US and China extend tariff truce to November, averting escalation
Both countries will maintain current rates of 30% for US tariffs and 10% for China until November 10. The White House cited the need to 'remedy trade imbalances' and 'preserve economic stability' during peak retail season.
The extension follows bilateral negotiations held in Stockholm on 28-29 July 2025, under the Geneva Joint Statement framework. Delegates agreed to suspend 24% of additional ad valorem duties and ease non-tariff barriers.
China committed to lifting certain export controls and suspending its 'unreliable entity' list restrictions. US officials confirmed the truce would allow time to address national security concerns and rare earth access. TECH EXPORTS AND OIL PURCHASES REMAIN STICKING POINTS
Despite the truce, unresolved issues persist, including China's purchases of Russian oil and US tech export restrictions.
Nvidia and AMD agreed to pay 15% of China-related AI chip revenues to the US government to retain export licences. Beijing has reportedly urged firms to avoid Nvidia's H20 chip, citing national security risks.
Analysts warn that unresolved tensions, including tech export controls and oil purchases, could complicate or delay future trade negotiations, especially given that the tariff truce is set to expire in early November 2025.
A summit between Trump and Xi Jinping is expected in late October, likely on the sidelines of the ASEAN Summit in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.
The expected Trump–Xi summit may advance negotiations on industrial subsidies, market access, and reciprocal tariffs, but no final trade deal has been confirmed.'
Experts say the truce extension stabilises markets and signals diplomatic intent but warn that deeper structural issues remain unresolved.
Analysts say the move 'boosts short-term confidence among importers and manufacturers,' particularly in sectors exposed to tariff volatility and supply chain disruptions.
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Daily Maverick
3 hours ago
- Daily Maverick
Trump threatens ‘severe consequences' if Putin blocks Ukraine peace
Trump meets Putin on Friday to discuss war in Ukraine Trump praises call with Zelenskiy, European leaders Macron says no territorial swap schemes on table Europe and Kyiv feared decisions being made over their heads Russia says its war aims remain unchanged By Andrea Shalal, Thomas Escritt and Tom Balmforth Trump did not specify what the consequences could be, but he has warned of economic sanctions if a meeting between himself and President Putin in Alaska on Friday proved fruitless. The comments by Trump and the mood music after a virtual meeting of Trump, European leaders and President Volodymyr Zelenskiy could provide some hope for Kyiv after fears the Alaska meet could sell out Ukraine and carve up its territory. However, Russia is likely to resist Ukraine and Europe's demands strongly and previously said its stance had not changed since it was set out by Putin in June 2024. When asked if Russia would face any consequences if Putin does not agree to stop the war after Friday's meeting, Trump responded: 'Yes, they will.' Asked if those consequences would be sanctions or tariffs, Trump told reporters: 'I don't have to say, there will be very severe consequences.' But the president also described the aim of the meeting between the pair in Alaska as 'setting the table' for a quick follow-up that would include Zelenskiy. 'If the first one goes okay, we'll have a quick second one,' he said. 'I would like to do it almost immediately, and we'll have a quick second meeting between President Putin and President Zelenskiy and myself, if they'd like to have me there.' Trump did not provide a time frame for a second meeting. RED LINES European leaders and Zelenskiy had earlier spoken with Trump in a last-ditch call hosted by Germany to lay out red lines ahead of the Alaska meeting. 'We had a very good call. He was on the call. President Zelenskiy was on the call. I would rate it a 10, very friendly,' Trump said. French President Emmanuel Macron said Trump agreed that Ukraine must be involved in any discussions about ceding land while Zelenskiy said Trump had supported the idea of security guarantees in a post-war settlement. 'President Trump was very clear that the United States wanted to achieve a ceasefire at this meeting in Alaska,' Macron said. 'The second point on which things were very clear, as expressed by President Trump, is that territories belonging to Ukraine cannot be negotiated and will only be negotiated by the Ukrainian president.' German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, who hosted the virtual meeting, said the principle that borders could not be changed by force must continue to apply. 