Season 2 Episode 15 : AI Breakthroughs, Iran Ceasefire Breakdown

June 11, 2026 — In this week’s episode of Around the World, hosts Dhruva Jaishankar and Rachel Rizzo discuss ongoing developments in the Middle East conflict, focusing on recent military escalations, ceasefire efforts, and the broader economic and political implications of the conflict for the United States, Europe, and the Global South. They also examine the growing geopolitical significance of artificial intelligence, highlighting how frontier AI systems are reshaping national security and economic competitiveness, while raising questions about international cooperation and the challenge of governing rapidly advancing technologies.

Available on Spotify and Apple Podcasts.

Image: dee karen, via Shutterstock

Image: Sunshine Seeds, via Shutterstock

Season 2 Episode 14 : Ebola Outbreak, Rubio at Quad and NATO, India-Africa Ties

May 29, 2026 — In this week’s episode of Around the World, Veda Vaidyanathan, Fellow in Foreign Policy and Security Studies at the Centre for Social and Economic Progress, joins hosts Dhruva Jaishankar and Rachel Rizzo to break down the latest Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Uganda — highlighting its implications for health governance and evolving India-Africa ties, as well as the recent cancellation of the fourth India-Africa Forum Summit. The hosts also recap U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s trips to Europe and India, assessing the outcomes of the NATO Foreign Ministers meeting and key developments in U.S.-India relations.

Available on Spotify and Apple Podcasts.

Image: © European Union, 2026, CC BY 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Image: Prime Minister addressing the Inaugural Session of India Africa Forum Summit 2015 in New Delhi (Oct 29, 2015) via MEAphotogallery on Flickr

Image: U.S. Embassy Australia via Instagram (@usembassyau)

Season 2 Episode 13 : Trump-Xi Summit in China, Europe’s Security Dilemmas

May 15, 2026 — In this week’s episode of Around the World, hosts Dhruva Jaishankar and Rachel Rizzo unpack the high-stakes summit between U.S. President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping, outlining what each side is hoping to secure amid rising tensions over tariffs, critical minerals, Taiwan, and the conflict in Iran. The episode then turns to Europe’s mounting security dilemmas, from the future of NATO to the growing push for a more self-sufficient European defense strategy.

Available on Spotify and Apple Podcasts.

Image: The White House, Public Domain, via WhiteHouse.gov

Image: MantasVD, via Shutterstock.com

sneak peak

Dhruva Jaishankar: On this week's episode.

Rachel Rizzo: President Donald Trump, wants China to pressure Iran, to reopen the Strait of Hormuz. He really wants to clinch a deal on rare earths minerals used for the growing semiconductor industry and other things. And he really wants the Chinese to purchase US agricultural products that it had boycotted during the trade war.

Dhruva Jaishankar: I think we're going to start seeing the gradual Europeanization of NATO without anyone risking trying to sort of, they don't even want to publicly talk about a NATO minus the United States because that may become a self-fulfilling prophecy. So slowly developing autonomous capabilities and some areas will move faster than others, we will start just seeing the Europeanization of NATO rather than the dissolution of NATO.

Rachel Rizzo: In New Delhi, we have the meeting of BRICS foreign ministers here today. You have this list of countries that I think numbers 11 now and it comprises more than half the world's population. You have these countries that are growing in terms of GDP, and they're really wanting to remake the global system in a way where the rules aren't necessarily all written in Washington. And then you have Trump going to Beijing not from a position of strength either.

WELCOME TO AROUND THE WORLD

Dhruva Jaishankar: Hello, I'm Dhruva Jaishankar.

Rachel Rizzo: And I'm Rachel Rizzo. Welcome to the Around the World podcast. Your essential guide to understanding the forces shaping our world today. Here at Around the World, we cut through the noise to bring you clear, insightful analysis of the most important developments in geopolitics.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Whether it's security challenges in Europe, great power competition in Asia, domestic updates in the United States, or regional developments in Latin America or the Middle East, we make sure you're up to speed on what's happening and more importantly, why it matters.

Rachel Rizzo: Thanks as always for tuning in. And be sure to like and subscribe to the Around the World podcast on Youtube, Spotify and Apple Podcasts.

All eyes on beijing

Rachel Rizzo: Hey, Dhruva.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Hi Rachel, how are you?

Rachel Rizzo: Good good, it's been a while, hasn't it?

Dhruva Jaishankar: It's been three weeks since our last recording and a lot has happened around the world.

Rachel Rizzo: It’s been three three weeks?

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yeah, it’s been three weeks, yeah. But a lot happening, of course, continuing talks in Iran, something we may or may not get to, but not a lot of clarity there. We've had some political crises in a few places, including the United Kingdom, where Prime Minister Keir Starmer is facing resignations in his cabinet. It's kind of a real House of Cards type situation. But today, I think we can, something that's happening, that's ongoing right now is US President Trump's visit to China to meet with China's paramount leader Xi Jinping. How are things looking from New Delhi, where you are?

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, I mean so this has been a highly anticipated visit. We've been talking about it for a few months now. And I think that, you know, President Donald Trump, this is his first visit to China since 2017, and he's showing up with a long list of needs. He wants China to pressure Iran, one of its closest partners, to reopen the Strait of Hormuz. He really wants to clinch a deal on rare earths minerals used for the growing semiconductor industry and other things. And he really wants the Chinese to purchase US agricultural products that it had boycotted during the trade war. And I think the thing about this meeting is that Xi, Xi Jinping, he knows every item on this list very well, and he's likely ready to play hardball. For example, when Xi threatened to restrict the exports of the rare earth minerals that underpin American semiconductors, EVs, fighter jets. They really got the United States to blink. And I think that the problem here with Trump coming to China with these asks is this fundamental scenario where Xi's guiding principle when dealing with Washington is that A, the East is rising and the West is declining, and that time and momentum are both on China's side. So it's going to be really interesting to see how both of those positions come to play in this meeting that is certainly very consequential.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yeah, you know, it's interesting, the China policy under Trump's second term and remember his first term was one that really hardened U.S.-China policy. It sort of accelerated in some the competition. The 2017 national security strategy highlighted the Indo-Pacific as the first priority. There was a very nasty, you know, was spats over COVID and China's handling of the COVID pandemic in his first term over. There was a shutting down of a consulate. I mean, it was a, we've seen a bit of a shift in tone. And it started with Trump's inauguration, in fact, where he said he wants his legacy to be that of a peacemaker. He wants to end his second tenure as having reached some kind of grand bargain with China. And announcing that has already in some ways undermined, it's not like from a position of strength. It started off with, I want to do a deal with you. And then we've seen things flow from that with consequences for everybody else. That alone has made a lot of people in Washington, including in his own party, Republican Party, and his own administration, quite uncomfortable. That is, it's unclear how much of this is Trump reaching out to Xi and how much of this is really indicative of U.S. policy. And these views are not necessarily shared by members of the bureaucracy, Republicans in Congress, some businesses, and the military. So ne thing to watch out for, I think couple other factors have just shaped the tone of this conversation, but then we can get into a bit more detail about what they might be discussing, the content. One is, I think the tariff war last year led to this awkward truce. We spoke about it on the podcast in Korea when they met, and the fundamental, the basis of that agreement was China would continue to export rare earth permanent magnets to the United States. was a feeling the US was really dependent on that. And the US would continue to export certain amounts of high-end GPU semiconductors required for its AI development. And that was the kind of fundamental basis of that truce. Second is that Xi wants a return visit by the end of this year. So he's not going to give everything upfront now because he wants a

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah.

Dhruva Jaishankar: return visit to the United States by the end of 2026. And so again, there's indications that that may not resolve everything. Third, the Iran war has come in between, you know, this meeting happened a couple of months ago, I think the US would have had a much stronger hand. But now Trump is going a little bit more, you know, it has less leverage in some ways. So all of this is contributing to this perception, however real, that in some ways Trump wanted this meeting more than Xi did, and Xi's taking advantage of it. But getting to some of the substances, maybe talk a little bit about the trade and economic aspects of what they might be discussing.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, so there's a couple aspects here, trade and the economy, then sort of flowing from that, you have specifically rare earths and tech. So I think for China, they really want to buy some time to consolidate their technological and industrial positions. And for the US, I think they probably want to secure more symbolic wins rather than, you know, work towards any meaningful structural reforms to China's economic model. So I think if the US can push Beijing to, for example, buy Boeing aircraft or buy American soybeans for stability, they want to announce a bilateral board of trade and a board of investment. These have kind of already been sketched out in previous working level talks. And I think this is what happens for anyone that follows this high level symmetry very closely. A lot of the final outcomes are agreed upon ahead of time at the working level so that you can make sure that when you have the leaders meet at the highest level, they're able to sign a piece of paper and both sides can walk away with something and both sides can walk away with a win. Otherwise, you know, it could be seen as a failure. So you really want to make sure to cement those ahead of time. I think, you know, flowing from that, you have this issue of rare earths and tech, which I think is probably the most structurally consequential. China controls, and we've talked about this on the podcast, about 90 % of global rare earth refining. So these are materials that we need for semiconductors, EVs, military equipment. And Beijing is expected to push for fewer US tech restrictions while Washington really wants China to resume shipments of rare earths and critical minerals after export controls really disrupted parts of the American automotive and aerospace sector. So kind of going back to what you were talking about in the tariff war last year, it hit both sides. So I think that the US is walking into this and there's sort of an uncomfortable reality, which is there's this rapid expenditure of advanced weapons systems in the US that have been used in the Middle East and Ukraine, which have compounded these deep vulnerabilities in supply chains that are tied to rare earth elements and magnets that China controls. And those inputs, as I mentioned, are dominated by China. So it's kind of a tough scenario, I think, for Washington walking into this. As you mentioned, Xi probably wants this meeting or knows that he can get more out of this meeting than perhaps the United States can.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Mm-hmm. And it also is this long-standing dilemma about short-term expedience. You need these critical supply chains versus a long-term de-risking. And how do you, over time, lessen that dependency? And the US is confronting that with China, but others are as well. Switching to geopolitics, how much do you think Iran will loom over? The Iran war and the straight-forward situation will loom over the Trump-Xi talks.

Rachel Rizzo: Mm-hmm. Yeah, so there, I mean, there's the geopolitical aspect to both to this as well, where you have Iran and you also have Iran and you also have Taiwan. So Iran in the Strait of Hormuz, I think for Trump, he really wants Xi to push Iran to reopen the strait. They want Beijing to use its over Tehran. China remains the largest buyer of Iranian oil. It purchases more than 80 % of Iran's shipped crude exports. But there's some complications here. Iran's closure of the Strait of Hormuz and Washington's competing blockade of Iranian ports have left Chinese ships stranded and in turn it has severely affected China's crude oil imports, half of which are shipped from the Middle East. So I think both sides have an interest in a resolution, but Beijing doesn't want to be seen as doing Washington's bidding for them. And so I think this is going to be sort of a delicate dance here. And then of course. And I'll come to you for this as well, because it's the elephant in the room, Taiwan. Xi said that in his opening remarks that Taiwan is, quote, the most important issue in US-China relations, and that if it's not handled well, it would push the relationship to a dangerous place. So I guess, you know, from your standpoint, what are you watching in terms of where both sides are going on on Taiwan? And how do you think this conversation is going to play out.

Dhruva Jaishankar: I mean, I think there's a lot of nervousness around that. Not so much, again, there is what will Trump himself say privately. You I think one of the you mentioned something earlier, you said, you know, most of these summits, and this is what I think a lot of us have grown accustomed to, you have a lot of the outcomes negotiated well in advance, you know, maybe until the final minute you have, but usually when a leader gets on a plane to go on a big trip somewhere, a big visit somewhere.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah.

Dhruva Jaishankar: 95% of things are already ironed out. The challenges, as we've seen with Trump, and look at his summit in Alaska with Putin, that's not always the case. Or Vice President JD Vance's trip to Pakistan to negotiate with Iran. It's unclear whether a lot of the groundwork has been laid. And so I think a big uncertainty, and officials not just in Taiwan, but in Japan and others are sort of nervous about this, is what will be brokered behind closed doors by Trump himself? And will any indication be given? And there's an immediate issue over arms sales to, US arms sales to Taiwan that have been postponed because of this meeting. One thing China tries to do is always schedule these meetings to ensure that there's not an arms sale before. And that basically helps to postpone US arms sales to Taiwan. It's a game that they know they play, but that makes Taipei quite nervous. But even Japan and Japanese officials are sort nervous about what the outcome might be of that. Even if a signal is sent, even if unintentionally, on how much the US might be able and willing to defend Taiwan in the case of some sort of forceful reunification by the PRC. So anyway, that's, think, the subject of a great deal of uncertainty we’ll see what comes out of this. But more importantly than what comes out formally, I think, will be what signal does Xi himself read in the talks with Trump.

Rachel Rizzo: You know what I think is interesting too, and this isn't related specifically to the Trump and Xi meeting, but here in New Delhi, we have the meeting of BRICS foreign ministers here today. So you have Lavrov here, you have South Africa, you have Indonesia, you have this list of countries that I think numbers 11 now and it comprises more than half the world's population. And in both of these scenarios, Washington, in the BRICS scenario, Washington is absent. You have these countries that are growing in terms of GDP, and they're really wanting to remake the global system in a way where the rules aren't necessarily all written in Washington. And then you have Trump going to Beijing not from a position of strength either. So it's just interesting to see where the US is sitting on the world stage at the moment from two different poles, from two different meetings. And I don't know what that means going forward, but I think that there's been some leverage there that has been lost maybe for flying a little bit too close to the sun in some aspects.

Dhruva Jaishankar: And yet at the same time, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi has decided to stay in Beijing for the Trump meeting and is skipping the BRICS summit. It tells you a question of China's priorities as well. Secondly, I think there's an inherent challenge within BRICS, which is there isn't really consensus on what kind of international order they do want to build. And you have countries like India, Brazil, some degree Indonesia, they're trying to position BRICS more as a non-Western body, and then you have China and Russia that want it to become a much more anti-explicitly anti-Western bloc and a much more cohesive bloc. And that tension is there. it's been there for a while. It's only exacerbated as new members have come on board. And then the third, this year particularly, there's a particular tension because Iran is a member of BRICS, as is the UAE, and they are effectively in conflict with each other at this point of time. And so in fact, I think a few months ago had we talked about the BRICS summit, which is going to take place in India this year, we would have said the main issue was resolving some of the dilemmas around Russia, China, India. But actually looks like the more immediate one will be between Iran and some of the other actors, notably the UAE to a lesser degree Egypt. Last year, in fact, the BRICS foreign minister summit did not even produce a joint statement on a very different matter. There were differences within the African countries between Egypt, Ethiopia, South Africa. So I think, again, on the one hand, you could say that there's that, but yet these other trends seem to indicate that despite the US losing some leverage, it still remains important as far as China's It still remains, Xi Jinping has said already, I think today, that it's the most important bilateral relationship, and Beijing understands that. And secondly, that the alternatives are still struggling to become very cohesive.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, lots to watch. then, so for you, you've been spending a bunch of time in Europe lately.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yeah, been a lot, I just came back a few hours ago from Italy. I'm in the US now. But I've been taking part in a lot of very detailed conversations on European security with planners and policymakers from across Europe. And it's very interesting trends. It's a really interesting time to be looking at Europe's evolving security architecture. And again, it's quite complicated in some ways. I think the essence of it is that Europe faces a major security dilemma. And this will be reflected in July in about two months' time. There will be a summit in Ankara in Turkey where all the NATO leaders, 32 NATO leaders, including Donald Trump, presumably will attend. And this will be a real test, and not the last one by any means, of this transatlantic alliance, this 77-year-old alliance, NATO alliance, that now consists of 32 members.

Rachel Rizzo: And so, I mean, every time that there's a NATO summit where Trump is going to show up, everyone gets nervous about what's going to happen. So in the conversations that you've been having over the last few weeks, are people nervous about the summit in Ankara? How are they preparing for it? Do they feel united? What's the vibe, I guess?

Dhruva Jaishankar: So again, I think there's a dilemma, right? There's a great of almost visceral anger and a sense of betrayal on the part of European policymakers, including policymakers who are the most traditionally the most committed to the United States and we would be seen as the most pro-American voices in the European security establishment. They are very, you know, there's a real sense of personal, almost personal betrayal on their part of the United States. And it's a combination of things. It's the tariffs last year. I think Greenland was a real tipping point. I mean, there was real concerns about the US forcefully taking over at some point last year we talked about this. The non-coordinated Ukraine talks with Russia over Ukraine, that the US is kind of freelancing and not keeping Europe in the loop on things has been at times seemingly willing to give up too much. That's how they see it. And then now the Iran war. So this, you know, where some countries more than others have basically said we were not kept in the loop, we were not going to cooperate in this. And they're questioning both the legality of it, but more also the means by which it's being conducted and negotiated. So the combination of these things is really led to a deep, deep distrust of the United States. And yet few things remain, Europe's threat perception is still very high, although varied. And again, this is part of the problem that for countries in northern and eastern Europe, Russia remains an imminent challenge for them, security challenge. Yet for an Italy or Spain or Portugal, Russia is a distant, you know, a more distant challenge. It can be negotiated with. They're worried about the consequences, the immediate consequences. They're more worried about Mediterranean security, resource security, migration, illicit smuggling, things like that. China has surprisingly emerged as a new factor in European security calculus, both as an enabler of, as many Europeans see it, of the war in Ukraine and its backing of Russia, including through economic and supply chains. China's growing role in the Arctic, particularly the Russian Arctic, is being watched very carefully, and also a little bit in the Atlantic as well, where they're playing a role. So this idea that China was a sort of savior at least on the security side and increasingly on the economic side that's not really changed. That has changed a lot. It's no longer seen as some sort of alternative to the United States and Russia seen as a very close ally of Russia's.

Rachel Rizzo: Mm-hmm. Yeah, I mean, it's interesting because, you know, I've always been a little bit skeptical and critical of NATO wading too much into the China conversation or the Indo-Pacific theater. I mean I understand that you can't ignore China and I understand that you have to pay attention to its relationship with Russia. You have to pay attention to the way it funds and provides money and equipment for, you know, would-be adversaries. And you also understand that NATO needs a, something to shape its priorities. After 9-11, you had NATO and the United States and the global war on terror, the ISAF mission in Afghanistan, and NATO seemed very unified at that point. And then once you sort of lose a boogeyman, it becomes harder to maintain that unity. So then it was Russia and it's still and I wonder where China's going to fall into this.

Dhruva Jaishankar: I don't think, you know, there was actually a terminology that was quite carefully negotiated amongst, because they had to get consensus amongst all the members about how to frame China as a I think the term they used was decisive enabler in Ukraine, but also in the NATO strategy that emerged a few years ago, think it three or four years ago, there was a mention of China as a sort of strategic competitor. I forget the exact terminology that they used, but it was one of those things that was very hotly negotiated. I think the difference is this idea that NATO is going to be some sort of global force, which was what was in vogue a little bit after Afghanistan. That's out of the question today. The real question is European security and the role of Europe, the European member states in European security. The challenge, is that China is now increasingly encroaching upon that through a member. So in the Arctic, in the Atlantic, by its close partnership with Russia, including a defense industrial partnership that is emerging, but also I think in certain hybrid contexts as well. And we're seeing again, whether it's in cyber in the cyber space, whether it's in sort of non-conventional means, there are concerns, great concerns that are there. But it's obviously not going to be NATO's raison d'etre. I mean, that's really clearly Russia at this point of time. But again, there's this real dilemma that Europe is facing at this point of time. One is on the one hand, it has some It's the defense spending is really going up high, that's real, particularly by Germany. In a few years, German defense spending will be more than France and the United Kingdom's combined. Europe is also like, as we've seen, even with Ukraine, but also Poland, the Baltics, Czech Republic, they're really investing a lot in certain defense industries, particularly drones. So that's again real, they're becoming exporters of these systems. Europe collectively has industry leaders on artillery, tanks, diesel, electric, submarines, aircraft. So it has a sort of, I think one thing that is very real and is happening quite quickly is a real industrial rearmament in Europe that is definitely underway. The questions, though, are a few there, and this is why there's still a big gap. There's a leadership gap. So, very deliberately, there is no security leader in Europe. It's kind of diffused. Plans and command are in NATO, in which the US is still very deeply embedded.

Rachel Rizzo: And we lead, we have the Supreme Allied Commander of Europe, is in an American military position.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Exactly, is an American, right? Yeah, but recruitment and spending is really up to individual member states, right? They have own military policies. And then defense industrial capabilities, the EU is getting more more involved. They have a 150 billion dollar, a billion euro program called SAFE, Security Action for Europe. And that's a lending program to boost defense industrial production. They've just created a new European Commissioner for Defense and Space. So you have in some ways very disparate leadership. The second is that there's a technological gap. There’s certain gaps that Europe will struggle to fill if the United States is not in the picture. This includes surveillance, and reconnaissance, targeting for long-range strikes, space-based capabilities, air defense and missile defense functions, and probably most importantly, the nuclear umbrella. And that's something that they're going to struggle with. Weirdly, France is seen as something of a problem in a common European defense strategy, despite what French President Emmanuel Macron says publicly about the need for a cohesive strategic autonomy by Europe. that's basically European defense, I'm sorry, French defense industry is often in direct competition with the rest of Europe and the of Europe is towards these kind of pan-European coalitions for space, for defense, for nuclear, and France is doing its own thing. And so I think there's a bit of frustration, which is the talk of the French leadership doesn't quite match what they're doing in public. And finally, I'd say a big gap is a social one, which I think nobody is really talking about, is Europe remains a very pacifist society, maybe not quite on par with Japan. But most young Europeans do not want to join the military, there’s real opposition to perhaps reintroducing the draft in certain countries or some kind of conscription. This remains a very pacifist society and getting over that, again, with some exceptions, Finland is to some degree an exception. Getting over that will be quite challenging, which will have domestic political implications as well. So the upshot is, I mean, think where I'm sort of coming down on this is like, I think we're going to start seeing the gradual Europeanization of NATO without anyone risking trying to sort of, they don't even want to publicly talk about a NATO minus the United States because that may become a self-fulfilling prophecy. So slowly developing autonomous capabilities and some areas will move faster than others, we will start just seeing the Europeanization of NATO rather than the dissolution of NATO.

Rachel Rizzo: And not to like toot my own horn, two years ago, my colleague and I from, I think it's called the Europe's War Institute, his name's Michael Benhamou, he's French, we wrote a piece called, I think the title ended up being, It's Time to Europeanize NATO. And it was this argument, like, Europe needs to fend for itself. No matter who comes after Donald Trump, the machinery is starting to roll a certain way. And no matter who comes after him, it's not going to be a return to things as it once was. The paradigm has shifted permanently. And NATO needs to Europeanize itself. And some people, you look at the Cato Institute and the folks over at Stimson that are more of the like realist lens and you know they're kind of like cheering for that position but then you had folks that you even I worked with at the time who hated this piece and hate this argument because they think it's a so you're creating a self-fulfilling prophecy rather than creating a NATO that will be much stronger at the end of the day so I've always been on this you know Europeanize NATO wagon and I'm excited to see more and more people join me on here because I think the right way forward ultimately.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Well, it's a way of threading this needle, right? is, I mean, think the reason I think it's happening is that the alternatives are just not really feasible this idea that overnight there'll be a European army is not feasible for a variety of reasons, nor is this idea that the US can be dependent upon in perpetuity for defending Europe. So I think that this is the natural outgrowth of that. But anyway, interesting times, very serious conversations on the way. think some things, again, are moving faster than a lot of people expected. Other things are moving in a very gradual pace for a variety of political, social, and economic reasons.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, absolutely.

Dhruva Jaishankar: So again, interesting times for Europe as it reemerges as a geopolitical actor rather than a geopolitical theatre.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, we'll keep an eye on the summit. I think it's in July, so in couple months from now.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yeah, early July.

Rachel Rizzo: As always, we're still tracking the negotiations in Iran. Also Ukraine, which doesn't get a lot of coverage these days, but those are still happening. We'll keep an eye on these. Make sure we're keeping everyone up to date. And be sure to tune in for our latest episodes every couple of weeks. Depending on how wild the news cycle is, sometimes we do every week, sometimes we do every two weeks.

Dhruva Jaishankar: As always, thank you for joining us on the Around the World podcast and tune in and we'll see you again.

Rachel Rizzo: Thanks.

Season 2 Episode 12 : Africa’s Economic Opportunities, EU Aid to Ukraine

April 24, 2026 — In this week’s episode of Around the World, Mavis Owusu-Gyamfi, President and CEO of the African Center for Economic Transformation (ACET), joins hosts Dhruva Jaishankar and Rachel Rizzo to discuss Africa’s shifting economic landscape, from declining global aid and greater domestic resource mobilization to expanding opportunities with non-traditional partners. They also recap recent developments in Ukraine, including the European Union’s latest aid package and what it signals for the trajectory of the war with Russia.

Available on Spotify and Apple Podcasts.

Image: Divaris Shirichena, via Unsplash
Image: alexkich, via Shutterstock

sneak peak

Dhruva Jaishankar: On this week's episode.

Mavis Owusu-Gyamfi: The impact of the U.S.-Iran war on the global economy is huge. In Africa in particular, we are beginning to see this in the increasing of fuel and fertilizer prices. East, West and Central Africa are literally entering their planting seasons and high fertilizer costs. That means that we should prepare for food insecurity risks ahead of us, especially in the Sahel and the Horn of Africa.

