China

US sanctions Turkish bank over alleged IRGC ties, accusing it of facilitating millions in transactions for Iran.

The United States Treasury Department has imposed sanctions on a Turkish bank and its subsidiaries over alleged ties to Iran, as Washington seeks to economically isolate Tehran.

The Treasury Department accused Golden Global Yatirim Bankasi Anonim Sirketi (Golden Global Bank) on Friday of facilitating “tens of millions of dollars’ worth of transactions for the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps-Qods Force” and providing the Iranian government with banking access to move its funds internationally.

Washington alleged the bank “was established for the purpose of enabling Iran’s rahbar network [shadow banking system] to transfer oil revenues from China to Turkey” using gold and cash.

Golden Global Bank responded on Friday, saying it fulfilled all local and international banking compliance rules and would take legal action against the US-imposed sanctions.

There are no transactions conducted by Golden Global Bank that could substantiate the claims made by the US, the bank said in a news release.

“We will exercise all our rights of objection and legal recourse in the most effective manner and will take the necessary actions at the earliest against these allegations and the decision,” the Turkish bank added.

“Financial institutions continue to find out the hard way that we are serious about Operation Economic Outcast,” said Secretary of the Treasury Scott Bessent in a statement published by the department on Friday.

The sanctions place the bank and its two subsidiaries on the US Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC)’s Specially Designated Nationals list, cutting off access to the US financial system.

The bank said individuals and entities named in the OFAC decision “have never been and are not currently customers” of Golden Global.

US Ambassador to Turkiye Tom Barrack said on Saturday that it would be a mistake for Turkish officials “to read [the US’s] narrow measure as a judgement upon Turkiye”.

“The health of the Turkish financial system is not in question; the conduct of one institution was,” Barrack said on X.

Last week, the US took steps towards severing the UAE operations of Egypt’s second-largest bank from financial access after accusing it of processing transactions for companies linked to Iran’s shadow-banking system.

Bessent said on Tuesday on the sidelines of a G20 summit that Washington would likely announce a bank sanction this week and another next week, as it ramps up its economic campaign against Tehran.

China is buying ninety percent of Iran’s oil exports, settling transactions in renminbi, and hiding the rest beneath layers of shell companies. This is not defiance. It is a demonstration, conducted in plain sight, of exactly how far American economic reach actually extends.

Scott Bessent promised, when he launched Operation Economic Outcast last week, that no one would be above the reach of US sanctions. China’s foreign ministry responded by saying Beijing would do everything necessary to safeguard its own rights and interests. That exchange, watched by the rest of the world, is not really about Iran. It is about whether the threat of American secondary sanctions can force a country that has already fought several trade wars with Washington to a standstill into changing its economic behaviour. The answer, which China has been demonstrating methodically for months, is no.

How China Made Itself Immune to US Secondary Sanctions

The architecture of Chinese-Iranian trade has been specifically designed to sit outside dollar-system jurisdiction. Chinese banks and companies that buy Iranian oil settle transactions in renminbi or through barter arrangements, making them effectively immune to American extraterritorial authority. The handful of Chinese entities that still touch dollar-denominated transactions do so through shell companies that can be discarded and replaced faster than Washington can identify and sanction them. The result is the regulatory whack-a-mole problem that American Treasury officials privately acknowledge, eliminate one entity, and three more appear in its place, each more obscured than the last.

Washington could escalate by sanctioning major Chinese banks and companies that have no Iran ties at all, using them as leverage to pressure Beijing to rein in those that do. That option exists on paper. In practice, it would constitute a declaration of economic war against China’s financial system at a moment when the US economy is already strained by six months of conflict with Iran, oil prices are elevated, and midterm elections are eight weeks away. The Trump administration knows this, which is why Bessent’s ultimatum came with no major Chinese institution on the sanctions list. The threat was real. The enforcement mechanism was not.

What a US Victory in Iran Would Cost Beijing

China sources roughly forty percent of its oil imports from the Gulf, with Iran accounting for ten percent of that total. If the US wins this war convincingly, meaning Iran’s government collapses or capitulates and Washington reinstalls itself as the dominant security guarantor across the Gulf, the energy architecture that China has spent two decades building becomes dependent on American goodwill. Every barrel of Gulf oil that China buys would effectively pass through a security framework Washington controls.

The regional knock-on effects compound that problem. The Mecca pact between Saudi Arabia, Turkey and Pakistan, the SCO’s deepening trade and financial architecture, the China-brokered Saudi-Iran normalisation of 2023: all of these represent years of Chinese diplomatic investment in a Middle East that is gradually reducing its security dependence on the United States. An Iranian defeat that pushes regional states back under the American umbrella undoes that investment at a stroke. From Beijing’s perspective, the cost of buying Iranian oil at a discount and absorbing American secondary sanctions is considerably lower than the cost of losing the regional influence that Iran’s survival helps sustain.

Neither Ally Nor Bystander

The SCO summit in Bishkek last week illustrated Beijing’s position with more precision than any official statement. Xi met Putin and Modi bilaterally. Iran’s President Pezeshkian attended the summit and held consultations at foreign minister level. He was not invited to Beijing. He did not get a Xi bilateral. That calibrated distance is deliberate, and it reflects a Chinese calculation that is more sophisticated than either alliance or abandonment.

Beijing does not want Iran to lose. It also does not want Iran to win so completely that Tehran’s regional hegemony destabilises the Gulf relationships China has been cultivating. The Chinese position, buying Iranian oil, refusing to arm Iran, keeping diplomatic engagement at arm’s length, is designed to keep Iran functional without making China responsible for Iranian behaviour. It is the foreign policy equivalent of keeping a fire burning without touching it.

Xi’s scheduled visit to Washington later this month, coming directly after the Bishkek summit, reinforces this reading. Beijing is simultaneously demonstrating to Iran that it has economic backing and demonstrating to Washington that it has strategic restraint. Both demonstrations serve Chinese interests. Neither requires China to choose a side.

Five Things Worth Watching

• Whether Xi’s Washington visit produces any concrete understanding on Iran-related secondary sanctions. If the two sides agree on a framework that gives China cover to quietly reduce Iranian oil purchases over time, the sanctions architecture gains traction it currently lacks. If the summit produces only standard language about constructive competition, Operation Economic Outcast’s China problem remains unresolved.
• The SCO Development Bank’s progress toward implementation. If the bank moves from agreement to operational institution in the coming months, it creates dollar-independent financing infrastructure that makes secondary sanctions significantly less effective not just for China-Iran trade but for the broader Eurasian trade network the SCO is building.
• Whether any Chinese entity on the August sanctions list is large enough that its designation produces real disruption rather than being absorbed and routed around. The signal from August’s first wave was that Washington sanctioned deliberately small targets. The size and visibility of the next wave’s targets will tell you how seriously Washington is willing to press China.
• India’s position on renminbi settlement for its own Iranian oil purchases. If Delhi follows Beijing’s approach and expands non-dollar settlement for energy trade, the secondary sanctions architecture faces a second major exemption that Washington is even less able to address given how carefully it has been courting India.
• Iran’s currency trajectory. The rial has hit record lows despite Chinese oil purchases continuing. If the currency continues to deteriorate even with Chinese demand stable, it suggests Operation Economic Outcast is landing on Iran’s non-oil economy in ways that the Chinese lifeline cannot fully offset which changes the pressure calculus regardless of whether Beijing complies.

The Bottom Line

Washington designed Operation Economic Outcast to isolate Iran. What it has demonstrated is the outer boundary of American economic jurisdiction in a world where China has spent a decade building the infrastructure to sit outside it. Renminbi settlement, dark fleet shipping, teapot refineries, shell company networks, these are not improvised workarounds. They are a parallel financial architecture, constructed precisely for this contingency, and it works well enough to keep Iranian oil flowing at volumes Washington cannot stop.

The deeper problem for the Trump administration is not that China is defying its sanctions. It is that China is proving, transaction by transaction, that the sanctions cannot be enforced against a country of sufficient size and sufficient preparation. That demonstration has an audience well beyond Beijing and Tehran. Every country currently watching whether to comply with American secondary sanctions is learning the same lesson: the reach of US economic power has a ceiling, and China has found it.

China has long been a rare partner to Iran, with the economic heft to blunt the United States’ efforts to strangle the Iranian economy.

Yet even as China opposes US President Donald Trump’s latest pressure campaign, few observers expect it to go much further than the modest economic links it has thus far forged with Iran to shield it.

While China opposes the Trump administration’s military attacks and sanctions against Iran, Beijing’s relationship with Tehran is just one consideration in a foreign policy that seeks to balance relations with numerous countries, including the US and the Gulf states, limiting its appetite to prop up the Iranian leadership at any cost, analysts say.

“China, with broader global interests, can only actively promote de-escalation of the US-Iran conflict, and cannot and will not engage in fierce confrontation with the US for Iran’s sake,” said Hongda Fan, director of the China-Middle East Center at Shaoxing University in China.

“Ultimately, the US-Iran conflict must be resolved by the two countries themselves,” Fan said.

China and Iran share substantial trade links, particularly in energy, and a mutual suspicion of US dominance, but their relationship is heavily lopsided, with Tehran depending on Beijing far more than vice versa.

That asymmetry in ties was on full display this week at the annual gathering of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, a 10-member bloc widely seen as a counterbalance to US hegemony, where Chinese President Xi Jinping joined more than a dozen non-Western leaders, including Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian.

While Iranian state media reported that Pezeshkian held a “brief meeting” with Xi on the sidelines of the summit in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan, Chinese outlets made no mention of the encounter.

Xi immediately followed his attendance at the summit with his first visit to Egypt in a decade on Tuesday, using the visit to call on countries in the Middle East to oppose “external interference” and reiterate his calls for a diplomatic resolution to the Iran war.

As Iran’s top trade partner, China has taken up to 90 percent of Iranian oil exports since the US and Israel launched their war in late February.

