Swiss announces new defence minister, Singapore cooperation deal
14 Mar 2025 16:09
ZURICH (Reuters) The Swiss government said on Friday that Martin Pfister will be the country's new defence minister when Viola Amherd steps down at the end of the month.
Separately, the government said it had approved a memorandum of understanding to step up defence cooperation with Singapore which would allow the two to deepen collaboration on research, development, innovation and defence procurement.
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Middle East Eye
2 hours ago
- Middle East Eye
US warns countries not to join French, Saudi UN conference on Palestine: Report
The US is lobbying foreign governments not to attend a UN conference next week sponsored by France and Saudi Arabia on a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, according to a US diplomatic cable reported by Reuters. The cable, sent to countries on Tuesday, warns them against taking "anti-Israel actions" and says attending the conference would be viewed by Washington as acting against US foreign policy interests. France, a permanent member of the UN Security Council, is a US ally in Nato. Saudi Arabia is one of the US's closest Middle East partners. US President Donald Trump was feted during a May visit to Riyadh, where Saudi Arabia signed billions of dollars of investment deals with the US. France and Saudi Arabia are co-hosting the gathering between 17 and 20 June in New York. New MEE newsletter: Jerusalem Dispatch Sign up to get the latest insights and analysis on Israel-Palestine, alongside Turkey Unpacked and other MEE newsletters "We are urging governments not to participate in the conference, which we view as counterproductive to ongoing, life-saving efforts to end the war in Gaza and free hostages," the cable says, according to Reuters. "The United States opposes any steps that would unilaterally recognise a conjectural Palestinian state, which adds significant legal and political obstacles to the eventual resolution of the conflict and could coerce Israel during a war, thereby supporting its enemies,' it added. France had been lobbying the UK and other European allies to recognise a Palestinian state at the conference. However, Middle East Eye reported in June that the US has warned Britain and France against recognising a Palestinian state at the conference. At the same time, Arab states have been urging them to proceed with the move, sources told MEE. In late May, United Nations member states held consultations in preparation for the conference, during which the Arab Group urged states to recognise Palestinian statehood. The Arab Group said they would measure the success of the conference by whether significant states recognise Palestine, sources in the UK Foreign Office told MEE. Since the 1950s, successive American administrations have stated that their ultimate goal in ending the Palestinian-Israeli conflict is a two-state solution. Many experts and diplomats have earmarked occupied East Jerusalem, the occupied West Bank and Gaza, which Israel seized from Egypt and Jordan in the 1967 war, as the heartland of a future Palestinian state. But US ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee told Bloomberg News on Tuesday that a Palestinian state in the occupied West Bank was no longer a US policy goal. He said Israel's 'Muslim neighbours' could give up their land to create one. According to the cable, the US said that "unilaterally recognizing a Palestinian state would effectively render Oct. 7 Palestinian Independence Day'. Hamas led an attack on southern Israel on 7 October 2023, killing around 1,200 people. Israel responded by launching a devastating assault on Gaza that has killed more than 54,000 Palestinians, mainly women and children, and reduced the enclave to rubble. The US cable also said Washington was working with Egypt and Qatar to reach a ceasefire in Gaza and free the captives there. "This conference undermines these delicate negotiations and emboldens Hamas at a time when the terrorist group has rejected proposals by the negotiators that Israel has accepted,' it said. The Trump administration pushed Israel to agree to a three-phase ceasefire with Hamas in January. Israel broke that agreement by refusing to begin talks on ending the war permanently and unilaterally resumed attacking Gaza.
Dubai Eye
4 hours ago
- Dubai Eye
World Bank cuts global growth forecast as trade tensions heighten uncertainty
The World Bank slashed its global growth forecast for 2025 by four-tenths of a percentage point to 2.3 per cent, saying that higher tariffs and heightened uncertainty posed a "significant headwind" for nearly all economies. In its twice-yearly Global Economic Prospects report, the global lender lowered its forecasts for nearly 70 per cent of all economies - including the US, China and Europe, as well as six emerging market regions - from the levels it projected six months ago before US President Donald Trump took office. Trump has upended global trade with a series of on-again, off-again tariff hikes that have increased the effective US tariff rate from below 3 per cent to the mid-teens - its highest level in almost a century - and triggered retaliation by China and other countries. The World Bank is the latest body to cut its growth forecast as a result of Trump's erratic trade policies, although US officials insist the negative consequences will be offset by a surge in investment and still-to-be approved tax cuts. It stopped short of forecasting a recession, but said global economic growth this year would be the weakest outside of a recession since 2008. By 2027, global gross domestic product growth was expected to average just 2.5 per cent, the slowest pace of any decade since the 1960s. The report forecast that global trade would grow by 1.8 per cent in 2025, down from 3.4 per cent in 2024 and roughly a third of its 5.9 per cent level in the 2000s. The forecast is based on tariffs in effect as of late May, including a 10 per cent US tariff on imports from most countries. It excludes increases that were announced by Trump in April and then postponed until July 9 to allow for negotiations. The World Bank said global inflation was expected to reach 2.9 per cent in 2025, remaining above pre-COVID-19 levels, given tariff increases and tight labor markets. "Risks to the global outlook remain tilted decidedly to the downside," it wrote. The