Trending Now
We have updated our Privacy Policy and Terms of Use for Eurasia Group and its affiliates, including GZERO Media, to clarify the types of data we collect, how we collect it, how we use data and with whom we share data. By using our website you consent to our Terms and Conditions and Privacy Policy, including the transfer of your personal data to the United States from your country of residence, and our use of cookies described in our Cookie Policy.
Russia/Ukraine
As the Israel-Iran war intensifies, Iran is seeking an urgent ceasefire, facing overwhelming Israeli military air superiority.
"They have virtually no capacity to strike back,” says Ian Bremmer in today’s Quick Take. Iran has reportedly expended 20% of its ballistic missiles, with minimal damage inflicted, while Israel has crippled large parts of Iran’s military infrastructure and nuclear program.
The US also looms large, as Ian says, “Trump is basically saying, ‘We’re not entering the war, but we will if you don’t engage in negotiations.’” A US-backed strike on Iran’s Fordow Fuel Enrichment Plant remains a real threat if talks stall.
Despite widespread global condemnation of Israeli strikes, even Iran’s allies like Russia are not stepping in militarily. “Regime survival is the priority now,” Ian warns, as internal dissent grows within Iran’s leadership. But with the risk of irrational escalation rising, Ian adds: “That’s the fog of war stuff … far more likely as this war is going on.”
U.S. President Donald Trump arrives to attend the G7 Leaders' Summit at the Rocky Mountain resort town of Kananaskis, Alberta, Canada, June 15, 2025.
The G7 is no longer setting the table; it’s struggling to hold the cutlery. Once a pillar of the post-war world order, the group today is splitbetween the US and the rest, casting about for common ground. Before this week’s summit even kicked off in Kananaskis, Canada, host Prime Minister Mark Carney warned there would beno final joint communique. So what’s up for discussion - and what could be achieved?
The official agenda: Trade, defense, and AI
Trade trumps climate change. With US President Donald Trump back on the scene,tariffs are huge, while climate action takes a backseat. Leaders will try to defend existing net-zero goals, update plans to tackle wildfires, and boost clean tech cooperation. But the meetings’first focus is on trade, and striking deals. Countries will seek to defend themselves against Trump’s protectionist policies by both expanding trade with each other and getting Trump to lift tariffs on their countries.
Defense and Industry. Whilethe Iran-Israel war now overshadows existing conflicts in Gaza and Ukraine, support for Kyiv is still on the menu. The tone is shifting, however, to talk of pan-European defense against Russian aggression. Carney, French president Emmanuel Macron, and German Chancellor Friedrich Merz are expected to push fora “defense-industrial pact,” a long-term commitment to arms production and supply chains to “Re-Arm Europe”.
Artificial Intelligence and Misinformation Leaders are lookingat baseline safeguards around algorithmic transparency and deepfake detection, given the worldwide rise in election interference, cybercrime and cyberwarfare. While global AI regulation is unlikely, the G7 may commit to coordinating digital watchdogs and fighting cross-border disinformation campaigns.
The backstory: America alone
All these items are dominated by a larger issue: the widening gap between the US and its allies. Trump’s view of the world order diverges starkly from that of the other members of the group. His thin skin and volatility could also compromise the outcome of the talks, especially if hestorms out like he did at the infamous 2018 Charlevoix summit. Carney’smain tasks include preventing Trump from feeling disrespected, and navigating the divide between G6 goals and US ambitions such as Trump’s takedown of China.
What can this meeting achieve, then?
Expect no joint statement, but lots of bilateral action, with both Trump and other world leaders. On Sunday, for example, Carney and UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer announced a strengthened partnership on a range of issues including trade and defense. Carney has also invited a slew of non-G7 leaders, including Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, arguing thatthey are key to solving major questions such as energy security and AI. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky will also be present, as willthe leaders of Australia, Brazil, Indonesia, Mexico, South Korea and South Africa. In the end, the biggest achievement may simply be keeping the group alive to meet another day.The G7 countries – the US, UK, Canada, Germany, France, Italy and Japan – will convene this weekend in Kananaskis, a rural town in the mountains of Alberta, Canada. High on the meeting’s agenda are tariffs, artificial intelligence, and international security, with special focus on Russian sanctions and Israel’s recent attacks on Iran.