Rachel Rizzo: Today, The European Council adopted the final piece of legislation needed to unlock a 90 billion euro loan to Ukraine.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Africa as a continent is not often enough in the news, yet the world's approach to this vast and growing continent is changing. The African Union joined the G20 in 2023. Kenya has been pioneering digital payments. The United States and the European Union have invested massively in a railway in Angola as part of the Lobito corridor and attempted extracting critical minerals from the Democratic Republic of Congo and from Zambia. Last year, South Africa signed the first clean trade investment partnership with the European Union. And earlier this year, the massive Dangote refinery reached capacity in Nigeria, turning that country into a net exporter of petroleum, diesel and aviation fuel.

welcome to around the world

Dhruva Jaishankar: Hi, I'm Dhruva Jaishankar.

Rachel Rizzo: And I'm Rachel Rizzo. Welcome to the Around the World podcast. Your essential guide to understanding the forces shaping our world today. Here at Around the World, we cut through the noise to bring you clear, insightful analysis of the most important developments in geopolitics.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Whether it's security challenges in Europe, great power competition in Asia, domestic politics in the United States, or regional developments in Latin America or the Middle East, we’ll discuss what's happening and more importantly, why it matters.

Rachel Rizzo: Thanks as always for tuning in. And be sure to like and subscribe to the Around the World podcast on Youtube, Spotify and Apple Podcasts.

Funding Ukraine

Rachel Rizzo: Hey Dhruva.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Hi Rachel, how are you?

Rachel Rizzo: Good. Okay, I'm not even going to ask where you are because I can hear a European siren in the background. So I know you're not in the US.

Dhruva Jaishankar: No, I'm in Brussels. I'm here this week for meetings and it's been a very instructive week. We've been discussing clean energy financing and trade with the Global South and EU, investments in that area, but also meetings with the European Commission on a variety of issues in the Indo-Pacific and beyond. So it's been a really interesting week here. We'll have opportunities to talk about this, I think, in the future. A lot going on there. But speaking of Europe, what have you been tracking? A topic that's been out of the news a little bit in the last few months, which is Ukraine, the war that continues there. What have you been tracking on Ukraine?

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, this is something we wanted to talk about today. You we've been so focused on Iran and what's happening in the Middle East. Obviously, that has not gone away. There will still be much to talk about, certainly. But I didn't want to let the moment pass without discussing a major development that happened just today. The European Council adopted the final piece of legislation needed to unlock a 90 billion euro loan to Ukraine. This was originally agreed upon by the European Council back in December of 2025. discussed it. I think we discussed it on this podcast back a few months ago.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Mm-hmm.

Rachel Rizzo: Hungary, as we all know, had held up the loan with a veto since February, but they lifted it this week, which ended a two-month impasse. And the breakthrough came just a couple of days after Ukrainian President Zelensky announced that the Druzhba pipeline, which carries Russian oil to both Hungary and Slovakia, and had been the main source of Orban, or so he says, his veto on this loan, that this pipeline had repaired and it could resume operations. And again, the disruption of that oil flow was what Orban had basically said was his reason and what guided his decision to veto the loan thus far.

Dhruva Jaishankar: And it probably was no coincidence that Orban lost an election as well in the meantime.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, there's probably has something to do with it. He lost a major election, a huge upset for him, but a major moment obviously for Hungary.

Dhruva Jaishankar: So what is the financing that will now go from the European Union to Ukraine?

Rachel Rizzo: So the deal is that in 2026, Brussels will transfer 45 billion euros with 16.7 billion allocated for financial and budget support and 28.3 billion euros for military support. Now, this comes not a minute too soon. Ukraine continues to be hammered daily by Russian military attacks just because this war has not been on the front page of the news anymore because everyone has been focused on Iran does not mean that it has relented. It is continuing and Russia, or Ukraine for that matter, desperately needs this money. The remaining 45 billion euros is earmarked for 2027. And what that's intended to cover is basically two thirds of Ukraine's funding needs. And then Western allies are expected to cover the remaining third.

Dhruva Jaishankar: So this is a sizable amount of money, and yet it's coming at a time when Russia seems to be hitting a lot of critical infrastructure in Ukraine, but also making very incremental gains on the ground. It's still a relative deadlock. Now, wasn't there some debate? We discussed this on a previous episode several months ago, I think, about there was a debate around using Russian frozen assets. What's going on there?

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, so this is basically a continuation of that debate. Back in December, the EU debated and then ultimately rejected this frozen assets route back in December of 2025. They thought it was too risky. They thought that it might scare other investors away from the European continent. What they agreed upon instead was to borrow from capital markets. And then they basically spent the following months getting all of this legislation in place. Hungary's veto held things up from until just this week today. And so basically this adoption was the last piece of paperwork needed to really start sending the money. So what's interesting about this was that when the EU was debating potentially using Russian frozen assets, the idea was that if they gave Ukraine a loan, they could be liable for repayment of that principle once it receives war reparations from Russia. And obviously, those war reparations are never going to come. That was sort of the debate around using those frozen assets that they would eventually be repaid. But instead, they went down this other route, and they have that same framework in place of repayment. But the idea of Russia paying war reparations is obviously extremely, extremely unlikely. So the way I look at this is kind of as a grant to Ukraine. I don't think that it's going to end up repaid. But again, very kind of tricky financial math here, but really shows the resolve still in Europe for support for Ukraine, which I think is you know obviously good for Zelensky.

Dhruva Jaishankar: And there's another source of financing that we can probably discuss in a future episode, which is Zelensky did this trip to the Middle East, which is you know likely, he visited Syria, visited Saudi Arabia. And one thing we're likely to see much more of is Ukraine using its pretty sizable now defense industrial base to export arms to places like the Middle East and that need it, particularly given the Iran conflict. And that will become a major source of revenue for Ukraine as the war continues with Russia. So something to watch out for, yeah.

Rachel Rizzo: Absolutely. And what you say is right. If you look at the way that Ukraine has responded to this war over the last four years, besides just fighting it, is that they have had an immense growth in their defense industrial base.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Mm-hmm.

Rachel Rizzo: I mean, they are one of the strongest armies, militaries in Europe now. They are on the front lines of the latest military technologies, especially drones. And people are looking at the Ukrainians to talk about the future of warfare,

Dhruva Jaishankar: Mm-hmm.

Rachel Rizzo: future of war fighting. And so again, when it comes to rebuilding Ukraine and integrating Ukraine, hopefully with its future in Europe, its defense industrial base is gonna be a huge part of that conversation.

Dhruva Jaishankar: And two other aspects of that that I think are worth pointing out. One is it's quite it's becoming more and more integrated with lot of other Central European defense suppliers as well. Poland, Czech Republic. In fact, the Czech Republic is also importing a lot of drones from Taiwan, many of which are presumably making their way to the front in Ukraine, the Baltics as well. So there's now a kind of a pretty vibrant and interconnected Central Eastern European defense supply chain ecosystem that is emerging. But, and again, something to watch out for. But the other thing is, this has also become a subject of negotiations with Russia, right? But part of Putin's terms in the negotiations is that his commitments for Ukraine to disarm. And so even if the status quo plus or minus remains in terms of territorial possession, that remains an abiding concern for Russia, that it doesn't want extremely heavily armed, well-trained, battle-hardened military in Ukraine to remain. So the disarmament clauses will be something that will keep on popping up in future negotiations. again, something to watch out for.

Shifting Realities: Africa's Economic Future & Development

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, absolutely. But moving beyond Ukraine, we are going to go south today and talk about a continent that we often don't talk about on this show. And we have a wonderful guest here with us today to discuss it. So, Dhruva, I'll hand it over to you to do that intro.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Africa as a continent is not often enough in the news, yet the world's approach to this vast and growing continent is changing. The African Union joined the G20 in 2023. Kenya has been pioneering digital payments. The United States and the European Union have invested massively in a railway in Angola as part of the Lobito corridor and attempted extracting critical minerals from the Democratic Republic of Congo and from Zambia. Last year, South Africa signed the first clean trade investment partnership with the European Union. And earlier this year, the massive Dangote refinery reached capacity in Nigeria, turning that country into a net exporter of petroleum, diesel and aviation fuel.

Rachel Rizzo: At the same time, however, the IMF just actually downgraded Sub-Saharan Africa's 2026 growth, growth forecast. The region entered 2026 with its strongest economic momentum in a decade. And then came the war in Iran. So the IMF and the World Bank, which just had their spring meetings in Washington, DC, really delivered this sobering reality of a potential 23% collapse in global development aid with Western donors cutting funding for the second consecutive year.

Dhruva Jaishankar: So to discuss Africa's present predicaments and future opportunities, we're really pleased to welcome Mavis Owusu-Gyamfi, President and CEO of the African Center for Economic Transformation, a Pan-African think tank focused on economic policy. And she's joining us from Accra in Ghana. Mavis, thanks for joining us on Around the World.

Mavis Owusu-Gyamfi: Thank you very much, Druva. It's a real honor to join you on Around the World today.

Dhruva Jaishankar: So just to you know get started, I saw you not that long ago in Washington DC for the spring IMF World Bank spring meetings. What were some of the outcomes of the spring meetings that mattered for Africa? I know there's been some talk about borrowers joining, creating a coalition of some kind. What managed to materialize on that front? And the IMF's own briefing said that this is different, particularly focusing on aid cuts. What are some of your takeaways from the spring meetings?

Mavis Owusu-Gyamfi: There were three things I took away from the spring meetings. The first one was the title, Building Prosperity Through Policy. Now this title was very important for Africa. The way in which we translate our policies into actions in a way that improves livelihoods for all Africans was key to us. And a lot of the meetings during the week focused on strengthening partnerships and accelerating development in a very uncertain times. So as we heard earlier on, the impact of the U.S.-Iran war on the global economy is huge. In Africa in particular, we are beginning to see this in the increasing of fuel and fertilizer prices. We heard Dangote during the spring meetings talk about how intraday springs of $10 per barrel could cripple Africa's aviation industry. East, West and Central Africa are literally entering their planting seasons and high fertilizer costs. That means that we should prepare for food insecurity risks ahead of us, especially in the Sahel and the Horn of Africa, where we traditionally have food insecurity challenges. Alongside that, entrepreneurs are being affected. We heard about countries like Kenya having to store tea that was due for GCC countries. We have a number of East African countries with migrants in GCC countries who are going to be affected as inflows of remittances fall. So we can't underestimate the impact of the war on Africa. And then the third thing was the fact that the financing landscape is changing so drastically. The OECD announced just before the spring meetings that ODA from DAC members, are the traditional development donors, fell by a 23.1 % drop in 2025. Now that's a record number. Most of the traditional aid donors, U.S., UK, Germany, Japan are all cutting their aid to the world. At the same time, Africa is having to navigate the high cost of borrowing. UNDP announced earlier in the week that they estimated that by removing subjectivity in credit ratings, African nations could save as much as 74.5 billion dollars. To make matters worse those who are servicing their debts are spending an average of 17 percent of their revenues on debt. So as you can see Dhruva

Dhruva Jaishankar: And I think that's almost as much as health and their spending on health and education, right? In some cases more than their spending on health and education.

Mavis Owusu-Gyamfi: You're right, in a number of cases, more than they're spending on their social services. So I think coordination amongst borrowing countries has become not necessarily important, but critical. And so that's why we were really excited to see coordination with the launch of the borrower's platform. But in Africa in particular, we like the fact that the African regional institutions are coming together ,African governments are talking about how do we collaborate as borrowers so that when we go to the broader borrower's platform, we can ensure that we have a much stronger voice. I mean, we can't keep going round and round in cycles. And then I think for me, I would say the final thing that was really striking, Dhruva, was there was a lot of conversations around domestic resource mobilization and better utilization of domestic capital markets in Africa. Now, as Africans, we all agree we need stronger tax systems, we need to better use our domestic capital, we need to improve public financial management. It is critical, but we must be careful that this isn't suddenly seen as a substitute for sustained global responsibility and in the financial space.

Rachel Rizzo: You know, this is really interesting because I wanted to follow up on, I was going to ask specifically about growth opportunities, which I think you've pointed to in your statement. I wanted to know about kind of looking back at the spring meetings you were speaking in Washington. What is this like a story about this economic transformation that the audience in Washington is almost certainly getting wrong? And like, what do you think partners and investors should be looking at in this specific place?

Mavis Owusu-Gyamfi: Okay. Thank you. And I think the first thing that the audience in Washington is getting wrong is the focus on GDP growth figures. You know, everybody talked about IMF downgrading their growth forecast for Africa and everybody was downcast by it. But there isn't enough focus on the quality of that growth. Okay, is that growth generating decent jobs? Is it building productive capacity? Is it driving structural change? And I don't hear enough about that. Okay, we don't hear enough about intracontinental trade. This is something that is really going to drive the quality of growth, but that is not going to happen unless attention is paid to infrastructure, logistic and cross-border regulatory reforms. We kind of skim around green industrialization. Dhruva, you and I had an opportunity to share a platform on green industrialization and we talk a lot about Africa's critical minerals and the fact that Africa is sitting on 60% of the world's solar resources. It's all nice to hear, but when there is an investment going into it, okay, Africa sits on 30% of the world's critical minerals, but it only contributes 2 % of global manufacturing value added. It sits on 60% of the world resources, but 600 million Africans still lack reliable electricity because they don't have access to technology to transform these resources to power. We have huge natural resources, cotton, gold, cocoa, you name it, but we are not manufacturing and processing it. We continue to export our raw commodities. So we're not seeing value chains develop either within or across borders. And most worryingly, the role of African businesses and private sector is overlooked. Look, everybody talks about Dangote, okay? But Dangote is not just the only African business on the continent. It might be the richest, but there are a thousand and one Dangotes who can be invested in and supported to become future alternative names to Dangote. So unless we start to talk about how do we invest in the domestic private capital market. How do we invest in regional institution, development, financial institutions on the continent? Who know how to invest in these companies? America and the world is missing a great opportunity. And I believe it was Dangote that said last week, well, don't worry, the return on investment is so great. If you don't come, those of us who are here will just continue collecting more.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Which actually I want to follow up a little bit on that, which is you work at the African Center for Economic Transformation. It's a very progressive looking at Africa, not just as an aid recipient as it's often looked at in the West, but as a sort of equal partner and one capable of developing markets and developing industrial growth. If not, I think we can all agree that traditional aid is going to be coming down, even if it comes up a little bit in the near future. What are sort of market-based solutions that you think are viable from, here it seems to me that it's almost like a negative feedback loop. People say, well, these projects are not bankable, not financially viable, so people don't invest. But unless you actually stimulate the investment, nothing's going to happen. And then if you could just touch upon a little bit new partners who are playing a role now in Africa, China, the Gulf, India. Do you see them as having a different approach and is that in some ways a true alternative to investment from traditional sources in developed world?

Mavis Owusu-Gyamfi: Okay, Dhruva that's a very packed question. I'm going to try my best. So let me begin you know, the growth, you know, the growth opportunities on the continent. The asset, we have something called the African Transformation Index, and we look at, you know, countries that are transforming their economies. And one of the indices we look at is the extent to which you are diversifying your economy and as a result, creating investment opportunities. And we see pockets of it all across the continent. So in North Africa, I'd like to encourage people to look at Morocco and Tunisia. They have a fantastic automotive and aerospace manufacturing assembly house that they are working on for Renault and Peugeot that can be expanded. They are building phosphate-based industrial value chains. Morocco is celebrated for its industrial zones. You go across to Tunisia, textiles and clothing, electronics and mechanical components. You go to East Africa, you see FinTech, tourism, digitalization, AI innovation in Kenya. Mauritius is driving innovation on textiles and light manufacturing alongside great financial centers of excellence, including offshore banking, et cetera. You go to South Africa, we see the emergence of industrial base. We've seen it in Uganda, Eswatini. Nobody ever thinks of us at Eswatini, but it's one the largest hubs of textiles and sugar industry. So when we think about Africa, we don't see a poor continent. We see a continent not just of potential, but a continent that's showing results. And with additional investment, could just bloom and thrive. That's what we see on the continent. It has challenges, but those challenges will only be overcome like every other continent with strong investment, both domestic and global. Now you asked me about the non-traditional partners that are coming on board. There's a reason countries go to them. Look, for a very long time, Africa said it needed in infrastructure and the traditional donors did not invest in infrastructure. They didn't think it was a priority for Africa. Guess what? China did. It changed the landscape for Africa as we know it today. Okay. We are beginning to see infrastructure that is connecting Africa. When Africa's manufacturing base grows, it can service its own middle class and stop being a net importer of clothes and food, et cetera. By connecting through infrastructure, that Chinese investment is helping to make a big difference. Other non-traditional donors, Turkey, India, et cetera, that you've, the GCC that you've mentioned are all actually engaging with Africa as investment partners. Now the onus is on African countries to ensure that they are negotiating robustly, that they have the skills, the capability, the know-how to negotiate properly. And, you know, this is one of the things that I think the borrower's club is going to really help with. Because what it's going to do over time is that African countries are not just going to be negotiating on investments and loans, et cetera, but they can learn from each other when they are negotiating with these new donors. And also, they might even get to that point where they borrow together to facilitate interconnectivity because the future of Africa is going to be realized through regional partnerships.

Rachel Rizzo: So I wanted to follow up on, you mentioned countries like Morocco, Tunisia, you mentioned South Africa, Uganda, and then sectors like fintech, tourism, AI innovation, financial centers of excellence. Do you see Western partners like the United States and Europe changing their their visions when it comes to real partnerships, private-public partnerships, private-private partnerships in Africa. That's kind of the first part. But then, going back to Dhruva's question about non-traditional partners and growing partnerships between different African countries in, China or India, is there. I don't know how to phrase this. Is there a worry or is there an idea amongst industry leaders, policymakers, that they don't want to get caught in this broader geopolitical competition between the United States and China? They don't want to have to look east or west. They want to be seen as partners for both sides. And that's the correct approach. I'd just be curious as to how this is playing out in the way that you're seeing it. So two vastly different questions but hopefully like bottom to top.

Mavis Owusu-Gyamfi: Okay, so you know something Rachel, I think that the traditional donors are changing their approach. You know, if you look at how they are engaging in Africa, a lot of people don't like it when I say the word transactional, but it is becoming more transactional. It's about what can we get from you and what can you get from us? So if you look at the UK government, the UK government has shifted from a traditionally large aid donor to really pushing British investment international. It's kind of like their new flagship. So you see BII everywhere. And I believe I saw the CEO of BII, Leslie recently on an interview saying, you know, UK development investment can help development and at the same time make profits with the UK. You know, everybody's doing it. The U.S. has become very transactional. The German government recently launched its new develop assistance and it's very business to business focused. So everybody is shifting into that transactional phase. They like to call it mutual interest. I call it transactional. It's a new way of doing business. And so that's why we're saying that the onus comes on us to make sure that we have the skills and the capabilities, especially with negotiation.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Mm-hmm, yeah.

Rachel Rizzo: Okay.

Mavis Owusu-Gyamfi: So that we are getting the best out of these deals. You know, like last week, a report was launched, which it was launched by Brook, no, it wasn't Brookings, Boston University. And they said that China's investment in Africa, which see a direct trend to growth, they couldn't show any of that for the World Bank investment in Africa over the last 20 years. That's a telling statement. Of course, it will be challenged.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Interesting.

Mavis Owusu-Gyamfi: And there are different ways you can look at the building blocks of growth, but it's a very strong statement to make. So I think everybody is becoming transactional. It's the nature of the world we are operating in at the moment. And in terms of your second question on where does Africa stand, I'd like to go to a very famous independent leader called Kwame Nkrumah who said,

Dhruva Jaishankar: Mm-hmm.

Mavis Owusu-Gyamfi: We don't face East, we don't face West, we just look forward. And I believe African countries in their silence are sending that very message to the world. We work with everyone, so long as it's in our interest. We are just looking forward. And for us, what we are saying to all our leaders is when you're looking forward, look forward to economic transformation, growth with depth, diversification export competitiveness, productivity, effective use of technology, all for the betterment of the well-being of human beings on this continent. That's it.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Well, thank you Mavis for joining us and for taking all of our questions. There's so much more to talk about. Hopefully we'll have you and other colleagues of yours from Africa on this in the future. But thank you again Mavis for joining us from Accra. I'm signing off from Brussels. Rachel is in New Delhi. But thanks to our listeners for joining us on this week's episode of Around the World.

Mavis Owusu-Gyamfi: Thank you, Dhruva and Rachel. And thank you for taking Africa's message to the world.

Rachel Rizzo: Absolutely. Thanks.

Season 2 Episode 11 : Iran Ceasefire, New Space Race, Hungary Elections

April 10, 2026 — In this week’s episode of Around the World, hosts Dhruva Jaishankar and Rachel Rizzo break down a last-minute ceasefire between the United States and Iran, exploring what drove the sudden de-escalation and what to watch as negotiations unfold. They then turn to the recent launch of the Artemis II mission and the broader revival of the global space race, before wrapping up with a preview of Hungary’s upcoming elections and what they could signal for European politics.

Available on Spotify and Apple Podcasts.

Image: The White House, Public Domain, via WhiteHouse.gov

Image: NHQ202604010263. Artemis II Launch, via NASA

Image: Goty98, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons

sneak peak

Dhruva Jaishankar: On this week's episode.

Rachel Rizzo: Trump's tweets that he had made on Truth Social, first on Easter Sunday talking about these guys have to open the effing straight, and then basically saying an entire civilization will die tonight if Iran doesn't come to the table and so he really set himself up I think for a moment that either would result in a massive show of military might or some sort of climb down. But the reality, I think, right now is that this is tenuous at best.

Dhruva Jaishankar: There is an Outer Space Treaty, which was negotiated in 1960s. 118 countries, I believe, are party to the treaty, including most of the major space players as well. And the key elements of that included no nuclear weapons in space, the peaceful uses of the moon and other celestial bodies. But there's actually quite a lot of room. even within the scope of that treaty for weaponization of space.

Rachel Rizzo: The story between Péter Magyar and Viktor Orbán is actually really interesting. They've been close since the early 90s, actually. And Péter Magyar was part of the Fidesz party and held important positions within the Orbán government. And he's ahead in the polls right now. And so I think it gives you a sense of maybe where Hungary has been heading.

welcome to around the world

Dhruva Jaishankar: Hello, I'm Dhruva Jaishankar.

Rachel Rizzo: And I'm Rachel Rizzo. Welcome to the Around the World podcast. Your essential guide to understanding the forces shaping our world today. We cut through the noise to bring you clear, insightful analysis of the most important developments in geopolitics.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Whether it's security challenges in Europe, great power competition in Asia, domestic politics in the United States, or regional developments in Latin America or the Middle East, we make sure you're up to speed on what's happening and more importantly, why it matters.

Rachel Rizzo: Thanks as always for tuning in. And be sure to like and subscribe to the Around the World podcast on Youtube, Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Onto the show.

what a ceasefire actually means

Rachel Rizzo: Hey, Druva.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Hi Rachel, how are you?

Rachel Rizzo: Good, good, lots going on this week. I was saying before we started recording that I just had my first encounter with a huge monkey on my terrace here in India, just jumped from the tree right in front of me. So that was super fun. First timer for that.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yeah, always a first time. But a lot's been happening in the last couple of weeks, I guess. We've been a lot happening around the world. It's just been dizzying, including in the last 24 hours. So a lot to talk about this episode.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, some good, some bad, but lots to discuss. I think the first thing I think on the docket for us is obviously the very last minute Iran ceasefire.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yes. So we are recording this on a Wednesday, morning U.S. time and evening India time. So about 12 hours ago, a little over 12 hours ago, which was the deadline imposed by Donald Trump for what he threatened was going to be some sort of major destruction of infrastructure in Iran. We get this announcement of a ceasefire in the Iran war. And we discussed this on an episode two weeks ago that a ceasefire might be forthcoming. There were some rumbles even then about the scope of that. There'd been an exchange between the US and Iran through an intermediary Pakistan in that evening two weeks ago. But it appears like we've had this sort of choreographed climb down that suits all sides for the moment. Trump this morning has said, that this shows peace through strength, essentially his threats seem to have worked. Iran, the regime survives and is already messaging domestically that they were successful, at least in, you know, again, bringing Trump to the negotiating table, including through the closure of the Strait of Hormuz and showcasing their resilience. And Pakistan plays up its role as a mediator, which has benefits domestically for the army and for the prime minister there. So what's your sense of how this is shaped up?

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, I mean, it was interesting. I was talking to some folks from work last night at an event, and it seemed like Trump's tweets that he had made on Truth Social, first on Easter Sunday talking about these guys have to open the effing straight, and then just 24 or 48 hours after that basically saying an entire civilization will die tonight, you know if Iran doesn't come to the table. And so he he really set himself up I think for a moment that either would result in a massive show of military might or some sort of climb down. And I don't really know whether to read it as he was serious about this all the time. Maybe there was obviously diplomacy happening in the background. Or if this woke people up and got them scrambling at the very last minute. I'm sure it's a little bit of a mix of both. But the reality, I think, right now is that this is tenuous at best.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Mm-hmm.

