US Trade Deal Live News Updates: US to announce a major trade deal with "with representatives of a big, and highly respected, country", says Donald Trump
US Trade Deal Live News Updates: U.S. President Donald Trump said he will unveil a major trade deal during a news conference at the Oval Office on Thursday morning, but withheld key details, including the partner country's identity. In a post on Truth Social on Wednesday, Trump said the announcement would feature 'representatives of a big, and highly respected, country' at 10 a.m. EDT (1400 GMT). 'This will be the first of many,' he added, referring to potential trade agreements under his administration's revived protectionist agenda. The tease comes as Trump's trade team continues intense negotiations following his April 2 decision to impose a 10% tariff on most countries—though those duties were temporarily suspended for 90 days. In addition, the former president has levied much steeper tariffs on specific sectors and nations: 25% on autos, steel, and aluminum; 25% on Canada and Mexico; and a dramatic 145% on Chinese imports. While Thursday's announcement has sparked speculation, Trump has not confirmed which nation is involved. Last week, he hinted at potential trade agreements in the pipeline with India, Japan, and South Korea. On Tuesday, he said his administration would review 'several trade deals' over the next two weeks to decide which to proceed with, adding that the U.S. was now 'negotiating from a position of strength.' The moves mark a reassertion of Trump's hardline trade strategy, which he championed during his first term, arguing that America had been taken advantage of by long-standing trade imbalances and weak global enforcement mechanisms. With Thursday's unveiling, all eyes will be on whether the deal signals a broader shift in global economic alliances or a new wave of U.S.-first trade pacts.
South Korea presidential candidate Lee Jae-Myung: US-North Korea summit must restart
reports Reuters
Global temperatures stuck at near-record highs in April: EU monitor
Global temperatures were stuck at near-record highs in April, the climate change monitor Copernicus said Thursday, extending a prolonged and exceptional heat streak that has lasted nearly two years.
"Globally, April 2025 was the second-hottest April on record, continuing the long sequence of months" with temperatures more than 1.5 degrees Celsius above the pre-industrial baseline, said Samantha Burgess from the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts, which runs Copernicus.
(reports AFP)
Japan defence minister Nakatani: North Korea's ballistic missile may have flown on an irregular trajectory
reports Reuters
US to announce trade deal with UK
reports New York Times
Iran FM Araghchi arrives in Delhi to strengthen ties at India-Iran Joint Commission Meet on 75th anniversary of Friendship Treaty
In a key diplomatic development aimed at bolstering strategic ties, Iran's Foreign Minister Seyed Abbas Araghchi arrived in New Delhi on Thursday to co-chair the 20th India-Iran Joint Commission Meeting.
The high-level dialogue comes as both nations mark the 75th anniversary of the India-Iran Friendship Treaty.
Official Spokesperson of the Ministry of External Affairs, Randhir Jaiswal, welcomed the visiting dignitary and highlighted the significance of the occasion.
In a post on X, Jaiswal said, "Warm welcome to FM Seyed Abbas Araghchi, as he arrives in New Delhi for the India-Iran Joint Commission Meeting. An opportunity to review and enhance bilateral cooperation on the 75th Anniversary of the India-Iran Friendship Treaty."
(reports ANI)
Quad conducts logistics network simulation in Hawaii to boost Indo-Pacific cooperation, MEA says
The Quad countries—Australia, India, Japan, and the United States—gathered in Honolulu, Hawaii, from April 28 to May 2 for a Tabletop Exercise (TTX) aimed at launching the Quad Indo-Pacific Logistics Network (IPLN), a key initiative to enhance regional coordination and maritime logistics.
The exercise, hosted at the Asia-Pacific Center for Security Studies, served as a simulation to develop and refine the IPLN, envisioned as a framework for operational cooperation among the four partners. According to India's Ministry of External Affairs (MEA), the IPLN reflects the Quad's broader commitment to a free, open, and inclusive Indo-Pacific.
"The IPLN, along with the Indo-Pacific Partnership for Maritime Domain Awareness (IPMDA), underscores the Quad's resolve to strengthen practical cooperation and collectively address regional challenges," the MEA said in a statement.