lender said its models showed that a further increase of 10 percentage points in average US tariffs, on top of the 10 per cent rate already implemented, and proportional retaliation by other countries, could shave another half of a percentage point off the outlook for 2025. Such an escalation in trade barriers would result "in global trade seizing up in the second half of this year... accompanied by a widespread collapse in confidence, surging uncertainty and turmoil in financial markets," the report said. Nonetheless, it said the risk of a global recession was less than 10 per cent. Top officials from the US and China are meeting in London this week to try to defuse a trade dispute that has widened from tariffs to restrictions over rare earth minerals, threatening a global supply chain shock and slower growth. "Uncertainty remains a powerful drag, like fog on a runway. It slows investment and clouds the outlook," World Bank Deputy Chief Economist Ayhan Kose told Reuters in an interview. But Kose said there were signs of increased dialogue on trade that could help dispel uncertainty, and supply chains were adapting to a new global trade map, not collapsing. Global trade growth could modestly rebound in 2026 to 2.4 per cent, and developments in artificial intelligence could also boost growth, he said. "We think that eventually the uncertainty will decline," Kose said. "Once the type of fog we have lifts, the trade engine may start running again, but at a slower pace." Kose said while things could get worse, trade was continuing and China, India and others were still delivering robust growth. Many countries were also discussing new trade partnerships that could pay dividends later, he said. The World Bank said the global outlook had "deteriorated substantially" since January, mainly due to advanced economies, which are now seen growing by just 1.2 per cent, down half a percentage point, after expanding by 1.7 per cent per cent in 2024. The US forecast was slashed by nine-tenths of a percentage point from its January forecast to 1.4 per cent, and the 2026 outlook was lowered by four-tenths of a percentage point to 1.6 per cent. Rising trade barriers, "record-high uncertainty" and a spike in financial market volatility were expected to weigh on private consumption, trade and investment, it said. The White House pushed back against the forecast, citing recent economic data that it said pointed to a stronger economy. "The World Bank's prognostications are untethered to the data: investment in real business equipment surged by nearly 25 per cent in Q1 of 2025; real disposable personal income grew by a robust 0.7 per cent month-over-month in April; and Americans have now seen three consecutive expectation-beating jobs and inflation reports," White House spokesperson Kush Desai said. He added that a sweeping budget package currently making its way through Congress would provide tax relief and "further turbo-charge America's economic resurgence under President Trump." The World Bank cut growth estimates in the euro zone by three-tenths of a percentage point to 0.7 per cent and in Japan by half a percentage point to 0.7 per cent. It said emerging markets and developing economies were expected to grow by 3.8 per cent in 2025 versus 4.1 per cent in the forecast in January. Poor countries would suffer the most, the report said. By 2027, developing economies' per capita GDP would be 6 per cent below pre-pandemic levels, and it could take these countries - minus China - two decades to recoup the economic losses of the 2020s. Mexico, heavily dependent on trade with the US, saw its growth forecast cut by 1.3 percentage points to 0.2 per cent in 2025. The World Bank left its forecast for China unchanged at 4.5 per cent from January, saying Beijing still had monetary and fiscal space to support its economy and stimulate growth.
Dubai Eye
4 hours ago
- Dubai Eye
Russia hits Ukraine's Kharkiv with deadly nighttime barrage of drones
A concentrated, nine-minute-long Russian drone attack on Ukraine's second largest city of Kharkiv in the middle of the night killed three people and injured 64, including nine children, Ukrainian officials said on Wednesday. The overnight attack followed Russia's two biggest air assaults of the war on Ukraine this week, part of intensified bombardments that Moscow said were retaliatory measures for Kyiv's recent attacks in Russia. Kharkiv, in Ukraine's northeast, withstood Russia's full-scale advance in the early days of the war and has since been a frequent target of drone, missile, and guided aerial bomb assaults. The intense strikes by 17 drones on Kharkiv sparked fires in 15 units of a five-storey apartment building and caused other damage in the city close to the Russian border, the city's mayor Ihor Terekhov said. "There are direct hits on multi-storey buildings, private homes, playgrounds, enterprises and public transport," Terekhov said on the Telegram messaging app. "Every new day now brings new despicable blows from Russia, and almost every blow is telling. Russia deserves increased pressure; with literally every blow it strikes against ordinary life, it proves that the pressure is not enough," President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said on Telegram. A Reuters witness saw emergency rescuers helping to carry people out of damaged buildings and administering care, while firefighters battled blazes in the dark. Nine of the injured, including a 2-year-old girl and a 15-year-old boy, have been hospitalised, Oleh Sinehubov, the governor of the broader Kharkiv region, said on Telegram. He added that the strikes also hit a city trolley bus depot and several residential buildings. In total, the Ukrainian military said Russia had launched 85 drones overnight, 40 of which were shot down. It said nine were lost - meaning the Ukrainian military used electronic warfare to divert them - or were drone simulators without warheads. "The main areas of the air strike are Kharkiv, Donetsk and Odesa regions," the military said on Telegram. There was no immediate comment from Russia. Both sides deny targeting civilians in the war that Russia launched on its smaller neighbour in February 2022. But thousands of civilians have died in the conflict, the vast majority of them Ukrainian. "We are holding on. We are helping each other. And we will definitely survive," Terekhov said. "Kharkiv is Ukraine. And it cannot be broken."