Iranian crude, however, accounts for only about 2 percent of China’s overall energy mix.

While China’s oil purchases have been an economic lifeline for Tehran, Chinese importers have not been immune to fears of exposure to US sanctions.

China’s major state-owned refiners such as Sinopec and PetroChina have shunned Iranian oil for years, leaving the trade to independent “teapot” refiners with minimal links to the dollar-based global financial system.

Though the Trump administration has imposed sanctions on these “teapot” refiners and a limited number of China- and Hong Kong-based firms and individuals, it has yet to target major Chinese banks accused of facilitating Iranian oil purchases.

The Trump administration has hinted at targeting China’s financial system as part of its ramped-up sanctions campaign, dubbed “Operation Economic Outcast”, though analysts are sceptical that Washington will risk provoking Beijing’s ire as the sides seek to lower the temperature in their trade war before a scheduled summit between Xi and Trump on September 24.

“The legitimate question is why third countries should be expected to adopt Washington’s unilateral economic policy towards another sovereign state,” said Zichen Wang, deputy secretary-general of the Center for China and Globalization (CCG) think tank in Beijing.

“That does not, however, mean that Beijing will provide Tehran with a blank cheque,” Wang said.

“China is likely to continue opposing US secondary sanctions politically and to defend what it considers legitimate Chinese commercial interests. But past behaviour also shows that major Chinese banks and state-owned companies are highly conscious of sanctions exposure.”

Rhetoric versus reality

Even as Beijing and Tehran have forged closer ties, their relations have for years been marked by a substantial gap between rhetoric and reality.

While China pledged to invest up to $400bn in Iran over 25 years as part of a “comprehensive strategic partnership agreement” signed in 2021, few projects have materialised amid what analysts say is Chinese firms’ reluctance to navigate sanctions and the opaque Iranian bureaucracy.

In 2023, Iran’s then deputy economy minister, Ali Fekri, complained that he was “not satisfied” with China’s level of investment since the agreement, saying it had only amounted to about $185m.

“Iranian experts often blame their government for not doing enough to attract Chinese investors or not pushing Chinese companies to share more technology,” said Andrea Ghiselli, head of research at the ChinaMed Project.

“However, the reality is that there is no point for Chinese companies to give up their ties with the international financial system to expand their business in Iran,” Ghiselli said.

“It is much easier and more profitable to trade and invest elsewhere. Iran’s own domestic physical and bank infrastructure is also an obstacle.”

Meanwhile, the most tangible measure of China’s economic support, purchases of Iranian oil, has been dwindling amid the US blockade of Iranian ports.

Iranian crude exports via the Strait of Hormuz, mostly bound for China, fell from an estimated 1.85 million barrels per day (bpd) in March-April to just 240,000bpd in August, according to data from ship-tracking platform Kpler, though millions more barrels shipped before the blockade are still at sea.

In an interview with CNBC on Monday, US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said “only” about 30 million barrels of Iranian oil remained on the water and Chinese remittances to Iran were “going to run out”.

Kpler last month estimated that about 80 million barrels were in on-water shortage, enough to provide revenues to Tehran for up to six months.

“For China, Iran is valuable – but replaceable across many dimensions. Iranian oil matters, but China can obtain energy from Saudi Arabia, Russia, Iraq, the UAE, and numerous other suppliers,” said Mordechai Chaziza, an expert on China’s Middle East policy who lectures at Ashkelon Academic College in Israel.

“Iran offers geopolitical access, but China possesses relationships throughout the region. Iran supports China’s multipolar agenda, but so do many other states.”

China’s support for Iran is also not risk-free for Beijing, given its important relationships with Iranian rivals such as Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, Chaziza said.

“Saudi Arabia and the UAE are major energy and commercial partners.

“Gulf stability is vital because China obtains roughly half of its crude imports from the Middle East,” he added.

The “ideal outcome” for Beijing, Chaziza said, would be “a stable, sovereign, economically connected, and internationally non-Western” Iran, but not one “whose confrontation with Washington, Israel, or the Gulf monarchies forces China to choose sides”.

Wang, at the CCG, said that while Beijing appears determined to defend Chinese commercial interests, it is unlikely to sacrifice its broader interests in the region or elsewhere.

Beijing’s warning that it is ready to take countermeasures against unilateral sanctions is “not the same thing as promising to underwrite the Iranian economy”, Wang added.

For China, Iran is seen more as a customer than an ally, said Kerri Bitsoff, a former senior official at the US Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control.

“I don’t think this is the alliance some people think it is, even though there’s real support. I think of a more like a customer relationship that Iran can’t walk away from,” Bitsoff said.

“And it was good for China – they got cheap oil, they got a US tied up in the Middle East, but I think that only lasts up until the point where it threatens China’s other interests,” she added.

Beijing must deliver “concrete results” by October or face “harsher measures”, EU Trade Commissioner Maroš Šefčovič has warned in an exclusive interview with Euronews, as Brussels sets an October deadline to rein in China’s record trade surplus with the bloc.

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With talks already underway, Šefčovič said the stakes go well beyond trade, with the future of European industry at play. The next two weeks are set to be crucial, with a video call between the EU’s trade chief and his Chinese counterpart, Wang Wentao, planned for mid-September, as both sides work towards the October deadline.

“This is super political,” he told Euronews, stressing that European leaders want to see results by October. Earlier this week, Commission President Ursula von der Leyen told a business forum in France that dialogue only works if it brings results.

If dialogue does not deliver results, the EU could resort to defensive instruments.

While Šefčovič did not go into detail about what retaliatory measures could look like, he said Brussels is looking to finalise a “diversification instrument” designed with China in mind. He also said the EU is now far more united in its objectives for the negotiations.

“They [EU27] want to see the direction of travel. They want to even have a concept for the solution of this issue, a pilot scheme,” Šefčovič said.

“I’m trying to do it through these negotiations, but they have to bring us very concrete results. Otherwise, of course, there will be a strong political movement to push for, I would say, harsher measures.”

Šefčovič will travel to China in October, ahead of an EU leaders’ summit in Brussels where the issue is expected to be high on the agenda.

All EU countries now run a trade deficit with China.

On the verge of a trade war

Brussels and Beijing have been on the verge of a trade war in recent months following the Commission’s introduction of several measures restricting Chinese companies’ access to the EU market and threats of retaliation from China.

A group of EU officials were in Beijing in recent days, as first reported by Euronews, to push forward the talks. They are expected to return to Europe on Thursday for a debrief.

Despite the sensitive discussions with Beijing, the Commission has already launched several probes into Chinese products over the summer over alleged unfair trade practices. Von der Leyen said the investigations were being stepped up “significantly”.

As pressure mounts ahead of the October deadline, Šefčovič said securing better access for European companies in China would not happen overnight, but stressed that the outline of a deal would be needed to move into a second phase of implementation talks.

“It’s an issue which would require clearly more time than until October,” Šefčovič said. “But what I think it’s very important for us to have by October [is] some kind of proof of concept.”

He added that EU leaders expect the Commission to bring solutions to rebalance the trade relationship, particularly in areas considered “sensitive”, such as “cars, medical devices, agri-food products”.

“We have now unprecedented intensity of our negotiations. I think we never talked to our Chinese counterparts as frequently, as intensely than right now.”

Caracas, September 1, 2026 (venezuelanalysis.com) – The Chinese government has called for its “legitimate rights and interests” in Venezuela to be protected following reports that joint ventures involving Chinese firms are set to be displaced by a US-backed corporation.

“China-Venezuela cooperation is protected by international law and the laws of both countries. China’s legitimate rights and interests in Venezuela must be guaranteed,” foreign ministry spokesman Guo Jiakun said in a press conference on Tuesday.

Guo added that the economic and trade relations between nations “should follow the principles of equality and mutual benefit.”

Beijing’s warning came in the wake of an announced US-Venezuela oil deal that Venezuelan Acting President Delcy Rodríguez termed “historic” and US President Donald Trump called “the biggest in history.”

Under the joint plan, Washington-backed North American Blue Energy Partners (NABEP) is set to receive long-term concessions to develop 17 oilfields, holding 65 billion barrels of proven crude reserves, in the Caribbean nation. The projects are split between light- and medium-crude fields in western Venezuela and extra-heavy crude ventures in the eastern Orinoco Oil Belt.

According to Reuters, five of the oilfields to be handed over to NABEP are joint initiatives with Chinese companies, including state-owned CNPC and Hong Kong-registered China Concord Petroleum. In 2025, China Concord installed a drill rig in Lake Maracaibo in what was the first major infrastructure investment in western Venezuela in many years.

Another project in the agreement is believed to be run by a joint venture between Venezuela’s state oil company PDVSA and a Russian enterprise.

NABEP is owned by Venezuelan oil mogul Alejandro Betancourt and has expanded its presence in the Venezuelan oil industry in recent years. Its current oil output is around 200,000 barrels per day (bpd). Betancourt has faced multiple international embezzlement and money laundering investigations but has never been formally charged, with US officials reportedly lobbying Swiss authorities not to bring criminal charges against the Venezuelan businessman.

In a statement posted on Monday, Betancourt said Venezuela is “blessed with an abundance of natural resources” that would be “unleash[ed] to the great benefit of both Venezuelans and Americans.”

The Trump White House published a “fact sheet” on Monday, claiming that the deal “secures US energy dominance for the next century.”

The administration stated that the Department of War’s Office of Strategic Capital (OSC) will receive a 35 percent stake in NABEP at no cost. The State Department will be given the right to purchase 20 percent of NABEP’s output at cost and hold the right of first refusal for the remaining 80 percent.

Washington will also have the final say on NABEP’s board of directors and the company will be subject to US laws and government audits. The document also pledged that the Betancourt-owned company will invest “up to $100 billion” in the oilfields.

The White House went on to explain that the concessions will conform to Venezuela’s reformed Hydrocarbon Law, which was “adopted with US support” and vastly expanded benefits for private corporations. Washington has exerted significant control over the Venezuelan oil industry since its January 3 military operation, issuing sanctions waivers for select companies while the US Treasury manages crude export revenues.

