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Farmers proceed to their fields for cultivation under Nigerian Army escort while departing Dikwa town in Borno State, Nigeria, on August 27, 2025. Despite the threat of insurgent attacks, farmers in Borno are gradually returning to their farmlands under military escort, often spending limited time on cultivation.
What We’re Watching: Trump threatens Nigeria, Jihadis surround Mali’s capital, Latin Americans back US-led regime change in Venezuela
Trump threatens hit on Nigeria over plight of Christians
US President Donald Trump on Saturday threatened military action against Nigeria, Africa’s most populous country, over the government’s alleged failure to protect Christian communities, who make up nearly half of the country’s 231 million people. Nigerian President Bola Tinubu rejected the claims, which echo a growing concern about anti-Christian violence among the American right, though his adviser said he’d “welcome US assistance” in combating jihadist insurgencies such as ISWAP, which have targeted Christian communities. In addition, there has been a surge in sectarian violence in Nigeria this year, a result of intensifying competition for land and resources between farmers, who are typically Christian, and herders, who are mostly Muslim.
Mali on verge of succumbing to jihadis
Meanwhile, in nearby Mali, jihadis have surrounded and blockaded the capital of Bamako, starving the city’s four million residents of fuel. The militants are now on the cusp of taking power from the Russian-backed military junta there. This is the latest twist in a 13-year long conflict that has featured three military coups, a French invasion, a Russian intervention, a French withdrawal, and a notorious jihadi leader nicknamed “One-Eyed Nelson.” The rise of an ultraconservative jihadist caliphate would subject Mali’s people – especially its women – to immense hardship, while also threatening to create a fresh refugee crisis that could ripple towards Europe. It would also mark a fresh setback for Russia, and could boost jihadist groups that have sprouted in neighboring Burkina Faso and Niger.
Split-screen on regime change in Venezuela
Nearly half of Americans oppose US-led regime change in Venezuela, and just 18% support it, a YouGov poll says. But people in the region see things differently, according to a multi-country Bloomberg study that shows 53% of respondents want Tío Sam to knock out Venezuelan strongman Nicolás Maduro. Mexico is the only country where opposition surpasses support for the idea. Within Venezuela? A plurality said they “don’t know.” The US has recently been striking boats it says belong to drug traffickers tied to the Venezuelan regime. But with more US warships in the region than at any time since the 1989-1990 invasion of Panamá, many are wondering if Maduro’s regime itself is the eventual target. (For more on what that could look like, see here.)
Trump hits oil states
Listen: US President Donald Trump has been piling the pressure on Russia and Venezuela in recent weeks. He placed sanctions on Russia’s two largest oil firms and bolstered the country’s military presence around Venezuela – while continuing to bomb ships coming off Venezuela’s shores. But what exactly are Trump’s goals? And can he achieve them? And how are Russia and Venezuela, two of the largest oil producers in the world, responding?
GZERO reporters Zac Weisz and Riley Callanan discuss.
What the Trump-Xi meeting means for US-China relations
In this Quick Take, Ian Bremmer weighs in on the Trump-Xi meeting in South Korea calling it “a truce, not a breakthrough.”
He explains, “It stabilizes the relationship… it brings us closer back to where we were before.” Key agreements include a one-year suspension of recent Chinese restrictions on rare earths, lowered tariffs, and renewed US soybean purchases.
But Ian notes that “there is still very much a movement longer term towards decoupling,” especially around tech.
US President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping talk as they leave after a bilateral meeting at Gimhae International Airport, on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit, in Busan, South Korea, on October 30, 2025.
The gaps in the Trump-Xi trade truce
After months of escalating tensions, US President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping reached a trade truce at their meeting in South Korea on Thursday.
What was agreed? The two sides each delayed imposing further tariffs, with Trump reducing the overall US tariff rate on China to 45%. China agreed to drop its rare earth export ban, while the US may allow China to purchase advanced semiconductors again. That’s not all: the two countries suspended port fees, China pledged to started buying American soybeans again, good news for American soy farmers who have lost market share to Brazil.
What didn’t the meeting resolve? There was no update on terms for the sale of TikTok to American buyers, and the two sides also didn’t discuss Chinese access to the most powerful US-made microchips. More broadly, Trump and Xi didn’t appear to come to any resolution on Washington’s longer-term issues, such as the US trade deficit with China, concerns about Chinese theft of US intellectual property, or the defense of Taiwan – which the US still supports against Beijing’s claims of sovereignty.
