Welcome back to Global Overview, where we feature United States-Iran negotiations over the Strait of Hormuz, rising anti-immigrant sentiment South Africaand what the next 10 years of Labor rule might look like England.
Who Controls Hormuz?
US and Iranian officials are preparing to hold indirect talks in Qatar on Tuesday and Wednesday following days of tit-for-tat strikes that threatened to unravel the ceasefire between the two sides. Instead of focusing on Iran’s nuclear program, though—as should have been the focus of this week’s talks—the parties plan to discuss ongoing security issues in the Strait of Hormuz.
Welcome back to Global Overview, where we feature United States-Iran negotiations over the Strait of Hormuz, rising anti-immigrant sentiment South Africaand what the next 10 years of Labor rule might look like England.
Who Controls Hormuz?
US and Iranian officials are preparing to hold indirect talks in Qatar on Tuesday and Wednesday following days of tit-for-tat strikes that threatened to unravel the ceasefire between the two sides. Instead of focusing on Iran’s nuclear program, though—as should have been the focus of this week’s talks—the parties plan to discuss ongoing security issues in the Strait of Hormuz.
Earlier this month, the US and Iran signed a preliminary document peace agreement which includes the clause to reopen the strategic waterway. However, the vague wording of the agreement, which states that Tehran “will make arrangements using its best efforts for the safe and free passage of commercial vessels for 60 days,” has left room for interpretation and fueled further conflict.
The latest results have been four consecutive days of hostility prevailed. On Thursday, an Iranian drone destroyed a Singapore-flagged container ship off the coast of Oman. In response, the US military was launched retaliatory strikes targeting Iran’s missile storage sites and drones as well as coastal radar facilities. Then, over the weekend, Iran attacked another ship in the Strait of Hormuz and later claimed it targeted US military bases in Bahrain and Kuwait.
US officials told Axios Sunday that the two sides agreed to stop their attacks. Still, this increase in violence seems to have dashed hopes that the critical route could be reopened to commercial traffic in the near future.
According to Kpler, a marine data monitoring company, the number of ships passing through the Strait of Hormuz. has come down from 74 ships on Wednesday to just 22 ships on Sunday. And the plan announced last week by the International Maritime Organization to move some 600 ships that are currently stuck in the sea remained suspended on Monday.
The United States has pushed commercial ships to use a way which hugs the coast of Oman and avoids Iranian waters. However, Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi insisted on Sunday that Tehran is solely responsible for controlling the strait and that “any attempt to adopt new or different plans from those currently pursued by the Islamic Republic will cause more problems, delays in the reopening of the Strait of Hormuz, and increased tensions.”
Iran’s Deputy Foreign Minister Kazem Gharibabadi he repeated this position on Monday, warning that “the situation is sensitive and difficult” and criticizing the French plan, he announced that day, to work with Oman to remove the current.
At the same time, the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Oman Badr Albusaidi confirmed on Monday that Oman and Iran are in talks over the possibility of imposing service-related fees on commercial vessels using the waterway. These services may include pollution prevention, navigational assistance, water safety measures, and other emergency preparedness assistance. However, he insisted that it will not be a payment for travel. “This is prohibited internationally, and we obey these laws,” Albusaidi said.
If this week’s talks to reopen the Strait of Hormuz are successful, then the world economy could begin to recover from the months-long war. Oil prices edged higher on Monday following a series of recent attacks, with Brent crude rising nearly 1 percent to more than $73 a barrel for September and West Texas Intermediate crude rising more than 1 percent to about $70 a barrel.
Today’s Most Read
The World This Week
Tuesday, June 30: A two-day meeting of Mercosur leaders is coming to an end in Paraguay.
EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas concludes a two-day trip to Turkey.
Wednesday, July 1: Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi begins a three-day visit to India.
Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. begins a four-day visit to Canada.
The deadline to complete the joint review of the US-Mexico-Canada trade agreement is set to expire.
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen visits Azerbaijan.
Irish Taoiseach Micheal Martin welcomes Council of Europe President António Costa.
Kallas embarks on a two-day trip to Bosnia and Herzegovina.
Thursday, July 2: Algeria holds parliamentary elections.
Von der Leyen visits Armenia.
Saturday, July 4: Iran begins a three-day funeral ceremony for former Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
What we’re after
From outside. Protesters have told all illegal immigrants in South Africa leave the country by Tuesday before anti-immigrant rallies planned for that day. Although the organizers claim that the event will be peaceful, many locals fear that the protest will turn violent.
Thousands of migrants have fled South Africa in recent weeks, with mobs accusing them of committing crimes and robbing the country’s citizens of jobs and resources. Last month, protesters put on fire to more than 50 huts in the port city of Mossel Bay in South Africa, killing at least five Mozambicans. Responding, South African President Cyril Ramaphosa he swore sending delegates across the continent to deal with xenophobic attacks.
Pretoria “will not tolerate any attempts to disrupt the country by anyone, whether protesting or otherwise,” Ramaphosa. he said before Tuesday’s protest.
However, previous efforts to end the violence have done little to ease concerns. With thousands of people scrambling to leave South Africa before Tuesday, embassies and foreign missions have been overwhelmed with a large amount of paperwork. Some foreign nationals have rushed to sleep outside government offices waiting to leave the country for fear of being targeted in their homes.
Balance the power. Andy Burnham, the leading candidate to replace outgoing British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, expressed his views. 10 year plan to the government on Monday with a speech promising major changes. “I will give Britain the circuit breaker it needs by building more inclusive politics at Westminster, by taking power out of the center and into the hands of the people and places that can best use it,” Burnham said in what he described as “a rebalancing of the country’s biggest powers.”
The former mayor of Greater Manchester – wearing a T-shirt under his suit jacket – vowed to pay attention internal affairssuch as industrial redevelopment, water regulation, and high living costs. He promised to give regional governments greater powers, and proposed the start of the largest social housing program since the years following World War II.
Labor MPs praised Burnham’s speech a few days later pushed Starmer out of the office. “Finally, there is hope again,” said former Health Minister Wes Streeting, who has decided not to challenge Burnham for the seat despite resigning from Starmer’s cabinet last month to do so.
Extreme heat. Italy and the Balkan countries became the latest countries to be affected by Europe record-setting heat wave on Monday. Italian authorities have issued a red alert for 22 cities, Serbian officials estimate temperatures could reach 102 degrees Fahrenheit, and firefighters in Croatia and Albania are working to contain wildfires that broke out over the weekend.
But the move of the heat wave to the east has not brought relief to Western Europe, where it is just around the corner 20 percent of the houses have air conditioners. The French public health agency on Sunday reported that approx 1,000 additional deaths it had been recorded between Wednesday and Saturday amid intense heat; of those, 85 percent were people aged 65 or older. The figure also included about 74 people across France who have drowned since June 18 while trying to escape the heat.
“Right now 150 million people are living under extreme heat, hundreds are dead, schools are closed, national grids are closed,” the head of the World Health Organization Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus. he wrote on X on Sunday. “Driven by climate change and global warming, ‘once-in-a-generation’ heat wave conditions are now occurring almost every year (every year). We were warned.”
Odds and Ends
More than 270 years after their discovery, papyrus experts can now read parts of 400 ancient scrolls burned during the eruption of Mount Vesuvius nearly 2,000 years ago. Using machine learning techniques, researchers last Thursday revealed approximately 230 columns of papyrus manuscripts believed to have once belonged to Julius Caesar’s father-in-law in the Italian coastal city of Herculaneum. The results include the existence of several new chapters On the Gods and the philosopher Philodemus of Gadara; until recently, On the Gods it was believed to be the work of one chapter.