The Trump administration hailed NABEP’s takeover of oilfields previously run by Russian and Chinese companies as a triumph for the Monroe Doctrine, “ensuring American dominance in our hemisphere is never again questioned.”

The US factsheet insisted that the oil concessions will last 100 years, contradicting Rodríguez, who said the agreement is for 25 years. Venezuela’s acting president vowed that the accords would usher in a new era of “welfare and prosperity.”

According to Rodríguez, the initiative has a 1.5 million bpd target and Venezuela will collect an estimated US $19 per barrel extracted, a figure significantly below the benchmarks established under the prior hydrocarbon legislation enacted by former President Hugo Chávez.

The US-Venezuela deal has drawn widespread scrutiny over its lack of transparency and the unfavorable terms for Caracas, with popular movements rallying against “neocolonialism and imperialist attacks.”

For its part, the Venezuelan National Assembly approved a resolution on Tuesday endorsing the “binational energy accords.” The proposal was backed by the United Socialist Party (PSUV) and allies as well as some opposition deputies.

National Assembly President Jorge Rodríguez, the acting president’s brother, reiterated the government’s argument that “oil underground serves no purpose” and promised that crude production will reach “levels never seen before.”

US Energy Secretary Chris Wright landed in Venezuela on Tuesday night ahead of a scheduled press conference with Acting President Rodríguez on Wednesday. The Trump official, the Venezuelan government, and NABEP are expected to formally sign agreements at the ceremony.

Alongside the White House deal, several multinational corporations, including US-based Chevron and GE Vernova, India’s state-owned ONGC, and Italy’s Eni, are expected to ink contracts with Caracas in the coming days.

Some companies are slated to update existing agreements in accordance with reformed legislation, while others are set to enter into new deals in the South American country. According to Reuters, Chevron will expand its presence in the Orinoco Oil Belt while also securing access to light crude in Monagas State.

Edited by Lucas Koerner in Philadelphia, USA.

Leaders of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO), including Chinese President Xi Jinping, his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, are set to gather in Kyrgyzstan’s capital Bishkek for an annual summit.

Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian is also attending the summit, which marks 25 years of its existence.

The two-day summit, starting on Monday, comes at a time when the world is grappling with the aftermath of the US-Israel war on Iran, which has upended global energy and financial markets, and the ongoing Russia-Ukraine war.

So, what will be the main agenda of the summit, and will the SCO leaders try to use the gathering to push for a multipolar world and Global South cooperation on trade and security issues, as United States President Donald Trump’s unilateral foreign policy has eroded the global rules-based order?

Here’s what we know:

Who is attending the SCO summit and where is it being held?

This year’s summit is taking place in Bishkek under the motto: Together for Sustainable Peace, Development and Prosperity.

Xi, Putin and Modi will be joined by the Iranian president and leaders of Pakistan, Uzbekistan, Belarus, Kazakhstan, among others.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) Secretary-General Kao Kim Hourn are also expected to attend the summit.

William Yang, senior analyst for Northeast Asia at the International Crisis Group, noted that the ongoing wars are putting more strain on the rules-based international order, and against this backdrop, the summit serves as an important occasion for several of the world’s rising great powers, including China and India, to elevate their global influence and deepen their engagement and cooperation with other countries in the Global South.

“For years, SCO has been viewed as one of the avenues for China to promote the multipolar world order and form its own bloc with other developing countries. Despite its narrow scope of cooperation at the beginning, SCO member states have sought to expand the scope of their mandate and the number of member states,” Yang told Al Jazeera.

Amid the ongoing conflicts in the Middle East and Europe, Yang said, “China could use this year’s summit to present itself as a great power that advocates for a peaceful resolution of the conflicts, thereby sharpening the contrast with the US.”

“However, these efforts are likely to be limited to rhetoric rather than any substantive proposal for conflict resolution,” he said.

Alicia Garcia-Herrero, chief economist for Asia Pacific at French investment bank Natixis, said the summit is particularly significant because it marks the grouping’s 25th anniversary and offers the first chance to turn last year’s Tianjin strategy, which called for a multipolar world order that fosters mutually beneficial international cooperation, into action. Last year’s summit took place in China’s Tianjin region.

“Putting Modi, Putin and Xi in the same room, with India-China border talks still live and a scheduled Modi-Putin bilateral, is a visible test of how far the recent thaw goes and how Eurasia wants to organise security, connectivity and trade without defaulting to Western institutions,” she told Al Jazeera, referring to the recent India-China talks amid the warming up of New Delhi-Beijing ties.

What is the SCO?

The SCO started in 1996 as a security bloc, dubbed the “Shanghai Five”. It was formed by China, Russia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan to settle their border disputes following the end of the Cold War and the collapse of the Soviet Union.

But in June 2001, the grouping evolved into the SCO, and expanded to include Uzbekistan, with headquarters in Beijing. In 2017, the bloc expanded to include India and Pakistan. Iran and Belarus were also added as full members in 2023 and 2024, respectively.

In addition, the organisation has 14 key dialogue partners, including Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Egypt, Turkiye, Myanmar, Sri Lanka and Cambodia.

SCO member states account for 43 percent of the world’s population and 23 percent – or almost a quarter – of the global economy.

Analysts have pointed out that while the SCO emerged with a focus on regional security, the expansion of its mandate to include trade and other Global South concerns means it is difficult to understand what sets the grouping apart from other Global South organisations like the BRICS, which is an acronym derived from the initials of the founding member countries, Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa.

Alejandro Reyes, adjunct professor in the department of politics and public administration at the University of Hong Kong, said the SCO has grown into a “counterbalance” to the US-led Asia Pacific alliance aimed at countering China’s rise. India is part of both groupings. “Interestingly, India is part of the SCO, and the US appears to have dropped the Indo-Pacific nomenclature,” he said.

Reyes emphasised that “the SCO is not a coherent anti-US, anti-Western alliance”. “It is better understood as a forum in which countries with very different interests can demonstrate that they have alternatives and strategic room for manoeuvre – agency in this more volatile geopolitical order, dominated by China and the US. It is less an anti-American alliance than a venue for countries hedging against and hinging away from American power,” he told Al Jazeera.

“The significance this year is that current US policies, especially with regard to Iran and continuing US tariff and sanctions action, may be making that hedging more attractive and necessary,” he added.

What is on this year’s agenda?

The US-Israel war on Iran, the Russia-Ukraine war and the economic and social situation in Afghanistan are key issues leaders are expected to discuss this year, according to the SCO Secretariat.

Relations between India and China – Asia’s two major economies – are also expected to be discussed. Last year, Beijing and New Delhi began a rapprochement after five years of tensions over a 2020 deadly border skirmish. Trump’s tariff war on Indian goods last year forced New Delhi to mend ties with Beijing. For the first time since 2018, Modi visited China last year for the SCO summit.

Border tensions between India and Pakistan also persist, and the issue is expected to be discussed at this summit.

Manoj Kewalramani, chairperson of Bengaluru-based think tank Takshashila Institution’s Geostrategy Programme, told Al Jazeera that apart from the traditional security agenda, this year’s summit might include any forward movement on issues of economic integration or financial cooperation architecture.

“In Tianjin, we had the agreement on establishing the SCO Development Bank,” Kewalramani said.

“The Kyrgyz leadership has said that its priority will be to move the needle on the bank, the SCO Development Fund and SCO Investment Fund,” he said, adding that while talks have reportedly been taking place in this direction, there is no clarity on whether any agreements will be announced at this year’s summit.

According to the SCO Secretariat, economic connectivity will be a key topic the group will discuss as the US and Israel’s war on Iran continues to paralyse key maritime routes like the Strait of Hormuz, which has upended global supply chains, the energy market and financial markets.

The group is expected to discuss new trade and transport corridors, such as the 7,200km (4,474-mile) International North-South Transport Corridor, which links the Russian port city of St Petersburg with India’s financial capital, Mumbai, through Iran and ports on the Gulf.

Herrero pointed out that with Modi and Putin scheduled to hold a bilateral meeting, discussions on the Northern Sea Route, which runs through the Arctic coast, are also expected. China last month announced a new shipping route through the Arctic Ocean, aimed at easing global trade amid the blockade of the Strait of Hormuz and attacks in the Bab al-Mandeb in the Red Sea, which will pass through the Northern Sea Route.

According to Indian media reports, Moscow and New Delhi could negotiate the use of the Northern Sea Route by India as the crisis in West Asia continues to affect trade routes.

The SCO will also seek to establish a network of Silk Road stations to support international freight traffic across Eurasia.

Can the SCO agree on all issues?

The Eurasian grouping has often been unable to agree on global geopolitical issues.

For instance, Russia has been able to get most SCO members to align with its interests when it comes to its war in Ukraine, but India has attempted to play a more balanced role – seeking peace and stronger ties with Ukraine, while also buying record levels of oil from Russia.

But this year, Ukraine is expected to feature in discussions, with Turkiye’s Erdogan and Russia’s Putin holding bilateral talks on the matter, according to a Kremlin aide. Europe’s deadliest war since World War II is in its fifth year.

Yury Ushakov, Putin’s foreign policy adviser, said the meeting would take place on the sidelines of the SCO summit.

“There are many issues to discuss. Of course, these include the situation in the Black Sea and the Ukraine issue in general,” he told reporters, referring to the rise in attacks in the Black Sea.

The SCO has, however, taken a more collective position on the US-Israel war on Iran and Israel’s genocidal actions in Palestine.

In March, the SCO condemned the US-Israel war on Iran. “The SCO member states considered the use of force as unacceptable and advocate for the resolution of existing differences exclusively by peaceful means, based on dialogue, mutual respect, and taking into account the legitimate interests of all parties, in accordance with the norms of international law and the principles of the UN Charter,” it said in a statement.