Nuclear tensions start to simmer. The US commander-in-chief announced on Thursday that he had ordered the Pentagon to start testing nuclear weapons “on an equal basis” with Russia and China. The US hasn’t tested a nuke since 1992, and is party to a 1996 treaty with Moscow and Beijing that bars such actions. Testing is unlikely to start soon, in part because of safety concerns but also because most National Nuclear Security Administration are furloughed right now due to the government shutdown.
What about Ukraine? Trump said that Ukraine “came up very strongly” during the meeting with Xi, but did not elaborate, and gave no indication that the two men had discussed the impact of recent US sanctions on Russia’s two largest oil producers. Chinese refineries – the largest buyers of Russian crude – have reportedly begun to explore alternative sources (read more here).
Scoring the showdown: who won?? “Nobody has the upper hand,” said Eurasia Group’s Practice Head for China David Meale. “What both sides have instead is an understanding that each is capable of triggering the other’s intolerable pain points – and therefore a path must be struck between them.”
But, Meale added, “China must feel more satisfied than the US about where it is compared to the beginning of 2025,” in part because Beijing has stood up to Trump’s “Liberation Day” tariffs and identified a “potent leverage tool through rare earths export controls.”
Overall assessment of the meeting? Trump couldn’t have been more pleased, saying, “On a scale of 1 to 10, the meeting with Xi was 12.”
Meale was a little more equivocal.
“I would put it at a seven out of 10.”
Trump-Xi meeting in South Korea
The talks come after weeks of trade escalation The US expanded export controls, which Beijing saw as a major provocation, and China responded with new rules on licensing agreements for critical minerals, a situation Ian describes as “a bit of miscommunication.”
Ian explains that the confusion was fueled by the fact that “you don’t have trusted regular engagement like you did at the end of the Biden administration,” making it easier for actions and tweets to be misinterpreted.
Still, Ian emphasizes that both sides “want to get to yes.” With the US still developing domestic rare earth production and China facing slowing growth, neither economy can afford further shocks.
Russian President Vladimir Putin chairs a meeting with members of the Security Council via video link at the Kremlin in Moscow, Russia, on October 24, 2025.
Will Trump’s new Russia sanctions work?
It’s been a tumultuous couple of weeks for US-Russia relations.
Two weeks ago, US President Donald Trump was considering handing Tomahawk missiles to Ukraine, which would allow Kyiv to strike deep into Russian territory. But, following a phone call with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Oct. 16, Trump decided to chop the Tomahawk plan, and announced a meeting with his Russian counterpart.
That quickly fell apart, though – reportedly because negotiations over a ceasefire deal had stalled – and by Oct. 23, an agitated Trump announced that he was sanctioning Russia’s two largest oil companies, Rosneft and Lukoil, which together produce half of Russia’s oil. This was a step that even the Biden administration refused to take, largely over fears that oil prices would spike, driving up inflation.
Now, combined with Biden-era sanctions on Gazpromneft and Surgutneftegaz, the US has blacklisted Moscow’s four largest crude producers.
There’s just one problem, per Eurasia Group’s Russia expert Alex Brideau.
“The new US sanctions are most likely insufficient to change Putin’s strategy in the war against Ukraine,” said Brideau. “The full effect will depend, in part, on whether the largest importers of Russian oil, India and China, halt these purchases.”
Will China and India halt purchases? Here’s the thing: they just might. This would be devastating for the Kremlin: the two countries combined currently purchase more than 80% of Russia’s crude exports, per the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air. What’s more, the oil & gas sector is vital to Russia’s government purse – it’s responsible for 30-50% of total budget revenues.
Even absent any pressure from the government to comply or ignore the sanctions, Chinese refiners are already looking elsewhere, per Eurasia Group’s Practice Head for China David Meale.
“I think there is no chance that China will push its firms to comply with the sanctions for the purposes of improving bilateral relations,” said Meale. “However, their major oil companies have already curtailed purchases due to how the threat of sanctions affects their other international interactions.”
India, meanwhile, has until now resisted Trump’s direct pressure to stop buying Russian oil, in part because it wants Moscow to stay neutral if China-India tensions flare up again. With the new US sanctions in place, though, it could be a different story.
“The sanctions on the two largest Russian oil firms have certainly changed the situation,” said Ashok Malik, partner and chair of The Asia Group’s India practice. “I would expect Russian oil purchases to decline significantly — at least in the medium run — should these measures be carried through.”