The simulation focused on sharing logistics capabilities and enhancing interoperability across humanitarian assistance, disaster relief, and defense operations. Officials and defense planners from all four countries worked together on scenarios requiring coordinated logistics responses across the vast Indo-Pacific maritime domain.
The IPLN is expected to complement existing Quad initiatives such as the IPMDA, which facilitates real-time information-sharing to monitor and respond to maritime activities across the region, particularly in areas prone to illegal fishing and unregulated vessel traffic.
The TTX also comes amid increasing concerns about coercive actions in the Indo-Pacific, with Quad members seeking to deepen security cooperation in ways that avoid overt militarization while reinforcing stability and rule-based norms.
The Quad's efforts in logistics and maritime awareness are widely seen as part of a broader strategy to provide credible, transparent alternatives to China's expanding influence in the region.
US to announce a major trade deal with "with a big, and highly respected, country", says Donald Trump
U.S. President Donald Trump said he will unveil a major trade deal during a news conference at the Oval Office on Thursday morning, but withheld key details, including the partner country's identity.
In a post on Truth Social on Wednesday, Trump said the announcement would feature 'representatives of a big, and highly respected, country' at 10 a.m. EDT (1400 GMT). 'This will be the first of many,' he added, referring to potential trade agreements under his administration's revived protectionist agenda.
The tease comes as Trump's trade team continues intense negotiations following his April 2 decision to impose a 10% tariff on most countries—though those duties were temporarily suspended for 90 days. In addition, the former president has levied much steeper tariffs on specific sectors and nations: 25% on autos, steel, and aluminum; 25% on Canada and Mexico; and a dramatic 145% on Chinese imports.
While Thursday's announcement has sparked speculation, Trump has not confirmed which nation is involved. Last week, he hinted at potential trade agreements in the pipeline with India, Japan, and South Korea.
On Tuesday, he said his administration would review 'several trade deals' over the next two weeks to decide which to proceed with, adding that the U.S. was now 'negotiating from a position of strength.'
The moves mark a reassertion of Trump's hardline trade strategy, which he championed during his first term, arguing that America had been taken advantage of by long-standing trade imbalances and weak global enforcement mechanisms.
With Thursday's unveiling, all eyes will be on whether the deal signals a broader shift in global economic alliances or a new wave of U.S.-first trade pacts.
(reported Reuters)
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Indian Express
32 minutes ago
- Indian Express
Russia launches 500 drones at Ukraine in biggest overnight bombardment of the war
Russia launched its biggest drone attack against Ukraine overnight, a Ukrainian official said Monday, part of an escalating bombing campaign that has further dashed hopes for a breakthrough in efforts to end the 3-year-old war. On the third straight night of significant aerial bombardments, US President Donald Trump lashed out at Russian leader Vladimir Putin, saying he had gone 'crazy' by stepping up attacks on Ukraine. The expansion of Russia's air campaign appeared to be another setback US-led peace efforts, as Putin looks determined to capture more Ukrainian territory and inflict more damage. It comes after Kyiv accepted an unconditional 30-day ceasefire in March that was proposed by the US but that Moscow effectively rejected. This month alone, Russia has broken its record for aerial bombardments of Ukraine three times. Russia is also still pushing along the roughly 1,000-kilometer (620-mile) front line, where it has made slow and costly progress, and is assembling its forces for a summer offensive, analysts say. 'Only a sense of complete impunity can allow Russia to carry out such attacks and continually escalate their scale,' Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy wrote on Telegram on Monday. 