While the G7 was originally formed as an informal grouping of the world’s wealthiest democracies, the BRICS – composed of Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa – have sought to challenge their dominance of the global agenda.
Here’s a look at how the share of the global economy held by G7 and BRICS nations has evolved over time.
In this episode of Europe in :60, Carl Bildt breaks down Serbia’s evolving foreign policy, and political developments in Poland.
After President Vučić’s visit to Ukraine, Bildt notes, “I think he is in the black book of the Kremlin because of that particular visit,” highlighting shifting alliances in the Balkans.
On Poland, following Donald Tusk’s post-election confidence vote, Bildt explains the challenges ahead: “The president can veto legislation, he can block important appointments.”
As Serbia weighs its EU path and Poland navigates internal politics, Bildt offers timely analysis on regional stability and European security affairs.
East and West German citizens celebrate as they climb the Berlin Wall at the Brandenburg Gate after the opening of the East German border was announced, on November 9, 1989.
– By Willis Sparks
Sometimes I find myself talking with one of my super-smart, well-informed younger acquaintances about some major event from “recent” history. I’ll tell them I remember watching nightly coverage of the fate of Americans held hostage in Tehran by furious Iranian students while I was in high school. Or, sitting on the floor of my grad school apartment, watching live TV coverage of Chinese tanks crushing Chinese protesters, and later of giddy Germans dancing and drinking atop the Berlin Wall. Then there’s the sunny fall morning when a plane struck a tower in lower Manhattan.
Then I remember that the person I’m speaking with wasn’t yet born when most (or any) of these things happened.
Everywhere in the world, succeeding generations have formative experiences that shape their understanding not only of the past but of the present and future. When we think about the politics of various countries today, this “horizon of memory” can help us consider something important about what’s happening and why.
50.5% of Americans are under 40. This means they have little memory of the Cold War, and didn’t grow up with the assumption that America has a “responsibility to lead” on the global stage. If you didn’t experience Cold War hopes and fears firsthand, you might find it odd that US presidents were once called “leader of the free world.”
43.3% of Germans are under 40. I haven’t visited Berlin since there were two of them. I went in the spring of 1990 because I wanted to put my hand on the Wall, to touch history, before it was gone. No German under the age of 40 will remember that surreal historical inflection point or the complex (sometimes contradictory) feelings triggered by Germany’s reunification.
45.9% of Russians and 42.4% of Ukrainians are under 40. No Russian under 40 will remember the Soviet superpower and the daily life that came with it. Even the Mikhail Gorbachev-period that I saw for myself on a visit to Moscow in April 1989 will be largely unfamiliar. Across the border, no Ukrainian under 40 will remember life in an empire ruled from the Kremlin. On both sides of the border, Vladimir Putin’s arguments about Russia’s historic claims to Kyiv land differently with people over 60 than those who are 30.
69.4% of South Africans are under 40. Everyone in that country knows the African National Congress was once the party of liberation. But unless you’re over 40, you likely won’t remember the astonishing day in February 1990 when a smiling Nelson Mandela, imprisoned for 27 years, walked out of his small cell in suit and tie. Nor will you recall the widely shared jolt of raw idealism when he became his country’s president. If you’re under 40, the ANC is the party of power.
64% of Brazilians are under 45. No Brazilian under 45 can remember living under the military dictatorship that was the “Fifth Brazilian Republic,” which lasted from 1964 to 1985. For them, debates over threats to democracy posed by former President Jair Bolsonaro might not resonate as they do for their parents.
78% of Iranians are under 50. No Iranian under 50 will remember life before the revolution that established the Islamic Republic (1979). They know the days of the Shah only through the happy or unhappy memories of their parents and the ideological education they continue to receive.