Rachel Rizzo: And Iran has now pitched a 10 point plan, obviously extremely maximalist as these plans always are, but it's a working point that Trump says he can begin with in terms of discussing some sort of ⁓ negotiation. I think one of them is that Iran now, permanently controls the in and out of the Strait of Hormuz. And I wonder how that's gonna play with this administration, honestly.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yeah, I mean, the terms of the 10 point plan, again, are pretty maximalist. They've asked for reparations. They've asked for pretty sweeping sanctions relief, a right to enrich uranium, the withdrawal of U.S. forces from the Middle East, and then this revenue sharing of shipping going through the Strait of Hormuz with Oman. Also, I wonder if this is also partly a bid also to sow dissent within the GCC as well, like, you know, if you can get Oman, which would benefit from this financially. And then one more thing is also no attacks on Iranian proxies, including presumably in Yemen and Lebanon. And, so that, I mean, that's going to be interesting because again, these are pretty maximalist terms. I think for the United States, the Strait of Hormuz issue is going to not go away for the Gulf Arab states, it's also not going to go away. I mean, they're now going to be dependent on Iran effectively for their exports of going forward. So I'm not sure like, you know, the UAE and Saudi Arabia and Qatar are going to be too happy with that arrangement. Israel certainly is not. In fact, this morning after the ceasefire announcement, there has been a bombing of southern targets in southern Lebanon by Israel so that hasn't ceased. So I think that again all of that suggests that this is a very tenuous peace for now.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, and so the initial ceasefire is for two weeks. And so I guess for us, we'll watch closely over the next couple of weeks at what sort of developments happen in terms of discussions through third party intermediaries between the United States and Iran. Again, that's a very interesting role, as you mentioned, for Pakistan. so we'll see how that develops. And I've mentioned this on a couple of other episodes, but I think it's worth repeating move forward, how the European’s move forward, I think, is going to be something to watch closely. You know, hopefully, the markets are reacting today. There is a rise in the stock market, and it seems like oil prices perhaps are or could be stabilizing. But again, the knock-on effects of this war, especially in energy costs, isn't something that just happens overnight. It happens over the course of weeks or even months. In some cases. So things might be fine now, but really depending on what happens in the next two or three weeks, that will indicate where we go this summer in terms of potential energy costs. And that's important, I think, for the Europeans to think closely. So we'll, again, watch it.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yeah, I think so. Three other things I think to look out for one not coincidentally, I think yesterday the S &P 500 ended on a five day high, right? So was just the announcement came just before markets closed and or there was indications that it was going to be possible ceasefire. And so it does seem like the really high oil prices and stock market depreciation may have played a role in Trump's calculations. Secondly, it'll be interesting to see what effect, if any, this has on Israeli politics. They are up for general elections later this year, I think in October of this year. And already you've seen the opposition sort of take advantage of the ceasefire and criticize Netanyahu for saying you were not at the table when the Yair Lapid, the opposition leader, has kind of criticized Netanyahu saying, you you started this war. He's quite careful not to criticize the military or the people of Israel and their resilience, but he does criticize Netanyahu and says kind of basically this ceasefire is sort of the worst of all outcomes for you

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah.

Dhruva Jaishankar: and it was a political issue. I think the third thing I think would be to look at the actual negotiations that are underway. Pakistan again seems to have worked primarily through Steve Witkoff. And again, this is somebody who Iran previously had said sort of that's not somebody we want to as our primary negotiator. There are reports that JD Vance weighed in on this issue, but also China possibly, we had Pakistan's foreign minister go to China a little while ago. China may have also weighed in with the Iranians as well. So it'll be interesting to see sort of the composition of the negotiating teams from Iran and the United States in particular, who are the major interlocutors and whether again, they can reach a deal because again, as of now, and things have changed, the Israeli and I'm sorry, the US and Iranian negotiating positions seem pretty far apart,

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, they're pretty far apart.

Dhruva Jaishankar: particularly on the issue of governing this trade. So all of those, I think, are amongst the things to watch out for, but there a lot of those uncertainties now at this point of time.

returning to the moon…and staying there?

Rachel Rizzo: And then, so I think with that, again, we have a couple of weeks of this ceasefire that we'll watch and then we'll come back and hopefully have good news, better news for everyone. Who knows? This is a live issue that doesn't seem to be going anywhere anytime soon. But there's also fun news this week. It doesn't really seem like we ever get to talk about fun news. But if you have been on social media, if you've been on NASA's Instagram account,

Dhruva Jaishankar: Mm-hmm.

Rachel Rizzo: you have definitely been inundated with the coolest pictures coming back from the Artemis II mission, which launched last week and really represents the next step in the U.S. sending a manned mission to the moon. I this is the first time that anyone has flown to or by the moon since the late 70s. They did... Yeah, I think it was, I think I read it today, was it 1979?

Dhruva Jaishankar: Early 70s, think. I think it was early 70s. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah..

Rachel Rizzo: Early 70s, 72, that's right, that's right. I'm getting my dates confused with the Iranian Revolution of 1979, which that's been what we've been reading about. So did a loop around, and then there's plans actually for Artemis IV to land on the moon in 2028. So that's gonna be maybe not coincidentally around the time of the next U.S. presidential election.

Dhruva Jaishankar: That's correct.

Rachel Rizzo: So, you know, I'm curious, like, how are you looking at this? Why do you think this has become so important in the past decade? Are there lower costs involved in space flight, space exploration now, new toys that we get to play with that make it more accessible? Like, what’re you, what's going on?

Dhruva Jaishankar: You know, in some ways we're in the midst or the early stages of a new space age, which is very exciting. And again, there are lot of reasons to be sort of positive and optimistic and inspired by what we're seeing. But again, this is a podcast about international relations. And so there's very much also a slightly more cynical reason for a lot of this, right?

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah.

Dhruva Jaishankar: In some ways, we're also in a new space race, akin to what we saw between the US and Soviet Union in the 50s, 60s and 70s. And part of it is, think, the reason for both of those things is that space has become more important and more affordable. And the last few years has seen just a radical change to this. So last year alone, almost 5,000 objects were launched into space. And that's all as many objects that were launched into space until 1997. So essentially about one fifth of all objects launched into space were launched just last year. And that just shows you the kind of almost exponential increase in countries' capabilities of launching objects into orbit. So I think again, it's happening for two main reasons. One is the cost has really come down. So the cost is about one fifth to one sixth per kilogram or per any kind of weight of what it was in the year 2000. So it's become more affordable. And secondly, satellites in particular have become much more useful and not just useful, integral to a lot of things in national security, but people's day-to-day lives. So communication satellites are the most important. We see this with like the power wielded in some ways by Elon Musk and his network of satellites are able to provide information to battle spaces and things like that. Earth observation has become very important and including for developing countries, For an agriculture tracking changes to climate and the environment. So things like that. Navigation is important GPS. We all use it, but it's becoming more precise and more important. And scientific research of various kinds in space. So a combination of those and other factors is really making space integral from a use perspective, but also, again, more it's becoming more affordable as well.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah. And there's also a geopolitical aspect to this. I've just actually been writing about this a little bit. It mostly comes down, of course, to the U.S. and China. You know, last year, China conducted, I think it was 68 space launches, this was in 2024, which placed 260 payloads into orbit. And it has its Guowang constellation, which is this state-owned low-Earth orbit project, which currently has under 200 satellites in orbit. But the plan is to increase that number to 13,000 by the early 2030s. Now when you compare that to a company like Starlink or SpaceX, which runs Starlink, another constellation, it already has over 10,000 satellites in orbit. So it just goes to show that private companies are playing a major role in this too. But I'm curious, there are obviously, I just talked about the US and China, but there's more players here. Japan is one. India is a major player in the space race, the UAE, Taiwan. So what kind of launch and satellite capabilities do these specific countries possess?

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yeah, so I this is an example. You mentioned a few countries, Israel, the UAE, even Rwanda has a space agency now. So like you have like, I think about 50 countries or thereabouts that have now space programs of various kinds, Singapore, others as well. Again, for all the uses that I mentioned as well. That being said, the, you know, I think this is a tiered approach to this. The US and China now account for over 90% of launches and Russia still has a pretty capable sort of sizable capability as well. Beyond those, think it's basically Japan, India, and some of the European countries, including France, that have a sort of independent launch capability. So you have, again, still relatively few, you have a lot of space programs, relatively few that have a launch capability. And so those countries often have to cooperate with those, you know, so Singapore, for example, launches lot of its satellites through India, to just give one example. So again, there is a sort of two or three tiered, approach to space. Some others are trying to get into the game, like Australia, private companies are starting to launch out of Australia. But really, it's just a few. And then an even smaller group of countries have a human spaceflight capability, US, essentially US, Russia, and China. are now trying to sort of work with them through the Artemis Accords, which the US is championing. We have a Canadian astronaut on the current Artemis 2 mission, for example. So again, I think the geopolitics is also layered as well. The US and China have a pretty commanding lead in many, in most space technologies. Russia has some legacy capabilities. And then really, you know, Japan, India, Europe, and then a lot of other countries are now starting again the game in various ways.

Rachel Rizzo: OK. And we're kind of talking about the geopolitics of it and the exploration part of it, the satellite part of it. But there's also been more and more on the weaponization of space. In April of 2025, the US Space Force released its space warfighting framework, which basically and explicitly talks about offensive and defensive actions to help achieve space superiority. You have China's ground-based laser weapons that can't just disrupt satellite sensors, but it can physically threaten them. They have so-called dogfighter satellites capable of pushing or pulling other satellites out of orbit. Russia is developing an anti-satellite system with nuclear explosion to create weapons effects that could potentially threaten every satellite by every country and every private company in space. So the weaponization of it is also something that is being taken very seriously by national governments around the world.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yeah, right. And this is partly a consequence of the undergovernance of space, right? So there is an Outer Space Treaty, which was negotiated in 1960s. 118 countries, I believe, are party to the treaty, including most of the major space players as well. And the key elements of that included no nuclear weapons in space, the peaceful uses of the moon and other celestial bodies. But there's actually quite a lot of room even within the scope of that treaty for weaponization of space. In 2007, China conducted an anti-satellite test, which showed, from the ground was able to blow up a satellite and others, the US and India have subsequently also done so in lower Earth orbit. And so in fact, we actually had, I think in 2023, the first military action in space, which was an Israeli arrow missile shooting down a Houthi missile coming out of Yemen. And it was the first, I think, essentially combat in space. Who would have thought it would have been with a non-state actor? But that shows you in some ways the creeping weaponization. And you mentioned many other steps that are underway that are indicating, again, the growing weaponization of space, both from ground-based systems, but also within space as well.

Rachel Rizzo: And then just kind of bringing it back to the Artemis II mission. Recently, the NASA administrator and the White House actually have been really emphasizing these plans to stay on the moon, colonize the moon. What's with the newfound interest in this? I mean, I think...That particular goal has been somewhat politicized just based on people's personal feelings about someone like Elon Musk, for example.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Mm-hmm.

Rachel Rizzo: Who's been a leader in this space. It seems as though the desire of space exploration has sort of to this, fallen victim to politicization and to personal feelings about private companies and private individuals. But there's something big about this. So what has the NASA administrator said and what is with the new found interest in specifically going back to the moon?

Dhruva Jaishankar: So, I mean, I think going back to the moon, I think it was part of a longer plan. It appears to eventually also get to Mars as well, get a human space, you know, space flight to Mars. But Jared Eisenman, who's a NASA administrator, somebody who previously was seen as very close to Elon Musk. In fact, that actually when there was a falling out between Trump and Musk, it actually jeopardized his confirmation as well. He had to be re-nominated. But he has said that the goal is to stay on the moon long term and build a moon base. And the White House has essentially reiterated that what's different about Artemis compared to Apollo in the 60s and 70s is that the United States is going to stay on the moon. Now speculation is that it may be in part motivated by intelligence on Chinese ambitions there, so this is not in some ways slightly maybe slightly reactive as well on the United States part, but it also appears to be motivated again about, driven by the temptation to exploit natural resources there including potentially critical minerals, so moon mining and other things. So this appears to be part of the calculus as to what may happen. There's some, again, speculation that by 2030 the goal is to establish some sort of permanent or semi-permanent presence on the moon.

Rachel Rizzo: All right. Well, again, we will be watching this closely into the 2030s and we will report on it here in the Around the World podcast.

Orbán v. Magyar: Hungarian Elections

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yes, we will. But bringing it back to earth. Well, one more thing I know you. Yeah, bring back to also Europe and bring it to a very specific place in Europe and something that think you and I have both been tracking for a little while. We have elections coming up this weekend in Hungary. And Hungary is sort of a fascinating country for many reasons. I actually lived there for three years, I visited two months ago again. And it's in the midst of, it was even then in the midst of election season. Viktor Orbán is the long-serving prime minister of Hungary. He's been there in 16 years. He also had a previous stint in the 90s, a short stint as prime minister. I think he's the longest-serving leader in Europe. And he is now facing quite a lot of heat because the polls indicate that he's going to lose to his party is going to lose in the parliamentary elections to TISA, the main opposition party led by Péter Majar. So, you know, what's your sense of how things are going there?

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, I mean, it's. I think it's sort of a bellwether for other major elections that are coming up in Europe over the coming year, specifically France in 2027. But you know, the Péter Magyar and Viktor Orbán clash kind of goes back a while because Magyar actually started as a member of the Fidesz party. He was one of Orbán's foreign ministers. I mean, he was part of, I think, think he was one of his foreign ministers.

Dhruva Jaishankar: He was in the foreign ministry, I don't know if he was a minister, but he was in... yeah.

Rachel Rizzo: What is with me today? I feel like there's like too much going on where my brain is getting ⁓ scrambled. OK, so let me just start that over. The story between Péter Magyar and Viktor Orbán is actually really interesting. They've been close since the early 90s, actually. And Péter Magyar was part of the Fidesz party and held important positions within the Orbán government, but then kind of started to speak out about corruption. There were a couple of things that happened within the country that led him to sort of break from Viktor Orbán. And now I think we are seeing a moment where he is running as himself a a center-right candidate as someone who can right the ship in Hungary's anti-democratic turn. He's running on a platform, you know, that is pro-EU, pro-NATO. It's pro-democracy. He wants to stamp out corruption. But again, you have, and he's ahead in the polls right now. And so I think it gives you a sense of maybe where Hungary has been heading. And you know, Viktor Orbán and his party are nervous enough where they had, you know, JD Vance come just a couple days ago and give a major speech on behalf of Viktor Orbán, obviously, who's a Trump loyalist and close to Trump and many folks that are in Trump's orbit. So I think it's gonna be interesting to see how exactly this plays out. It's been interesting to watch the platform that Orbán is running on as well.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yeah so, it's interesting. Orbán kind of has been a bit of a outlier in European politics for some time, has kind of dissented within the EU, within NATO on many issues. But he's kind of had a sort of three pronged approach. I this is what he and his party keep on emphasizing. One is of family values. And so he's provided like tax incentives for marriage and children. And yet Hungary has one of the lowest birth rates in the world, possibly, and certainly in Europe. Right. So the second has been a sort of anti-immigration platform. And so he's emphasized like Christian values very overtly. In fact, Hungary pays a sort of 1 million euro tax every day, effectively, to the European Union, essentially to not take more immigrants. And in their view, this is like worth, this is is money well spent, right. And then the third sort of platform has been sort of again, strongly against funding Ukraine in the ongoing war with Russia. And so Hungary even participated as observer in Russian military exercises, Zapad military exercises last year. Orbán, I think, is the only EU and NATO leader to visit Russia since the war in Ukraine began. He's met Putin. And so this in some ways, Orbán, I mean, it's very visible, very overt. It's been a campaign against Brussels, right. And when I was in Budapest, like there are posters everywhere showing

Rachel Rizzo: Mm-hmm.

Dhruva Jaishankar: PéterMajer as sort of this puppet of Ursula von der Leyen and the Brussels establishment, right? And that he was putting money in the hands of Zelensky and things like that, right? So that's very much the direction that Orbán has taken. But it's also interesting that Hungary has not actually chosen to leave the European Union, right? It derives sufficient benefits. It does appear though that I think more than foreign policy, Marco Rubio visited a month or so ago, JD Vance was just there, did a sort of election rally type of thing for Orbán. Trump has endorsed Orbán. But it seems like this is really an election, like a lot of elections, that's indicated that that's being driven by domestic issues, right? It's the, hunger is not a Eurozone country. Inflation has been pretty high. Actually, because of, in some ways, because of the anti-immigration stance, it's been harder for others to invest there. I mean, and you can kind of see it, right? Poland and the Czech Republic have sort of in many ways pulled ahead economically from Hungary relative to two decades ago.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah.

Dhruva Jaishankar: So it does seem like again, know, Péter Madras, campaigning on mostly on economic issues, less on sort of foreign policy. He will obviously be, I think, a bit more sympathetic to the EU and NATO. But again, he comes from Fidesz, right? So he's not like, is it? And he's right, Yeah.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, I mean, he's not like a, he's not a lefty by any means. He's tough on immigration, you know, talks about family and Christian values in the same way that many other folks in Fidesz do.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yeah, yeah. So I mean, he's he's had some pretty strident anti-immigration sort of statements as well. So again, it'll be interesting to see this as a bellwether. Again, the Trump administration has thrown its weight clearly behind one camp.

Rachel Rizzo: Mm-hmm.

Dhruva Jaishankar: But again, there's often within the European Union, I mean, there was a remarkable statement last year, It was something related to Ukraine, and all EU members signed on and there was like a dissenting note from Hungary saying all countries except for Hungary sign on to it, right? So it is sort of remarkable how much it has been an outlier on some issues with Slovakia, but on many issues just Hungary by itself within the European Union.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah. And if he wins, I think it's going to be interesting to see whether he can secure a two-thirds majority in Parliament or if he only gets a simple majority. With a simple majority, it's going to be a lot more difficult to push through the reforms on which he's been campaigning. And then he really has to decide how far he's willing to go, especially with Orbán loyalists still inside government institutions. He has to decide, does he want to purge those people? Does he not want to purge those people? So beyond him just winning, What he's able to secure in parliament is the other important factor in this entire puzzle.

Dhruva Jaishankar: So a lot going on, a lot to watch out for in the next few days. Again, the results of Hungarian elections, Artemis, I think splashdown will be possibly the day this is released or a day after. And again, what happens with the Iran ceasefire negotiations, all three big issues coming up in the next few days.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. We'll be here to talk about them. As always, be sure to like and subscribe to the Around the World podcast on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and YouTube. Our episodes come out on Fridays, and we will see you all soon.

Season 2 Episode 10 : Iran War Uncertainty, Myanmar, Italy Referendum

March 27, 2026 — In this week’s episode of Around the World, hosts Dhruva Jaishankar and Rachel Rizzo deliver updates on the growing uncertainty surrounding the U.S.-Israel-Iran conflict, discussing whether a ceasefire is within reach and how the crisis is shaping perceptions in Washington, Tehran, and across Europe. They also recap Myanmar’s recent election and its contentious results, as Tatmadaw chief Min Aung Hlaing seeks presidency. The episode wraps with Italy, where Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni’s referendum on judicial reform was rejected by voters — raising questions about her popularity and what it could mean for Italy’s next general elections.

Available on Spotify and Apple Podcasts.

Image: Tasnim News Agency, CC BY 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Image: Myanmar Now News, CC BY 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Image: © European Union, 1998 – 2026, Attribution, via Wikimedia Commons

sneak peak

Rachel Rizzo: On this week's episode.

Dhruva Jaishankar: We have a lot of evidence to suggest that maybe a ceasefire is forthcoming and maybe we'll see that in the next few days on the other hand there's a lot of evidence that the war is not letting up at all.

Rachel Rizzo: She suffered a pretty serious setback with a referendum loss on judicial reform. Meloni has said is that this would sort of like "demafia" the judiciary and introduce an appointment by lottery system rather than election of their members.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Myanmar is important because it's really at that intersection, It borders China, it borders India, and it borders Southeast Asia. It's a member of ASEAN, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations. And so those are the three primary actors.

WELCOME TO AROUND THE WORLD

Dhruva Jaishankar: Hello, I'm Dhruva Jaishankar.

Rachel Rizzo: And I'm Rachel Rizzo. Welcome to the Around the World podcast. Your essential guide to understanding the forces shaping our world today. Every week, we cut through the noise to bring you clear, insightful analysis of the most important developments in geopolitics.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Whether it's security challenges in Europe, great power competition in Asia, domestic politics in the United States, or regional developments in Latin America or the Middle East, we make sure you're up to speed on what's happening and more importantly, why it matters.

Rachel Rizzo: Thanks for tuning in. And also be sure to like and subscribe to the Around the World podcast on Youtube, Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Onto the show.

A ceasefire in reach?

Rachel Rizzo: Hey, Druva.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Hi Rachel, good to see you.

Rachel Rizzo: Good to see you too, it's been a couple weeks.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yeah, it's been a of weeks. A lot's been going on. Mostly, I think everyone's been preoccupied with the war in Iran, and that's certainly something we're going to discuss in the next few minutes. But also other things happening around the world. So I think we'll just touch on those as well. What's happening in Myanmar on the other side of India, and also in Europe as well, politics continues there. How does Iran, let’s start with Iran, how does Iran look from your vantage point?

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, lots of stuff going on. Yeah. I mean, look, I feel like this war, from the get-go, it has been pretty incoherent and some might say, depending on where you sit or stand on this decision, also misguided, which means that the end result remains pretty convoluted and the messaging coming from the White House remains convoluted as well. There's mixed messaging in terms of whether or not negotiations are happening or whether they're not happening. There's discussions potentially about a 15-point plan that Iran says is maximalist and unacceptable. They've come back with a five-point plan. But amongst all of this, what continues to happen? The Strait of Hormuz remains effectively closed. Only 62 ships have traversed it in the month of March. Energy prices are continuing to skyrocket. There's instability in the market globally and other countries that are not directly involved in what's going on, Europe, India, certainly and beyond that are beginning to feel the effects of this ongoing instability. So it doesn't seem like it is ending anytime soon, but also the messaging again, as I said before, it is pretty mixed. What are you hearing your side of the aisle or your side of the ocean, I should say.

Dhruva Jaishankar: So again, there's a lot of confusion out there. think let's try and break it down as to what we know with reasonable certainty. So on Monday, we were recording this on a Thursday, it'll be coming out Friday. So a few days ago, three days ago, Donald Trump announced talks with Iran to bring it into the conflict before markets opened in the United States, not coincidentally. There was a lot of confusion around this announcement. Iran, as you said, initially denied that any talks had taken place, but the oil and stock markets responded very positively to this, right? And yet the Strait of Hormuz remained effectively closed. Now Iran is it may let non-hostile, whatever that means, pass through the right? So are talks underway or not? I think, again, a few things we know. The United States has been reaching out to intermediaries, mostly Turkey, Pakistan, and Egypt, to propose, amongst other things, this 15-point plan, which includes stipulations on sanctions relief, but also denuclearization and commitments that Iran might have to make. And Iran's military leaders, at least, have so far publicly resisted this, although they do seem to be back and forth with five-point plan that Iran seems to come up with. A few things, again, to note. One is Israel is clearly uncomfortable with all of this. They've been leaking to the press. So a lot of times the first time we're hearing about this is because the Israelis are putting it out there, seemingly because they are concerned. The other thing is the emergence of an interlocutor in Mohammed Baga Galibaf, who is the speaker of Iran's parliament may emerge as the lead interlocutor with the United States on the Iranian side. He was previously the mayor of Tehran. He has a military background. He was a pilot who fought in the Iraq-Iran War so he has credibility with the military establishment in Iran. But there's some speculation that he may be put up as a future leader. But there do seem to be differences within Iran. The military, particularly the IRGC, the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, does not necessarily seem to be playing ball with this.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah. But so are you saying that, are you suggesting rather, that there is enough instability in Iran where, you know, this sort of like uprising that has happened over the last few months and which we about on an episode, I think in January, I mean, could this go somewhere? Obviously, interim leaders or current leaders in Iran have said to parents, don't let your children, your kids go out in protest because we

shoot them. So it seems like they are squashing any sort of regime change discussions or possibilities of uprisings or democratic transitions in Iran.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Look, the honest answer is there's not a lot of information coming out of Iran, right?

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Because there's been a media blackout, there's internet cutoffs, and sometimes just so there's not been, I mean, it's very hard and a lot of this is in the realm of speculation.

Rachel Rizzo: Mm-hmm.

Dhruva Jaishankar: In terms of, know, the initial political leadership was pretty decimated. And then figures that emerged like Ali Larijani was killed subsequently by an Israeli strike. He was sort of seen as one of the sort of old guard that had a lot of credibility at home.

Rachel Rizzo: Mm-hmm.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Today, just today, the Navy command killed by another strike.

Rachel Rizzo: Yep.

Dhruva Jaishankar:The president has survived. The foreign minister has survived. There is more about the new Khomeini's son has, but it has not been very visible. A lot of them are.

Rachel Rizzo: No, and some people say he might be injured or something.

Dhruva Jaishankar: There are rumors that he's in a coma, that he's been injured or somewhat injured. So the statements have come out, but he's not been very physically present. And again, some of it has to do with security. concerns, you know, Larijani appeared publicly two days before he was hit in the strike. So I think it's very unclear who the leadership is at this point of time. It may end up being a sort of rump leadership of the IRGC, which is more hardline, possibly. But again, someone, I think the feeling is Ghalibaf is somebody who might be willing to do a deal. He has the credibility, he's sort of seen technocratic, but has the military cred. So, you know, somebody who has engaged with Western leaders in the past. So again, there's still just way too much uncertainty about the regime in Iran, obviously they're trying to out a position themselves as still being strong and still being capable, but it's very hard to know.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, and so there's no sense amongst whatever stated Iranian leadership is currently in place that they're ready for a deal or looking for a deal because they are clearly fighting. They are, they've been caught on their back foot. They're not looking to kind of sit back and allow the Trump administration or other Western countries to be able to claim a win here. So it seems like there's still, it doesn't seem like it's gonna wind down anytime soon, unless you are seeing something different.