'There is no significant military logic to this, but there is considerable political meaning.' The Russian bombardment on Sunday night included 355 drones, Yuriy Ihnat, head of the Ukrainian air force's communications department, told The Associated Press, calling it the biggest of the war. The previous night, Russia fired 298 drones and 69 missiles in what Ukrainian officials said was the largest combined aerial assault of the conflict. From Friday to Sunday, Russia launched around 900 drones at Ukraine, officials said. Russia's Defense Ministry, meanwhile, said Monday that its forces shot down 103 Ukrainian drones overnight that were flying over southern and western Russia, including near Moscow. Russia's Federal Air Transport Agency said 32 flights scheduled to land at three Moscow airports on Sunday and Monday had to divert amid Ukrainian drone attacks. The numbers from Ukraine and Russia could not be independently verified. Soon after Russia's Feb. 24, 2022, invasion, the conflict became a testing ground for increasingly sophisticated drone warfare. Drones are generally cheaper to produce than missiles. Russia has received Iranian-made Shahed drones since 2022 and is now believed to be manufacturing its own version. Ukraine, as well as receiving smaller battlefield drones from its allies to help it compensate for a troop shortage, has developed its own long-range drones for strikes deep inside Russia. Meanwhile, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz said on Monday that there are 'no longer any range restrictions for weapons that have been delivered to Ukraine — neither by the British, nor by the French or by us, and not by the Americans either.' 'That means Ukraine can also defend itself by, for example, attacking military positions in Russia. Until a while ago, it couldn't … it can now,' he said. It was not clear if Merz was referring to the easing of restrictions on longer-range weapons late last year. Before becoming chancellor, Merz called for Germany to supply Taurus long-range cruise missiles to Kyiv, something his predecessor, Olaf Scholz, refused to do. Commenting on Merz's statement, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said that a decision to lift range restrictions was 'quite dangerous' and 'contrary to our efforts to reach a political settlement.' On Monday, French President Emmanuel Macron said the latest Russian bombardments 'show the extent to which President Putin has lied to the Europeans and to the Americans.' He told reporters while on a visit to Vietnam that Ukraine's allies should, with U.S. support, set Putin a deadline 'so that finally everyone can understand that he is lying and that beyond this deadline, massive retaliation is carried out, in particular in terms of sanctions.' The European Union's top diplomat, foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas, also said the bloc intended to impose more sanctions on Moscow, calling Russia's latest attacks as 'totally appalling.' Trump has threatened massive sanctions, too, but so far hasn't taken action. But he made it clear Sunday night that he is losing patience with Putin. 'I've always had a very good relationship with Vladimir Putin of Russia, but something has happened to him. He has gone absolutely CRAZY!' Trump wrote in a social media post. Trump said Putin is 'needlessly killing a lot of people,' pointing out that 'missiles and drones are being shot into Cities in Ukraine, for no reason whatsoever.' The U.S. president also expressed frustration with Zelenskyy, saying that he is 'doing his Country no favors by talking the way he does.' Peskov, the Kremlin spokesman, said Putin makes decisions that are necessary to ensure Russia's security and that the attacks were Moscow's response to a series of deep strikes by Ukraine. He said negotiations are at 'a decisive moment that is linked to emotional overloading for everyone and emotional reactions.' Russia and Ukraine swapped hundreds more prisoners Sunday in the third and last part of a major exchange. All told, each side released more than 1,000 prisoners — soldiers and civilians — in the biggest swap of the war.