'If there is no movement on the Russian side in Alaska, then the United States and we Europeans should … increase the pressure,' he said. 'President Trump knows this position, he shares it very extensively and therefore I can say: We have had a really exceptionally constructive and good conversation with each other.' Trump and Putin are due to discuss how to end the three-and-a-half-year-old conflict, the biggest in Europe since World War Two. Trump has previously said both sides will have to swap land to end fighting that has cost tens of thousands of lives and displaced millions. RUSSIA MAKES SHARP ADVANCE INTO UKRAINE On a day of intense diplomacy, Zelenskiy flew into Berlin for virtual meetings with European leaders and then with Trump. He and the Europeans worry that a land swap could leave Russia with almost a fifth of Ukraine, rewarding it for almost 11 years of efforts to seize Ukrainian land, the last three in all-out war, and embolden Putin to expand further west in the future. Russian forces have made a sharp thrust into eastern Ukraine in recent days in what may be an attempt to increase the pressure on Kyiv to give up land. 'I told the U.S. president and all our European colleagues that Putin is bluffing (about his stated wish to end the war),' Zelenskiy said. 'He is trying to apply pressure before the meeting in Alaska along all parts of the Ukrainian front. Russia is trying to show that it can occupy all of Ukraine …' A source familiar with the matter said the call with Trump discussed possible cities that could host a three-way meeting, depending on the outcome of the talks in Alaska. Wary of angering Trump, European leaders have repeatedly said they welcome his efforts, while stressing that there should be no deal about Ukraine without Ukraine's participation. Trump's agreement last week to the summit was an abrupt shift after weeks of voicing frustration with Putin for resisting the U.S. peace initiative. Trump said his envoy had made 'great progress' at talks in Moscow. A Gallup poll released last week found that 69% of Ukrainians favour a negotiated end to the war as soon as possible. But polls also indicate Ukrainians do not want peace at any cost if that means crushing concessions. Russian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Alexei Fadeev earlier said Moscow's stance had not changed since last year. As conditions for a ceasefire and the start of talks, the Kremlin leader had demanded that Ukraine withdraw its forces from four regions that Russia has claimed as its own but does not fully control, and formally renounce its plans to join NATO. Kyiv swiftly rejected the conditions as tantamount to surrender.
Daily Maverick
3 hours ago
- Daily Maverick
What role, if any, is South Africa playing in Ukraine peace efforts?
President Cyril Ramaphosa has been in direct telephonic contact with all the main players, but it is unclear just how significant a role South Africa can, or will play. Before the big Ukraine war peace summit between Russian President Vladimir Putin and US President Donald Trump in Alaska on Friday, 15 August 2025, President Cyril Ramaphosa had phone calls last week with the three key players, Putin, Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky – who is, inexplicably, not invited to the Alaska meeting. Were Ramaphosa's calls an indication that he and South Africa have a role to play in trying to end Russia's brutal war on Ukraine, now in its 42nd month? Or was this merely some sort of diplomatic name-dropping? It's clear from the statement by his office that Ramaphosa and Trump mainly discussed tariffs and other aspects of the fraught South Africa-US relationship. Whether they also talked about Trump's peace efforts in Ukraine is unclear. But peace was, of course, the main focus of Ramaphosa's calls with Putin on Thursday, 7 August and Zelensky on 8 August. The Kremlin statement said Putin had shared with Ramaphosa the main results of his conversation the day before in Moscow with Trump's special envoy on the peace process, Steven Witkoff. Putin also complimented the African Peace Initiative, the delegation of Africans which Ramaphosa led in June 2023, meeting Zelensky in Kyiv and Putin in St Petersburg. Ramaphosa's office later said Putin had asked to brief the President on the peace process and had 'expressed his recognition and appreciation for South Africa's involvement in advancing a peace process between Russia and Ukraine'. Call with Zelensky, cryptic statements A day later, Zelensky posted on X that his call with Ramaphosa had been 'a friendly and candid conversation about how to achieve real peace and stop the killings'. He said Ramaphosa had shared details of his conversation with 'the Russian side' (Putin) and was adamant that 'the path to peace must begin with a