Dhruva Jaishankar: No, mean, see, the other way of looking at it is if they were to reach a ceasefire agreement now or soon after this, would actually, Iran would come out looking pretty good. And that's not necessarily the case a few weeks from now. So at this point, the narrative would be, I mean, Trump would, of course, sell this as a win. He, he decapitated

Rachel Rizzo: Sure

Dhruva Jaishankar: He, he decapitated

leadership. He, you know, managed to or degrade their missile program. That's how it'll be portrayed in the United States. But in Iran, it would be, well, we resisted, you know, everything was thrown at us and we

and we survived. Right.

Rachel Rizzo: Yep. Yeah, that's a good point.

Dhruva Jaishankar: And we cut off the Strait of Hormuz and the world, brought the world to its knees, right? So I think from their point of view, it is appealing to maybe reach a ceasefire soon.

Rachel Rizzo: Mm-hmm

Dhruva Jaishankar: I think there appear to be some divisions because there are mixed messages coming out of Iran. There are different interlocutors there. There's one channel, actually I want to talk about this quickly, which is through Pakistan.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, yeah.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Pakistan is pushing itself as an intermediary, was the one that seems to have sent the 15-point plan from the United States to Pakistan to Iran has proposed a meeting in Islamabad. Interestingly, the Iranians do seem to have been clear that they don't want to negotiate with Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner. They want possibly bringing JD Vance into the picture as a negotiator, because that was who was negotiating with them before the war started in Oman, broken through Oman.

Rachel Rizzo: Mm-hmm, yeah.

Dhruva Jaishankar: So anyway, that's one way. But that doesn't seem to be the only line of communication Turkey has claimed again, for example. There is a G7 foreign ministers meeting taking place today in Paris, so I think we may have some clarity after that.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, and then other things to look out for, obviously. There's been a lot of discussions about US troop redeployment to the Middle East continuing. I think, two MEU's, Marine Expeditionary Units. That kind of begs the question about the specialty of these Marine units are amphibious landings. And so what could that potentially mean? And where could they possibly do be deployed. So I think in terms of the military preparedness side, that's something to look for.

Dhruva Jaishankar: There's actually, so yesterday there was a very contentious in the House, in the US Congress, where the members of Congress were, and the relevant committees were briefed about this. And some of the, Republican members stormed out quite about this because they're worried about some kind of ground invasion, whatever that means. Some of the speculators, all again in the realm of speculation, is around Karg Island, which is an island on the western end of the Persian Gulf, Iranian controlled, which is kind of crucial to their energy exports as well,

Rachel Rizzo: Mm-hmm.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Whether the US plans to seize that and maybe not even stop there. So that's where some of the speculation is. So there's no, there doesn't seem to be a let up in terms of US force posture. Israeli strikes have continued despite Trump's announcement. In fact, it seems to be accidental now, but there was a hit on an Iranian nuclear facility at Bushehr. And there's some concerns about that it could lead to some environmental damage and something that whatever you may think on the war, whatever side you're on, even the people opposed to Iran are concerned about the possible consequences of a nuclear disaster there. So again, it doesn't seem like, and this seems to be bit further hardening of the position of the GCC of the Gulf Arab states. So they've expelled Iranian diplomats. In the last few days they put out a statement just today the GCC which was quite striking it's quite critical of Iran so all of again we have a lot of evidence to suggest that maybe a ceasefire is forthcoming and maybe we'll see that in the next few days on the other hand there's a lot of evidence that the war is not letting up at all.

Rachel Rizzo: Mm-hmm. Yeah, and then one other thing before we move on and talk about what's happening in Myanmar. I think the European position is something worth talking about and definitely worth watching over the next week or so. Mark Rutte, who's the NATO secretary general, has said that he believes that European leaders will, quote, come together in some sort of way, especially in terms of helping to reopen the Strait of Hormuz. But of course, they're stuck between a few different difficult points here. You know, there's public opinion. There's their own continental security. There's the relationship with the United States where Trump renewed his threats on Greenland, calling the Europeans weak again, saying that they kind of attacking them for not being willing to be specifically involved. But they're also feeling the brunt of this. They're facing, you know, inflation and energy prices. And I think eventually what happens is the domestic cost of those things ends up being higher than some sort of direct involvement for certain European leaders. And so I think that's something that's worth watching, especially over the next couple of weeks, if energy prices continue to remain high and the energy market to remain squeezed.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Two quick questions for you on that specific thing. One is, Mark Ruta, the NATO secretary general, seems to have not one himself fans amongst other European leaders

Rachel Rizzo: No.

Dhruva Jaishankar: for sticking his neck out. just one quick thought. And secondly, Spain, of all countries, has been perhaps the most critical of the United States and the Trump administration on this issue. And the Prime Minister there has actually defended it. I saw he compared, he's like, the Vatican has criticized this war. You don't see anybody criticizing the Vatican. He's kind of stuck to his guns on that. Quick thoughts on how Spain has deferred from the Trump administration quite vocally and the Mark Ruta's reputation in Europe.

Rachel Rizzo: You know, this is part of the reason that Mark Ruto was chosen as NATO secretary general, right?

Dhruva Jaishankar: The Trump Handler.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, he was the Trump handler. When he was the prime minister of the Netherlands, he was seen as someone who knew how to deal with Trump, who knew how to speak with him, who knew how to sit at the table with him, kind of push the right buttons. But what that means when you're NATO secretary general is that you are trying to lead a consensus-based organization. And you're caught between countries that see this war as, as I said in my opening statement, misguided and incoherent, and they see it as not their war. They see it as an undeserved provocation from the United States. And they're asking themselves, wait a minute, we've been on the receiving end of tariffs, we've been on the receiving end of threats of our own security in terms of the potential to invade Greenland, you know? So why should we continue to support the United States when they have put us over and over again in untenable positions, both at home and abroad? And Spain, I think, really has been at the forefront of this when it comes to the war in Iran. And we've seen anger from the Trump administration, know, threatening tariffs on them as well. And so I think what we're seeing in Europe is an unwillingness at this point to kind of like fall to their knees and do what the Trump administration says that they should do. And as I said before, unfortunately, they are going to have to figure out what their role is here because whether they like it or not, they are on the receiving end or bearing the brunt of economic results of this campaign, including skyrocketing energy prices. So let's watch what happens. But, you know, I think the U.S. is seeing what happens when they continuously put allies into a corner and like berate them over the course of like a decade at this point.

something old, something new: Myanmar’s elections

Rachel Rizzo: So, but, you know, shifting from Iran, you've been following pretty closely what's happening in Myanmar. You've been following what's happening in Myanmar closer than I have. So tell us what is going on there and what you've been watching.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yeah, I think part of the point of a podcast like this is, we often discuss what's urgent and what's in the news and immediate, but also sometimes also talking about what's important, even if it's not in the news as much as maybe should be. So, Myanmar is a really fascinating country. I visited a couple of times now almost a decade ago and a really amazing country. But you know, in February, 2021, the Tatmadaw, which is the Myanmar's military, took control of the country in a coup. You may have seen the images of this woman doing a workout video.

Rachel Rizzo: Yes. I was just going to say that.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yeah, so that's what happened February 2021. And the immediate dispute was over the then military leader, Min Aung Hlaing and differences with the civilian elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi and her coalition, party, whose government had just won elections the previous year. And it was over his extension. That was the immediate issue. So the junta took over, and the military took over in a coup. Initially, they controlled about 40 % of the area of the country, about two thirds of the population. But a civil war has basically been raging on since then. The military actually some setbacks in 2023 particularly. Elections, very disputed elections took place earlier this year, which is I talk back to focusing on it. And the results, of course, were very contentious. Many said it's not necessarily a very free or fair election. But now Min Aung Hlaing, after basically being the military ruler, is retiring, possibly to shed his uniform, with the speculation being that he's going to make himself President. So he's not relinquishing the reins of power, but he's shedding his uniform.

Rachel Rizzo: So as we say in our opening every week, we don't just talk about what's happening geopolitically, but we also talk about why it matters. So what are the geopolitical implications of this? obviously, you have major players in the region, China, Southeast Asian nations, India. Where do all these puzzle pieces fall into place?

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yeah, so Myanmar is important because it's really at that intersection, right. It borders China, it borders India, and it borders Southeast Asia. It's a member of ASEAN, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations. And so those are the three actors. And the US has had a very dangerous role as sort of treated Myanmar like a pariah state for a long time. And then after 2015 in particular started even a little bit earlier than that, started opening up to it, had diplomatic relations, but that's not been reversed. So China's arguably the most important external actor, but it's played a very odd role in all of this. On the one hand, Myanmar's opening after 2011 especially was intended to diversify the country's dependence on China and the coup kind of reversed course. But China has sort of been playing all sides in some ways. They've been a mediator between some of the factions in the conflict, but they've also actually undermined negotiations at certain time. So in 2024, they actually put one of the rebel leaders under house arrest in Kunming in China to kind of block some of the negotiations. So there's little love lost even in the Myanmar military for Beijing, but it remains the most important actor. And they've made efforts now to try and reach out, the military, to India and Russia to kind of diversify their military dependence on China. ASEAN is perhaps the second actor of consequence and they were the lead negotiators, international negotiators with the new military junta. They had this presented in April 2021 five-point plan which really didn't go very well, you know, very far. Indonesia was really kind of the lead in on many of those negotiations but it's kind of this whole episode has added to questions about ASEAN's effectiveness as an organization and it's because it's taken its lowest common denominator approach. And finally India has had this tricky balancing act of continuing to engage the Myanmar military in the bureaucracy, but not politically legitimizing the coup that took place. And so it had a very belated political engagement. They invited the foreign minister to something a few years after the coup, was a bit of a, you know, at the political level, not a lot of contact at first. But then as as sort of oppositional forces sort of gained ground in 2023, especially 2034, then India also started reaching out to other parties as well. And New Delhi's priorities have been sort of managing this very long and contested border. It's not contested, but it's a very complicated border between India and Myanmar. There's some counterterrorism concerns, the counter narcotics concerns, a lot of illicit arms trade. And COVID actually was a big, you know, they had to engage the government to manage because it was a flow of people. And so those were some of the considerations. And so India and others, including the United States, somewhat belatedly provided, for example, humanitarian assistance after a pretty bad earthquake that took place in Myanmar last year. So this has been kind of the sort of game that is underway. The United States, meanwhile, has sort of lost a lot of leverage that it had started to accumulate by disengagement. And in some way, continues to stream Myanmar or Burma in official U.S. government as a pariah state.

Rachel Rizzo: So what would you say are two or three main lessons to draw from this or what are you watching next on this specific issue?

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yeah, I think if you look back over the past, again, it's been a very difficult six years for the country. But if you look back the past years, think a few lessons. One is sort of, you know, there's always this debate about balancing values and interests. And for a country like the United States, they can sometimes afford because they have the luxury of distance, they can afford to be sort of, you know, the coup is bad, the junta has done some terrible things. We are going to sanction everyone involved and sort of them off. But for countries in the region, India, the ASEAN countries, Thailand, especially, even Japan, they've had to engage with the military to different degrees. And so I think that that's one of those questions, which is it doesn't look the same, you know, the sort of values versus interests debate. A second is it's been notable how Aung San Suu Kyi who was, you know, a global champion of democracy, a former leader, a Nobel Peace Prize winner, and how she's sort of fallen off the radar in some ways. And partly it has to do with her tenure as the de facto are on the question of the Rohingya, which were sort of a minority group that were discriminated against. And she kind of embraced sort of the Burmese nationalism narrative. And so even though she's been imprisoned or she's been sentenced to a long imprisonment, there hasn't been a of galvanizing of global support for her, which you would expect.

Rachel Rizzo: No there hasn't.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yeah, so when was the last time you heard about her in the context of human rights or democracy? So that's been quite interesting. And then lastly, think it's been interesting to see as there have been swings on the battlefield as different factions have gained ground or lost ground in the civil war, it has led to external parties engaging different people, right. So when the Tatmadaw looked weak, a lot of countries started engaging the opposition there. But as they've now kind of consolidated in certain areas, there's kind of a growing, people are quite reconciled to, in other countries to well, we have to work with them even though we're not happy with them. And that again carries lessons for other conflict areas, whether it's Ukraine, whether it's Iran, you know, in some ways success or failure on the battlefield translates into diplomatic success and failure as well.

Rachel Rizzo: Absolutely. Yeah, super interesting. We'll watch it closely.

meloni’s referendum defeat

Dhruva Jaishankar: Last issue, know, interesting things happening in European politics.

Rachel Rizzo: Always.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yeah, we just had Danish elections. But another one, we had a referendum in Italy and Italy's Prime Minister, Giorgia Maloney, who's been extremely popular, she's been in power since 2022, and yet it appears that the referendum that she was pushing lost. What happened there?

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, I mean, it's really interesting because I remember when Georgia Maloney was elected, there was a lot of unease about her rising to the rank of prime minister, creating a right-wing coalition. But she has been pretty popular at home. She has brought stability to Italian politics. Stability and Italian politics are not two

Dhruva Jaishankar: Don't go together naturally.

Rachel Rizzo: topics that you see together very often, you know, Italy has been pretty stable over the last three or four years. And I think on top of that, she has forged a pretty good relationship with the Trump administration and has sort of risen as a leader that is pro-NATO and pro-Ukraine support but also sort of falls in line with the Trump administration in terms of domestic priorities, which means that she's a good voice for Europe, a good conduit for speaking on behalf of Europe to the Trump administration. But what ended up happening this past week is she suffered a pretty serious setback with a referendum loss on judicial reform. So this was known as the Nordio reform, and it would have, I mean, it kind of gets into the weeds in terms of how the Italian constitutional system is set up, but it basically would have separated the career paths of judges and prosecutors and split the high council of the judiciary into two distinct bodies. And basically what Meloni has said is that this would sort of like "demafia" the judiciary and introduce an appointment by lottery system rather than election of their members. And so I think it's notable that she lost that because many reports are saying that this judicial reform was pretty deep in the weeds. And so people didn't vote against the actual reform. It was a way for them to voice displeasure with Meloni and her government, actually. Which sounds pretty familiar because it is what has happened in the US when it to the 2016 election of Donald Trump. know, a lot of people decided to vote for Trump because they didn't like Hillary Clinton. So I think it's interesting to kind of extrapolate what that might mean for Maloney, what that might mean for popularity in Italy, and basically what it might mean for the general elections next year. So that's something to watch closely as well.

Dhruva Jaishankar: It's really interesting because I think polls showed a few months ago even that the majority might vote to pass this referendum, vote yes on the referendum,

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah.

Dhruva Jaishankar which would lead to this judicial reform of Italy's high judicial council. But a few interesting things happened. think voter turnout was actually higher than expected.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah. It was. It was like 60%. Yeah, it was pretty high. Yes.

Dhruva Jaishankar: I think it was like 50-55 percent. And amongst young voters especially, and young voters voted pretty decisively, over 60 voted against it, particularly in the south of Italy. Again, it's called into question, she was looking pretty secure leading up to next year's general election in 2027, and now I think that's called into question. So, because she's such a linchpin in European politics, as you said, she's right-wing, kind of in some ways pro-NATO, pro-Trump on many issues, so she's been this sort of a, and brought stability to Italian politics, and now that's been called into question. And so it'll be interesting see how this plays out. I'm very skeptical of this translating to other European countries but we have a Hungarian election coming up now where Viktor Orbán is kind of, know, his tenure is in question. So it'd be interesting to see if the broader ramifications of this in European politics.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, absolutely, And then I think, you know, what happened in Denmark this week where the Danish prime minister failed to secure a majority, it was her party's weakest election showing since I think 1903. So, yeah.

Dhruva Jaishankar: And despite the Greenland bump, Mette Fredrickson, who was a very impressive prime minister, but she had received a bump in popularity because of a rally around the flag effect as Greenland. And yet her party did much worse than expected. So let's see. Yeah.

Rachel Rizzo: Well, we can spend a whole episode on just European elections.

Dhruva Jaishankar:. Yeah, yeah. But again, the Iran war continues. I'm sure we'll continue talking about that. But there are other things happening around the world. I hope we can discuss this in future episodes as well.

Rachel Rizzo: Absolutely. And as always, be sure to like and subscribe to the Around the World podcast on Spotify, YouTube, and Apple podcasts. And we'll see you all next week.

Season 2 Episode 9 : Oil Market Volatility, U.S. War in Iran, Carney in the Indo-Pacific

March 13, 2026 — In this week’s episode of Around the World, hosts Dhruva Jaishankar and Rachel Rizzo explore the recent disruptions in global energy markets following the Strait of Hormuz closure, examining its impact on oil prices and the steps countries have taken to mitigate the effects. They also continue the conversation on the Middle East conflict, delving into the debate over potential U.S. troop deployments to Iran despite opposition from both Democrats and Republicans. They wrap up the episode with a quick look at Canadian PM Mark Carney’s trips to India, Australia, and Japan, and what they signal about Canada’s efforts to reduce dependence on the United States.

Available on Spotify and Apple Podcasts.

Image: Andrew Ly / Shutterstock

Image: Tasnim News Agency / Hossein Zohrevand, CC BY 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons. Cropped from original.

Image: 205269. PM meets the Prime Minister of Canada, Mr. Mark Carney at Hyderabad House, in New Delhi on March 02, 2026. Courtesy of the Government of India Press Information Bureau, via pib.gov.in.

Sneak peak

Rachel Rizzo: On this week's episode.

Dhruva Jaishankar: So there's already a cooking gas shortage in India, in some of the smaller South Asian countries, in Africa, that we're already feeling. And secondly, jet fuel is another thing to watch out for, which is we're going to see a spike in airline prices because jet fuel is something that a lot of countries are dependent on the Middle East to export still.

Rachel Rizzo: Senator Blumenthal, who's a Democrat from Connecticut, walked out and said that he is under the impression that the administration is indeed on a path toward deploying American troops on the ground in Iran. This was a direct quote of his. And he said that he left briefing angrier than he had ever been at any briefing in his 15 years in the Senate and he left with more questions than answers. But I think that's what we have right now are more questions and answers.

Dhruva Jaishankar: And even on trade and economics, Canada is a major beneficiary of access to the United States market. And so, again, while we may see some diversification underway, it may not be as much, I think it's tempered by realism on the part of Canadian businesses as to how much they will.

WELCOME TO AROUND THE WORLD

Dhruva Jaishankar: Hello, I'm Dhruva Jaishankar.

Rachel Rizzo: And I'm Rachel Rizzo. Welcome to the Around the World podcast. Your essential guide to understanding the forces shaping our world today. Every week, we cut through the noise to bring you clear, insightful analysis of the most important developments in geopolitics.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Whether it's security challenges in Europe, great power competition in Asia, domestic politics in the United States, or regional developments in Latin America or the Middle East, we’ll discuss what's happening and more importantly, why it matters.

Rachel Rizzo: Thanks as always for tuning in. And be sure to like and subscribe to the Around the World podcast on Youtube, Spotify and Apple Podcasts. On to the show.

A sudden surge in oil pricing

Rachel Rizzo: Hey, hey, Dhruva.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Hi, good see you, Rachel. I'm back in Washington and you’re in Delhi?

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, I can tell you've got the ORF America background. Here in Delhi, just wrapping up from the Raisina dialogue last weekend

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yes.

Rachel Rizzo: Where you of course were, you were here for it and we both recorded an episode from our various rooms in the same hotel so that was fun.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yeah, and it was quite an eventful conference. This was held just a few days after the outbreak of war in the Middle East, but we had the Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister speaking, the US Deputy Secretary of State, the Israeli Foreign Minister participated virtually. And so the implications were on everyone's lips there, so kind of quite timely. But one thing that's happened, I think, in the last few days even has been extreme volatility in the global oil market and global energy markets.

Rachel Rizzo: Yep. Yeah, and that doesn't seem to be going anywhere. It seems to actually be getting worse.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yes.

Rachel Rizzo: Especially now that the new Ayatollah just spoke and said that they were going to keep the Strait of Hormuz closed for now.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yeah, so I mean I think this is really interesting to think through, right? You know, global energy consumption in some ways drives the economy. About a hundred million barrels per day of liquid fuel is used around the world. Mostly oil, you know, crude oil that's been processed, but also liquefied natural gas and other energy sources. And about 15 to 20 percent of all energy flows through this very narrow strait, the Straits of Hormuz. Between Iran on the one side and Oman and UAE on the other. And in some ways, the closure of the Strait of Hormuz has been like the nightmare scenario for people in the energy industry, right? Like this is something people have been contemplating what would happen with the global economy shut down. And yet that's precisely what has happened. Over 20 ships have been hit, I mean, container ships, commodity ships but also oil tankers have been hit in the ongoing conflict over the past 10 days or so and that has freaked out insurance companies

Rachel Rizzo: Mm-hmm.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Which are now charging a huge premium. Also the sailor security is also at risk and so we've had the effective shutdown of the Strait of Hormuz which is quite striking.

Rachel Rizzo: Did you see that article actually in The Economist, I think it was today or yesterday, basically talking about the very limited options that Trump has in terms of bringing down global oil prices and sort of balancing out the volatility? One of them was countries releasing some from their strategic reserves. There's obviously difficulties and challenges when it comes to that as well, though.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yes. So initially, within the days of the outbreak, OPEC +, which is a cartel of oil exporters, including a few others like Russia, agreed to a very tepid—they had a scheduled meeting anyway—they agreed to a very small increase in production initially

Rachel Rizzo: Mm-hmm.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Which made people think that maybe people thought it was not going to be as bad. But what we've seen in last few days is the International Energy Agency, which is a group of mostly developed economies United States, Europe, Japan, South Korea, others, have collectively said that they're going to release 400 million barrels from their strategic reserves. And that is, in some ways, again, that's about four to five days of global energy consumption.

Rachel Rizzo: Oh so not much. Like, five days.

Dhruva Jaishankar: I mean, this is pretty significant, but again, if you add it up,

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah.

Dhruva Jaishankar: It doesn't appear to be that much. It'll be spread out over some time. So the idea is to give a bit more flexibility to the global energy market.

Rachel Rizzo: Okay.

Dhruva Jaishankar: But one thing I think has happened, which is I think, again, this was the nightmare scenario, but a few steps were taken by several countries over the past decade or so that has kind of offset some of the, again, the doomsday scenarios that have been predicted for this. One, I think the biggest one is that the US has increased its output significantly,

Rachel Rizzo: Mm-hmm.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Both oil and gas. A decade ago, a little over a decade ago, the US was the largest oil importer. It's now the largest producer in the world.

Rachel Rizzo: Mm-hmm.

Dhruva Jaishankar: It's also the largest liquefied natural gas LNG exporter in the world. So the US, to some degree, other Western Hemisphere economies, Canada, Brazil, Guyana, have all increased their output significantly over the past decade or so. And that has kind of offset some of the over-dependence on the Gulf. The second is that Saudi Arabia and UAE have built pipelines.

Rachel Rizzo: Okay.

Dhruva Jaishankar: So Saudi Arabia has a major pipeline going from east to west across Saudi Arabia, allowing them to actually use Red Sea ports to export oil. So it's again kind of circumvented the Strait of Hormuz. And the UAE has also built a west to east pipeline that runs parallel to the Strait of Hormuz. And so again, these two major pipelines have slightly offset some of the choke point that the Strait of Hormuz represents. A third development has been China building up reserves.

Rachel Rizzo: Okay.

Dhruva Jaishankar: China has invested massively in oil reserves over the past decade or so. And then lastly is the US has decided just in the last few days to kind of loosen some of the restrictions, sanctions, waivers on Russian oil exports as well. So all of this means that there's actually more flexibility, more resilience in the global energy markets than one might have expected a decade ago.

Rachel Rizzo: So is this like the doomsday scenario that everyone is saying that it is?

Dhruva Jaishankar: So yes and no. I think we are having the shock. I mean the reality is, the Strait of Hormuz is going to be functionally disrupted for perhaps weeks.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Again, people were worried about this. There is more flexibility in the global energy markets than before, as I mentioned, for all those reasons. So a combination of strategic reserves, storage in China, pipelines that build resilience in the Gulf, and greater exports out of the United States and the Western Hemisphere.

Rachel Rizzo: Mm-hmm.

Dhruva Jaishankar: But where I think the pinch is going to be felt is in areas which are more specialized.

Rachel Rizzo: Okay.

Dhruva Jaishankar: So for example, liquefied petroleum gas, which say in India, where you are,

Rachel Rizzo: Yep.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Is used a lot for cooking. So there's already like a cooking gas shortage in India, in some of the smaller South Asian countries, in Africa that we're already feeling. And secondly, jet fuel is another thing to watch out for, which is we're going to see a spike in airline prices

Rachel Rizzo: Great.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Because jet fuel is something that a lot of countries are dependent on the Middle East to export still.

“BOOTS ON THE GROUND”

Rachel Rizzo: Okay. So this isn't the only debate that we are having about the ongoing conflict in the Middle East. One of the big ones is this potential for, as we like to call it, boots on the ground. I'm putting this in quotes because it's become such a mainstay of discussions when it comes to U.S. involvement in really any conflict abroad. It's something we talked about when it came to the Nicolas Maduro raid earlier this year. We’ve, you know, talked about it through the lens of the conflict in the Middle East last year. So that's another one that's kind of heating up in the United States is where is the end game and does the end game include actual Americans on the ground in Iran somehow?

Dhruva Jaishankar: So what's striking is that Trump's campaigned on this issue.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah.

Dhruva Jaishankar: That this would not, the end of forever wars, and even if there were gonna be strikes, and he had shown in his first term a propensity to use, for example, long distance airstrikes or targeted attacks, that it would not be, he would not go back to the era of Iraq, Afghanistan style, what critics call forever wars. So where do you see this going?