Mint
34 minutes ago
- Mint
Xi tightens leash on officials' boozing and lavish living
Local officials gathered in China's central city of Xinyang in March for a seminar about regulations requiring them to be frugal. Over lunch, five officials consumed four bottles of baijiu, a fiery sorghum-based spirit, flouting the very rules they had studied. One of them died that afternoon, according to an official account, which didn't state the cause of death. The officials at the lunch tried to hide the illicit consumption of alcohol, the account said, by paying off the deceased official's family and omitting the drinking in their reports to superiors. The Communist Party's top disciplinary agency highlighted the incident amid a new campaign to denounce extravagant and profligate conduct within the party's rank and file, underscoring Xi Jinping's struggle to rein in what he sees as widespread hedonism in China's bureaucracy. 'The party center has beaten drums and swung hammers, issued orders time and again," but some officials still 'turned a deaf ear and showed no fear or awe," the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection said in its disclosure on the incident. 'For such problems, we must insist on zero tolerance." The CCDI said authorities have punished more than a dozen officials in relation to the Xinyang incident, with penalties including censure, probation, demotion, removal from positions and expulsion from the Communist Party. The Chinese Communist Party's top disciplinary agency has denounced misconduct within the party's rank and file. Beijing reinforced its message with updates to its frugality rules for party and state workers, published in May, adding provisions that included an explicit ban against serving alcohol, gourmet dishes and cigarettes at official meals. Other clauses prohibit floral displays and elaborate backdrops at work meetings, and the purchase of extravagant equipment for events. The new rules, added to a 2013 frugality code, are meant to promote the view that 'thrift is glorious." Xi's belt-tightening efforts underscore how China's economic woes have reverberated across the country, with sluggish growth, a real-estate slump and a weak job market forcing many to adjust to doing more with less. Many local governments have been struggling under heavy debts for years. Such difficulties have stoked public unrest and fueled grumbling over Xi's stewardship of the world's second-largest economy. 'Updating the frugality code will not solve Beijing's fiscal challenges," said Neil Thomas, a fellow on Chinese politics at the Asia Society Policy Institute. 'But it reinforces Xi's political control over the bureaucracy and burnishes his image as a leader who stands against corruption and excess, especially at a time when many ordinary Chinese are feeling economic pain." Xi has been urging officials in recent years to 'get used to living frugally" as part of a government belt-tightening campaign. He has ramped up a crackdown on petty corruption, which has targeted opulence, bribery and other misconduct by low-level bureaucrats that affect ordinary citizens. The crackdown has driven disciplinary cases to record levels. The party punished nearly 313,000 people in 2024 for breaching the 'eight-point regulations," a directive against frivolous and wasteful conduct that Xi enacted shortly after taking power in 2012. This was more than double the 2023 figure and 10 times the total in 2013, the first full year of Xi's leadership, according to CCDI data. 'It is pretty clear that its decades-old anti-extravagance message is not getting through," said Andrew Wedeman, a professor at Georgia State University who studies governance and corruption issues in China. Despite the enforcement, 'cadres will continue to skirt around those new rules and find ways to continue to engage in 'research'—yanjiu," Wedeman said, referring to a Chinese phrase that also sounds like 'tobacco and alcohol." The latest drive against extravagance started in March, when Xi launched an ideological campaign requiring all party members to study the spirit of the party's eight-point regulations. The CCDI recommended a lengthy reading list, including four anthologies of Xi's remarks on discipline and over a dozen sets of party regulations and directives, including rules against convening official meetings at scenic tourist spots and using public funds to buy fireworks for the Lunar New Year. Then in May, the party published the updated frugality code, which included more detailed guidelines on how public money should be spent on government meetings, receptions, travel, offices and vehicles. As well as preventing the display of floral and plant arrangements at work meetings, the new guidance bars officials from using government vehicles for private purposes and gambling while traveling abroad. Officials were also told to avoid arranging activities to welcome or send off visitors at airports, railroad stations and docks. The new guidance also prohibits officials from carrying out lavish renovations of party and state facilities under the guise of repair work. Another provision requires officials to 'resolutely prevent inefficient and ineffective investments." 