ceasefire'. Ramaphosa's office said Zelensky 'expressed his appreciation for South Africa's continued support in finding a peaceful resolution to the conflict'. These statements were rather cryptic. Zelensky and Putin are poles apart on how to end this vicious war, yet both expressed appreciation for Ramaphosa's contributions to peace efforts. So what did Ramaphosa say, what advice, if any, did he give? No one who really knows seems to be saying. Jalel Harchaoui, a political scientist at the Royal United Services Institute, said he believed 'Ramaphosa couldn't possibly have said anything of relevance' in his phone calls with Zelensky and Putin. And Ramaphosa's conversations with Zelensky and Putin were probably 'just standard fare', underlining his general narrative that he wants a ceasefire. 'And that does not mean over-concern about Ukraine's territorial integrity or the status of the occupied territories,' said Samuel Ramani, lecturer in politics and international relations at Oxford University (and author of the book, Russia in Africa). 'Moreover, South Africa wants to be seen as supportive of a key Trump initiative to help it deal with the US 30% import tariffs. So I think this is largely routine from him. I wouldn't read too much into it,' he said. Peace talks in SA? One source suggested, however, that a future round of the peace talks starting in Alaska could be held in South Africa. Was this discussed in the phone calls? Dzvinka Kachur, co-founder of the Ukrainian Association in South Africa, noted that Ramaphosa had in the past spoken about the importance of Ukraine's territorial integrity, and so she hoped that he underscored this in his call with Putin. It should also be noted that Zelensky made about 30 calls to international leaders last week to underscore his point that no Ukraine peace negotiations were possible without Ukraine in the room, and that a ceasefire should be unconditional, rather than conditioned on territorial concessions, as the US had initially suggested. And it is understood that Putin also initiated the call to Ramaphosa. Nevertheless Ramaphosa's phone conversations – and there have been others, as well as Zelensky's visit to Pretoria in April and Ramaphosa's in-person meeting with Putin at the BRICS+ summit in Kazan in October 2024 – do prompt the wider question of whether Ramaphosa and South Africa are playing any kind of real role in the Ukraine peace process, and if so what is the contribution, and what should it be? Kachur noted that South Africa was playing a concrete role in the attempts to return some of the about 20,000 Ukrainian children abducted by Russia after its invasion of Ukraine and deported to Russia. When Zelensky met Ramaphosa in Pretoria, he gave him a list of 400 abducted children who South Africa promised to try to return – but with no success and no visible progress so far. African Peace Initiative But Kachur believes there is much South Africa and Ramaphosa could still do for Africa and otherwise. The 2023 African Peace Initiative remained important, not only because of those direct impacts which Ramani mentioned – such as African food insecurity caused by Russia's blockade of Ukraine's grain exports. It also remained important because the Ukraine war also had wider, deeper and longer impacts on principles important to Africa, such as restitution for war damages, accountability for aggression, reframing borders, and the future of the UN system. She also noted that Russia's questionable presence in the Central African Republic, Mali and Niger through the Wagner private security company and its successor, the Africa Corps, had direct negative outcomes for the human rights, safety and security of the continent. 'The illegal, undocumented export of raw materials from these countries also provides Russia with the funding to continue the aggression. This is not bringing any benefits to the continent, but creates more trauma, undocumented weapons and suffering.' And she believes that given its history and role as a champion of nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation, South Africa could and should be doing more to ensure nuclear safety – which has been jeopardised by Russia's military capture of Ukraine's Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant. Perhaps Ramaphosa was conveying messages in his phone calls with Zelensky and Putin, said Steven Gruzd, head of the Africa-Russia project at the South African Institute of International Affairs in Johannesburg. 'But I don't think South Africa is playing any major role in peacemaking between Ukraine and Russia. 'I don't see much room and evidence of us being a major peacemaker. 