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India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi during a press conference following a bilateral meeting at Admiralty House in Sydney, Wednesday, May 24, 2023.
India appeases Trump, but will it avoid trade war?
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi says his country will crack down on illegal migration to the United States. The announcement, which came before Modi’s meeting next week with US President Donald Trump in Washington, is part of an effort to head off a possible trade war.
What moves is Modi making? Delhi has made a series of concessions in the past few weeks. On Saturday, itrevised its tariff system, slashing levies on a broad range of imported US goods, from textiles to motorcycles, including Harley Davidsons, whichTrump had repeatedly raised. Modi has also agreed to accept 18,000 Indian nationals currently on the US deportation list and to keep the US dollar as India’s trading currency. The US had a$45.7 billion trade deficit in goods and services with India in 2022.
But a backlash is brewing. Modi is facing anger at home after a US military transportflew 104 Indian nationals in shackles to Amritsar on Wednesday. Foreign Minister S. Jaishankarmaintained that US authorities followed “standard procedure,” but deportees tell a different story, describing a 40-hour flight in restraints.Opposition leaders called the deportations "deplorable and unacceptable” and demanded that they be conducted under humane conditions in the future. We’ll be watching whether future flights go differently – and whether or not tariffs follow.
Washington, DC, USA; President Donald Trump, First Lady Melania Trump, outgoing United States President Joe Biden and first lady Dr. Jill Biden participate in the departure ceremony for the Bidens on the East Front of the United States Capitol in Washington, DC after the swearing-in of Donald Trump as President on January 20, 2025.
Hard Numbers: Biden’s preemptive pardons, Trumpcoin, Billionaires blow up, India convicts hospital rapist
5: With just minutes left in his term, President Joe Biden issued preemptive pardons to five members of his family, explaining that he feared people associated with him could be prosecuted under the Trump administration. Hours earlier, he pardoned Gen. Mark Milley and Dr. Anthony Fauci, as well as the members and staff of the Congressional committee investigating the events of Jan. 6, 2021, and police officers who testified before that committee. Biden also commuted the sentence of Leonard Peltier, an Indigenous activist who was controversially convicted of killing two FBI agents on the Pine Ridge Reservation in 1975.
5.5 billion: A cryptocurrency token launched by President Donald Trump, known as $Trump, reached a value of nearly $5.5 billion within hours of its launch on Saturday. A Delaware company called CIC Digital LLC and Fight Fight Fight LLC owns 80% of the coins, but it is unclear how much money Trump will make from this launch.
3: Oxfam, the UK-based anti-poverty charity, reported that the wealth of billionaires grew three times as fast in 2024 than in 2023, accelerating wealth inequality while the global rate of poverty has barely changed. The report comes as the World Economic Forum, the marquee gathering of the world’s political and financial bigwigs, gets underway in Davos, Switzerland.
1: A court in India has convicted one person, Sanjay Roy, of the brutal rape of a trainee doctor in Kolkata last year that launched nationwide protests — but the parents of the victim maintain that the crime was committed by a group, not a single man. Despite Indian police claiming before the court that the rape was “rarest of rare” incidents, the most recent data available in India shows 31,516 reports of rape in 2022, a fraction of the true number of assaults as many are not reported.
Re-elected Croatian President Zoran Milanovic with wife Sanja Music Milanovic celebrate after winning Croatia's presidential election ON January 12, 2025 in Zagreb, Croatia.
Hard Numbers: Croatia’s populist prez, Sweden sails forth, Mayotte hunkers down again, Hindus commence world’s largest religious ceremony
74: Populist Croatian President Zoran Milanovic won an impressive landslide reelection on Sunday, taking 74% of the vote. His office is largely ceremonial, but the overwhelming margin of victory should send a message to Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic – in power since 2016 – about the changing mood of the country.
3: Sweden, NATO’s newest member state, announced its Navy would contribute up to three warships to the alliance’s efforts to secure the Baltic Sea from Russia. The Swedish coast guard will also contribute a further four ships, with seven on standby. With increased resources, NATO aims to prevent possible provocations like severing undersea communication cables, 10 of which have been damaged since 2023.
1: Nearly one month to the day since the French Indian Ocean territory of Mayotte was devastated by Cyclone Chido, Tropical Storm Dikeledi brought more inundating rains and strong winds to the island. Over 200 people were still missing from the first storm, which killed at least 39 and injured over 5,000 while destroying entire neighborhoods, and the French government has deployed over 4,000 emergency personnel and security forces to the island.