'Xi wants to signal that the party leadership can detect and discipline cadres who are taking advantage of their positions," said Thomas at the Asia Society Policy Institute. State media issued reassurances that the revised rules wouldn't affect government salaries and are merely intended to end excessive workplace indulgences. Authorities have also made a show of punishing miscreant officials, past and present, to soothe public resentment. In one recent case, authorities in the southwestern city of Ya'an opened an investigation against a former bureaucrat after his 17-year-old daughter posted a photo of her wearing luxury earrings on social media. The image sparked an uproar, with some users claiming that the earrings cost about 2.3 million yuan, equivalent to around $320,000. Others questioned how she could afford them, given that her father was once a civil servant. State media reported in May that Ya'an authorities had uncovered alleged misconduct by the father during his time as a government worker from 2011 to 2017. Investigators accused him of illegally engaging in business activities and concealing the fact that he had a second child when applying to join the civil service, a violation of China's one-child policy that was in force at the time. The father's alleged misconduct 'will be dealt with seriously and in accordance with the law," state television said. Write to Chun Han Wong at
Mint
35 minutes ago
- Mint
Why Chinas auto, tech giants threaten Tesla's self-driving future
Key assisted driving equipment costs 20-40% lower in China: study BYD, others offer advanced driver-assistance as standard feature Tesla charges 64,000 yuan for FSD in China BYD's scale seen as advantage in 'training' assisted driving system AUSTIN, Texas June 10 - Chinese electric-vehicle makers led by BYD beat Tesla in the competition to produce affordable electric vehicles. Now, many of those same fierce competitors are pulling into the passing lane in the global race to produce self-driving cars. BYD shook up China's smart-EV industry earlier this year by offering its 'God's Eye' driver-assistance package for free, undercutting the technology Tesla sells for nearly $9,000 in China. 'With God's Eye, Tesla's strategy starts to fall apart,' said Shenzhen-based BYD investor Taylor Ogan, an American who has owned several Teslas and driven BYD cars with God's Eye, which he called more capable than Tesla's 'Full Self-Driving' . It's not just BYD. Other Chinese auto and tech companies are offering affordable EVs with FSD-like technology for a relative pittance. China's Leapmotor and Xpeng, for instance, offer systems capable of highway and urban driving in $20,000 vehicles. A slew of Chinese firms are chasing the same technology, an industry push backed by China's government. BYD's assisted-driving hardware costs are far lower than Tesla's, according to analyses performed for Reuters by companies that dismantle and analyze vehicles for automakers. The comparisons, which have not been previously reported, show that BYD's costs to procure components and build a system with radar and lidar are about the same as Tesla's FSD, which doesn't have such sensors. That undercuts Tesla's unusual technological approach, which aims to save costs by nixing such sensors and relying solely on cameras and artificial intelligence. The rising competition from Chinese smart-EV players is among the chief problems confronting Tesla CEO Elon Musk after his rocky tenure as a Trump administration advisor as he refocuses on his business empire - as Tesla vehicle sales are tanking globally. The stakes are made higher by a moment-of-truth challenge this month in Tesla's home base of Austin, Texas, where it plans to launch a robotaxi trial with 10 or 20 vehicles after a decade of Musk's unfulfilled promises to deliver self-driving Teslas. Tesla did not respond when reached for comment about its Chinese competitors. Previously, Musk has described Chinese car companies as the most competitive in the world. Chinese competition was one factor driving Tesla's strategic pivot away from mass-market EVs last year, when Reuters reported it had killed plans to build an all-new EV expected to cost $25,000. Musk has since staked Tesla's future instead on self-driving robotaxis, the hopes for which now underpin the vast majority of the automaker's stock-market value of roughly $1 trillion. Now Tesla faces the same stiff competition on vehicle autonomy from many of the same Chinese automakers who undercut its affordable-EV plans. Adding to the challenge are tech firms including Chinese smartphone giant Huawei, which supplies autonomous-driving technology to major Chinese automakers. Short of full autonomy, today's driver-assistance systems offer a critical competitive edge in China, the world's largest car market, where Tesla sales are falling amid a protracted price war among scores of homegrown EV brands. Tesla is further handicapped by China's regulations preventing it from using data collected by Tesla cars in China to train the artificial intelligence underpinning FSD. Tesla has been negotiating with Chinese officials, so far without success, to get permission to transfer such data back to the United States for analysis. Tesla's competitors in China do benefit from subsidies and other forms of policy support from Beijing for advanced assisted driving technology. Their advantages also stem from another consequential factor: cut-throat smart-EV competition that has characterized their industry over the past decade. The resulting EV boom created economies of scale and the industry's tendency to forgo some profit margins to expand new