India, which has strong ties with Israel, had refused to endorse an SCO joint statement condemning Israel for its attack on Iran in June 2025.

Iranian President Pezeshkian is also scheduled to meet Putin on the sidelines of the summit, according to Iran’s official IRNA news agency. Russia is a close ally of Iran and the two countries cooperate on defence issues. China has emerged as Iran’s biggest economic lifeline as it buys more than 80 percent of its crude oil. Moscow and Beijing have also lent diplomatic cover to Tehran at the UN.

Frictions also exist on how the group views border tensions between India and Pakistan. New Delhi has repeatedly called on the organisation to condemn “cross-border terrorism”, for which it blames Islamabad, a close economic and defence ally of China.

Last July, India demanded that the grouping condemn the April 2025 attack by armed men in Indian-administered Kashmir, in which 26 people were killed. Pakistan has also blamed India for armed attacks inside its territory.

During the Tianjin summit, the bloc condemned “terror” attacks in both India and Pakistan, taking a more balanced position on the issue.

What are Russia, China and India going to gain at the summit?

Reyes from the University of Hong Kong pointed out that all eyes will also be on Russia, China and India.

“For China, the SCO is partly about institution-building. Beijing wants to demonstrate that it can convene a large part of Eurasia around an agenda of security, connectivity, trade and development, while promoting a more multipolar, agentic international order. It also reinforces China’s increasingly important economic position in Central Asia, a strategically key region of the Eurasia landmass,” he said.

“For Russia, the summit is an opportunity to show that it is not isolated internationally. Maintaining strong relationships with China, India, Iran and Central Asia is economically and diplomatically important, given the Ukraine war and Western and other sanctions. But Moscow also has an interest in preserving its own influence in Eurasia rather than simply becoming more and more dependent on China.

“India is in an intriguing position. Modi’s participation is not an indication that India is joining the China-Russia axis, such as it is. India itself describes its SCO priorities as ‘security, connectivity and opportunity’. That is much more consistent with India’s longstanding pursuit of strategic autonomy – its agency amid the great-power rivalry,” Reyes explained.

He added that New Delhi wants “access and influence in Central Asia, continued relations with Russia [from which it buys the bulk of its defence equipment], and a mechanism for managing its difficult but gradually stabilising relationship with China”.

“At the same time, New Delhi maintains important relations with Washington, including through the Quad security arrangement.

“So China and Russia may see the SCO partly as an instrument for building a less US-dominated international order. India, meanwhile, sees it more as one of several overlapping platforms through which it can maximise its own agency.”

What does all this mean to the US?

As part of his unilateral foreign policy vision, Trump has undermined the Western-led international order and lashed out at Global South blocs, such as BRICS, which he sees as a threat to the US’s economic dominance. He has called the grouping “anti-American”.

However, Kewalramani noted that the Trump administration has continued some of its predecessors’ approaches and deepened engagement with countries in the region where this year’s SCO is being hosted, especially with the C5 or Central Asian countries of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan.

“Joe Biden had established a leader-level meeting mechanism with C5 countries in 2023. Trump also hosted them in DC in November 2025. [US Secretary of State] Marco Rubio and subsequently Trump are expected to visit the region later [this] year. Kazakhstan has announced accession to the Abraham Accords, becoming the first Central Asian state to join [the Trump-led diplomatic efforts to cajole Muslim countries to recognise Israel]. The US has been engaged with the region on critical minerals and other business deals,” he said.

“In other words, C5 members are also adopting a diversified diplomatic approach, seeking to balance China and Russia’s dominance,” he noted.

“But the fact that you are witnessing these countries meeting with far more purpose to think about alternative financial and energy architectures is a reflection of the limitations of the US’s disruptive foreign policy,” Kewalramani added.

Herrero said for the US, the SCO summit is a reminder that countries like India will keep practising strategic autonomy: it will sit in the Quad and buy US defence equipment while also talking to Moscow and Beijing in a China-heavy forum.

The Quad or Quadrilateral Security Dialogue was established by India, Japan, Australia and the US in 2007 to counter China’s growing influence in the Asia Pacific region. Over the past quarter-century, India has grown closer to the US and its allies, amid shared concerns over Beijing’s rise.

Reyes warned that Washington should be careful not to read the SCO as a consolidated anti-US coalition, even though China, Russia and Iran are members.

“The differences among China, Russia and India are far too substantial to substantiate that label. The more important message is that American economic and geopolitical pressure can sometimes produce convergence among countries that otherwise might disagree with one another more,” he said.

“The SCO’s criticism of unilateral economic measures is significant in that respect. China and Russia explicitly want a less US-dominated international order. India does not necessarily share that objective, but it does want a world in which Washington cannot dictate its foreign-policy choices.”

Washington has recently stepped up efforts to economically pressure Tehran amid the deadlocked truce talks.

Washington plans to impose sanctions on another bank this week as it steps up its campaign to economically isolate Tehran amid the deadlocked truce talks, the US Treasury chief has said.

In an interview with The Associated Press news agency on Sunday, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent declined to name the bank to be targeted by sanctions.

The announcement comes just days after Washington said it would cut off the United Arab Emirates’s operations of Basque Misr from the US financial system after accusing Egypt’s second-biggest bank of doing business with the Iranian government.

“This is going to be financial violence if we have to,” Bessent told AP on Sunday. “We are showing people that we know who you are, you know who you are, and this has got to stop.”

⁠In an interview with the Reuters news agency, Bessent said the next step may be cutting off an institution entirely from the dollar-based financial system.

“You’re going ⁠to see a lot ⁠more of these every week,” he said on Sunday, ahead of a Group of 20 finance leaders ⁠meeting in Asheville, North Carolina. “We’re starting with the banks, and we’re telling ⁠the banks it’s not OK ⁠to have Iranian money and to aid the regime.”

The US has stepped up efforts to economically pressure Tehran to submit to Washington’s demands, a campaign dubbed “Operation Economic Outcast”, amid the stalled truce talks between both parties.

Last week, the Treasury Department imposed new sanctions on nearly 60 individuals and entities that Washington accused of being part of networks helping Iran generate oil revenue, procure weapons and conduct cyber-operations.

Iran, however, has rejected the latest US sanctions, with Minister of Finance and Economic Affairs Ali Madanizadeh saying they will fail.

Violence in the conflict resumed on Sunday, the first time since late July, with Iran launching missiles at two US bases in Jordan following a US attack on Larak Island in southern Iran.

Cooperation against Iran

Bessent is preparing to host the meeting of the G20’s finance leaders, where he will huddle individually with his counterparts from the world’s major and developing economies to encourage cooperation against Iran.

The US Treasury chief also told AP that he would speak to his Chinese counterparts at the meeting and “all options are on the table” in terms of sanctioning Beijing for its continued trade with Tehran. 

But he rejected the idea that the US was reluctant to confront China, calling it “a completely false narrative that the media picked up on”.

He insisted that Beijing and Washington agreed on the need to reopen the Strait of Hormuz and prevent Iran from developing a nuclear weapon.

Specialised search-and-rescue teams join recovery operations in Nepal and China as floodwaters and severe weather hamper search efforts.

At least 797 people have been killed and 3,048 others remain missing after a glacier collapsed in the Himalayas, sending water and debris tearing through several villages.

Nepal announced an updated death toll of 781 on Sunday, with 2,502 people missing, including 592 foreign nationals. In China, state broadcaster CCTV reported 16 deaths and 546 people missing, including 261 foreigners.

The disaster occurred on Wednesday when part of a glacier at an altitude of roughly 5,200 metres (17,000 feet) collapsed, plunging around 1,200m (3,900ft) and gathering rock and debris before slamming into the Lende River.

Rescue operations have been suspended repeatedly since Friday due to poor weather and fears of fresh flooding. The disaster created a lake across the border between Nepal and China that has begun overflowing into Nepal’s Lhende and Trishuli Rivers.

More than 100 workers are also believed to be trapped inside several hydropower tunnels.

Burials start

Authorities in Nepal began burying some of the victims on Sunday after taking DNA samples to allow for future identification. Many bodies were carried away by the floodwaters, leaving families unable to locate and identify their relatives. Mass burials for hundreds of unidentified victims are taking place in Nepal’s scenic Chitwan district, known for its forests and rivers.

According to the Red Cross, about 90,000 people in Nepal are likely affected by the disaster.

Specialised teams from India, China, and South Korea have joined the search-and-rescue efforts. Malaysia is also deploying its Special Malaysia Disaster Assistance Search and Rescue Team (SMART) and contributing $1m in recovery assistance.

International funding has begun to arrive, with the European Union promising $2.3m on Friday. The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) has allocated more than $1m and launched an emergency appeal for $31m.

The rebel fighters who abandoned Falam in Myanmar in April said they gave up the strategic border town near India only after running out of bullets.

The fighters had endured a six-month assault by Myanmar’s military, including more than 2,500 air strikes and a ground assault by roughly 1,000 troops. The fall of the town, which had been under opposition control for a year, marked a strategic victory for the military: Falam is home to the only airport in Chin State and commands a trade route to the Indian border.

Within weeks, three more towns in Chin had fallen, and by late May, the military was claiming control of the entire northern part of the state.

“Falam taught us an important lesson,” said Salai William Chin, a member of the rebel Chin Brotherhood. “Capturing a town and holding it are two very different challenges,” he said, noting that maintaining  control required manpower, logistics, administration, as well as “the ability to withstand repeated attacks, especially from the air”.

But he promised to keep fighting.

“I would not measure success only by whether we permanently hold every town,” he told Al Jazeera. “Where the military has a significant advantage, especially through airpower, mobile warfare may sometimes be more effective. The important thing is to preserve our forces, protect civilians and maintain our ability to continue the struggle.”

‘War of attrition’

The retreat is part of a broader reversal. Myanmar’s opposition – a loose coalition of militias and ethnic armed organisations fighting the military that seized power in a 2021 coup – has been weakened. Their gains in 2023 and 2024, when coordinated offensives stripped the military of dozens of towns, have given way to a steady withdrawal from the urban centres the rebels had captured.

