Hello,
Here are the five things you need to know today:
UNITED NATIONS. Trump brings more noise to a global gabfest.
UKRAINE. RUSSIA. The White House has a change of tack, not change of heart.
CHINA. Beijing foregoes its WTO developing country perks.
NORTH KOREA. A desire for talks could upend counterproliferation norms.
SOUTH KOREA. JAPAN. A cultist’s arrest in Seoul could shift a vote in Tokyo.
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UNITED NATIONS. All talk
Trump brings more noise to a global gabfest.
In an almost one-hour speech, Donald Trump told the UN General Assembly “your countries are going to hell” due to asylum seekers and “suicidal energy ideas”. The UN blamed an escalator and teleprompter fault on White House staff.
INTELLIGENCE. An allegedly broken teleprompter allowed Trump to veer off script more than usual. The result was a diatribe of familiar and domestic grievances, more suited to a rally than a summit. But in that, the speech was not unusual. All great UNGA lectures, from Fidel Castro’s 4-hour monologue to Nikita Khruschev’s shoe, are primarily aimed at home. And in this, as leaders talk past each other, the UN’s failing, and that of global politics, is shown.
FOR BUSINESS. Nothing new came from the speech except for Trump’s willingness to further diminish himself and US institutions. Plain talk can be refreshing, but the novelty of the president’s style of candour washed off by 2016. Foreign leaders appear to be making fun of him. Emmanuel Macron brought up his speech’s claim of stopping seven wars in remarks to the media Tuesday, adding that if Trump wanted a Nobel Prize, he needed to stop the war in Gaza.
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UKRAINE. RUSSIA. About-two-face
The White House has a change of tack, not change of heart.
After meeting Volodymyr Zelensky, Donald Trump said Ukraine was able to “win” its territory “back in its original form”, and that Russia looked like a “paper tiger”. Asked if NATO should shoot down Russian incursions, Trump said “yes I do”.
INTELLIGENCE. The change in rhetoric is being seen as a shift to Ukraine, but the
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