, for now. Maduro has said that he’s open to talks as long as Washington shows him respect. At other times, he tells the U.S. to mind its own business. “Don’t mess with Venezuela’s internal affairs, that’s all I ask for,” Maduro said in a news conference Friday.

source:The World That Was – Africa Unauthorised