Analysts say the shift has been driven by several factors: a mass conscription drive that has refilled the military’s ranks with tens of thousands of troops, a devastating air campaign that has killed hundreds of civilians, and backing from China, which has brokered ceasefires between the military and some powerful ethnic armed groups while helping choke off weapons supplies to others.

But the military is unlikely to score “existential or politically decisive wins” against the opposition, wrote Su Mon, an analyst at the Armed Conflict Location and Event Data (ACLED) project. She warned in a recent briefing note that the country “faces a protracted war of attrition” and a mounting humanitarian crisis in the coming months.

The war, which began in the wake of a military coup in February 2021, is now in its fifth year. It began following a brutal crackdown on unarmed protesters, with young people taking up arms and forming militias known as the People’s Defence Forces (PDF). They were aided by powerful armed ethnic organisations who control Myanmar’s borderlands, some of which have fought for autonomy since the country’s founding in 1948.

According to ACLED, deaths in the conflict have now surpassed 100,000, while the United Nations says 3.9 million people have been displaced and an estimated one in three people requires humanitarian assistance.

Earlier this year, Senior General Min Aung Hlaing, who led the 2021 power grab, presided over tightly controlled elections, with major opposition parties barred from participating and voting impossible, or boycotted, across much of the country. He was sworn in as president in April, completing his passage from commander-in-chief to head of a nominally civilian government in Naypyidaw.

Min Aung Hlaing now says his government wants peace talks with armed opponents, including in Chin.

But the fighting continues.

Capture of strategic towns

The military has opened new operations this year in Chin, Kachin, Kayin and Rakhine States, and according to ISP-Myanmar, an independent think tank, it has now retaken 22 of the 101 towns it lost after the coup. That amounts to 9 percent of the lost territory, but the areas are strategically located and include key trade corridors linking border areas to central Myanmar, where the military’s main bases are located.

Their capture has disrupted the “economic and logistical capacity of many resistance groups”, according to Su Mon at ACLED. And “while the military has yet to fully restore its own regime administration in these areas”, she wrote, “the victories have effectively hindered resistance coordination”, and are pushing the opposition groups “away from large-scale coordinated offensives to defensive guerrilla warfare”.

The Myanmar military has lauded the battlefield wins.

Speaking in Bangkok this month, Min Aung Hlaing said Myanmar was “on the path of democracy and heading towards a better future”, while state media has run photographs of what it described as triumphant troops returning from operations around the country.

Anthony Davis, a Bangkok-based security analyst, said a mass conscription drive and Chinese support have proven pivotal for the military.

Close to 150,000 troops have been added to its combat ranks since 2024 through conscription, he said, with many of the conscripts barely trained, but numerous enough to grind forward. Pressure from China has pulled two powerful opposition forces, the Myanmar National Democratic Alliance Army and the Ta’ang National Liberation Army, out of the fight, freeing the military to redeploy troops elsewhere. Beijing also pressed the United Wa State Army, one of Myanmar’s strongest ethnic armed groups, to stop selling weapons to opposition groups, contributing to ammunition shortages nationwide.

“Unchallenged airpower has from the beginning of the war provided the [military] with a crucial advantage,” Davis added, both in resupplying troops and in carrying out attacks against opposition forces. At the same time, “the rapid proliferation of drone technology in both surveillance and strike roles, along with improved battlefield coordination between different combat arms, have both boosted [the military’s] capability”, he said.

Air campaign

The toll on civilians has been severe.

The Myanmar Internet Project counted 520 air strikes from April through June, hitting 87 townships and killing at least 314 civilians, including 41 children. Chin State was hit hardest, with 122 strikes, followed by Sagaing with 101, and Rakhine with 98.

Phil Robertson, the director of Asia Human Rights and Labour Advocates organisation, said that “the inability of the resistance to counter the military’s air superiority” had weakened drive among opposition forces.

“Air attacks demoralise PDFs and other resistance troops, and scatter civilians who have supported the rebels,” he told Al Jazeera.

Still, the anti-military forces insist that the war is not lost.

Thinzar Shunlei Yi, an activist living in exile, said opposition networks are still training organisers and building support. “Even in the face of mass murder, in the face of massive violations, we have that courage and integrity that we resist, and we reject,” she said. “Myanmar people keep up that spirit, and we will keep on going.”

In Chin, Salai William Chin remained resolute.

“We do have further plans, but it is still too early to speak publicly about them,” he said. “I would not say that airpower has permanently decided the battlefield. It remains a serious challenge, but warfare continues to evolve, and resistance forces also continue to learn and adapt.”

The upcoming official visit of Chinese President Xi Jinping to Egypt, scheduled for August 30 to September 3, 2026, coincides with the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) summit. The visit will address economic and technological cooperation, as well as regional and international issues, and marks the 70th anniversary of diplomatic relations between Egypt and China. The visit aims to strengthen the comprehensive strategic partnership between the two countries and expand Beijing’s economic and political influence in the Middle East amidst escalating regional and international tensions, while also bolstering China’s role in the Global South.

As an Egyptian academic specializing in Chinese politics and the policies of the ruling Communist Party of China, I can analyze and summarize the significance of President Xi Jinping’s visit to Cairo and his meeting with his Egyptian counterpart, President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi, and its importance to China’s influence in the Middle East and the Global South through the following points:

– First: What does China hope to achieve with Xi Jinping’s visit to Egypt at this particular time?

This visit of President Xi Jinping to Cairo (the first by a Chinese president to Cairo in nearly a decade) coincides with the 70th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between the two countries. It carries several key objectives, including political and international dimensions related to Chinese coordination with Egypt on Middle Eastern issues. The visit comes at a sensitive time, as the region is experiencing tensions linked to the conflict between Iran and the United States and its repercussions on maritime security in the Strait of Hormuz and global energy markets. Beijing also seeks to strengthen its strategic balance and reaffirm its diplomatic presence as an international power that supports diplomatic solutions and cooperates with pivotal countries like Egypt to achieve stability. This follows President Xi Jinping’s participation in the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation summit.  President Xi Jinping’s visit to Cairo also carries several economic and trade dimensions, such as expanding the economic partnership and capitalizing on the significant increase in trade between the two countries to deepen cooperation. Furthermore, China will support infrastructure and energy projects in Egypt by boosting Chinese investments in Cairo, including renewable energy sectors such as wind turbine manufacturing plants, transportation deals, and electric trains, in addition to extending currency swap agreements between the two central banks.

The visit also aims to discuss the technological and artificial intelligence file in China’s relations with Cairo, particularly major technological offers, most notably the offer from the Chinese company Huawei to build data and artificial intelligence centers in Egypt. This project is viewed with apprehension by intelligence, military, political, and strategic circles in Washington, which are attempting to offer Cairo alternatives from major American technology companies such as Microsoft, Nvidia, and AMD.

– Second: Does the visit carry political messages that extend beyond bilateral relations, especially regarding the Middle East and Africa?

Yes, Chinese President Xi Jinping’s visit carries major strategic political messages that transcend the framework of bilateral cooperation. It aims to reshape the international order and build a multipolar world, starting with the Global South. The visit also carries messages that go beyond bilateral relations, pushing for a Global South leadership role. Beijing seeks to garner African and Arab support to assert its position as a major power, offering an alternative to Western and American competition and influence. China also aims to promote multilateralism by urging countries in the region to adopt common positions that support international stability and security, moving away from the unilateral polarization of the United States. Furthermore, President Xi Jinping’s visit signals China’s desire to secure its economic interests. Chinese actions are focused on ensuring the security of maritime routes and the stability of energy and trade markets within the framework of the Belt and Road Initiative. Here, President Xi’s visit to Cairo coincides with the launch of the second iteration of the massive joint air exercises, Eagles of Civilization, in August 2026 at Egyptian air bases. These exercises, which follow the first iteration in May 2025, will involve advanced fighter jets from both sides. This sends political and strategic messages to Washington and Tel Aviv about the new military partnership between Egypt and China, the diversification of arms sources, and the independence of Egyptian military and political decision-making in diversifying its partnerships.

Furthermore, the Chinese president’s visit to Cairo carries support for Egypt’s regional role in the Middle East and Africa, reaffirming the pivotal role of Egypt. Choosing Egypt as a starting point reflects Beijing’s understanding of its geopolitical importance as a key link between the Arab world and the African continent and its commitment to addressing regional repercussions. China is also demonstrating its readiness to cooperate with its African and Arab partners to contain the economic crises resulting from conflicts in the Middle East.  In addition to China’s anticipated plan to expand alliances by strengthening the integration of Chinese development projects with major economic blocs such as BRICS, the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO), and the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, this visit also aims to coordinate common positions on de-escalation and maintaining peace and security in the Middle East and to discuss regional conflicts, particularly in the wake of the Gaza and Iran wars.

– Third: What economic files could witness new agreements or steps between Cairo and Beijing?

Economic relations between Cairo and Beijing are increasingly moving towards signing new agreements and taking new steps focused on strengthening joint investments and supporting financial stability. The most prominent joint economic and investment files between Egypt and China are based on supporting financial partnership and currency diversification. This involves renewing and strengthening local currency swap agreements between the Central Bank of Egypt and its Chinese counterpart to facilitate trade and support monetary stability, independent of international currencies. Economic cooperation and currency swaps will be among the top economic priorities of the visit through monitoring the surge in trade and extending the local currency swap agreement to enhance economic partnership within the BRICS framework.

Furthermore, there is a shared Chinese-Egyptian desire to localize industry and technology in Cairo by attracting substantial Chinese investments in electric vehicle manufacturing, new and renewable energy sectors, and advanced technology industries. With the expansion of Chinese projects in the Suez Canal Economic Zone, through the expansion of Chinese industrial and logistical projects within the Suez Canal Corridor, a major value-added production base is being established. China is also supporting Egypt in achieving food security and agricultural development by preparing joint Egyptian-Chinese alliances targeting large-scale agricultural land reclamation projects to enhance food security. This is happening concurrently with Chinese support for infrastructure and smart cities in Egypt through cooperation in urban development projects and modern smart cities.