400 million: At least 400 million pilgrims are expected to kick off the Maha Kumbh Mela festival on Monday in the Indian city of Prayagraj, where pilgrims will immerse themselves at the confluence of the Ganga and Yamuna Rivers over six weeks. Hindus believe the mystical Saraswati River will intermingle in the mundane waters and cleanse worshippers’ souls — but the government faces a big logistical challenge: This will be the world’s largest-ever religious gathering, and officials have assembled 150,000 tents, 3,000 kitchens, 145,000 lavatories, all served by 450,000 new electric connections, protected by 40,000 policemen, and transported by 98 special trains making over 3,300 trips.Former Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan pauses as he speaks with Reuters during an interview, in Lahore, Pakistan in March 2023.
Hard Numbers: Pakistan indicts Imran Khan (again), RFK wants polio vaccine revoked, India eyes one election, Australia charges big tech, Zuckerberg and Bezos make YUGE donations
200: Former Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan and his wife, Bushra Bibi, were indicted on Thursday on charges of unlawfully selling state gifts, including jewelry, at undervalued prices. They pleaded not guilty the same day, calling the charges politically motivated amid nearly 200 cases Khan has faced since his 2022 ouster. Khan and Bibi received 14-year sentences before this year’s election, but those terms were suspended on appeal following a prior three-year sentence in a related case.
14: A lawyer for Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Donald Trump's pick to helm the Department of Health and Human Services, has filed a petition to pause the distribution of 14 vaccines – including polo, hepatitis A, and other deadly diseases. The petition also asks the agency to revoke its polio vaccine approval and end COVID-19 vaccine mandates around the country.
1: India’s cabinet has approved legislation for simultaneous national and state elections, the first step in advancing Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s “One Nation One Election” plan. Supporters say it would put a stop to India’s state of “perpetual elections,” but critics argue it would favor the national ruling party, Modi’s BJP, in local races.
160,000,000: In its latest crackdown on Big Tech, Australia will charge social media giants like Meta and Google millions if they don’t pay local media for news content. All platforms with revenue over AU$160 million will be obliged to pay up, but charges will be offset by any commercial agreements voluntarily struck between the platforms and news media businesses.
1,000,000: Nothing says sorry quite like cold hard cash. Meta announced on Wednesday that it's donating $1 million to the inaugural fund of President-elect Donald Trump, and Amazon.com, not to be outdone, plans to do the same. The moves appear to be fence-mending gestures – or, as critics call them, attempts to curry favor. Meta founder Mark Zuckerberg's relationship with the president-elect soured after Facebook and Instagram suspended Trump’s accounts in 2021 for his praise of the Jan. 6 Capitol rioters, and Trump has been critical of Jeff Bezos for owning the Washington Post -- and the newspaper's political coverage.
ISKCON (International Society for Krishna Consciousness) activists hold placards as they protest demanding the release of Hindu priest Chinmoy Krishna Das Prabhu, who was arrested in Bangladesh, in Kolkata, India, 29 November 2024. Chinmoy Krishna Das Prabhu, the spokesperson for the Bangladesh Sammilita Sanatani Jagran Jote was arrested by the Dhaka Metropolitan Police on November 25, accused of disrespecting Bangladesh's national flag during a rally.
India-Bangladesh trade war brews, Hasina accuses government of genocide
Anger in India over mistreatment of Bangladesh’s Hindu minority could spark a trade war. India’s ruling Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party has threatened to impose a five-day trade embargo against Bangladesh unless anti-Hindu violence ceases by next week, and possibly for “an indefinite period” in 2025. Some Indian businesses have already stopped exporting to Bangladesh, and Indian hospitals are reportedly refusing Bangladeshi patients.
Why the threats? Violence erupted last week after the arrest in Bangladesh of Hindu monk Krishna Das Prabhu on sedition charges followingprotests Prabhu led against anti-Hindu discrimination. Prabhu’s supporters stormed the Bangladeshi consulate in Agartala on Monday and reportedly hacked a Muslim lawyer to death in Chattogram.
Hindus constitute less than 10% of Bangladesh’s 170-million-strong population and have long claimeddiscrimination and violence from the Muslim majority. Attacks intensified after former Prime Minister Sheikh Hasinafled Dhaka in August following violent anti-government uprisings. On Wednesday, in her first public address since then, Hasina accused interim leader Muhammad Yunus of genocide.