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah. Yeah, so basically where this, I mean, there's always a debate about this. Anytime you get involved in something overseas. And there's a debate about where we go with it and if American personnel are going to be necessary. So this particular one was essentially ignited by Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who is actually against this idea, who ended up telling Congress in a briefing that the US needs to physically secure Iran's nuclear material. He said people are going to have to go and get it. And that really freaked everyone out, not just amongst the Democrats, but Republicans too. Around that same time, there were these reports that started to surface that Trump had been in contact with Iranian Kurdish rebel groups in Iraq, which analysts and others and policymakers could interpret as potentially exploring proxy forces on the ground. At the same time, sources have told the media that Pete Hegseth is actively pushing for a ground troop deployment, while as Marco Rubio, as I mentioned before, is against the idea. So there's a split within the administration itself on this particular topic.

Dhruva Jaishankar: So it’s interesting to see where this goes. Again, one interesting point is that there have been US and Israeli strikes at border checkpoints between Iran and Iraq, which suggests, again, support for the infiltration of Kurdish rebels into Iran. And so when you talked about the proxy forces, that seems to be happening, at least.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah.

Dhruva Jaishankar: But again, the politics around US boots on the ground in Iran will actually be, again, very interesting to see how that plays out between now and November.

Rachel Rizzo: It's going to be super interesting. There was a classified hearing hosted by the Senate Armed Services Committee where Senator Blumenthal, who's a Democrat from Connecticut, walked out and said that he is under the impression that the administration is indeed on a path toward deploying American troops.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Interesting.

Rachel Rizzo: On the ground in Iran. This was a direct quote of his. And he said that he left briefing angrier than he had ever been at any briefing in his 15 years in the Senate and he left with more questions and answers. But I think that's what we have right now are more questions and answers. The majority of voters in the US oppose sending US ground troops to Iran. Only 20 % support it. Even most Republicans support it, sorry not support it, oppose it as well. And at the end of the day, I mean, logistically it's going to be extremely difficult if you're talking about a ground operation, it's like airborne rangers securing entry points, special forces, you know, Navy SEALs carrying out these really sensitive tasks, trying to penetrate extremely hardened nuclear facilities, collecting intelligence, securing nuclear materials, and then getting out.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Hmm. Mm-Hmm.

Rachel Rizzo: I mean, I don't want to, I don't want to make a cartoonish comparison here, but I remember watching, I think we all watched Top Gun 2 a couple years ago, and it was all based on this Iran scenario.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yes.

So I've been reading these things and I'm like, well, they were pretty close. But no, mean, I don't think Trump has ruled it out, but it would be, I think it would be, it would be pretty surprising at this point. But again, it's part of the debate. It's something we can't ignore and it's something to keep a close eye on for sure.

cAN CANADA DIVERSIFY?

Rachel Rizzo: Okay, and then moving on to a different region because we've been talking about Iran and the Middle East for a couple weeks now. Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney was in Delhi. He's now in the Indo-Pacific. What are you watching there?

Dhruva Jaishankar: So again, in non-Iran news, Canada's Prime Minister Mark Carney, who made a speech in Davos a few months ago, which I think led to a lot of conversations about the Western unity. Essentially, he said that the US-led international order had been a bit of a fiction, that it was a useful fiction, but that time has come to an end and we need to move on. And it was a speech he wrote personally. You can criticize it. I think it's worth reading even if you disagree with it, but it kind of started a conversation on dependence on the United States and really on diversification. Can a country like Canada, which is so dependent on the U.S. for security and for its trade and economic well-being, actually successfully diversify? Carney went on a trip of where he visited India, Australia, Japan, not coincidentally for Quad partner countries of the United States, and in each case actually helped try to consolidate their relationship with a uranium supply

Rachel Rizzo: Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Deal in India, a meeting with the Prime Minister Albanese in Australia, and a new partnership that he was announced when he was in Japan. This kind of outreach reflects a kind keenness of Canada's leaders and businesses to reduce the dependence on the United States.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah.

Dhruva Jaishankar: I think they're also appear to be tempered by a certain sense of realism that, you know, let's say on security, Canada remains extraordinarily dependent on the United States for missile defense,

Rachel Rizzo: Yep.

Dhruva Jaishankar: For foreign intelligence, and replacing that is going to be extremely costly.

Rachel Rizzo: Under spends on defense.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yeah, and I think a lot of Canadian taxpayers or politicians understand the limits of that. And even on trade and economics, Canada is a major beneficiary of access to the United States market. So, again, while we may see some diversification underway, it may not be as much, or I think it's tempered by realism on the part of Canadian businesses as to how much they will continue to have to work with the US.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah.

Dhruva Jaishankar: So something to watch, because it's part of, I think, a longer set of developments that is taking place. But it's interesting to see him going out so aggressively.

Rachel Rizzo: It is. Yeah, don't talk about Canada through that lens very often. And so it's a different moment for Canada, I think, for sure.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yes, yes. And I think, you know, Carney's speech had been made by another leader who may not have had the same kind of resonance, but the fact that it was Canada of all countries that did that, I think was really what triggered a lot of, Trump himself started calling Carney, Governor Carney,

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah.

Dhruva Jaishankar: This is something he had previously only reserved for Justin Trudeau.

Rachel Rizzo: Uh-huh.

Dhruva Jaishankar: As a kind of to demean him. And in his meetings with Carney, he had been much more respectful until the speech. So let's see what happens now.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, absolutely. As always though, we are keeping an eye on all of these developments and more. We'll see what happens over the next five or six days when we record next week or the week after. But as always, thank you for joining us on the Around the World podcast. And as I mentioned before, always be sure to like and subscribe, listen to us on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and YouTube as well. .

Dhruva Jaishankar: Mm-hmm. Thanks for joining us.

Rachel Rizzo: Thanks

Season 2 Episode 8 : Iran War in the Middle East

March 6, 2026 — In this week’s episode of Around the World, hosts Dhruva Jaishankar and Rachel Rizzo zero in on the escalating conflict in the Middle East, unpacking the U.S.-Israeli strikes that killed Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and Iran’s retaliation against military bases and critical infrastructures in the Gulf. They explore Israel’s push for regime change, the impact on U.S. domestic politics, and how Europe and the Gulf Arab states are being drawn into the widening war.

Available on Spotify and Apple Podcasts.

Image: Avash Media, CC BY 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Sneak Peak

Rachel Rizzo: On this week's episode.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Looking this from Iran's point of view, they say, well, Israel's hardened its targets, US military bases have hardened their targets. If this is an existential conflict from their point of view, they're trying to go after all commercial activity in the Gulf. They've hit all six GCC countries, Gulf Cooperation Council countries. So they have gone after, very deliberately after this sort of economic infrastructure, energy infrastructure, hoping that this would compel the GCC countries to lean on the United States to bring a swift end to this conflict, perhaps short of regime change.

Rachel Rizzo: The real wild card here is how does US involvement develop over time? Hegseth has said that this campaign is just getting started, which really creates a question about what the casualties for the United States might look like. If Iran emerges from this battered but not broken, you get a sense that these actions were for naught. I wouldn't say it's a popular move, but just how unpopular it is, we'll have to see.

Welcome to around the world

Dhruva Jaishanker: Hello, I'm Dhruva Jaishankar.

Rachel Rizzo: And I'm Rachel Rizzo. Welcome to the Around the World podcast, your essential guide to understanding the forces shaping our world today. Every week, we cut through the noise to bring you clear, insightful analysis on some of the most important developments in geopolitics.

Dhruva Jaishanker: Whether it's security challenges in Europe, great power competition in Asia, domestic politics in the United States, or regional developments in Latin America or the Middle East. We'll discuss what's happening and more importantly, why it matters.

Rachel Rizzo: Thanks for tuning in. And as always, be sure to like and subscribe to the Around the World podcast on YouTube, Spotify, and Apple podcasts. On to the show.

A widening war

Rachel Rizzo: Hey, Dhruva.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Hi Rachel, you're in Delhi for the Raisina Dialogue, which is starting today.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, we're both in Delhi. We're finally recording. We're recording from the same city, but not from the same place.

Dhruva Jaishankar: The same building. And as we're speaking, the Raisina Dialogue, this is the Observer Research Foundation's big annual conference, is getting underway. I think, again, in the building we're in, Prime Minister Narendra Modi of India, President of Finland, Alex Stubb, are speaking, I think, right now. I'll get to see the video later, I think. I'll probably do that, avoid the crowds.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, it's pretty busy down there. We snuck away to do this recording because, you know, as everyone probably watching this and listening to this knows, it has been a pretty incredible week in terms of developments in geopolitics. And you know, for an event like the Raisina Dialogue, where you spend months sort of planning for it, the strikes in Iran and the ensuing conflict in the Middle East, which seems to be widening, doesn't seem to be stopping, is really sort of changing the nature of the conversations that we're having here. So we wanted to be sure to take some time and kind of inform our listeners, inform our viewers of what has been going on over the last five or six days, how that impacts the region, how that impacts Europe. And so, Dhruva, I wanted to start with you and, you know, most people listening have an idea that the U.S. and Israel struck Iran and there's been retaliation. But give us a sense of like the timing of that. What is happening now and what you're watching.

Dhruva Jaishankar: So we actually discussed this a few weeks ago. I think like three weeks ago on an episode where we discussed the, we discussed the US military buildup in Iran in the Persian Gulf or against Iran. And we talked about it being possibly imminent at the time.

Rachel Rizzo: Yep.

Dhruva Jaishankar: About two or three weeks elapsed. And then this past Saturday, February 28th, Israel initiated strikes against targets in Iran and Tehran and other parts of the country. These were initially sort of decapitation strikes so they really went after the leadership of Iran, killing the Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, who has not only been like a long time Supreme Leader of Iran, but is also a religious figure of great consequence as well. In addition, several other Iranian leaders were killed, but I think the Israelis estimate that about 40 senior leaders, political, military, and clerical leaders were killed in those initial strikes, including the Defense Minister, the Chief of Staff of Iran's Armed Forces, and many others. So that kicked things off. The United States joined those strikes. President Trump authorized it. And we saw, we can get to like what happened next. But I think the one thing that differentiated this from the conflict last year, the summer of June of 2025, is that the Iranian response was very quick. They seem to have been better prepared.

Rachel Rizzo: Mm-hmm.

Dhruva Jaishankar: They launched drones, missiles, airstrikes against a pretty wide range of targets. And they were not relegated to US military bases and Israel, which were struck, but also the Gulf Arab states as well.

Rachel Rizzo: And so, I mean, you point to something really important, which is that this is, it doesn't just feel much different than last June. It is fundamentally different than last June. The aims are different.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Mm-hmm.

Rachel Rizzo: The breadth is different.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yeah, yeah, so I mean, I think, let's look at this first from Israel's vantage point. In the post October 7, 2023 environment, Israel's threat perceptions have increased. The war in Gaza wasn't going exactly according to plan and they were worried about Hezbollah, which is the Iranian ally in Lebanon joining, so preemptively, well entering the conflict with Israel. Preemptively Israel struck Hezbollah, killed its leader Hassan Nasrallah in a very dramatic fashion, and also took out air defenses and missiles that were operated by Iranian proxies in Syria and Iraq. So by the end of 2024, essentially, Israel had a clear path, if you think of it from the point of view of air defense, to Iran. So I think that was step one. Step two was like last week's, I'm sorry, last year's 12-day war in June, where they really brought home their air superiority. In fact, they completely dominated the airspace in Iran, were able to strike IRGC, Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, leadership killing many of them. And then, of course, the U.S. followed up with strikes on Iran's nuclear facility. So I look at this as sort of the third round of, in three years, of this Israel-Iran war. And this one has a very explicit objective, as you suggested, of regime change in Iran.

Rachel Rizzo: Okay. And so the retaliation by Iran has not just been – it has widened beyond Israel. It has widened beyond Hezbollah, which is now involved in this conflict as well. But it's hit major financial, global, geopolitical centers – the UAE shutdown airports in the Gulf. This feels much bigger for the Iranians. Is it a last breath of existence for this regime? I mean, how are they thinking about their retaliation and what comes of this?

Dhruva Jaishankar: Mm-hmm. Right, Israel again sees this as kind of a real final attempt perhaps at regime change

Rachel Rizzo: Absolutely.

Dhruva Jaishankar: and believe that the window will close after. By the way, Israel is going into elections later this year, I by October. They think that by then, in any case, Iran will have built up a lot of, built up its arsenal again, and then perhaps even accelerated nuclear program. The United States is a bit more ambivalent about this, about what the end game is. And Trump himself is, I mean, reflected both in Trump himself and his advisors and they have slightly different views as to what the objective is here. The US entered into talks. Again, it's unclear, there's lot of speculation how sincere those talks were on the part of the United States. Was it really a last ditch attempt? Could a compromise have been reached? Rather infamously now, Oman's foreign minister has gone on to say

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Iran basically accepted almost everything the United States wanted so the U.S. shouldn't have started this war, that's the implication. But then again, looking this from Iran's point of view, they say, well, Israel's hardened its targets, US military bases have hardened their targets. The only, mean, if this is an existential conflict from their point of view, they're trying to go after all commercial activity in the Gulf. They've hit all six GCC countries, Gulf Cooperation Council countries, Saudi Arabia, UAE, Qatar, Oman, Kuwait, Bahrain, gone after energy infrastructure, including refineries, ports. They’ve gone after military installations in Iraq and Jordan and even as far as Cyprus where there's a British base. They've hit a French base in the UAE and then shipping coming out of the Strait of Hormuz into the Indian Ocean into, you know, towards Oman. So they have gone after, very deliberately after this sort of economic infrastructure, energy infrastructure, hoping that this would compel the GCC countries to lean on the United States to bring a swift end to this conflict, perhaps short of regime change.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah. It was really interesting this morning. We had Deputy Secretary of State here in, at Raisina, Chris Landau, and he brought up this conflict and said that Iran, since the fall of the Shah, has been in a state of, quote, this is what he said, death to America ever since, and that just couldn't fly anymore. And so I find it interesting to see what this administration thinks about regime change and what may come after because this idea that a pro-American, pro-Western democracy is somehow going to emerge out of this is just, it seems pretty close to impossible.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Well, we've heard that story several times before

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah

Dhruva Jaishankar: With at best, mixed results, right? But since you mentioned the U.S. Secretary of State, Deputy Secretary of State, who is speaking at Raisina, and this is a little plug for the event, I think we'll also be hearing from the Deputy Foreign Minister of Iran this week at the same event. I don't think there too many places around the world where you can hear from senior U.S. and Iranian officials. And I think the Israeli Foreign Minister will be participating virtually as well, doing a live interaction. So things to look forward to probably by the time this episode comes out but before this recording. I wanted to ask you about the US domestic political angle to this. A question I'm getting a lot is how is this going to play domestically in the US? Trump famously campaigned on a platform of saying he's not going to start any more wars. You know sort of a lot of people in the MAGA movement are against foreign intervention but again you see him basically help launch the largest in the Middle East in 30 years. What do you make of this?

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah. Well, the Deputy Sec State talked about that today and said, you know, Trump didn't, he was not elected with this idea that he was going to bomb Iran or go to war with Iran. But the way that the developments have played out in that region in these negotiations, it became clear that there was no other option. And so, you know, do with that what you will or believe it or not, but that's kind of the, I think, the mindset that this administration is approaching it with. Look, there's a couple things here. We have the midterm elections in November. And so I think it really, first of all, it's really risky timing because you have about six months or seven months for this to either wrap up or for it to balloon into something that requires a much heavier presence by the United States than was originally planned. And then it becomes a debate about the United States yet again being a instigator of and involved in another foreign war that was not congressionally authorized. So a clear majority of Americans just based on polls say that the administration has not clearly explained its goals. And I think that's true. Depending on who you speak to or who you hear from some people say it's a war. Other people say it's not a war. Some people say it's regime change. Other people say it's about the nuclear program. So I think the end goal here is, I don't know what a win looks like. Independent voters, I think it's about 58%, say the US should not have taken military action. 89 % of Democrats agree. Even a slice of the Republican Party opposes it too. And so I think the real wild card here is how does US involvement develop over time? 6 U.S. service members have already been killed in a drone strike in Kuwait. Historically, to put it crudely, body bags changed the political calculus pretty quickly. And Hegseth, Secretary of War, Hegseth has said that this campaign is just getting started, which really creates a question about what the casualties for the United States might look like. The shadow of Afghanistan and Iraq still looms large over the domestic voters in the United States at looms large over public opinion, especially if Iran emerges from this battered but not broken, you get a sense that these actions were for naught. And so the timing is one of them. I think deaths are another one. I think US involvement in general is another one. But it's certainly, I wouldn't say it's a popular move, but just how unpopular it is, we'll have to see.

Dhruva Jaishankar: What's your gut sense that let's this drags on for a few weeks and I'll get into why I think that might be the case after this.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, I think you're probably right.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Let's say it drags off for a few weeks, whatever the outcome is, maybe it's successful, maybe not from the US point of view. Does this help or hurt Trump in the midterms? What's your gut sense?

Rachel Rizzo: Well, I think it could end up helping him, if I'm being honest. If he is able to walk away from this and claim credit for a fallen Iranian regime that was anti-American, and we have yet to see what will take its place, I think that will take some time. If the US is able to walk away with limited casualties, if they are able to contain the war regionally and see it wrap up in the next few weeks rather than drag out closer to the midterms. I think that he will be able to point to this as a, you know, American power and the U.S. being able to, you know, stand by its position that the Iranians cannot have a nuclear weapon and moving forward with that policy position without dragging this out or without expanding this war. But again, I think it really depends. But I do think that if it's able to be contained, the Republicans will certainly use this as a campaign talking point. But even if it is contained, the Democrats will use it as well, saying it's just another example of presidential overreach and the sidelining of Congress. So I think that's where we are.

Dhruva Jaishankar: So bringing it back to the region a little bit. A few quick thoughts, and then I want to ask you about Europe in particular. So one other thing I think to watch, I mean, it’s just four points, think that maybe haven't, I mean, just scanning the news, I don't think have received as much attention in the US as in particular as maybe is warranted. One is the role of the Gulf Arab states is going to be really interesting to see in the next few days and weeks. They've been taking pretty, like a pummeling, you know, in terms of missile strikes again against civilian targets. They've been reacting defensively so far. And the question though is their exhausting law of the air defenses and so at what stage if at all do the UAE and possibly Saudi Arabia and possibly even Qatar kind of go on the offensive against Iran effectively joining the United States and Israel in this campaign. So that would be one interesting thing to watch. A second is the effect on the energy markets.

Rachel Rizzo: Yep.

Dhruva Jaishankar: And you're already seeing a little bit of jostling amongst major economies in trying to look for longer term solutions, which is suggesting that, again, planning is underway for this possibly last for weeks. so, again, a few days of shock in the oil markets, people could live with they would adjust, there's enough strategic reserve in most major economies for oil especially, but I think it's something to look for, which is why I think it may, again the planning is on for this lasting few weeks.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, I think that's right.

Dhruva Jaishankar: I think a third thing we just had in the last 24 hours news of a ship that was sunk, Iranian naval vessel. It was actually in India for pretty routine military exercise. In fact the military exercise, one of them, they participated with actually involved the United States as well. It was a U.S. destroyer there in the same exercise. It was on its way back to Iran. It was sunk in international waters by a U.S. submarine.

Rachel Rizzo: Was this the torpedo video?

Dhruva Jaishankar: I haven't seen the video of it.

Rachel Rizzo: It's nuts. Yeah.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Okay, so it was sunk by a US submarine off in international waters closest to Sri Lanka. Several, about 30 plus sailors have been rescued. It looks like many have been lost at sea. But again, how that plays out, and it's playing out a little bit politically in India, how that plays out in the wider region. It is wartime, it was international waters, it was against a warship. But I think the dynamics of that will be interesting to see just in terms of public relations and so the justification for this war. And then one more thing I think worth considering, we've been talking about regime change versus non-regime change. Like you know if Israel meets the objective of regime change, it has won the war. If doesn’t is it a loss? There are also kind of like in between solutions. We may end up with like a Venezuela type situation

Rachel Rizzo: Mm-hmm.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Where on paper the Islamic Republic of Iran but it has a sort of weakened leadership that knows that if it steps out of line, it'll be decapitated again by a combination of Israel and the United States, right? So a sort of Delcy Rodriguez type situation in Iran. So we have an interim leadership right now. The President of Iran survived the initial assault. He was actually wounded last year in June in one of the Israeli strikes but Masoud Pezeshkian, he survived. Ali Larijani is a really interesting figure to watch. He's kind of had every role in the, every key role, in the Iranian government for the past 20 years and then of course people may come from the clerical establishment as well. Actually Khamenei's son, his second survived and was widely tipped to be a possible heir as well. So let's see like what happens the Iranian domestic front as well. But want to ask you last, what is the scene in Europe? We've had attacks against, as I mentioned, French bases, British bases in Cyprus. An Italian contingent in Kuwait was also struck. So again, Europe is being dragged into this conflict. How do you think plays out there?

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, I mean, first of all, it's another hit for the United States and Europe because it puts allies in an incredibly difficult position where they're left balancing their relationship with the United States, left being forced potentially to respond to a conflict that was not instigated by them and but they are now implicated in and involved in. They have to deal with their public opinion as well. But on top of that, just going beyond domestic stuff, I mean, just energy prices. I mean, seeing what that might mean for the European continent, most Europe imports, essentially all of its oil and a significant share of its LNG, meaning that if we look at a major surge in prices, it could be reminiscent of the 2021 to 2023 energy crisis. The European Central Bank is in a dilemma here because you have this oil shock that could potentially push this sticky inflation higher while at the same time the growth outlook weakens from U.S. tariffs at the same time. So that seems like it could be the worst of both worlds. There's also concerns about what it means for Europe's security, right? Not just when it comes to its imported fuel dependence, but that it distracts EU attention from this $90 billion Ukraine aid package and a potential refugee wave. I mean if we're really looking at the potential knock-on effects of this, I think if the conflict wraps up in a few weeks, the economic damage stays manageable. But if it really drags on with the Strait of Hormuz remaining closed, Qatar LNG offline, Europe faces a really difficult energy question and an inflation crunch heading into the summer storage season, so lots going on with the Europeans but again, I think we'll probably have another conversation about this next week, the week after, just based on how it plays out.

Dhruva Jaishankar: And its’s also been interesting to watch it from India. know, there are a few shared concerns as well. You know, the energy prices being one and India is very dependent on imports of fossil fuel energy from the Middle East. The almost nine million strong Indian community, the Indian diaspora in the Gulf, you know, and their security and safety, you know, it's kind of mind boggling, but there are almost as many Indians in the Middle East as the entire population of Israel.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, wow.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Right. And so their safety and security in the run up to state elections, where it's quite sensitive issue in India. And then also, India has a very large Shia population as well, probably the third or fourth after Iran and Iraq and possibly Pakistan. And so how that plays out domestically as well. So I think the multiple dimensions to what is a wide and complex conflict that will have really reshaped potentially the Middle East for decades to come. So really something to watch.

Rachel Rizzo: Absolutely. I think you're right. And will, again, we'll cover all of this probably again next week and have a chat about whatever happens in the coming days. But as always, as I mentioned in our opener, be sure to like and subscribe to the Around the World podcast. Wherever you get your podcasts, Apple, Spotify, YouTube, and thanks, Dhruva, and we'll see you next week.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Thanks Rachel, bye.

Rachel Rizzo: Bye.

Season 2 Episode 7 : U.S. Tariffs after Supreme Court Ruling, Trump’s State of the Union

February 27, 2026 — In this week’s episode of Around the World, hosts Dhruva Jaishankar and Rachel Rizzo recap a landmark U.S. Supreme Court ruling that struck down President Trump’s use of emergency powers to impose global tariffs, exploring its implications for current trade deals and future negotiations. They then pivot to Trump’s State of the Union address, highlighting his claims of economic revival and conflict resolution abroad.

Available on Spotify and Apple Podcasts.

Image: Mathieu Landretti, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons
Image: The White House, Public Domain, via WhiteHouse.gov

Sneak Peek

Rachel Rizzo: On this week's episode.

Dhruva Jaishankar: The Supreme Court voted six to three to strike down President Donald Trump's use of International Emergency Economic Powers Act, IEEPA, and his use of IEEPA for tariffs. This really constrained his ability to apply tariffs. That being said, there is a sort of menu of options that Trump has on the table, at least five different ways that he can continue to impose tariffs, each with certain limitations. Most immediately, he imposed some tariffs under Section 122, which basically limits tariffs to 15, up to 15%, but only for 150 days, and it can be extended with congressional approval.

Rachel Rizzo: I mean it was like it was typical Trump, you know, he started the main section of the of the State of the Union basically saying our nation is back, it's bigger, it's better, it's richer, it's stronger than ever before. He talked about falling inflation. He claimed credit for what he refers to as a turnaround for the ages. it was pretty light on foreign policy, actually. It took a backseat. But what he did say was, as has become very custom for Trump, pretty self-congratulatory. He claimed credit for ending eight conflicts around the world.

Welcome to Around the World

Dhruva Jaishankar: Hi, I'm Dhruva Jaishankar.

Rachel Rizzo: And I'm Rachel Rizzo. Welcome to the Around the World podcast. Your essential guide to understanding the forces shaping our world today. Every week, we cut through the noise to bring you clear, insightful analysis of the most important developments in geopolitics.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Whether it's security challenges in Europe, great power competition in Asia, domestic politics from the United States, or regional updates in Latin America or the Middle East, we’ll discuss what's happening and more importantly, why it matters.