– Fourth: Can China strengthen Egypt’s role as a key hub for its projects in the Middle East and Africa?

Yes, China is already strengthening Egypt’s role as a key and central hub for its strategic projects in the Middle East and Africa. The pillars of Chinese strategic cooperation with Egypt are based on China’s projects and investments within the Belt and Road Initiative. China considers Egypt a strategic gateway and a vital corridor for the maritime and land Silk Road, given the Suez Canal’s role as a global trade artery.  With the diversification of Chinese partnerships and investments in the Suez Canal Economic Zone, given the concentration of major industrial projects by Chinese companies in the zone, such as the China-Egypt Economic and Trade Cooperation Zone (TEDA). China aims to access African markets through Egypt. Chinese companies utilize Egyptian land and ports as a joint manufacturing base and a launchpad for exporting products and services to markets across Africa and the Middle East. China also seeks to achieve developmental and security integration with Egypt, aligning its five-year development plans with Egypt’s Vision 2030. This is further evidenced by the development of joint military cooperation and air exercises between Egypt and China, such as the Eagles of Civilization exercises between the Egyptian and Chinese air forces, the first iteration of which took place in May 2025 and the second in August 2026.

Beijing also seeks to disseminate artificial intelligence and innovation technologies through Egypt to the African continent, the Middle East, and the Global South.  Especially since Egypt hosts a number of Chinese companies across various sectors, particularly technology, such as Huawei, Xiaomi, Oppo, ZTE, Midea, and Haier. Furthermore, a $300 million investment fund has been established with Tsinghua University in China, focusing on artificial intelligence and semiconductor design.

– Fifth: To what extent can the Egyptian-Chinese partnership affect the balance of American influence in the region?

The Egyptian-Chinese partnership significantly impacts American influence in the Middle East by diversifying China’s economic and political alliances in the region. However, it does not eliminate the strategic alliances between the United States and several countries in the region, particularly the Gulf states. The partnership between Egypt and China is based on the economic and financial dimension, including major Chinese investments in Egypt. China is pouring billions of dollars into infrastructure projects and the Suez Canal region. China also supports Egypt’s bid to join the BRICS group, led by China and Russia, to reduce its dependence on the dollar and the Western and American financial system. Furthermore, China is keen to closely integrate its Belt and Road Initiative projects with the Egyptian economy. The partnership between Egypt and China also rests on the diplomatic and strategic dimension as well as the diversification of alliances. Egypt pursues a balanced foreign policy that is not limited to a single ally.  Here, the partnership with China grants Egypt greater freedom of movement and a wider margin to maneuver, free from American political conditions and pressures, particularly in the areas of armament and military deals. This creates a delicate balance for Egypt, as it refuses to fully align itself with one power against another, maintaining its security partnership with Washington alongside its relationship with Beijing.

In this context, Beijing does not view Egypt merely as an economic partner, but rather as a strategic gateway and a pivotal pillar of its geopolitical influence in the Middle East and Africa, countering American penetration. This approach stems from China’s desire to fill the political and military vacuums resulting from the decline or fluctuation of the Western and American presence in the region. To this end, China leverages Cairo’s historical and political weight as a platform to expand its diplomatic influence and build partnerships with other countries in Africa and the Arab world. China’s support for Egypt’s membership in the BRICS bloc has provided Beijing with a strong regional ally, bolstering its vision for reshaping the global financial system into a multipolar order in the face of the United States’ unilateral hegemony in the region. This is especially significant given that Egypt represents a crucial land and sea crossroads for China’s Belt and Road Initiative via the Maritime Silk Road, considering the strategic and vital importance of the Suez Canal.

– Sixth: Does Beijing want Egypt merely as an economic partner, or does it see it as a strategic gateway for its influence in the Middle East and Africa?

Beijing views Egypt as a major strategic gateway for its influence, not just an ordinary economic partner. The relationship combines commercial interests with broad geopolitical ties. The economic dimension is based on the importance of the Suez Canal. China considers the Suez Canal a key artery for its trade with Europe and the rest of the world, and it is investing heavily to connect Egyptian ports and roads to its major commercial projects related to its Belt and Road Initiative. In addition to China’s role as a major logistics hub in the Suez Canal Economic Zone, numerous Chinese companies have established factories there to export goods. This is further compounded by Egypt’s strategic and political importance, as well as its sensitive geographical location, which is crucial to China’s interests. Egypt’s position at the crossroads of Africa, Asia, and Europe serves China’s regional influence. This coincided with China’s support for Egypt’s formal accession to the BRICS group, a move fully backed by China to bolster both countries’ political and economic weight globally.

Beijing also focuses on the growing security and military dimension of its relationship with Cairo to secure investments and international maritime routes. Chinese ambitions extend beyond simply selling goods; it seeks a greater role in protecting its interests and citizens by strengthening military cooperation with Cairo and diversifying defense partnerships with countries in the Middle East, Africa, and the Global South through Egypt. Beijing sees the growing military cooperation and arms sales to Egypt and the region as an opportunity to undermine Western and American military influence and to forge closer ties with the Egyptian army, one of the largest armies on the African continent. This is the true objective of China in transforming Egypt into a political and military hub that guarantees Beijing’s vital interests in the Middle East, Africa, and the Global South.

Accordingly, Chinese President Xi Jinping’s visit to Cairo comes at a time when Beijing seeks to strengthen its engagement in the Middle East and expand its relations with developing countries and the Global South, coinciding with escalating competition with the United States for economic and technological influence. Xi’s visit to Cairo also carries significance that transcends bilateral relations, given the ongoing repercussions of a potential US war with Iran and the instability in global energy markets. Therefore, China seeks to leverage Egypt’s pivotal role in achieving regional stability, mitigating crises, and protecting its interests in the Middle East and Africa.

Nepal and China have paused rescue efforts for survivors of the devastating flash flood that hit the border region two days ago as a “barrier lake” formed during the disaster began to overflow.

Chinese rescue teams and vehicles were forced to pull back to safe ground, state broadcaster CCTV reported, as the risk of the lake bursting rose. Nepalese authorities also paused search operations for 90 minutes, an army officer confirmed.

The “barrier lake”, formed as Wednesday’s flash flood carried huge volumes of mud and debris down a steep valley, is threatening to unleash another huge and destructive wave.

In Nepal’s Rasuwa district, on the border with Tibet, residents were seen scrambling up hillsides to escape potential surges in the river level, according to the Reuters news agency.

The disaster unfolded as a glacier collapsed and sent a huge torrent of ice, water, rock, and mud down Himalayan river valleys, burying entire villages and destroying roads, bridges, and hydropower plants.

In its wake, leftover debris trapped water to form a barrier lake, a natural dam created when landslides block a river.

With water continuing to pour into the lake, the threat to downstream communities of another wave of flooding is rising.

China has deployed an engineering team to conduct aerial surveys and 3D modelling of the site. By Friday, the lake’s volume had swelled to more than 2.5 million cubic metres, up from the estimated 1.5 to 2 million cubic metres recorded just a day earlier.

Downstream in Nepal, officials received warnings that the lake had begun breaking its bank, according to Narendra Pariyar, the top administrator in the hard-hit Rasuwa district.

“We can see that the level of water in the river is rising,” he said, adding that the exact height of the surge remains unclear.

Relief supplies blocked

The death toll from the disaster has surpassed 470. On Friday, the Nepalese prime minister’s office reported 469 confirmed deaths, with 977 people still missing. About 1,550 people have been rescued.

Chinese authorities reported on Friday that the death toll in Tibet has now risen to at least five, with 558 missing.

Bishal Nath Upreti, president of the Nepal Centre for Disaster Management, told Al Jazeera that conditions are “extremely difficult” for those trapped in the disaster zone, as destroyed roads have left them completely cut off.

So far, about 800 people have been rescued by helicopter and 700 by land, with airlifts delivering vital aid to survivors.

Al Jazeera’s Katrina Yu, reporting from Beijing, said the number of missing is expected to rise. China has deployed about 500 military and paramilitary personnel and sent Premier Li Qiang to supervise operations on the ground, while Nepal has deployed 30,000 security personnel to search remote, cut-off valleys, she said.

More ⁠than ⁠90,000 people are estimated to have been affected ⁠by disaster, the ⁠Red Cross said on Friday, adding that the delivery of relief supplies has been blocked by the overflowing lake.

“We’re of course very concerned about the secondary flood,” said David Fisher, head of delegation ⁠for the International Federation ⁠of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies in ⁠Nepal.

BEIRUT — Iran’s economy, already strained by high inflation, years of Western sanctions and a war that has sharply reduced oil revenue, is poised for more instability as the Trump administration tries to coerce other countries into ending all financial dealings with the Islamic Republic.

A decision by the United Arab Emirates to suspend trade relations with Iran last week kick-started the White House’s latest attempt to isolate Tehran into submission. Iran entered the war with its foreign commerce concentrated among a relatively small group of countries, leaving it with fewer places to turn now.

The success of the U.S. strategy largely will hinge on China, the main buyer of Iranian oil and its top trading partner. Russia, a fellow target of sweeping U.S.-led sanctions, has a military conflict and economic crisis of its own and probably can’t offer longtime ally Iran much hard financial support.

Regional partners like Turkey, Pakistan and Iraq maintain important relationships with both Iran and the U.S., giving them reason to avoid exposure to the secondary sanctions that Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said awaited nations that did not cut economic ties with Iran.

“Those who stand with the United States will reap the rewards of our partnership,” Bessent said Monday while outlining the plan he called “Operation Economic Outcast.” “Those who tether themselves to the Iranian regime should expect to share in the isolation.”

