Welcome back to World Brief, where we’re looking at the Trump-Putin summit in Alaska, a proposed U.S. refugee admissions cap that favors white Afrikaners, and India’s warning to Pakistan.
Welcome to Alaska
U.S. President Donald Trump rolled out the red carpet (literally) for Russian President Vladimir Putin when the two men arrived in Alaska on Friday for their closely watched summit on the Ukraine war. Between Trump’s warm welcome to his Russian counterpart and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s notable absence from the talks, it is unclear just how much progress will be made toward securing a peace deal.
Trump and his lineup of top U.S. officials hosted Putin and his own senior delegation at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson. Upon landing in Anchorage, Trump gave Putin a first-class greeting: ordering a military flyover, applauding Putin as he approached, and even sharing the presidential limousine (known as the “Beast”) to ride through the U.S. military base.
“It struck me as an arrival that would be worthy of an ally, instead of a country and a Russian president that considers the United States its enemy or, at best, its adversary,” former U.S. Ambassador to Russia John Sullivan said. This was starkly different treatment from the open hostility that Trump expressed toward Zelensky during their White House summit in February.
Russian trolling ahead of the meeting also had Ukrainian allies pessimistic about Moscow’s intentions. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov stepped onto the tarmac in Alaska wearing a CCCP sweatshirt, which are the Russian initials for the “USSR” or Soviet Union. And Russian journalists’ in-flight meal appeared to be chicken Kiev, a dish bearing the name of Ukraine’s capital city (though with a Russian spelling). Even the United States made some questionable choices, with Trump posting on Truth Social on Friday that he had a “wonderful talk” with Belarusian President Aleksandr Lukashenko, a longtime ally of Putin’s who allowed Moscow to use Belarus as a staging ground for the Ukraine invasion.
Ahead of the meeting, the White House also announced an eleventh-hour change of plans. Trump and Putin were initially supposed to speak one-on-one without additional advisors present beyond their respective translators. But ahead of their arrival, the Trump administration notified reporters that the meeting format had been changed to a three-on-three, with Trump being joined by U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio and White House special envoy Steve Witkoff and Putin being accompanied by Lavrov and Kremlin advisor Yuri Ushakov. No explanation for the format change was given.
Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One on Friday that he wants to see a cease-fire quickly. “I don’t know if it’s going to be today, but I’m not going to be happy if it’s not today,” he said. Although he expressed optimism about Putin’s decision to bring several business-oriented people with him, Trump added that “they’re not doing business until we get the war settled,” and he reiterated past threats that he would impose severe economic consequences on Moscow if Putin appeared uninterested in making progress to end the war.
Several points of contention appear off the table, though. This week, Trump promised Zelensky and his European allies that no decision would be made concerning potential territorial swaps without Ukrainian involvement; Kyiv opposes all land concessions. Trump also suggested on Friday that using NATO for security guarantees was “not gonna happen,” which places doubts on whether Trump will negotiate a deal that allows Ukraine to seek NATO membership in the future.
This is the first in-person Trump-Putin summit since the former began his second term in January, and it is the first time in a decade that the Russian leader has stepped onto U.S. soil. At the time of writing, the two world leaders—along with their last-minute additions—had entered hour three of talks. Experts predict that it may be some time before any news emerges from the room.
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What We’re Following
Refugee cap with a bias. The Trump administration is discussing a potential cap on refugee admissions that would reserve the majority of slots for white Afrikaners, Reuters reported on Friday. A cap of roughly 40,000 admissions for the coming year reflects the White House’s closed-door mindset toward immigration; to compare, the Biden administration issued a cap of 100,000 refugee admissions for 2024. By allocating some 30,000 of the 40,000 spots to Afrikaners, the White House would also be doubling down on its unsubstantiated claims that an anti-white “genocide” is taking place in the country.
On Tuesday, the U.S. State Department released its annual human rights report that, for the first time, included allegations of discrimination linked to Pretoria’s land redistribution acts. South Africa maintains that the policy seeks to return land to dispossessed Black South Africans who suffered under decades of apartheid; today, white South Africans comprise roughly 7 percent of the population yet own around 72 percent of farmland. However, Trump and some of his closest advisors have falsely accused Pretoria of engaging in a genocide against white farmers.
The White House has issued several retaliatory measures against South Africa for its alleged rights violations, including ambushing South African President Cyril Ramaphosa with purported evidence of white genocide during a summit at the Oval Office in May as well as imposing a 30 percent tariff on South African goods this month.
Not the friendliest neighbors. Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi marked India’s Independence Day on Friday with a warning for its neighbor Pakistan. “India has decided that it will not tolerate nuclear threats,” Modi said. “For a long time, nuclear blackmail had been going on, but this blackmail will not be tolerated now.” He vowed to punish Islamabad for any future attacks on Indian soil, saying India’s “new normal” does not differentiate between “terrorists” and those who support terrorism.
The threat comes roughly three months after the nuclear-armed rivals engaged in days of rare, intense fighting that regional experts worried could escalate into a larger war. And it follows Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif’s announcement of the creation of a new Army Rocket Force Command on Thursday, aimed at bolstering the nation’s defense capabilities.
During Friday’s speech, Modi also reiterated the importance of India’s self-reliance in a not-so thinly veiled critique of the United States’ steep tariffs on Indian goods. And he suggested that India would continue its unilateral suspension of the Indus Waters Treaty, which outlines regional water usage rights. Islamabad previously warned that stopping or diverting the Indus River from flowing into Pakistan would be considered an “act of war.”
A shift to the right? For the first time in nearly 20 years, analysts suspect that round one of Bolivia’s general election on Sunday may experience a swing to the right. Local polling currently has two conservative figures, businessman Samuel Doria Medina and former Bolivian President Jorge “Tuto” Quiroga, leading the presidential race. And the long-ruling Movement for Socialism (MAS) is expected to lose seats in the legislature as public dissatisfaction with the left-wing party grows.
Bolivia’s election comes at a time of economic crisis for the country. Inflation rates soared to a 34-year high in July, fuel scarcity remains rampant across the country, the national currency has lost more than half of its value, and cost of living continues to skyrocket for residents. Conservative candidates have capitalized on these concerns to try to push the MAS from power.
It doesn’t help that some of Bolivia’s biggest left-wing figures are not in the running. President Luis Arce announced in May that he would not seek reelection following his internal party rift with former President Evo Morales. And that same month, the country’s Constitutional Court upheld a ruling barring Morales from running due to term limits. Morales claims to have won a fourth term in 2019 but was forced into self-imposed exile over backlash from his political opponents.
Odds and Ends
FP’s news team may be excited about the start of the English Premier League season on Friday, but there’s another major sporting event drawing massive crowds. China kicked off its three-day World Humanoid Robot Games on Friday to showcase advances in technology and artificial intelligence. Around 280 teams from 16 countries entered robot contestants to participate in events including boxing, soccer, and track and field. “We come here to play and to win, but we are also interested in research,” said Max Polter, a (human) member of HTWK Robots soccer team from Germany.
The post Trump Rolls Out the Red Carpet for Putin in Alaska appeared first on Foreign Policy.