Rachel Rizzo: Thanks as always for tuning in. And be sure to like and subscribe to the Around the World podcast on Youtube, Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Onto the show.

SCOTUS Strikes Down Tariffs

Rachel Rizzo: Hey Dhruva.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Hi, how are you?

Rachel Rizzo: Good. You're in Australia?

Dhruva Jaishankar: I'm in Canberra. I've spent the last week here mostly in Sydney and also in Canberra. Very interesting. We were launching a report on maritime security in the Indo-Pacific, but also had very good meetings with think tanks and officials in Sydney and Canberra from the Australian, Japanese, Indian governments in Sydney, but also in the foreign defense ministries here in Australia. So it's been very productive. And it's also just nice to get a, it's my first time back in Australia in six years.

Rachel Rizzo: Nice.

Dhruva Jaishankar: And it's nice to kind of get a sense of how they see the world, whether it's relations with the United States or what's happening in the South or Southeast Asia. So it's always interesting to learn from perspectives here. So it's been a very educational, illuminating week for me.

Rachel Rizzo: Good, good. And then you're not going back to the U.S. after. You're coming straight here to Delhi.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yeah, and we may record maybe a next episode in Delhi where we'll both be there for.

Rachel Rizzo: We've got, yeah, we've got the Raisina dialogue next weekend.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yes, yeah, big annual conference at the Rise in a Dialogue. Planning is underway. I think, Rachel, you're very much involved in that. So next week should be a very exciting week in India.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, lots of India-focused stuff coming up, but it was a big week for US domestic politics and also the reverberations that they might have in terms of some of Trump's major cornerstone decisions of his presidency. And the biggest one that we want to talk about first is this Supreme Court decision to strike down Trump's tariffs.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yes.

Rachel Rizzo: That kind of came as a surprise. Everyone had been waiting for this decision for a while. But tell us what you've been watching. Tell us what happened.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yeah, so we, think a lot of us have been watching this from late last year. There actually had been an expectation that maybe the US Supreme Court would make a decision on tariffs in December. It got postponed a little bit, but we finally had a ruling. The Supreme Court voted six to three to strike down President Donald Trump's use of International Emergency Economic Powers Act, IEEPA, and his use of IEEPA for tariffs. This really has constrained his ability to apply tariffs using that legal authority. And essentially what the Supreme Court said, it was again more procedural than against anti-tariff, so we can get to that a little bit as to why. But essentially they said that no president has used this to confer tariff authority. And really, it was more on the legality of the process rather than a ruling against tariffs in general. And he could not, the president could not provide a sort of clear rationale for his ability to impose tariffs of unlimited amount, duration, and scope under these extraordinary powers. And it basically required congressional authorization. So that was the sum and substance of the ruling.

Rachel Rizzo: Got it, got it. And so I think the major question that I still don't quite have an answer to is what it actually means for the tariffs that have been imposed. mean, people are talking about reimbursements, but those are legal issues there. It's a huge pain. He's now increased the global tariff rate to 15 % in response to this. I mean he's obviously clearly upset about it, but what does it actually mean?

Dhruva Jaishankar: So I think that two important things to look at. One is the international dimension, and one is the domestic dimension of this ruling. So on the international dimension, I think the ruling essentially says 60 % of Trump's tariffs that he has imposed are invalidated, including most significantly against some of the tariffs against Canada, Mexico, China. That being said, there is a sort of menu of options that Trump has on the table, at least five different ways that he can continue to impose tariffs, each with certain limitations. Most immediately, he imposed some tariffs under Section 122, which basically limits tariffs to 15, up to 15%, but only for 150 days, and it can be extended with congressional approval. And this is what he did immediately. The rationale for Section 122 tariffs is that there's a challenge with international payments. Again, that's questionable, but that's what he has now used. In the meantime, what I think we can expect is that there will be investigations and an imposition of tariffs under several other potential rationales. Section 232 tariffs that relate to threats to national security determined by the Department of Commerce. Section 201, which is sort of injury to domestic industry.

Rachel Rizzo: 301 or 201?

Dhruva Jaishankar: There's 201 and 301.

Rachel Rizzo: Okay.

Dhruva Jaishankar: So 201 is by the International Trade Commission. Section 301 is discrimination against U.S. businesses or violation of U.S. rights under trade agreements, and that's determined by the U.S. Trade Representative.

Rachel Rizzo: Got it.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Then there's also, this is kind of another biggie, a potential one, is Section 338 which is discrimination against US commerce. that's kind of a, he could do that, but that would be much more wide ranging. So essentially he has a menu of at least five different authorizations that he could use. I think some people are jumping to the conclusion that this means the end of tariffs. think Peter Navarro had an article in the Financial Times, this is one of his trade advisors. And also some of the things Trump has said that he's not backing down from tariffs.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah. Yeah.

Dhruva Jaishankar: This has simply complicated his legal authority to impose tariffs under IEPA. So that's the international dimension. The domestic dimension, think one thing that may pick up is the question of the tariffs that have been raised, and it's quite significant in terms of value. We're talking billions of dollars here. Do these need to be reimbursed to importers, to American importers? And I guess the question I have is, how much particularly small and medium enterprises in the United States, which have had to pay pretty hefty tariffs over the past year or so, how much they will demand sort of reimbursements? Will this potentially affect ⁓ Trump's popularity in the run up to the November midterm elections,

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Then sort of the legal processes that take place. we're talking, I think I have the statistics somewhere. I mean, it is really like a very large number of transactions, millions of transactions have taken place. so how this process unfolds is really going to be complicated.

Rachel Rizzo: And it's going to be a, I mean, we're looking at like a long term process here. I mean, this is not something that's going to be wrapped up with a bow anytime soon. This is just the very beginning and we've got a long road ahead right.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yeah, and so I think you've got this 150 days, either Congress will reauthorize some of that 15 % tariffs, or even if not, there will be a raft. And in some ways, the administration has been preparing for this since at least November or December last year, because in the oral arguments made in the Supreme Court, it was pretty clear that many of the Supreme Court justices, including the conservative justices, expressed quite a lot of skepticism about the legal authority that the US President had to impose these tariffs unilaterally. So I think they have been preparing the ground for at least two or three months to impose a raft of new tariffs under different authorities.

The Longest SOTU Address

Rachel Rizzo: Okay and then a few days after that decision, he then had to face three of the Supreme Court justices who made that decision in his State of the Union address. So that was fun.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yeah, that happened. I was in a strange time zone, didn't follow the State of Union as much as you might have. So tell us a little bit about what happened in what I think is the longest State of Union address in history.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, it was like an hour 48 minutes I think off the top of my head if I remember right.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Mm-hmm.

Rachel Rizzo: But yeah, I also am in a strange time zone when it comes to watching US primetime TV So I was up at 7:30 in the morning here in Delhi watching it with my cup of coffee in the morning So that was pretty a nice way to start the morning, you know with like Trump yelling at everyone But I mean it was like it was typical Trump, you know, he started the main section of the of the State of the Union basically saying our nation is back, it's bigger, it's better, it's richer, it's stronger than ever before. He talked about falling inflation. He claimed credit for what he refers to as a turnaround for the ages. you know, this also, as I mentioned before, comes on the heels of the Supreme Court declaring his tariffs illegal and him rising or raising global tariffs in response to that. I thought that it was gonna, I mean, he would maybe start some sort of, not like direct yelling confrontation with the Supreme Court judges that were there, but certainly would like call them out in a pretty, in a pretty loud, garish sort of way. But he sort of avoided that. He, he, you know, greeted them when he walked in. Chief Justice Roberts, who's a, you know, right leaning Chief Justice on the Supreme Court, he's the one that wrote the opinion, actually. So that part of it wasn't as shocking as I thought it was going to be, but the rest of the speech obviously was sort of classic, classic Trump.

Dhruva Jaishankar: And what about foreign policy?

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, so it was pretty light on foreign policy, actually. It took a backseat. But what he did say was, as has become very custom for Trump, pretty self-congratulatory. He claimed credit for ending eight conflicts around the world. This is a line that we have heard from him many times up until now. He rattled off that included the Israel-Gaza, what was it? No, Israel-Iran ceasefire. He talked about the India-Pakistan standoff earlier last year. I think he said that the Pakistani prime minister would have been killed if it wasn't for him, if I remember the line correctly. He said Gaza was just about there, which you know that's obviously one of the most debatable things that you can say in terms of foreign policy at the moment.

Dhruva Jaishankar: My pet favorite war that he's ended is the one between Egypt and Ethiopia, which is you know which aren’t neighboring countries, but that's one he takes credit for. Yeah.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah he did talk, he mentioned this too. He talked about Armenia and Azerbaijan. And then he talked about the, you know, obvious military operation in January that captured Venezuelan president, former president, guess, Nicolas Maduro. He said Venezuela is our new friend and partner. Said that we're now on the receiving end of millions of barrels of Venezuelan oil. He said pretty little on the Ukraine war, despite the fact that the speech fell on the four-year anniversary of Russia's invasion. He just had kind of a brief line about working to end the killing and the slaughter. But I will say on Iran, he did strike a little bit more of an ominous tone. He warned that Iran would not be allowed to get a nuclear weapon. He left military action on the table. But I think as usual, there are people that are his champion when it comes to foreign policy. Critics, obviously, point out a very clear gap between these triumphant frames that he presents and the reality on the ground. So it's long on confidence and short on strategy, as some people might say.

Dhruva Jaishankar: And what was, I didn't see it, but what was the partisan flavor like? know, I mean, again, you have Democrats in the audience. It has, I think in recent years, the State of Union has taken on a more partisan tone, but what was it like?

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, I mean, remember, I can't remember what year it was exactly, but there's that famous moment during Trump's State of the Union. was during his first, I almost said first semester, during his first administration where he finished the State of the Union and Nancy Pelosi stood behind him and just ripped up the speech.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Nancy, Nancy Pelosi, ripped it. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Rachel Rizzo: So that didn't happen because he had Vice President Vance and Mike Johnson standing, sitting behind him. But he set up the speech to make it as partisan as possible. Ilhan Omar. the Congresswoman from Minnesota screamed that he had killed Americans. This was in a moment about immigration, about halfway. And obviously she's talking about the ICE agents and Alex Preti and the in Minneapolis who was killed, who was shot by an ICE agent. About halfway through the speech, he asked everyone in the, and this was a really interesting moment. He asked everyone in the chamber to quote, stand up and show your support for the idea that the first duty of the U.S. government is to protect American citizens rather than illegal aliens. And those are his words, illegal aliens are his words.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Mm-hmm.

Rachel Rizzo: And immediately Republicans jumped to their feet, they applaud, Democrats stay seated, and then Trump just wheeled on them and said, should be ashamed of yourselves for not standing up. So, I mean, it's, and he didn't stop there. He referred to the Democrats as crazy in a moment where JD Vance and Speaker Johnson stood up and applauded. So I mean, it's a moment that I think Republicans have said that they are going to use in terms of footage for the midterms that are coming up this November. So there's a lot there, but I think we have to, it wasn't as shocking as some of his former State of the Unions, I guess, because we've heard it before. We kind of know what his MO is at this point. I thought it was gonna be a little bit heavier on foreign policy, but we'll see how things go on that front. yeah, for anyone that watched it, it wasn't anything that was like super new.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Well, there's a lot else going on this week, partly as a result of the Supreme Court ruling. The US has delayed trade talks including with India that were scheduled to take place.

Rachel Rizzo: Mm-hmm.

Dhruva Jaishankar: There has you know, I think they're close to an interim agreement there, but it has also complicated the existing and negotiated trade agreements with Europe and with Japan and many others so I think that that's one space to watch. We've seen a burst of violence in Mexico related to cartel related violence.

Rachel Rizzo: Yep.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Drug leader known as El Mencho, cartel leader, was killed and that has sort of triggered some violence there. And I think another thing, I mean I'm certainly watching, a lot of people are, is the ratcheting up of tensions on Iran.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Again today in fact there's some talks going on to kind of hopefully avert sort of tensions there, but I think a lot of people are expecting possible military action against Iran. So.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, but not when Modi is in Israel, which is where he is now.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yes, yeah, but I think he's returning today or tomorrow and at time of this recording he's actually hosting Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney. So again, lot going on in the world. I think we'll discuss all of this next week and beyond. But it's interesting to see these tensions, know, the Supreme Court ruling, the State of the Union and other things in the United States and how it's being read all over the world.

Rachel Rizzo: Absolutely. Yeah, and I think maybe our next episode will come to you live from India, perhaps, when we are both finally in the same place. So of course, we'll see how that goes. And as I mentioned before, be sure to tune in every Friday for the latest episodes. We took a week off last week. Things were a little busy and hectic with travel schedules. But of course, as always, subscribe to the around the world podcast like the around the world podcast on Apple podcast YouTube and Spotify and we will see you all hopefully next week!

Dhruva Jaishankar: As always, thank you for joining us and see you next week.

Rachel Rizzo: Thanks, Dhruva.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Bye

Season 2 Episode 6 : India AI Summit, Japan's Stunning Election

February 13, 2026 — In this week’s episode of Around the World, Amlan Mohanty, Technology and Society Fellow at Carnegie India, joins hosts Dhruva Jaishankar and Rachel Rizzo to discuss India’s upcoming AI Impact Summit, which will take place in New Delhi and feature global leaders and CEOs from companies like Nvidia, OpenAI, and Microsoft. They explore the Summit’s implications for global AI governance, India’s role as the first Global South host, and tensions around access, inclusion, and U.S.-China competition. Dhruva and Rachel then pivot to Japan, where they recap Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi's major victory for the Liberal Democratic Party during the recent snap election.

Available on Spotify and Apple Podcasts.

Image: Ministry of Culture (GODL-India), GODL-India, via Wikimedia Commons
Image: 内閣広報室｜Cabinet Public Affairs Office, CC BY 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Dhruva Jaishankar: On this week's episode.

Amlan Mohanty: You know whether you have the US or China or India or the Middle East, I think everybody wants to see that AI is producing some significant social economic impact. But I think there are two areas where you are likely to see some tension. I think one is this question of access, right? Like US and China, for example, are competing with each other. And I think then that begs the question, what does that mean for access for the rest of the world? And the second area where potentially we could again see some disagreement is around this question of trust and safety. I think we've all seen that some parts of the world,are willing to take more of a free market, laissez-faire approach or deregulatory approach when it comes to trust and safety or AI governance. So what is, I think, the consensus around questions of trust and safety and questions of access is potentially where I think there could be some contentious discussion.

Dhruva Jaishankar: We discussed the new Japan's new prime minister, I think in October on an episode of the show, Sanae Takeuchi. She just had snap elections, general elections in Japan. Her party, the Liberal Democratic Party or LDP won just a sweeping landslide victory that was really quite stunning. And I think nobody would have expected this in October or September, October where she, you on a not even her first try, she had been elected leader of a battle party. She welcomed Donald Trump to Japan very soon after becoming prime minister. She's doubled down on relations with South Korea, which have always been a very sensitive subject in both countries. Then the other thing is there's a sort of a relatively new far right party called Sanseitō. And Sanseitō increased its vote share to about 7%. So again, something to watch there, but it has been quite a turnaround over the past three or four months in Japanese politics and again with some implications for Taiwan relations with China, Korea, the United States and beyond.

Welcome to Around the World

Dhruva Jaishankar: Hi, I'm Dhruva Jaishankar.

Rachel Rizzo: And I'm Rachel Rizzo. Welcome to the Around the World podcast. Your essential guide to understanding the forces shaping our world today. Every week, we cut through the noise to bring you clear, insightful analysis of the most important developments in geopolitics.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Whether it's security challenges across Europe, power dynamics in Asia, domestic updates from the United States, or regional updates in Latin America or the Middle East, we make sure you're up to speed on what's happening and more importantly, why it matters.

Rachel Rizzo: Thanks for tuning in. And also be sure to like and subscribe to the Around the World podcast on Youtube, Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Onto the show.

India's AI Impact Summit with Carnegie India's Amlan Mohanty

Dhruva Jaishankar: Hi, Rachel.

Rachel Rizzo: Hey, Dhruva, how's it going?

Dhruva Jaishankar: Good. I'm back in Washington after a quick trip to Europe. And how are you?

Rachel Rizzo: Good, good, good. You were in Budapest, right, for the Global Dialogue?

Dhruva Jaishankar: I was in Budapest yes, and very interesting politics there, something we'll discuss on a future episode. But this week we will focus on something that's happening in a few days, which is India will be hosting the AI Impact Summit, which brings together national leaders. We, I think, expect the leaders of France, Brazil, amongst other places, and the international CEOs, such as those of Nvidia, OpenAI, Microsoft, many more. And so they'll all be converging on Delhi in the next few days. And to discuss the summit and its implications, we're pleased to have Amlan Mohanty join us this week. Amlan's a lawyer by training. He's worked for Google and now is at Carnegie India think tank based in India and also works with Niti Ayog, which is the Indian government's in-house think tank. So Amlan, thank you for joining us this week.

Amlan Mohanty: Hey Dhruva. Hi, Rachel.

Rachel Rizzo: Hey, thanks so much for being with us today. Or I guess it's evening here in India. It's morning for Dhruva.

Amlan Mohanty: Thank you for having me. Of course.

Rachel Rizzo: So great to have you here. So we kind of wanted to start this out for people listening to the show. You some folks are like deeply steeped in the policy discussions around AI, the implications of AI. I am not one of those people. I focus on, you know, security and economics and those issues. So AI it’s something that, you know, that we all sort of have to touch on, but that is better understood by others sometimes. And so I wanted to, you know, maybe this is a question that's, you know, too easy, but we can start with an easy ballpark question. Can you explain for people that don't follow this stuff super closely, what exactly is the AI summit? Is it standalone? Is it part of a series? And how did India come to be hosting it?

Amlan Mohanty: Yeah, no, thanks, Rachel. There's no easy question. I think it's an important question to start off with. You can't, I think, escape AI in the newspapers or actually online or anywhere else these days. But it's worth thinking about why, like you said, India is hosting this summit. To answer your question, is a summit in the series of global AI summits that was first started at Bletchley Park by the government of the UK in 2023. Since then, it's been to Seoul and Paris and now in India and happens essentially every year. And so India was the co-chair of the summit last year along with France. And it was decided that India would host this year's summit. In terms of kind of what's unique about this summit, right? There are obviously lots of AI conferences that happen around the world. But this one's particularly, I think, important because it's actually hosted by the government itself. So in many ways, it's a multilateral platform that invites participation from governments around the world, but also features high level participation from companies, tech CEOs, AI startups, lots of international development organizations. And so they all come together in this forum once a year to talk about what's pressing and what's top of mind when it comes to AI. And so that's actually where we are at. And this is going to start on Monday on the 16th of February. And I will point out this is actually now the first global AI summit that's going to be hosted in the global South. And so I think that's also something to keep in mind.

Dhruva Jaishankar: So one subtle change that's happened, you mentioned it started in Bletchley Park, which is historically significant. was where a lot of the World War II code breaking took place, then to Seoul, Paris, and now here. But the name has changed a little bit over time, right? So the initial one was the AI Safety Summit. Then last year we saw the AI Action Summit in Paris. And this time they're calling it the AI Impact Summit. So what's the significance for that? And while you're at it, so what is India hoping to highlight beyond the name change as well?

Amlan Mohanty: Yeah, no, absolutely. You've hit the nail on the head. I think there's a lot that goes behind that nomenclature, right? I think the government of India was very, I think, intentional about calling it the Impact Summit. I think what they're really trying to signal is, in 2023, when the UK government hosted this inaugural Bletchley Park Summit, there was a lot of discussion about these large, potentially powerful models and applications like Chat GPT. They were concerned about what the risks of this could be, right? Like potentially malicious users around this or deep fakes or, you know, potential issues around bias and discrimination. So that was the focus then. And we've now since, you know, evolved to, you know, I think seeing some of the kind of potential of this technology. And we're, I think where we're at in 2026 is to say, look, there's all of this, you know, opportunity, look, all of these ideas, there's this optimism around this technology. But I think in 2026, we want to see that return of investment in a tangible way. And so I think that's what impact denotes. It's like, are we able to in 2026 really demonstrate what the social, economic, technological impact of this technology is on the lives of people? And I think this is something that's actually very personal to the Prime Minister Modi, who's been talking about really having AI touch people's lives and have a positive impact on their lives. So I think that's what this summit is being organized around. And I think that's why they picked the term impact summit. And I think you'll see a lot of the deliberations are going to be anchored around this idea of demonstrating impact, real social economic impact on the lives of people with AI.

Rachel Rizzo: Can I go back to something that you said in your opening answer that I wanted to get you to expand upon? You said, you know, it's worth noting that this AI Impact Summit hosted in India is the first one of its kind. You know, the first was in Bletchley Park, then Seoul, then Paris. This is the first that's hosted in the Global South. What is the significance of that in your mind?

Amlan Mohanty: I think it is actually really significant because it really, I think, informs the nature of the discussion and what I think the government leaders meeting in New Delhi next week are going to try and achieve and try and get out of this, right? Because it's the Global South, I think the nature of the conversation is a lot less about, you know, where is the technology at? Are we being able to, you know, develop this technology, accelerate this technology? So it's less about the technology itself and it's a lot more about people. And I think that's just a product of the fact that it is actually the global majority that we're talking about here, right? So people, for example, talk about what do you mean by the global South? Is it countries, you know, south of the equator? But I think, you know, you can use this synonym to say it's actually which represents the majority of the people of the world. And so, you know, this is a summit that's being organized around, you know, principles of human centricity, right? Like, again, as I mentioned, how does AI impact people's lives? And so I think, you know, that's one way to think about it. And the second, I think, is to think about where we are geopolitically right now. The rules of the global order are being rewritten. is rebalancing of powers. There's a lot of discussion around the importance of technology and trust in the context of multilateral bilateral relationships, and AI is central to that. So I think it's also worth thinking about where does the global South fit into this? And some people use the phrase middle powers. So I think you'll find that this summit is going to engage with questions around equity and access and inclusivity, which are, I think, very fundamental to how the Global South thinks about questions of access to technology and technology development.

Dhruva Jaishankar: I want to ask you a bit more on the application side in just a little bit. But first, mean, since you mentioned this of geopolitical context, we will have expect delegations to the summit from both the United States and China. And for many observers of AI, there seems to be at least on the R&D side in terms of developing AI models, kind of a two way race between the US and China to develop better, more comprehensive models. They're pouring tons of financial and human resources into this. So I think from the US we expect people, sort of a pretty senior delegation involving the White House, State Department, Commerce, and others, the scientific establishment. And then from China also, I think quite a senior delegation, sort of AI leaders from government. But what, where do you see, with this emphasis on the Global South, how do you see this affecting this kind of appears to be in some ways a two-horse race between the US and China to develop the most ambitious AI models.

Amlan Mohanty: Yeah, no, you're absolutely right. There is going to be a delegation from the US and China, but several other countries from the EU, from Latin America, from the African Union. So really, I think it speaks to India's convening power. And I think the relationships that Prime Minister Modi and his government have actually established over the last few years to ensure that this is a global summit, not just in name, but in substance. You actually have everybody that matters in AI at the table. So I think that's something to just note. And two, in terms of you know, kind of where we're at. Yes, it does seem like a two horse race when it comes to kind of AI technology development. But I said early on, I think, you know, this technology only really works and is only really transformative if it actually is diffused through the entire population. I think you'll see that message kind of hammered through the summit, which is, you know, whether or not, you know, it's the US or China that's actually leading this race. How do we ensure that AI is actually adopted and diffused across the rest of the world? And what are the mechanisms through which that happens? I think there'll be a big part of this summit that's going to be talking about access to this technology. What are the ways in which this can be accessed? So there's this entire discussion around Pax Silica that the US is leading, where this is about having like-minded countries at different levels of the supply chain have access to this technology. China has a similar kind of thinking around diffusing its technology through open source and open weight models and developing standards that allow for quick adoption of these technologies around the world. And you know, you see different parts of the world, including the African Union saying, you know, they're considering themselves to be scaling hubs, where you invest in this technology and you're able to develop this technology at a massive scale. India has its own kind of approach to DPI, which is again around openness and inclusivity and interoperability. So you actually see a lot of different, I think, ideas being presented at the summit. But I think fundamental and central to that is how can we leverage this powerful, potentially transformative technology and diffuse it through the entire world to ensure that there is actually human flourishing that's front and center of all of this.

Dhruva Jaishankar: So just a quick follow up and know Rachel has other question, but like you mentioned DPI, maybe just explain to people what DPI is for like non-Indian. I think in India, a lot of people know it intuitively. And maybe also what does the summit signal about India's broader approach to AI? What is India doing in the AI space? And maybe with some sort of what are some tangible outcomes that we've already seen India produce in the AI space?