The Emirates will be hard for Iran to replace as a conduit for foreign goods and payments

Despite Western sanctions, Iran in 2024 exchanged $125 billion worth of goods globally, according to Trade Data Monitor, a private firm. Iran is not a member of the World Trade Organization.

The bulk of its declared international trade, though, was with a handful of partners. The UAE, China and Turkey supplied nearly three-quarters of Iran’s merchandise imports. Four countries — China, Iraq, the UAE and Turkey — accounted for more than two-thirds of its non-oil exports.

On the supply side, the UAE held outsized importance. It was Iran’s biggest source of imported items and a gateway to financial channels that helped Iranian businesses make and receive international payments. Both roles kept Iran connected to the global economy.

As a reexport hub, the UAE processed shipments from foreign suppliers reluctant to deal directly with Iranian customers.

“From Iran’s perspective, the UAE can be replaced, but the Iranians are openly saying it’s not going to happen overnight,” said Alex Vatanka, a senior fellow at the Middle East Institute in Washington.

China has deep economic ties to Iran but depends less on the relationship

Beijing has economic interests in the Persian Gulf beyond Iran, and so far has avoided getting drawn into the conflict the U.S. and Israel initiated. China buys the overwhelming majority of Iran’s crude through opaque trading networks that bypass sanctions.

Its manufacturing clout and stranglehold on critical mineral supplies nonetheless give Beijing more room than Iran’s other partners to resist U.S. pressure, said David Lubin, a senior research fellow at Chatham House. Aggressive action against major Chinese banks and businesses could revive trade tensions as Chinese leader Xi Jinping prepares to meet with President Trump in Washington next month.

“I don’t see China playing ball by any means,” Lubin said.

China is both Iran’s largest reported export market and a supplier of essential parts and products, according to WTO and United Nations data.

During the Obama administration, Beijing did agree to reduce energy imports from Iran, said Atlantic Council fellow Daniel Fried, a former U.S. ambassador to Poland.

“We will want the Chinese to go a lot farther than they have gone in the past,” Fried said. “But it’s a lot harder now.”

China has experience helping an ally survive sanctions: It has long been North Korea’s economic lifeline and main diplomatic backer. Experts say China has avoided fully enforcing U.N. sanctions on North Korea and sent clandestine aid to help its impoverished neighbor stay afloat.

Expanding bilateral trade would create problems for Iran’s neighbors

Iranian Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Qalibaf, who has been his country’s lead negotiator over the last six months, was in Iraq the day of the UAE’s trade suspension. A purpose of his visit, he said, was “speeding up efforts to expand joint cooperation among all countries in the region, without foreign interference.”

The U.S. dollar’s preeminence in international trade and finance, however, means none of Iran’s trading partners would antagonize Washington lightly, Vatanka said. “We’re still at a point where if the U.S. wants to hurt you, it will matter,” he said.

Underscoring potential consequences, Turkey settled a years-long U.S. dispute in July over the role of a state-owned bank in helping Iran evade sanctions through an oil-for-gold scheme. Trump also moved to lift sanctions on its fellow NATO member stemming from Turkey’s purchase of a sophisticated Russian missile system.

“I really don’t think Turkey would like to become the next country helping Iran to evade sanctions right now,” said Riccardo Gasco, an analyst at the IstanPol think tank in Istanbul.

Iran is a vital import source for Iraq and retains influence there through allied political factions and armed groups. Baghdad has sought closer economic and security ties with Washington. Since it invaded Iraq in 2003, the U.S. has significant control over the nation’s foreign currency reserves because they are housed in the Federal Reserve Bank in New York.

Oman, a frequent intermediary between Washington and Tehran, has found its balancing act suddenly precarious. Trump threatened Oman last week over its ongoing negotiations with Iran on the future management of the Strait of Hormuz.

One easy route for goods slipping past sanctions on Iran would be ports like Gwadar near the Persian Gulf in Pakistan, said Peter Harrell, a visiting scholar at Georgetown University.

“Ship an intermodal container of drone parts to one of the ports in western Pakistan and unload it onto a truck and have it driven across the border into Iran,” he said.

While Pakistan, a key ally and economic partner of China in the region, wants to increase trade with Iran, it faces competing pressures. It is serving as a key mediator between Tehran and Washington and has deep security ties with Saudi Arabia, Iran’s longtime regional rival.

Caspian Sea trade route alternatives unlikely to grow quickly

With the Strait of Hormuz mostly blocked and Russia’s war with Ukraine endangering ships on the Black Sea, Iran has sought to develop a “road of life” on the Caspian Sea, said Nikita Smagin, an independent analyst and a former Russian state news agency correspondent in Tehran.

Russia reportedly sent drones to Iran this year, repaying Tehran’s favor after Moscow’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. It also rerouted exports to Iran via Caspian Sea ports like Astrakhan. Agricultural products make up 80% of Russia and Iran’s reported trade.

“Both economies are exporting natural resources and have little to offer each other,” Smagin said.

The other countries that border the Caspian — Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan and Kazakhstan — probably won’t rush to join in, said Umud Shokri, a fellow at George Mason University.

Yet Russia and Iran are already in an “axis of the sanctioned,” said Mark Galeotti, executive director of the Mayak Intelligence firm. For decades the pair have collaborated to thwart trade restrictions, and increasing bilateral trade in both “strategic goods” and contraband like military technology, microchips and Gucci handbags could be a next step.

“Pomegranates and tomatoes only go so far,” he said.

Chehayeb and McNeil write for the Associated Press. McNeil reported from Brussels. AP writers Amir Vahdat in Tehran and Dasha Litvinova in Tallinn, Estonia, contributed to this report.

Published on
27/08/2026 – 14:10 GMT+2

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said on Thursday that if negotiations to reduce the record-high trade deficit with China did not produce a breakthrough, the EU should make use of all its trade defence mechanisms.

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Tensions have remained high between Brussels and Beijing since the talks were launched last June. Over the summer, China moved to ban Chinese firms from participating in EU antitrust probes, while the Commission has continued opening trade defence investigations into the suspected dumping of Chinese products into the European market.

“Dialogue with China remains necessary. But it must produce results. And when dialogue is not enough, we must be ready to make full use of our instruments,” von der Leyen said in remarks to Medef, the French business organisation.

The EU is facing a wave of cheap imports coming from China, which have increased by 45% in five years, the Commission’s President added, pointing out that 30 trade defence investigations have been opened over the last year – “almost three times more than the historical average”.

“We are stepping up investigations significantly,” she said.

Von der Leyen’s remarks come as the EU’s trade deficit with China reaches €1 billion a day. The Commission has set October as a deadline to reach a deal with Beijing to rebalance the trade relationship.

“China is a key economic partner. And our approach is clear and consistent: derisking without breaking ties. But being a partner does not mean accepting permanent imbalances,” von der Leyen said.

Beijing and Brussels have been on the verge of a trade war in recent months, with China threatening several times to retaliate against proposed EU regulations that could reduce market access to Chinese firms.

On Thursday, von der Leyen recalled that all EU member states now record a trade deficit with China.

In June, EU leaders gave her a mandate to act to rebalance the relationship through dialogue as well as the use and review of defence mechanisms. Among these is the EU’s so-called anti-coercion instrument, which can be triggered in case of pressure from a foreign country on the EU to change its policies.

This tool, sometimes referred to as the “trade bazooka”, allows the EU to adopt strong measures such as restrictions on access to public procurement or the removal of intellectual property rights.

However, it requires the support of a majority of the bloc’s member states. It is unclear whether this could be achieved while EU countries continue trading with China on a bilateral basis, seeking access to its market or investments from Beijing.

On August 21, the US Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) issued a couple of new general licences related to Venezuela’s telecommunications sector. Both General Licenses 61 and 62 will now allow the Venezuelan Government (including but not limited to the telecom authority CONATEL and the State-owned telecom company CANTV) to acquire goods and services from and/or related to the United States and authorize them to negotiate new contracts. 

To better understand the implications of this on Venezuelan telecommunications, there’s what specialized local journalist William Peña wrote on Telecommunicaciones360 and his conclusion is that “this opens an opportunity to the country in the issue of technologic updating, now it’s up to companies to have resources in order to accelerate their innovation process”.

The reaction from CONATEL to this announcement was so enthusiastic to the point of bragging that these licences “represent the recognition of the institutional legitimacy of the Venezuelan State” and that “these mechanisms reaffirm the intention of strengthening the infrastructure.”

Its press statement also mentioned the many areas that these couple of licenses will help to improve: from telephone and high-speed Internet to subscription TV services and everything in relation to fiber optic cable networks, satellite transmission systems and submarine cable links.

The purchase of any non-US tech not explicitly banned is still subject to OFAC approval.

“Despite being the regulation authority, CONATEL is the one who disposes and provides the equipment for technical analysis of infrastructure and monitoring of the radioelectric spectrum,” Peña told Caracas Chronicles, later adding that “Many of CONATEL’s current equipment is Chinese (in origin) and the Americans do not want that.”

Which leads to the main catch that the OFAC’s licences leave clear by explicitly forbidding: “Any transaction involving a person located in the Russian Federation, the Islamic Republic of Iran, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, the Republic of Cuba, the People’s Republic of China, or any entity that is owned or controlled by or in a joint venture with such persons.”

The purchase of any non-US tech not explicitly banned is still subject to OFAC approval.

The same day the licenses were published, the US Assistant Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Affairs, Juan Pablo Segura, said on his X account that Chinese tech companies like Huawei, ZTE and several others “cooperate with Beijing’s intelligence services, creating risks of spying, hacking, and network shutdowns” and asked “US partners in the Americas to quickly switch to trusted suppliers to protect their people and their sovereignty”. 

A deep relationship

This also comes with challenges for CANTV, which despite being the largest company in the sector, found itself behind in comparison to private companies because of several factors, including the US-set sanctions that forced it to go with what other allies were offering.