'The African Peace Initiative didn't really go very far. And there was not much follow-up. I don't think the money or the infrastructure has been put behind it to really make it a serious effort.' Gruzd added though that South Africa had also 'taken measures to appear less one-sided (i.e. pro-Russian) in this conflict, the biggest being Zelensky's visit to SA in April'. He thought that South Africa could play a bigger role in the Ukraine peace effort but that would require US support, which could in turn improve its poor relations with Washington. And he noted that South Africa has attended most of Zelensky's international peace formula meetings (which began in 2023) and is working on two points of the formula – returning kidnapped Ukrainian children and exchanging prisoners of war. Denys Reva, researcher at the Institute for Security Studies in Pretoria, said those meetings still continued at a lower level (mainly, it seems, on the return of the abducted children). And although the African Peace Initiative did not seem to still exist as a formal grouping, South Africa had been engaging in different peace processes, promoting the values of the African peace plan, including advancing African interests and values. For example, at the UN in New York in September 2024, South Africa joined the 'Friends for Peace' group backing the China-Brazil peace plan (which Zelensky strongly opposes because he believes it serves Moscow's interests mainly because it does not demand the withdrawal of Russian forces from Ukraine, as his plan does). Read more: War in Ukraine 'Realistically, no single initiative has yet succeeded in bringing peace,' Reva says. 'Pretoria seems to have shifted its emphasis towards humanitarian concerns, rather than positioning itself as a primary broker of a peace settlement.' He added that 'SA's readiness to mediate the return of the children is an important humanitarian contribution amid stalled negotiations elsewhere. I think Pretoria has been fairly consistent in this regard, and I think that both Kyiv and Moscow probably welcome South African efforts.' And he said both Kyiv and Moscow also see South Africa as crucial in improving their relations with Africa. Ramani said: 'I'm not hearing too much about South Africa being an influential interlocutor.' He added that other countries of the Global South were playing a greater peace role, citing the United Arab Emirates, which he said had hoped to host Friday's summit between Trump and Putin. However, he also added that South Africa was probably doing its best to ensure that the voice of Africa was heard in the Ukraine peace process, and that this was important because the war had significant implications for food security, supply chains and many other things that impacted Africa's socioeconomic development so profoundly. DM
The South African
5 hours ago
- The South African
I want a three-way with Putin and Zelensky, says Trump on pending meeting
US President Donald Trump said Wednesday he was planning a second meeting with Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin soon after Friday's Alaska summit – this time with Ukraine leader Volodymyr Zelensky included. Trump is due to sit down with Putin in Anchorage on Friday, the first meeting between the Russian leader and a sitting US president since 2021. 'If the first one goes okay, we'll have a quick second one,' he told reporters. 'I would like to do it almost immediately, and we'll have a quick second meeting between president Putin and president Zelensky and myself, if they'd like to have me there.' The high-stakes talks come with Trump seeking to broker an end to Russia's nearly three-and-a-half year war in Ukraine, and Zelensky and his European allies have urged the Republican to push for a ceasefire. A stepped-up Russian offensive, and the fact Zelensky has not been invited to the Anchorage meeting Friday, have heightened fears that Trump and Putin could strike a deal that forces painful concessions on Ukraine. Trump said Russia would face 'very severe consequences' if Putin did not agree to end the war after Friday's meeting, without elaborating. The US leader promised dozens of times during his 2024 election campaign to end the war on his first day in office but has made scant progress towards brokering a peace deal. He threatened 'secondary sanctions' on Russia's trading partners over its invasion of Ukraine but his deadline for action came and went last week with no action announced. Trump told reporters he'd had a 'very good call' with European leaders including Zelensky as he took questions from reporters at an arts event at Washington's Kennedy Center. 'I would rate it at 10. You know – very, very friendly,' he said. Let us know by leaving a comment below, or send a WhatsApp to 060 011 021 1. Subscribe to The South African website's newsletters and follow us on WhatsApp, Facebook, X and Bluesky for the latest news. © Agence France-Presse