Amlan Mohanty: Sure. Yeah. So DPI, the full form is digital public infrastructure. And it's actually more than a type of technology. It's a way of approaching technology design, which is to say, we'll create building blocks which are open by design, which are interoperable by design and are scalable by design. So these are some of these design elements around which you design technologies. And really the idea is people can build on top of this to be able to have impact at population scale. So let me give you an example, right? Aadhaar, which is a national ID project in India, is designed on these principles, right? It's, you know, interoperable, it's inclusive, it's open by design, and it's allowed the national ID system to scale to a billion plus people in a very short period of time. The UPI platform, the Unified Payments Interface is a P2P payments platform where people in India are able to make payment transactions between each other, independent of where your bank accounts or, you know, what applications you are using. So I can make a payment to Dhruva using a UPI app independent of you know where he is, what bank account he uses, what phone he's using, what operating system he's on, what app he's using. And this is, like I said, it's open, it's interoperable, it's inclusive, it's scalable. And so really, I think the Indian government is trying to think about how it can bring some of this thinking to this idea of having AI diffuse through the population to produce a real impact. And so you know I'm looking at the summit from the lens of what India might want to achieve. I think India will want to demonstrate some of this thinking. There is this national AI mission that was approved with a $1 billion plus initial budget that cuts across seven pillars, which includes things like data and computing power and talent and startup financing and trust and safety. So it will definitely want to bring that front and center. It will also want to, I think, demonstrate its own thinking around things like sovereign AI. So it is, for example, supporting and issuing, providing grants to local national champions to be able to build sovereign AI, which includes you know models. It's also funding local startups and MNCs to develop chips, semiconductors, and all of this will take time. But I think this is an opportune moment for the Indian government to say, and we heard IT Minister, Ashwini Vaishnaw at Davos talk about how India is investing across the AI stack. Dhruva, you mentioned applications and people kind of think about India being very forward and very successful at the application level, whether it's IT services or products. But actually, if you kind of listen to what I think Mr. Vaishnav was saying is India is investing long term across the AI stack, its chips, its data centers, its models, its applications, and this might take time. But that is the strategy for India. I'm sure it will be using this summit to showcase some of that work.

Rachel Rizzo: Are there any potential tensions that you're following or will be looking for potentially on display at next week's summit? mean, obviously different countries, I'm thinking of the US and China have potentially different futures in mind when it comes to the development and the use of AI. Maybe these clash even with the futures that major companies see as well. What are you going to be looking at in that specific route?

Amlan Mohanty: Yeah, no, that's a great question, Rachel. Look, I think there's some things everyone will agree on. And I think we're fortunate that on this idea of organizing principle of impact, I think everyone agrees that's where we're headed. I think it's taken some time, but whether you have the US or China or India or the Middle East, I think everybody wants to see that AI is producing some significant social economic impact. So I think that's why we agree. But I think there are two areas where you are likely to see some tension. I think one is this question of access, right? And fundamentally, I think, as Dhruva was saying earlier, because it's kind of this bipolar AI race we're working with, right? Like US and China, for example, are competing with each other. And I think then that begs the question, what does that mean for access for the rest of the world? Which of these two kind of future trajectories or visions for AI is the rest of the world potentially going to get?And two, between these two countries, how are they going to intermediate their relationship with the rest of the world in terms of access to this technology? So think access is going to be really a sticking point. And to really break that down with an example is if India is very keen to, I think, demonstrate and ask for a principle of inclusivity to drive future discussions around AI, which is, as Prime Minister Modi says, AI for all or AI for inclusive development. I would ask, is this something, for example, that the US government is going to get behind? Because from everything we've heard in the previous summit in Paris, one of the, I mean, for your listeners, that actually wasn't a consensus, in that leader statement. The US and the UK did not sign that leader statement. And one of the reasons potentially for that is there was a big emphasis even in that summit around inclusivity. And of course, that's a subjective term and you know, there might have been some tensions around questions around what that means. So I'll definitely be looking to see whether if the Indian government kind of advances some thinking around equitable access, around inclusivity, around questions of non-discrimination, whether it's something that they can build consensus around. And the second area where potentially we could again see some disagreement is around this question of trust and safety. And this is not new. I think we've all seen that some parts of the world, I think, are willing to take more of a free market, laissez-faire or deregulatory approach when it comes to trust and safety or AI governance. I think the US government is a good model of that. And so, while the Indian government has presented a model that's a lot more balanced and measured, which is try and promote innovation, support innovation, light touch, flexible approaches. They are aware and are willing to intervene through regulation to address specific risks. For example, the Indian government just issued regulations on deepfakes, I think two days ago. And that's actually quite at odds with some of the positions, like I said, that other governments are in. So what is, I think, the consensus around questions of trust and safety and questions of access is potentially where I think there could be some contentious discussion.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Well, thank you, Amlan. This has been very insightful and comprehensive. And I think this is obviously an issue that's not going to go away anytime soon. So I'm sure we'll have future discussions on this podcast and other places on AI. But good luck to you and your colleagues who have been working a lot over the past year plus too behind the scenes in terms of raising awareness and sort of fleshing out policies as well for next week's summit. And thanks for joining us.

Amlan Mohanty: Thanks, Dhrua. Thanks, Rachel. Really enjoyed this conversation. See you guys soon. Bye.

Takaichi Sweeps the Snap

Rachel Rizzo: Thanks for being with us. Bye. Okay, so we covered the AI Summit here in India, moving a little bit further to the east before we wrap up for the day. Elections in Japan. Dhruva, what do you have to say about, you've been watching this.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yeah, yeah. I mean, we discussed the new Japan's new prime minister, I think in October on an episode of the show, Sanae Takeuchi. She just had snap elections, general elections in Japan. Her party, the Liberal Democratic Party or LDP won just a sweeping landslide victory that was really quite stunning. And I think nobody would have expected this in October or sometime October where she not even her first try, she had been elected leader of a battle party.

Rachel Rizzo: Mm-hmm.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Just looking back, her initial priority when she became prime minister in October was the economy. That was really bread and butter issues, people inflation, debt, things like that, that people focused on. But she also had to deal with a bunch of foreign policy issues immediately upon assuming the leadership. She welcomed Donald Trump to Japan very soon after becoming prime minister. She's doubled down on relations with South Korea, which have always been a very sensitive subject in both countries. So right now we have a sort of center left government in South Korea, a right wing government in Japan. This was traditionally a source of tension in the relationship. And the fact that the two of them, the two leaders actually did a drumming session together. I don’t know if you saw this, this went kind of, and she also had a meeting with China's leadership very early on in a bid to sort of engage them. Then what happened was in November last year, in remarks in parliament, she said that in a Taiwan crisis, that any kind of military conflict in Taiwan would constitute an existential crisis for Japan. And this led to, I mean, in some ways it was well known, this is something her predecessors had been dealing with, but this led to this really sharp response by Chinese diplomats in Japan. In fact, one of the consul generals, I think in Osaka, said something saying, when a snake sticks its head out, you have to cut its head off, which then he had to retract that.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah.

Dhruva Jaishankar: And this led to basically a really nasty diplomatic spat between China and Japan. A Chinese fighter jet locked radar on a Japanese aircraft. Soon after that, China introduced new rare, January, new rare earth restrictions on Japan. Travel advisories were issued. But these events have only sort of added to Takeuchi's popularity and she ended up much higher than her own party.

Rachel Rizzo: Okay, so then why the snap elections?

Dhruva Jaishankar: So I think, again, the party had been sort of on the back foot. They'd been losing ground. I think the only saving grace for them was that there wasn't a unified opposition or a charismatic leader in the opposition that was able to take advantage of that situation. But the party was really, really unpopular and her predecessors were. I think she just took advantage of the fact that her personal popularity spiked after all of this, called snap elections, and this gamble appears to have paid off quite well for her. The LDP, her party, has increased its vote share by 10 % over the previous election. They want a complete majority. And at the same time, China has done a kind of quiet climb down. They sort of quietly authorized a continuation of some rare earth exports to shipments to Japan. And this victory will also strengthen her hand in dealing with Trump. Trump loves the winner. He sent a relatively warm congratulatory message to her. But a couple of things to observe about the elections. One is actually voter turnout was still really low. It increased just a little bit, but just over 50 percent.

Rachel Rizzo: Oh that is low, yeah.

Dhruva Jaishankar: So that still suggests that like in Europe, a pretty widespread dissatisfaction with electoral politics. And then the other thing is there's a sort of a relatively new far right party called Sanseitō. They have sort of modeled loosely on a sort of Japan, on a sort of American Manga movement or like the AfD in Germany and things like that, anti-immigration. And Sanseitō increased its vote share to about 7%. So again, something to watch there, but it has been quite a turnaround over the past three or four months in Japanese politics and again with some implications for Taiwan relations with China, Korea, the United States and beyond.

Rachel Rizzo: Absolutely, all stuff to watch.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Great. Thanks again for joining us this week on Around the World for what's been happening in geopolitics. Be sure to tune in every Friday for the latest episodes.

Rachel Rizzo: And as always, thanks for joining us. And as I said at the beginning, be sure to like and subscribe to the Around the World podcast. are on YouTube, we're on Spotify, and we are also on Apple podcasts. We'll see everyone next week.

Season 2 Episode 5 : India-U.S. Trade Deal, U.S.-Iran Tensions

February 6, 2026 — In this week’s episode of Around the World, hosts Dhruva Jaishankar and Rachel Rizzo break down a major shift in U.S.-India relations after U.S. President Donald Trump and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced a trade deal earlier this week. They explore what’s driving the breakthrough, what remains unclear, and whether this deal will put the bilateral relationship back on steadier ground. The episode then turns to rising tensions with Iran, as the United States increases its military presence in the Gulf even as informal nuclear talks take shape, heightening questions about escalation, diplomacy, and what to watch for next.

Available on Spotify and Apple Podcasts.

Image: The White House, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
Image: Tasnim News Agency, CC BY 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Sneak peek

Rachel Rizzo: On this week's episode.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Trump and Modi spoke four times between September and December, didn't seem to make much of a difference. And then we finally seem to have on February 2nd a breakthrough. What we know so far is the drop to 18 % tariffs for India. This is part of a longer term strategy by India to consolidate its trade relationships with so-called complementary economies of which the United States is the largest. There’s a palpable sense of relief on both sides that some business can return to normal. I think a lot of normal activity that have been waiting in the wings is going back. And enough people are invested in that relationship on both sides to actually sort of want to keep that going.

Rachel Rizzo: There's a few things on both sides that we should look at pretty closely. The first, think, is watch whether the U.S. sustains or further expands its force posture in the Gulf. And then watch for clarity of scope. So if the discussions expand beyond the nuclear file to include things like regional activity, that's where the talks are most likely to stall. So if they remain tightly nuclear focused, a limited deal becomes, I think, more plausible. finally, what I would say on the Iran side, really watch internal politics closely. Statements from the Supreme Leader's office or open IRGC resistance or public criticism of negotiations, could potentially constrain Iranian diplomats or raise the odds of a deliberate provocation.

Welcome to Around the World

Dhruva Jaishankar: Hi, I'm Dhruva Jaishankar.

Rachel Rizzo: And I'm Rachel Rizzo. Welcome to the Around the World podcast. Your essential guide to understanding the forces shaping our world today. Every week, we cut through the noise to bring you clear, insightful analysis of the most important developments in geopolitics.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Whether it's security challenges across Europe, power dynamics in Asia, domestic updates from the United States, or regional updates in Latin America or the Middle East, we make sure you're up to speed on what's happening and more importantly, why it matters.

Rachel Rizzo: Thanks for tuning in. And also be sure to like and subscribe to the Around the World podcast on Youtube, Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Onto the show.

Rachel Rizzo: Hey, Dhruva.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Hi Rachel, how are you?

Months in the Making: The U.S.-India Trade Deal

Rachel Rizzo: I'm good. Another newsy week on the India US front. So we've got some good news.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yeah, we had on February 2nd, Monday, which also happens to be Groundhog Day in the United States. President Donald Trump announced a broad framework agreement with India that settles the trade disputes that have been ongoing for about nine months or so. But the most important thing is he announced this decrease in tariffs to 18 % for Indian imports from imports from India to the United States. That's actually been the big news of the last week.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, so can you give us a little bit of background? I mean, everyone has been so focused on the FTA that was signed between India and the EU last week. And then obviously the questions that that brought up are what was going to happen between the US and India given that that relationship has really been on the rocks over the last almost a year at this point. So what kind of set the stage for a breakthrough on this? It happened and was announced on social media. We still don't really have any language here, but were you surprised? What have you been watching on this front?

Dhruva Jaishankar: So I think the timing was surprising. Just a little bit of background. India actually entered engagement with the Trump administration quite early, like pretty much immediately after his inauguration last January on trade issues. And in February of last year, Trump and Modi, Prime Minister Modi announced that they would conclude a bilateral trade agreement, a BTA, by the fall. That was the timeline they gave. In the midst of all of this, the United States announced so-called liberation day tariffs against many countries, including India. It was initially given a 26 % quote reciprocal tariff, not quite reciprocal, but that was the terminology used, which when a deadline expired at the end of August, end of July, was like a White House imposed deadline for negotiating a deal and India didn't have one. It was actually then a 25 % tariff was imposed on India. And then in September, another 25 % kicked in due to an executive order that Trump passed that targeted India for its purchases of Russian oil sanctions. So for the last few months, in September, we've had 50 % tariffs on Indian exports amongst the highest the United States has been applying on any country. Trade did not actually fall quite surprisingly. So U.S. exports to, I'm sorry, Indian exports to the United States actually grew in the last quarter of last year of 2025 by about 26 % over the year before. And U.S. exports to India grew about 3%. So it didn't really address the problem that Trump said was a problem, which was the trade imbalance. And India, meanwhile, concluded trade agreements with the UK, New Zealand, and most significantly, the European Union in January. So this is, think, the backdrop to all of this. And then we finally, Trump and Modi spoke four times between September and December, didn't seem to make much of a difference. And then we finally seem to have on February 2nd a breakthrough. I mean, what I would stress is a few things is what we know so far is the drop to 18 % tariffs for India. Secondly, that this is part of a longer term strategy by India to consolidate its trade relationships with so-called complementary economies of which the United States is the largest.

Rachel Rizzo: So in terms of the details, it seems like the details are still a little bit scant. We're not quite sure exactly what this entails besides tariffs dropping down to 18%, which is great news right out of the gate. But what are you waiting for in terms of signals, in terms of what comes next here?

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yeah, it seems like a lot of analysts are getting a little bit ahead of themselves and trying to sort of interpret what's going on. The reason is we've had now an announcement which has now signaled to the bureaucracies on both sides that they need to work out the technical details. And those are still being sorted out. think we will see as soon as this week, we will see executive orders that will start implementing some of this, particularly the first 25 % tariff related to Russian oil purchases and so reversing that. And secondly, I think we will see a joint statement at some point, hopefully by the end of this week, that will offer the technical roadmap for the implementation of this agreement. So I think we will see what that is, but broadly it seems to be along the same lines broadly as India's trade agreements with the European Union and UK and others.

Rachel Rizzo: So do you think that we're sort of in the clear at this point when it comes to the relationship between the US and India? I mean, it seems like nothing is ever certain. Nothing is ever off the table. But once you sort of get to this point in a trade relationship or a trade deal, it's in the interests of both sides to make sure that it's stable. Are you going to be looking for anything specific that could derail it at this point or are you pretty confident that now that we've gotten this far, it's kind of uphill from here?

Dhruva Jaishankar: So I think a few things. One, there's a palpable sense of on both sides that some business can return to normal. We're already seeing this today in Washington. There's actually a ministerial critical minerals meet that's taking place. I think a lot of normal activity that have been waiting in the wings is going back. and normal and enough people are invested in that relationship on both sides to actually sort of want to keep that going. So I think one thing to keep in mind. Second, this is not a trade agreement akin to what India signed with the European Union or the UK, which are sort of ratified binding agreements. They have to be ratified by the legislatures of both countries. These are, you know, those are serious trade agreements, right? This seems to be something a bit more tactical deal based, which is how President Trump operates. He has similar agreements with many other countries. And three, getting to that is what we've seen, you know we're one year into a four year Trump administration, right? It's only been 12 months, really, a little over 12 months. We've seen some swings. I would just give two examples with the United Kingdom recently, where as we spoke about on previous episodes, we had tariffs applied related to Greenland and also with South Korea, which again, there was a trade agreement and then Trump felt that South Korea wasn't doing enough and so 25 % tariff was threatened against them too. And so I think we will see, we're not at the end of the road yet, but obviously I think this is for the bilateral relationship, this is a positive step.

Rachel Rizzo: And then finally last question. mean, does this say anything about how bad the relationship actually fell over the last year? I mean, if it recovers this quickly, maybe the floor isn't as low as people thought it was, or do you think there's something there?

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yeah, I think the last year exposed two things. One is that the ceiling may not have been as high as some anticipated. I think that there have been some bumps in the road in the past year, mostly on trade and tariff issues, but other matters as well. But secondly, I think on the positive side of the ledger, the floor is also higher than people anticipated, right? And I kept pointing out even during the worst of this, which is like August, September, October, you still had military exercises between the two countries, had army exercises in Alaska, you had major AI deals being brokered, including by Amazon, Microsoft, Google, OpenAI were also, you know, something that the United States considers as a crown jewel of its economy. They're investing more in India, not less, despite tariffs. We had some defense sales and defense framework agreements signed in September. We had a major energy deal towards the end of the year. So, you know, lot of the people-to-people relations have dropped a little bit because, you know, you have seen a slowdown in overall migration to the United States because of visa related issues. But again, you still have 5 million people of Indian origin in the US. so, know, the broad, so sinews of the relationship remained intact mostly. Obviously things are not, you know, they will take time to build up trust again. Everyone knows something like this could happen you know. S I the long short of it is while the ceiling may not have been as high as some thought, neither is the floor is perhaps higher than people feared.

Rachel Rizzo: Well, good news all around. Something we'll be watching closely in the next few weeks.

Tension & Talks with Iran

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yeah. Turning to very different issue, but one I think that will stay in the news for some time, Iran. have seen a sort of, well, we had US strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities last year. What is happening now in Iran? We seem to have another drumbeat and real concerns was talking to some journalists there today in the last couple of days in Washington - US journalists and they felt that an attack on Iran might be imminent.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, I mean, people have been talking about this for weeks now. It comes amidst a pretty brutal crackdown by the Iranian regime on protests around the country. We've talked about this over the last few weeks. It also comes after, as everyone remembers, a military operation last June when the US bombed some critical nuclear sites in Iran. But basically what's happening right now is Trump has really been pressing Tehran to enter negotiations over its nuclear program. He has repeatedly threatened more military action in response to these crackdowns on anti-government protests. And just last week, the U.S. president ordered the USS Abraham Lincoln to the Gulf region, which heightened concerns about a potential military confrontation. So now the carrier strike group, brings approximately 5700 additional U.S. personnel, joined three destroyers and three littoral combat ships already operating in the region. So there's a pretty serious growing military U.S. presence there. At the same time, there's also been direct military conflict, although not soldier to soldier or air to air combat or anything like that. A U.S. Navy jet an F-35 shot down an Iranian Shahed 139 drone that they say was, quote, aggressively approaching the US aircraft carrier, the USS Abraham Lincoln in international waters in the Arabian Sea. And so I think when you look at an incident like that, it risks further escalating tensions that are already high as the Trump administration continuously warns of possible military action to pressure Tehran into negotiations. So this shoot down came within hours of IRGC forces, that's the Iranian Revolutionary Guard forces harassing a US flagged merchant vessel in the Strait of Hormuz, which then prompted the USS McFaul, which is a destroyer, to intervene and escort this ship to safety with air support. And then Iranian media reported that the drone had transmitted imagery before it was down. So we see a lot of actions happening at the moment while at the same time, potential talks taking place. So it's a lot of fog of war stuff at the moment, I think.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yeah, but it is a bit reminiscent of Venezuela, right? I there's been this sort slow US military buildup in the Gulf, some sort of testing of each other's military capabilities that is already taking place. Now, you mentioned just right at the end, some talks, what is happening in terms of talks between the United States?

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, so between the US and Iran, they're really informal at the moment. So these are preliminary U.S.-Iran negotiations focused pretty narrowly on Iran's nuclear program specifically and the terms under which Tehran would potentially return to constraints in its nuclear program in exchange for sanctions relief. This is so this is pretty narrow rather than looking at a broad reset of US-Iran relations right now. So on the U.S. side, the process is being coordinated by a name we are all familiar with, Steve Witkoff. It's operating with the backing of the White House in close consultation with U.S. CENTCOM, U.S. Central Command and regional allies. And the Iran delegation is being led by Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi and he's acting on instructions from the Iranian president. So these are, like I mentioned, still at a pre-formal stage. There's no fixed venue or agenda publicly agreed. They're being facilitated by regional intermediaries, most notably Turkey and Oman, who have offered to host and broker the talks. So that's kind of where we are right now in terms of the talks specifically.

Dhruva Jaishankar: And finally, what do we watch for next? What should we look out for?

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, I think there's a few things on both sides that we should look at pretty closely. The first, think, is watch whether the U.S. sustains or further expands its force posture in the Gulf. So this is looking at things like additional carrier aviation sorties, bomber task force deployments, air defense reinforcements. That could suggest that Washington is keeping credible strike options live. On the flip side, any drawdown or quieter operational tempo could indicate a real confidence on behalf of Washington that talks are stabilizing the situation. And at the same time, Iranian behavior at sea is equally important. So another drone incident, more unsafe naval encounters or proxy action could really raise escalation risk. So that's on the military side. I think the clearest indicator of real progress would be whether or not these current talks, these informal talks, harden into a real formal sort of time-bound negotiating framework where you have a confirmed venue, agenda, real senior -level participation. And then watch for clarity of scope. So if the discussions expand beyond the nuclear file to include things like regional activity, that's where the talks are most likely to stall. So if they remain tightly nuclear focused, a limited deal becomes, I think, more plausible. And then finally, what I would say on the Iran side, really watch internal politics closely. Statements from the Supreme Leader's office or open IRGC resistance or public criticism of negotiations, this could potentially constrain Iranian diplomats or raise the odds of a deliberate provocation. While on the other side, disciplined messaging on behalf of the Iranians suggests that there is buy-in at very elite levels or for the talks, but de-escalation at the same time. So a lot to look at, a lot to watch for. Nothing is certain at the moment. So this is definitely a conversation we'll continue to have over the coming weeks.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Great. We'll be keeping an eye on all these developments and make sure we're keeping you, our listeners, up to date in the latest happenings in geopolitics. Our last few episodes have been amongst the most listened to, including the one on the India-EU trade agreement. A few weeks ago, we discussed the FED and issues there. And actually, one of the names we mentioned in that discussion ended up getting named FED chair by Trump.

Rachel Rizzo: Yep. .

Dhruva Jaishankar: So be sure to tune in every Friday for the latest episodes. We're on Spotify, on Apple podcasts and on YouTube. Feel free to leave comments as well for issues that you'd like us to cover and tune in every week.

Rachel Rizzo: Absolutely. And as always, thank you for joining us on the Around the World podcast and we'll see you next week.

Season 2 Episode 4 : Trump’s Board of Peace, U.S. Defense Strategy, China Military Purges

January 30, 2026 — In this week’s episode of Around the World, hosts Dhruva Jaishankar and Rachel Rizzo examine Trump’s Board of Peace, a multilateral initiative originally aimed at overseeing the Gaza ceasefire — and the questions around its membership, funding, and Trump’s ongoing role. They also assess the Department of War’s newly released National Defense Strategy and its priorities for U.S. security, as well as China’s recent detainment of top PLA officers. 

Available on Spotify and Apple Podcasts.

Image: Board of Peace session with world leaders at the Official, on 22/1/2026 from 10:30 to 11:30 in the Congress Centre – Congress Hall (Zone C), Stakeholder Dialogue (special session/board of peace). CC BY-NC-SA 4.0. Courtesy of the World Economic Forum / Jason Alden, via Flickr.

Sneak peek

Dhruva Jaishankar: On this week's episode...

Rachel Rizzo: I think in order for a body like this, a plurilateral body like this, or a minilateral body like this to have meaning. The way that it's given meeting is by other organizations or other countries thinking that it is legitimate and having it be legitimized.

Dhruva: The National Defense Strategy, define in some ways the role and worldview of the US military, the US Defense Department, now called the Department of War, the most controversial parts as I see it and where there's been some pushback has related to China and it says: our goal is simple, to prevent anyone, including China, from being able to dominate us or our allies. I think more controversially, it seeks a stable or, quote, a decent peace with China. There was a big bombshell that dropped amongst the China watching community the last few days. And this was a surprise announcement that General Zhang Youxia, who is like the vice chairman of the Central Military Commission or and he's been detained and purged, right? And so was Liu Zhenni, who is the chief of staff to join staff departments. So these are two of the most senior military officers in China have been purged. Five out of the six military positions, the senior most of the CMC are now vacant and there's only one guy, one guy standing and who really controls the PLA now is sort of anyone's guess.

Welcome to Around the World

Dhruva Jaishankar: Hi, I'm Dhruva Jaishankar.

Rachel Rizzo: And I'm Rachel Rizzo. Welcome to the Around the World podcast. Your essential guide to understanding the forces shaping our world today. Every week, we cut through the noise to bring you clear, insightful analysis of the most important developments in geopolitics.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Whether it's security challenges across Europe, power dynamics in Asia, domestic updates from the United States, or regional updates in Latin America or the Middle East, we make sure you're up to speed on what's happening and more importantly, why it matters.

Rachel Rizzo: Thanks for tuning in. And also be sure to like and subscribe to the Around the World podcast on Youtube, Spotify and Apple Podcasts.

Rachel Rizzo: Hey, Dhruva, how's it going?

Dhruva Jaishankar: Hi, Rachel. Hi, how are you?

Rachel Rizzo: Good, good, good. Not as newsy of a week as every other week this year, but still busy. We had the big FTA with Europe and India that was signed. That was a big one. Republic Day here in New Delhi, that was exciting.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Did you get to see any of those things or be involved in any of the Europe meetings?