Most of those countries mentioned were the only viable options that CANTV and other State entities were left with as a consequence of the US sanctions, and Peña notices their negative impact: “This process, with exceptions like some Chinese Huawei technologies, ended up harming the country’s advance in diverse areas, as beside the issue of language, many of the implemented solutions were not compatible with the technologies passed down and most were of very low quality regarding assets and software solutions with plenty of complications.”

This instruction from Washington to avoid China as a telecom provider was not missed by either the PRC’s embassy in DC or by Hong Kong’s major newspaper, the South China Morning Post, indicating that “the China carve-out could prove particularly consequential. Huawei and ZTE became important suppliers to Venezuela as US sanctions and compliance concerns curtailed other international companies’ ability or willingness to work with government-linked entities”.

The relationship between CANTV and Huawei was very close in matters of system infrastructure, to the point that Peña says the State telecom company has a hefty debt of 600 million dollars with Huawei. “If CANTV already paid for that technology, and has it at its disposal either in inventory or storage, then it’ll be deployed, but from now on any new acquisitions must come from the US.” Many of those issues aren’t directly addressed by OFAC’s licenses.

So important is the role of the Chinese company in CANTV operation that in 2019 there was an unfounded rumor on social media that the Maduro government was about to sell it to Huawei.

A decade later, the political ID card was rolled out, and ZTE’s personnel were working within CANTV in handling the related databases: “We don’t support the government… We are just developing our market.”

ZTE, the other company mentioned by the South China Morning Post, has its own long history not only with Cantv but with the Venezuelan government: the company had a central role in the development of what is one of chavismo’s biggest instruments of political control: the “carnet de la patria”.

A 2018 special report by Reuters mentions how it all started with a visit from a delegation from the Venezuelan Justice Ministry to the headquarters of ZTE in Shenzhen back in 2008. Then, the delegation saw a glimpse of what later became known as the “social credit system”, which started its first trials in some regions of mainland China the following year.

A decade later, the political ID card was rolled out, and ZTE’s personnel were working within CANTV in handling the related databases. This was confirmed by ZTE’s head in Venezuela at the time, Su Qingfeng: “We don’t support the government… We are just developing our market.” The deep rapport between Nicolás Maduro and Xi Jinping continued until very recently. In July 2025, the Gran Expo China-Venezuela exposition was held in Caracas, and new agreements between both governments on a diverse range of issues were signed. Six months later, things would change with Operation Absolute Resolve. The person who signed those deals on behalf of Maduro was then VP Delcy Rodríguez.

Now, the Trump administration is taking a growing interest in Latin America (thanks in part to having new allies in the region like Jose Antonio Kast in Chile or Abelardo de la Espriella in Colombia), and it’s using it to push out the influence of Beijing. Still a work in progress.

The impact on Venezuelan clients 

Going back to what these licences could mean for Venezuela’s telecommunications sector, they could bring an expansion of the improvement seen in recent years, like with our Internet service. 

Peña mentions the immediate benefit for private companies, domestic and/or foreign: “This will allow them not only to be part of these large purchases, but also for the payments to be made in an easier and more opportune manner. Back in the time of the sanctions, they couldn’t open a bank account in the US, and buying abroad was complicated, causing the costs to go up. Now they can buy again from American companies with no hassle”.

Besides, this can also help with fixing the faults and limitations found because of the June 24 quakes, like the damaged submarine cable which affected overall access for weeks. And even before OFAC’s announcement, CANTC and Liberty Networks launched a joint investment in a new Fenix underwater cable that will connect Venezuela and Curaçao, reinforcing our connectivity.

In 2022, a satellite image emerged showing unusual fighter-like ‘shapes’ with a very loosely similar appearance to the stealthy J-20 at a remote Chinese airbase. Three years later, another image appeared showing a broadly similar, but also distinctly different-looking object at a different airport in China. The mystery of these ‘airframes’ now seems to be at least partially solved with new pictures of a mock-up being used for airfield firefighting training.

Images of the aircraft fire trainer in question are now circulating on social media, but where or when they were taken is not immediately clear. Markings seen on the tarmac are different from what is present on the aprons at Lintao Air Base, where the ‘shapes’ were spotted back in 2022, as well as at Jining Qufu Airport, where the other object was spotted in 2025.

The overall design of the vaguely J-20-like aircraft fire trainer also aligns more with the object that previously appeared at Jining Qufu Airport. Both share a distinct modified diamond-like delta planform, as well as canards, and twin vertical tails. It is worth noting that the ground-level images we have now also show a cockpit configuration that is more representative of the newer J-35. Regardless, the articles seen at Lintao had differently shaped wings and longer, more slender noses.

In general, aircraft fire trainers can be anything that loosely represents a desired class of aircraft – fighter, airliner, etc – and can range from specially built systems to repurposed old aircraft hulks. Training aids of this kind are designed to offer a readily reusable way to add realism to airfield firefighting drills. They are in widespread use globally by national militaries and civilian fire departments. The shapes previously seen at Lintao could still serve some other purpose as full-scale mock-ups, or decoys, as well.

The emergence of the firefighting trainer also comes as the People’s Liberation Army Air Force’s (PLAAF) fleet of real J-20s continues to expand, something TWZ explored in detail earlier this year. The PLAAF may have some 500 J-20s in service now, with examples assigned to at least 14 operational units and three training bases, according to one estimate. There are projections that the total fleet could grow to 1,000 airframes by 2030 if production of the jets continues apace. This is inclusive of all variants, including a two-seat version that first broke cover in 2021.

The growing size of China’s fleets of J-20s, as well as other more modern fighters, can only increase demands for training, both for pilots and ground crew, as well as maintenance and sustainment requirements. Ever larger numbers of routine day-to-day sorties raise the risk of crashes and other accidents just as a matter of course.

Also, while the object spotted at Jining Qufu Airport in 2025 now seems pretty definitively to have been a firefighting trainer, a steady stream of new, real advanced aircraft designs have been emerging in China in recent years. This includes crewed and uncrewed types with a multitude of shapes and sizes, ranging from the J-36 and J-XDS next-generation fighters to various sleek combat drones to several types of pilotless flying wings. New Chinese aviation developments do have a history of emerging suddenly, as TWZ has often been the first to report.

As China’s fleets of more advanced operational aircraft continue to expand in scale and scope, we can expect to see similar growth in the infrastructure and other assets necessary to support their operations, including new aircraft fire trainers.

Special thanks to Andreas Rupprecht, an expert on Chinese aviation and contributor to this website, who goes by @RupprechtDeino on X, for bringing this to our attention.

Contact the author: joe@twz.com

Aug. 25 (UPI) — China is angrily pushing back against the President Donald Trump administration on new sanctions against Iran that will harm it.

China said it would defend its interests against the United States and accused the administration of disrupting the global financial order.

On Monday, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent set out plans to “sever every economic lifeline” to Iran, targeting countries that do business with the country.

China’s foreign ministry representative, Lin Jian, said China is firmly opposed to what it called “illegal unilateral sanctions” and would take “all necessary measures” to defend its rights.

“Cooperation between China and Iran has always been conducted within the framework of international law and should not be interfered with or disrupted,” Lin said.

China is the largest customer of Iranian oil.

The United States listed more than 60 brokers, companies and ships facing new sanctions. They included more than a dozen small businesses from Hong Kong and China, The New York Times reported. But larger companies in China weren’t on the list, which some have speculated means Washington was being careful not to antagonize the country.

Chinese President Xi Jinping is planning to visit the United States next month to meet with Trump and continue talks.

Iranian Economy Minister Ali Madanizadeh said Tehran was “fully prepared” for the broader sanctions, which he said would lead to “another defeat” for the United States.

“The government is and was ready and has a two-year plan to manage these events,” he told state television. “We also have our own tools and know how to play the game,” he said. He also said that Tehran had been “waiting for these plans for a long time.”

BANGKOK — Chinese artist Gao Zhen was sentenced to three years in prison on Tuesday for “infringing upon the reputation of heroes” over his satirical works of art, including statues of China’s former leader Mao Zedong.

U.S.-based Gao, who was part of an artistic duo known internationally as the Gao Brothers, was arrested while visiting family in China in August 2024. He has been in official custody since then.

He was sentenced by the Sanhei People’s Court court in northern Hebei province, according to his wife, Zhao Yaliang.

The charges against Gao relate to artistic works that China’s authorities claim insulted revolutionary figures, including a 2009 statue called Mao’s Guilt, which shows the former leader and founder of modern China as kneeling in repentance. Others include as series called Miss Mao, which shows a caricatured version of Mao with breasts and an engorged nose.

Shane Yi, a researcher at Chinese Human Rights Defenders, who has been advocating for the case, described the sentence as “a very clear case of a violation of a person’s freedom of expression.”

Yi noted that the artworks in question were created before the law Gao was sentenced with had been passed and said the artist plans to appeal the sentence.

The court did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Amnesty International criticized the court sentence which it described as a deterrent against artistic expression.

“The lengthy pre-trial detention and, ultimately, decision to convict Gao Zhen and sentence him to the maximum three-year prison term under this offense illustrate the authorities’ determination to deter others from engaging in independent artistic expression,” said Amnesty’s China Director Sarah Brooks.

“No artist should face criminal punishment for creating work that challenges official narratives or encourages critical reflection on history,” she said.

Zhao said she hopes to be reunited with her husband and be able to return to the U.S., where the family had immigrated to.

“I felt two years was my limit, and I was really disappointed and sad. I haven’t been able to catch my breath,” she said. She had prepared clothes for her husband hoping that he would be released. Chinese courts often count the time of a sentencing from the date a prisoner is taken.

The Gao Brothers, whose works addressed themes of authoritarianism and censorship, became famous in a time of relative openness in China and were exhibited both inside the country and abroad.

However, in recent years, the state’s increased its controlling grip on certain aspects of expression, especially in regards to political figures with the passage of law in 2018 that bans criticism of the nation’s heroes.

Wu writes for the Associated Press.