Without doubt, these events are crucial for all of us. No matter our age today, these are the movements of history on which we build the world around us. But I know my grandparents understood the poverty and fear of the 1930s differently than I ever can. My parents came of age in the peaceful but paranoid 1950s and entered adulthood with the Cuban Missile Crisis.
At 60, I’m blessed to have seen some dramatic historical turning points and to value the perspective they offer. But I’ve also learned that politics, anywhere and everywhere, is impossible to understand without reminders of our horizons of memory — and respect for the assumptions, beliefs, and aspirations of those who’ve engaged the wider world since.
What memories of historical events have shaped your worldview? Let us know here, and if you include your name and where you’re writing from we may include your response in an upcoming edition.Hard Numbers: Polish PM’s gamble pays off, UK sanctions Israeli government ministers, Taiwan indicts Chinese “spies”, and more
Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk reacts after a vote of confidence for his center-left coalition government, in Warsaw, Poland, June 11, 2025.
33: Poland’s Prime Minister Donald Tusk survived a no-confidence measure on Wednesday by a margin of 33 votes in the 460 seat legislature. Tusk had called the vote himself in a bid to reinforce his mandate after an ally of his lost the presidential election to a rightwing challenger late last month.
4: Taiwanese prosecutors indicted four former members of the ruling Democratic Progressive Party over allegations of spying for China. One of the alleged suspects worked as an assistant to former Foreign Minister Joseph Wu, who is now the secretary-general of Taiwan’s National Security Council.
0.1%: The US’ annual inflation index rose by 0.1 points from 2.3% last month—an early indication that Trump’s tariffs are having only a modest impact on consumer prices so far.
5: Five western countries – Australia, Canada, New Zealand, Norway, and the UK – imposed sanctions on two of Israel’s far-right ministers on Tuesday, accusing Itamar Ben-Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich of “inciting extremist violence” in the West Bank and denying essential aid to Palestinians in Gaza. Israel’s foreign minister Gideon Saar pledged a response to the “outrageous” move.
40%: US National Institutes of Health Director Dr. Jay Bhattacharyadefended his agency during a Senate hearing on Tuesday after the Trump administration proposed a 40% budget cut to it. Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME) slammed the proposed cuts, which would lower the NIH’s total budget to $27.5 billion for the next fiscal year.
1,200: Russia and Ukraine began a major prisoner swap earlier this week, with each side expected to hand over at least 1,200 prisoners. However, prospects for a ceasefire remain distant: Kyiv and Moscow have exchanged ferocious aerial assaults in recent days.
Robert F. Kennedy Jr. speaks in the Oval Office of the White House, on the day he is sworn in as secretary of Health and Human Service in Washington, D.C., U.S., February 13, 2025.
17: In an unprecedented move, US Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. fired all 17 members of the vaccine advisory committee at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Monday. While Kennedy defended the “clean sweep” as necessary to restore public trust, experts warn that changes to the panel could threaten public confidence in government health agencies.
$180 million: Chinese tech giant Tencent recently struck a deal with SM Entertainment, one of the leading K-pop production houses, to purchase almost a 10% stake for $180 million. The latest move signals a potential musical thaw in China-South Korea relations: Beijing has imposed an unofficial ban on K-pop ever since Seoul agreed to host US missile defenses in 2016.
2%: Citing the need to reduce reliance on the United States, Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carneypledged to raise defense expenditures to 2% of the nation’s GDP by the end of the year. The accelerated spending will bring the country in line with NATO benchmarks five years ahead of Carney’s previous target of 2030.
499: Russia launched 499 drone and missile attacks on Kyiv last night, in one of the largest aerial assaults of the three-year-war. The latest attack coincides with a fresh Russian push into eastern Ukraine, and it follows Kyiv’s own large-scale drone attacks on Russian strategic bombers last week.
3%: Less than 3% of the world’s oceans are effectively protected from destructive activities like industrial fishing and deep-sea mining. But with the UN Oceans conference now underway in France, delegates are on track to ratify the High Seas Treaty, a landmark agreement that will allow countries to establish protected areas in biodiverse international waters.