technologies' market penetration quickly, leading to lower manufacturing costs. BYD investor Ogan, of Shenzhen-based Snow Bull Capital, has a front-row seat to China's autonomous-tech battleground. He recently drove several BYD models equipped with God's Eye, he said, and didn't have to take over driving in any of them while traveling the congested streets of Shenzhen, a bustling southern China megalopolis of 18 million people. Another notable smart-EV player in China is Huawei, experts say. Huawei lends its technology and branding to a half dozen automakers including heavyweights Chery, SAIC and Changan, and has lower-profile partnerships with more than a dozen other carmakers, Huawei representatives said. Reuters journalists rode in an Aito M9 — a luxury electric SUV from Seres with Huawei driver-assistance technology — as it navigated Shenzhen roadways in April. With a driver's hands off the wheel, the vehicle exited a highway seamlessly into a congested urban zone, where the M9 proceeded cautiously and slowed to a crawl as a construction worker appeared like he might walk into the roadway. At one point the vehicle turned right and slowly drifted left to avoid two men unloading boxes from a parked truck. The vehicle then parallel parked itself at Huawei's Shenzhen headquarters. Huawei was among several Chinese companies, including automakers Zeekr, Changan and Xpeng, that touted progress towards fully-autonomous cars at April's Shanghai auto show, even as Beijing announced a new marketing crackdown on terms such as 'smart' and 'intelligent' driving in the wake of a deadly crash in a Xiaomi vehicle involving driver-assistance technology. Huawei said it's ready to undergo a new validation regime being developed by Chinese regulators to certify so-called Level 3 driving systems, meaning they are capable enough to allow drivers to look away unless notified by the system to take over. Zeekr, a luxury brand of China auto giant Geely, also plans to soon sell cars with Level 3 systems. Tesla has yet to release such an "unsupervised" version of FSD because its technology needs more training to operate without a driver's hands on the wheel and eyes on the road. Tesla plans to launch self-driving robotaxis in Austin this month. Little is known about its plans. The company has said it aims to initially deploy between 10 and 20 fare-collecting driverless robotaxis in restricted geographic areas of the city, which Tesla has not publicly identified. Chinese EV makers are moving quickly to develop driver-assistance systems in a market where car-buyers are demanding them at a faster pace than in other regions, analysts say. Their ability to do so at lower costs poses the biggest threat to Tesla's new autonomy-based business model. BYD buyers can get an FSD-comparable version of God's Eye as a standard feature in cars priced at about $30,000. The cheapest FSD-equipped Tesla in China is a Model 3 selling for about $41,500. According to an analysis by A2MAC1, a Paris-based tear-down firm that benchmarks components, the mid-level God's Eye version most comparable to Tesla's FSD runs on an Nvidia computing chip with data collected through 12 cameras, five radars, 12 ultrasonic sensors, and one lidar sensor, at a cost of $2,105. That compares to $2,360 for Tesla's FSD, which uses cameras without sensors and two AI chips, the firm estimates. Cameras, radar and ultrasonic sensors are 40% cheaper in China than comparable devices in Europe and the United States, A2MAC1 estimates. Lidar sensors cost about 20% less, the firm says. Sensor costs have fallen because China's EV boom created economies of scale, said A2MAC1 engineer Elena Zhelondz. The fierce competition also pushed carmakers and suppliers to accept lower profits on driver-assistance equipment, she said. BYD's 22% gross margin will likely fall as it gives away God's Eye but it will benefit from a vehicle-sales boost, said Chris McNally, head of global automotive and mobility research for advisory firm Evercore. MORE CARS, MORE MILES, BETTER AI Falling behind the Chinese brands on driver-assistance technology would compound Tesla's challenges in China, where it's already losing market share to rivals including BYD, which sells an entry-level EV for less than $10,000. The growing scale of BYD and others could also provide a technological advantage: Racking up more miles on China roads helps train the AI technology needed to perfect automated-driving systems. BYD has a 'clear and ongoing market-share driving advantage' over Tesla in gathering such on-road data to refine God's Eye, Evercore's McNally said, adding that advantage might only increase as offering God's Eye for free helps sell more BYD vehicles. BYD's scale also helps lower costs by providing uncommon leverage over suppliers. In November, a BYD executive in charge of passenger-vehicle operations wrote to suppliers telling them that the automaker sold 4.2 million vehicles last year because of 'technical innovation, economies of scale, and a low-cost supply chain.' The executive noted the new year would likely bring more growth, but also fiercer competition. Without specifically mentioning God's Eye, he ended the letter by asking the suppliers for an across-the-board 10% price cut on all parts and systems starting on January 1, calling the new year a final 'knockout round.' This article was generated from an automated news agency feed without modifications to text.