It seems the process has already begun: Reuters reported last week that Indian oil refiners are poised to halt purchases of Russian oil.
“A near-total halt in Russian crude imports by late November appears inevitable – not out of political alignment, but because continuing would endanger India’s economy itself,” Ajay Srivastava, founder of the Delhi-based Global Trade Research Initiative, told GZERO.
In a sign that the sanctions are already hurting Russian crude firms, Lukoil unveiled a plan yesterday to sell off its foreign assets.
So it looks like Moscow is in trouble? There are signs that the attritional war is starting to take a toll on the Russian economy, which had been remarkably resilient over the first three years of the war. The International Monetary Fund forecast that the Russian economy will expand by less than 1% this year – it grew over 4% in each of the last two years. Inflation has remained stubbornly high at around 8%. And Russians are becoming less optimistic about whether economic conditions are improving in their area, per a Gallup poll.
“Over a longer period of time,” said Brideau, “these trade-offs may become too difficult for the state to manage.”
A stubborn (Moscow) mule. If there is one last reason that Russia will continue this war, it’s Putin. The Russian leader has displayed an extraordinarily high threshold for pain on the battlefield: his army has suffered huge losses and is advancing in Ukraine at a snail’s pace, yet he has shown no willingness to compromise on his main war objectives. He believes that Ukraine belongs to Russia, and that NATO shouldn’t be continuing to expand along Russia’s border.
If this high pain threshold applies to economic suffering, too, then these sanctions won’t stop the war any time soon.
“Politically, Putin remains strongly committed to his objectives in Ukraine,” said Brideau. “He is willing to risk the long-term health of the Russian economy to pursue these goals.”
U.S. President Donald Trump, alongside Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi, speaks to the country's military personnel aboard the aircraft carrier George Washington at the U.S. Navy base in Yokosuka, Kanagawa Prefecture, eastern Japan, on Oct. 28, 2025.
What We’re Watching: US and Japan sign rare earths deal, Bill Gates softens on climate, world’s oldest leader declares victory
Trump signs deals in Tokyo
US President Donald Trump and Japan’s new Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi signed a critical minerals deal and Tokyo pledged $550 billion of fresh investment in the US, as well as purchases of American pickups. Trump heaped praise on Takaichi, Japan’s first female leader, who is a conservative China hawk and a protegé of slain former PM Shinzo Abe, a Trump pal. Takaichi called for Trump to win the Nobel prize. The dealmaking bonhomie smoothed rocky relations between the US and its longstanding ally Japan. Trump’s next Asia stop is in South Korea tomorrow, ahead of a crucial Thursday summit with Chinese President Xi Jinping. A mooted meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un appears not to be in the cards.
Bill Gates changes his tune on climate change
A week before COP30 climate summit in Brazil, Bill Gates has cautioned against a “doomsday outlook” on climate change. Record scrrrratch – what? The global philanthropist, who has poured billions into the effort to slow global warming, now says we should focus more energy on tackling disease and poverty in the developing world instead. Gates’s focus has shifted in part because of the Trump administration’s moves to slash foreign aid budgets – he wants to fill the void left by defunct USAID programs. Earlier this year his flagship clean energy venture fund shuttered its climate policy group.
World’s oldest leader wins another term in Cameroon
Who’d have guessed it? Cameroon’s 92-year-old President Paul Biya was elected to an eighth seven-year term in office, after he was finally declared the victor of the West African country’s October 12th election on Monday. Biya officially won 53.7% of the vote, against just 35.2% for opposition leader Issa Tchiroma Bakary – who had declared victory last week. Biya’s victory claim has prompted violent unrest in the oil-rich nation, including in Bakary’s hometown of Garoua. The protests had been expected to continue Tuesday, but a combination of bad weather and a fierce crackdown appear to have kept demonstrators at bay for now.
Trump’s East Wing demolition, Binance pardon, and tariffs on Canada
While President Trump’s demolition of the White House East Wing dominates the headlines, Ian Bremmer says bigger stories are being overlooked.
Chief among them is Trump’s pardon of Binance founder Changpeng Zhao, whose crypto platform underpins the Trump family’s digital currency. “The fact that this stinks to high heaven is of zero concern to Trump,” Ian says. “It makes the administration look like it’s for sale.”
There’s also Trump’s new 10% tariff on Canada, in retaliation for a Reagan clip aired by Ontario in US markets. “It’s a farce,” Ian adds. “There’s clearly no national emergency here.”