What’s the issue for India? An ally of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi,Hasina now lives in exile in India, complicating Delhi’s relationship with the new Bangladeshi administration. Bangladesh is a key ally for India’s border security, particularly in the northeastern states where armed insurgents frequently cross the border to escape local authorities.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi arrives to address the media ahead of the commencement of the Winter Session of Parliament, in New Delhi, on Monday, Nov. 25.
Modi’s party posts landslide election victories
Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his party scored a big political win over the weekend. After losing its parliamentary majority in national elections in June, the BJP posted a landslide victory in a state election inMaharashtra, India’s wealthiest state and home to Mumbai, the country’s financial capital. The BJP ran in this election as the head of an alliance that includes two smaller parties.
This victory in India’s second most populous state, combined with a victory last month in the northern state of Haryana, will reduce the reliance of Modi’s BJP on unpredictable allies to move legislation forward at the national level.
Modi also notched a political victory by holding peaceful elections in the violence-plagued territory of Jammu and Kashmir. Though his party didn’t win there, the elections themselves helped to legitimize Modi’s 2019 controversial decision to downgrade the troubled province’s status from state to “union territory,” a move that revoked its previous autonomy and allowed for it to be ruled directly from Delhi.
How did Modi’s BJP-led alliance win big in a year that has seen incumbent parties take political losses in South Africa, France, the UK, Japan, the US, and India itself? In part, the win was secured with cash payments and increased subsidies from the government, politically motivated decisions that will threaten the longer-term fiscal health of these states.
What does Russia give in exchange for North Korean troops?
Carl Bildt, former prime minister of Sweden and co-chair of the European Council on Foreign Relations, shares his perspective on European politics from Stockholm, Sweden.
What are the global consequences of North Korean soldiers now appearing on the frontlines in Ukraine?
Well, I think first, it's a reflection of the fact that Russia President Putin, does have difficulties getting the manpower to man the front lines. He has difficulty recruiting in Russia itself. He's dependent upon soldiers, and evidently, he's now dependent upon North Korea to supply the front lines. I mean, that's a sign of at least long-term weakness in terms of Russia. Then the question is, of course, what has he given in return to the sort of dictator in Pyongyang? In all probability, high-tech and different sorts of military equipment. And that, of course, has serious implications or potential serious implications for stability on the Korean Peninsula. So there are consequences on the frontlines in Russia and on the Korean Peninsula.
What’s the nature of the agreements that German Chancellor Scholz concluded during his recent visit to Delhi?
Well, apart from bilateral German-Indian things, he was putting an amount of pressure on the Indians to move forward on the negotiations ongoing for a free trade agreement between the European Union and India. That's been negotiations that have been going on for quite some time. It's been a valley of tears because of slightly different approaches from the European and the Indian side. But it's clearly very much in the mutual interest to have such an agreement concluded, particularly since we don't know what's going to happen in the US. And more choppy waters when it comes to global trade. So let's see if there is any progress coming out of the visit. It remains to be seen.
Graphic Truth: BRICS economies eclipse the G7
In 2001, a Goldman Sachs economist coined an acronym for the four largest and most promising “emerging market” economies: Brazil, Russia, India, and China became known as the “BRIC” countries.
Five years later, reality imitated art when the countries decided to begin meeting regularly at “BRIC summits,” with the latest occurring in Kazan, Russia, this week. The subsequent inclusion of South Africa upgraded the “s” to a capital letter: the BRICS.
The group, which lacks formal treaties or binding obligations, has always been united more by what it opposes — US dominance of global financial systems — than by what it supports.
After all, it’s a hodgepodge: energy exporters (Brazil and Russia) and importers (China and India), democracies (India and Brazil) and non-democracies (China and Russia), allies (Russia ❤️China) and adversaries (India x China).
But the economic clout of the group is, on paper, formidable. With the addition of Iran, Egypt, Ethiopia, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates this year, the BRICS+ economies account for 36% of global GDP – while the G7 group of wealthy democracies amount to just 29%. But, of course, there’s a catch: China and the US each contribute more than half of their respective group’s GDP.
Here’s a look at the economic size, and breakdown, of the BRICS+ and the G7 group it hopes one day to eclipse — not only economically but also geopolitically.