Trump announces visit to China “early next year”

Today's headlines: Sanae Takaichi is Japan's new prime minister; Burmese junta raids KK Park scam centre, seizes 30 Starlink receivers;. Israeli raids in southern Lebanon against Hezbollah “terrorist sites”; Vance is in Israel today; Two terrorists with RPGs arrested in Indian Punjab, police: contacts with Pakistani intelligence.

CHINA - UNITED STATES

On the sidelines of his meeting with Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, US President Donald Trump announced a visit to China in 2026. The announcement comes after a recent phone call with Xi Jinping regarding the TikTok agreement and tariff negotiations. The call also served to set a bilateral agenda: the first meeting is announced in South Korea at the end of the month, on the sidelines of the APEC summit scheduled in Gyeongju on 31 October and 1 November. Confirming that appointment - which in recent days had seemed uncertain - Trump said he would travel to China “early next year”, while Xi would visit Washington “at the appropriate time”.

JAPAN

Sanae Takaichi, president of the ruling Liberal Democratic Party, has been elected prime minister of Japan, supported by the new coalition partner, the Japanese Innovation Party. She is the first woman to hold the position. Although the alliance between the LDP and the JIP holds a narrow majority in the House of Representatives, Takaichi was approved by both houses of the Japanese National Diet and succeeds Shigeru Ishiba.

MYANMAR

Myanmar's military junta says it has seized 30 Starlink receivers during a raid on one of the country's most notorious online scam centres. In KK Park, near the border between Myanmar and Thailand. The number of Starlink devices is said to be only a fraction of those identified. Government media announced that junta troops occupied about 200 buildings, found nearly 2,200 workers on site, and arrested 15 “Chinese fraudsters”.

ISRAEL - LEBANON - GAZA

The Israeli Air Force carried out a series of air raids on Iqlim Al-Tuffah, southern Lebanon, with drones and reconnaissance aircraft violating Lebanese airspace by flying over Beirut. An Israeli military spokesman confirmed that ‘terrorist sites’ and Hezbollah infrastructure ‘under reconstruction throughout Lebanon in violation of existing agreements between Israel and Lebanon’ were targeted. This is a time of increasing pressure on the Lebanese government to respect the state's monopoly on weapons. Meanwhile, US Vice President Vance is in Israel today as part of US efforts to support the ceasefire in Gaza.

INDIA

During an operation conducted by the secret services, police in Amritsarha, Punjab, arrested two terrorists who were in possession of a rocket-propelled grenade (RPG) intended for a targeted attack. Preliminary investigations indicate that the accused were in contact with a Pakistani intelligence agent (ISI), who allegedly supplied the weapon. Punjab police have reiterated their commitment to dismantling transnational terrorist and criminal networks.

RUSSIA

A Russian Orthodox priest, Hieromonk Father Evgeny Pinchuk, residing in the Sverdlovsk region of the Urals, was arrested for expressing his ‘respect and sympathy’ on Telegram for members of the Russian Association of Volunteers Supporting Ukraine, accusing him of ‘inciting terrorism’ after other occasions when he had been accused of “discrediting the armed forces” for calling the operation in Ukraine an “invasion”.

ARMENIA

Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pašinyan outlined his vision of the “Fourth Republic of Armenia” on the Civic News podcast, which he said was already being formed under his government's leadership, “based on peace and not conflict”, in which “power belongs to the people”, who must also confirm the amendments to the Constitution, in a “healthy collaboration between the people and the institutions”, now living in the “homeland we have always dreamed of”.

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