Rachel Rizzo: No, so I just watching it all be set up downtown was like super intimidating over the last week. It was just so much going on. And all of the traffic was crazy. So I stayed home. But I did watch the flyover from a distance. So that was pretty fun.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Great. And here we've had bad traffic as well in Washington because of the snow. So things are still shut down. Federal government was shut down for a few days and things are still quite messy.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, DC takes forever to clean any of the snow up. yeah, just good luck with that.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yes. But we have had some developments over the past week, which are quite noteworthy.

Rachel Rizzo: Yep.

Replacing the UN?

Dhruva Jaishankar: You mentioned a few, but one thing that has picked up steam a little bit, it was announced a couple of weeks ago now, but we got more clarity during Davos, is Trump's Board Peace.

Rachel Rizzo: Yes.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Now, this originally seemed to be defined in the context of the Gaza War as sort of part of the peace process there. But it seemed then there was a report and seemed to be confirmed that it's going to be much more expensive. So what exactly is Trump's Board of Peace and what's that all about?

Rachel Rizzo: So I think the short answer is that we're not quite sure yet. You're right that Trump first proposed this idea, this concept of a Board of Peace back in September of 2025. This was part of the second phase of a 20 point plan to end the war between Israel and Hamas. And basically it was sort of designed ultimately to oversee the Gaza ceasefire and reconstruction following the Israel Hamas war. And then it was kind of formally established just last week in January 2026 on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum in Davos. But as you mentioned, the mandate has expanded. doesn't just, it doesn't even actually talk about Gaza and Hamas and Israel in sort of like the final charter. Its mandate has expanded to include just this general idea of promoting global stability and conflict resolution around the world.

Dhruva Jaishankar: So who exactly signed up for it so far?

Rachel Rizzo: So I think this is the big question. as of now, you have 19 of 62 invited countries that have signed this charter. So you have notable participants, including the UAE. You have Hungary, you have Pakistan, you have Argentina, like an interesting grouping here. But you also have major European allies like France, Germany, the UK, Italy, that have all thus far declined to join or remain non-committal. And I think there's also some controversy surrounding the executive board of this board of peace. Critics, I think, describe it as sort of a pay to play club, I'm putting that in quotations here,

Dhruva Jaishankar: They expect to pay a billion dollars to become part of the board, is that right?

Rachel Rizzo: That's right. like, instead of having a Gaza-focused mechanism, countries that contribute more than a billion dollars receive permanent membership. As I mentioned before, the Charter doesn't mention Gaza, despite the board's origins in the Gaza peace agreement. Trump has also suggested it might replace the UN. This raises some concerns. And then, Finally, just like the executive governing board here, it includes folks like Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Jared Kushner, Steve Witkoff, Tony Blair, World Bank President, Ajay Banga. So I think the framework is there for it to be something, but we're not sure exactly what that something is going to be quite yet. There's still major questions at play here. And it's something that I think will be closely watched in the coming months.

Dhruva Jaishankar: I think just some questions of of membership, obviously, leadership, what exactly enforcement, what kind of enforcement it will have, what would Trump's role be in it? mean, is this really the question about how much this is very personalized? Will Trump still have a role in a post-president environment? So I think all those questions are still being raised.

Rachel Rizzo: Absolutely, and I think that you ask all the right questions. I don't think there's a clear sense of what Trump's role is in it going forward. I mean, clearly now he's the head of it, the chairman, whatever you want to call it. But this question about membership, who's in, who's out, what the governing board looks like, what mandate does it actually have? I mean, I think in order for a body like this, a plurilateral body like this, or a minilateral body like this to have meaning, The way that it's given meeting is by other organizations or other countries thinking that it is legitimate and having it be legitimized. And so I think let's watch that closely and see if more countries sign on to it, if more decide not to sign on to it. Lots at play here. And then I think for the US, kind of switching gears a little bit, a few weeks ago now, I guess this would have been in December. We talked about the national security strategy that was released. Big deal, lots of drama around it given the way that the Western Hemisphere was prioritized over all other regions in the world, what it meant for Europe, what it meant for India, what it meant for the Indo-Pacific. What the Defense Department has released, I think it was just last week at this point, they love to drop these documents on Friday, was the new National Defense Strategy. So can you talk a little bit about that, maybe how it differs from the NSS, how the NSS informed the NDS, maybe how international folks that are this should be reading it.

NDS v. NSS

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yeah so the National Defense Strategy, NDS, is something produced by the Pentagon, meant to be informed by the National Security Strategy, and define in some ways the role and worldview of the US military, the US Defense Department, now called the Department of War, over the rest of this presidency. And we finally have the NDS, and I think it's not entirely surprising the main outcomes. And their four main, we'll get into the diagnosis in a second, but in some ways the prescriptions are basically four pillars. One, it has a very expansive definition of homeland security covering the Western hemisphere, missile defense, again, things we've been talking about. Very much in line with the Trump administration. Second, and this is the part which is, think, the most contentious is policy of deterring China through strength. And again, some of the devil in the details here. The third is allied and partner burden sharing again, not not particularly surprising It's something the Trump administration has stressed for a long time whether it's NATO allies or allies in the Indo-Pacific of the Middle East and fourth, it's supercharging the defense industrial base again something not entirely surprising. There a lot of legacy problems in the US military and I think overcoming some of those so the most controversial parts as I see it and where there's been some pushback has related to China and it says: our goal is simple, to prevent anyone, including from being able to dominate us or our allies. That's quite vague n some ways, what exactly that means, can be interpreted.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah.

Dhruva Jaishankar: I think more controversially, it seeks a stable or, “a decent peace” with China. And this is very much the language of the current Undersecretary of War for Policy, Elbridge Colby. know, ElBridge is popular, know, and is somebody who's known to many of us. He's been around in Washington for long time. He is the main architect of the NDS. Incidentally, this was the role he played in the first Trump administration in 2017, he was a slightly more junior capacity where he was the lead drafter of that. But there's been a shift in the rhetoric since 2017. And in fact, he used some of the same language that he used in the speech that he gave in 2024 when the Trump administration was out of power, when the Republicans were out of power at the National Conservative Conference. And there he kind of used this term, decent piece and contrasted it with what he saw as hawkishness on the part of many in Washington who wanted to seek somehow a regime change or something in China, like a much more aggressive ideological conflict. I think there are a lot of open questions now. I think the biggest one is, a modus vivendi or a decent piece of balance of power, however you call it, between the United States and China something that can live with? Because any strategy it takes two. It's responding to. And I think skeptics will rightly also ask how much this is different from what Clinton and Bush and Obama pursued for 20 years with China. So I think there's also varying interpretation of what it means to dominate the United States or its allies, right? At what stage does the United States intervene if China is doing something with the Philippines or with Japan or with Korea? And then of course, there's a question of some mismatching the intentions with other actions, like for example, Trump applied 25 % tariffs on Korea.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah

Dhruva Jaishankar: Just as Colby was visiting Seoul to deliver his first speech, kind of explaining the and where he called South Korea a model ally, right? So again, there's sometimes a little bit of a mismatch there. So those are all the questions raised by the NDS.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, I I think, that the other thing I would add is you often hear the phrase burden- sharing.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Mm-hmm.

Rachel Rizzo: In the context of the US allies in Europe. This is very much a phrase that Trump likes to use when referring to the Europeans. But interestingly enough, that phrase burden sharing, burden shifting is now being applied to US partners and allies in the Indo-Pacific as well.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Right.

Rachel Rizzo: So I think of having that phrase or that strategy just applied to Europe and Russia, it now very much applies to the Indo-Pacific as well, we should be watching closely at how that burden shifting applies in the region.

Dhruva Jaishankar: And it means something quite different in Indo Pacific context because one you don't have pooled resource sharing like you have a NATO, the US alliance structure is different.

Rachel Rizzo: Exactly.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Second, you have like partners such as India, Vietnam, Singapore, Indonesia that are sort of not bound by any kind of treaty obligations with the United States. And then I think third is that it's, it means something very different in peacetime and wartime. Right. So you have an active conflict in Ukraine. There are concerns about an active conflict in the Indo Pacific but we haven't had sort of a major breakout at this point of time. So I think it really means very, it's very different based on the context.

Purging the PLA

Rachel Rizzo: Absolutely. Okay, so staying in the Indo-Pacific region, but moving beyond the national defense strategy, you have been watching some military purges in China over the last little week, or the last little I guess I should say. Can you tell us a little bit what's happening there and what you have had your eye on in China on this particular issue?

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yeah, so this was kind of the, there was a big bombshell that dropped amongst the China community the last few days. And this was a surprise that General Zhang Yuxia, who is like the vice chairman of the Central Military Commission or CMC.

Rachel Rizzo: So big, big name, big personality. Okay.

Dhruva Jaishnkar: He's the senior most military officer in China, and he's been detained and purged, right?

Rachel Rizzo: Oh.

Dhruva Jaishnkar: And so was Liu Zhenli, who is the chief of staff to join staff departments. So these are two of the most senior military officers in China have been purged.

Rachel Rizzo: Wow.

Dhruva Jaishankar: The CMC is, I should explain, is one of the most important bodies in China, not just militarily. It's headed by Xi Jinping, the leader of China. And the vice chair is the senior most military officer. And it's also worth pointing out that the People's Liberation Army of China is kind of unlike a of national militaries because it's a political body. It's like the armed wing of the Chinese Communist. So these purges are a big deal. And it's not like comparable to, for example, Trump's removal of the chairman of Joint Chiefs of Staff. The charges against Zhang have been included the usual stuff that often accompanies these kinds of purges. Corruption, there's a whiff of espionage. There's a report in the Wall Street Journal that many have cast aspersions on that Zhang transferred nuclear secrets to the United States. Really doubts about the accuracy of this report, but it's equally possible that there were political factors at play, including questions of loyalty, personal loyalty to Xi Jinping or questions of competence. And Zhang is a particularly interesting figure because he's amongst the last serving Chinese military officers to have fought, to have had combat experience. He fought in the war against Vietnam in 1979. He was involved in action in 1984 as well. And he's also from an old Communist Party family. His father, his father and Xi Jinping's father served together during the Chinese Civil War. They're like old, old comrades. So a big deal.

Rachel Rizzo: So is this the first time that Xi Jinping has actively purged members of his inner circle or the military or is this something we've seen before? Why is it different if so?

Dhruva Jaishankar: So Xi has overseen the biggest political and military purges in since Mao Zedong. And it started soon after he took the reins of power in 2013. Zhou Yongkang, who was one of the senior most official of Hu Jintao regime, of the previous regime, was purged, expelled from the party, imprisoned for life. Someone at the time, I remember, compared this to Barack Obama throwing Dick Cheney prison, right? I mean, that was the kind of signifiance of it. But such episodes have become more regular both in the political sphere and in the military. And we spoke on an earlier episode with Neil Thomas, and he mentioned there's several vacancies at the senior levels of the CCP, as was evident at the party plenum.

Rachel Rizzo: Mm-hmm.

Dhruva Jaishankar: But on the military side, just recently the defense minister purged, most visibly the former foreign minister Qin Gang, who suddenly disappeared from public view and related to pretty credible espionage charges. So imagine like the US Secretary of State suddenly like disappearing without an explanation right?

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Now are a ton of vacancies at the top of the PLA. So five out of the six military positions, senior, you know, the senior most of the CMC are now vacant and there's only one guy, standing, one guy standing and who really controls the PLA now is sort of anyone's guess.

Rachel Rizzo: So are there are these purges, are there broader implications for say Taiwan or, you know, China's ability to like build its own military or pursue active conflict? How would you read into that?

Dhruva Jaishankar: I think, again, I'm not the expert on this, but I've been reading a lot of commentary by some people who follow this very closely.

Rachel Rizzo: Mm-hmm.

Dhruva Jaishankar: it's pretty ambivalent, evidence that it can be read in two very different ways. On the one hand, the PLA purgers have removed commanders with the most experience in Taiwan-related contingencies. And the PLA rocket forces, which is in charge of missiles, long-range strike, They've witnessed a major shakeup. There's been a major corruption scandal associated with them as of the Eastern and Southern command. So one interpretation that Xi maybe has been dissatisfied with recent military exercises and planning for Taiwan, but an alternate explanation interpretation that Xi’s actually shaping a PLA much more in his own image, staffing of a younger commanders with less combat experience, as possible that the risk of miscalculation or just general risk aversion in the PLA decreases. And that increases the possibility of conflict for example, over Taiwan or another contingency.

Rachel Rizzo: Interesting.

Dhruva Jaishankar: So two, think, very conflicting and almost opposing ways of reading this.

Rachel Rizzo: So in terms of what are you gonna be watching next?

Dhruva Jaishankar: Let's see where this goes, who is appointed. Again what it means, you know, the tenor of the rhetoric coming out of China will be very interesting because some of this will be. So again, I think we can have people who follow this much more closely than I do on future episodes to discuss this.

Rachel Rizzo: Okay, sounds good. think we will definitely do that. As always, we'll be keeping an eye on all these developments and make sure we're keeping our listeners up to date on the latest happenings in geopolitics around the world. So be sure to tune in every Friday for the latest episodes.

Dhruva Jaishankar: As always, thank you for joining us on the Around the World podcast. We'll see you next week.

Rachel Rizzo: Thanks.

Season 2 Episode 3 : Transatlantic Rift, EU-India Summit, UK-Mauritius Chagos Deal

January 23, 2026 — In this week’s episode of Around the World, hosts Dhruva Jaishankar and Rachel Rizzo are joined by Garima Mohan, Senior Fellow at the German Marshall Fund, to discuss the growing momentum in EU-India relations ahead of an upcoming summit and potential trade agreement. Dhruva and Rachel also dig into the latest developments between Trump and Greenland, as well as the sudden resurrection of the U.K.–Mauritius Chagos Islands deal.

Available on Spotify and Apple Podcasts.

Image: FellowNeko, via Shutterstock.

Image: 111176. PM meeting the President of the European Commission, Ms. Ursula Von Der Leyen, in New Delhi on April 25, 2022. Courtesy of the Government of India Press Information Bureau, via pib.gov.in.

Image: Copernicus Sentinel-2 data 2021, ESA / CNES, via Wikimedia Commons.

SNEAK PEAK

Rachel Rizzo: On this week's episode.

Rachel Rizzo: I think you said two words there that perfectly encapsulate what is going on here. And those two words are and yet. The Europeans are increasing their defense spending and yet. They are coming to the table when Trump threatens tariffs and yet. They are sending troops and showing that they will better defend Greenland if that is what Trump is looking for and yet.

Garima Mohan: And next week is really momentous because we have EU Commission President von der Leyen as chief guest for India's Republic Day, followed by the EU-India summit on the 27th of January, where we are expecting no less than 113, 114 takeaways. The biggest of them are, of course, the long elusive free trade agreement, which I think we are very close to signing. An advanced security and defense partnership between the EU and India, of the sort the EU has with Japan, South Korea, Norway, so a really important list of partners.

Dhruva Jaishankar: This has been a sort of become a campaign issue for Nigel Farage. And reform UK, is sort of the right-wing opposition in the UK, which is gaining ground politically And they're seeking to turn this return of the Chagos Islands into an election issue in Britain. This is threatening to reopen a can of worms on a very tricky issue that many people had thought was resolved and has somehow survived changes in government in the UK, Mauritius and the United States.

Welcome to Around the World

Dhruva Jaishankar: Hi, I'm Dhruva Jaishankar.

Rachel Rizzo: And I'm Rachel Rizzo. Welcome to the Around the World podcast. Your essential guide to understanding the forces shaping our world today. Every week, we cut through the noise to bring you clear, insightful analysis of the most important developments in geopolitics.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Whether it's security challenges across Europe, power dynamics in Asia, domestic updates from the United States, or regional updates in Latin America or the Middle East, we make sure you're up to speed on what's happening and more importantly, why it matters.

Rachel Rizzo: Thanks for tuning in. And also be sure to like and subscribe to the Around the World podcast on both Youtube, Spotify and Apple Podcasts.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Hello, Rachel.

Rachel Rizzo: Hey Dhruva. How’s it going?

Dhruva Jaishankar: Good, good. Like every week, think every week this year, I've been thinking it's going to be a slow week and we can go into more depth on a particular issue,

Rachel Rizzo: No.

The Pursuit for Greenland Continues

Dhruva Jaishankar: But events seem to seem to take precedence over everything else. But this week, this past weekend, I can tell you on Saturday, felt like something, this January 17th, it felt like something fundamentally cracked in transatlantic relations. And Trump posted on Truth Social that on February 1st, eight European countries, which are all sending troops to Greenland, will be charged a 10% tariff that will become 25 % tariff on June 1st.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah.

Dhruva Jaishankar: And I, to be honest, even I was taken aback by the response by many of my European friends and colleagues who, some of whom are, have been like real votaries and committed transatlantic partners have said, you know, Europe needs to find a way to work with Trump. But even from any of these European backers of the US alliance, there's been a really strong response. We've seen that in the last couple of days in Davos and Trump has him backed out. And he's actually today, the day of our recording, he's actually speaking in Davos. So Rachel, what's going on with Greenland and tariffs and the transatlantic relationship?

Rachel Rizzo: You know, it's always such a hard question to answer what's going on with Greenland because it changes by the day. But first I would say a couple things. Look, I mean, we've talked about this before. The Greenland idea isn't new, but it's a renewed interest in this administration. And people always say that we should take Trump seriously, but not literally. And when it comes to Greenland, I say take him literally because he is hell bent on finding a way to acquire this island and people and he's says it through the lens of the US needing it for national security reasons. The US is the only country that could defend Greenland. But there are also other issues at play here. The idea of whether critical minerals are accessible on the island at some point. aren't now. Whether the melting of ice in the Arctic means that shipping lanes will become accessible for longer stretches throughout the year and what that means for US access, but also access for Russia and China. So there's a lot here. But what I would say is that as we are doing this recording, we're doing this on Wednesday, we'll release it on Friday, he's giving his Davos speech now.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Mm-hmm.

Rachel Rizzo: It might have just ended. And we were wondering if he was going to talk about Greenland and he did. And he basically said, he had kind of hearkened it back to World War II and the United States defending Greenland, winning World II and kindly returning the island to the Danes. He also said, which I think everyone was hoping to hear, that he would not use force to acquire the island. Now, of course, he said we could and we would win. No one could defend it, but he won't do that. So in terms of what happens now, he wants direct and immediate negotiations with the Europeans. However, the Europeans are also holding a pretty firm line here. So what happens next I think is still really anyone's guess, but I think we're in for a pretty difficult time in the transonic relationship.

Dhruva Jaishankar: But a quick thing, what precipitated this, right? We had eight European countries, it's four Nordic countries minus Iceland, Germany, France, UK, and Netherlands, sending what was pretty small groups of small military units, I think the UK even sent just one officer to Greenland, right? That is what precipitated Trump's ire, right? Yeah.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah. It was. And they sent those troops, as the secretary general of NATO said, sort of under the guise of looking at the region, doing sort of a situational recon, because Trump has talked so much about Russia and China in that region and the threats both of those countries pose to Greenland, sort of sending NATO troops there to look and see what actually is happening. But also, I think, what could end up happening there is short of acquiring Greenland, which Trump has really backed himself into a corner here saying that anything less than that is unacceptable. I think we could see some broader mill to mill cooperation through the lens of NATO in response to Trump saying that this is a national security threat. But I think there's also a question on how the EU decides to respond to Trump's threat of tariffs, as you mentioned, 10 % on these eight countries February 1st, potentially 25 % in June. Whether or not the EU will invoke this trade bazooka that could send this into a real escalatory spiral, I think those are the things that we're gonna be watching over the coming, maybe even days here, depending on when negotiations get started.

Dhruva Jaishankar: But I feel like there's almost like a real sense of betrayal on the part of many Europeans. There was a feeling that there, I think, a couple of things. One, they were doing something that Trump was criticizing them for not doing, which is reinforcing the security of Greenland. And instead of a positive response, they get slapped with tariffs that, at least in some of those countries, with the UK particularly, they felt that some of this had been settled already. And this, again, one of the few relationships that had been reasonably stable, you know, think there's a feeling that the Labour government in the UK had done everything to accommodate Trump. And yet there was, you know, there's been this response, right? So just explain a little bit, like, what is the response in Europe? Because we've heard some pretty extraordinary statements coming out of Mark Carney, the Canadian Prime Minister, the Belgian Prime Minister yesterday in Davos, you know, described like, you know, we're not slaves. But there really has been a very visceral response on the part of many Europeans to this development.

Rachel Rizzo: Mm-hmm. I think you said two words there that perfectly encapsulate what is going on here. And those two words are and yet. The Europeans are increasing their defense spending and yet. They are coming to the table when Trump threatens tariffs and yet. They are sending troops and showing that they will better defend Greenland if that is what Trump is looking for and yet. So I think it really shows that you know, this idea of multilateralism, this idea of allies and NATO especially as like a sense of mutual defense doesn't necessarily play with this administration. It's very much as the Canadian Prime Minister, Mark Carney said, an era of might makes right, an era of renewed great power rivalry. And while I do think that the president, the US president certainly sees Greenland as important, I do think there's an aspect of this that's just like he wants a big island

Dhruva Jaishankar: Mm-hmm.

Rachel Rizzo: And he wants to be able to say that this thing that the United States has tried to do for so long, know, Harry Truman secretly offered Denmark $100 million for it and they said no and that only became public years later. So I think for him being able to say that he's the one that got this done is a big aspect of this entire conversation. And I think we also have to keep that in mind that it goes deeper than just security, minerals, shipping. It gets to the heart of who Donald Trump is as a person and as a president.

A Long Time Coming for EU-India Relations.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Well, that's a great segue to the transatlantic rift that we're seeing in Davos and elsewhere is contributing to something that's really been in the works for some time, which is a closer EU-India partnership as Europe seeks to diversify its security and trade partners. And to discuss that, have Garima Mohan, who is senior fellow at the German Marshall Fund, to talk us through this, based in Brussels from India. Garima has been a friend of ours for many years and really is one of the best experts on India-Europe relations. Garima, thank you for joining us.

Garima Mohan: It's great to be here. Thank you for having me.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yeah. So, Garima, you you heard we were talking about this sort of real shake up that we've seen in even the last few days in the transatlantic relationship. But a lot's been there's been a lot of traffic from Europe to India. We are going into Republic Day, January 26, which is, you know, India will have a parade. There's usually a head of state or government as a guest. We'll have European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen as the guest, the chief guest for that and reports now of a trade deal. So talk us through maybe what is to be expected over the next week or so in EU India engagement.

Garima Mohan: Yes, it has indeed been a very eventful month for EU-India ties. It started with the visit of German Chancellor Merz, his first official visit to a non-NATO ally, first visit in Asia to India, followed by we've also seen dignitaries from Spain and Poland. And next week is really momentous because we have EU Commission President von der Leyen as chief guest for India's Republic Day, followed by the EU-India summit on the 27th of January, where we are expecting no less than 113, 114 takeaways. We've been told in a pre-briefing. The biggest of them are, of course, the long elusive free trade agreement, which I think we are very close to signing. Piyush Goyal, Minister Goyal, has called it the mother of all trade deals. So really setting up very high expectations, hope they're able to sign it. An advanced security and defense partnership between the EU and India, of the sort the EU has with Japan, South Korea, Norway, so a really important list of partners. And then a bunch of other agreements around mobility of highly skilled professionals, startups, industry bodies, a defense industry forum. We'll also see an industry forum for the first time on the sidelines of the summit. So really a lot of momentum around issues of security, economic security and trade diversification, all three areas where as you noted earlier, Europe is feeling a lot of stress because of tensions with the US as is India.

Dhruva Jaishankar: So two quick questions from me, I'm sure Rachel has some as well. One, what step will this be in a trade agreement? Because we've just seen even the last day, the Mercosur agreement, which was at this stage about a year and a half ago, EU Mercosur, this is a group of South American countries, that is hitting some judicial roadblocks in Europe. There've been protests against it. So even if a trade agreement is signed between India and the EU, there's still some steps ahead. And what does that look like? How real is that?

Garima Mohan: Yes, so this is the beginning of the trade agreement journey for EU and India, but I would consider this as one of the most important steps. Politically agreeing that both sides have agreed to close all the chapters that were under consideration and now they will work on the text of the agreement which will be released later is what we've been told, but they will be signing a political agreement and as is the case, in the case of UK and India, the agreement text came out after a few weeks. Their last few final negotiations still to be done. What you're referring to with Mercosur, Mercosur is a different sort of deal because it has provisions on agriculture. One chapter that is excluded from the EU India FTA. Now agriculture, as we know, is a very sensitive issue and we've been seeing lots of protests from farmers, but also countries like France around that. With India, on the other hand, there seems to be an agreement across capitals that this is an agreement we need to sign. We want to tie India politically and geoeconomically closer to Europe. So there seems to be a very sort of positive assessment, positive momentum around this. And we do not expect a lot of opposition even from the EU Parliament, because even the EU Parliament, which till a few years ago was known as you know, a body that was very critical of India, I generally issuing, generally, yeah, political statements on domestic things and what's happening in India. I've seen the biggest tonal shift in the EU Parliament on India, where they've started talking about India as a very important partner, strategic partner for Europe. This is the time that we have to get India right. We cannot afford to miss the India bus, are quotes that I've heard from the European Parliament. So of course there can be roadblocks on both sides, but I do think the biggest one was agreeing to something and having something to sign and announce on the 27th of January.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Mm-hmm.

Rachel Rizzo: So for our listeners that don't nerd out on think tank papers the way that we might, Garima, you released a sort long reform piece today with the German Marshall Fund and the headline is A Long Time Coming. So everyone who's listening to this should go read it. But also I wanted to ask you that, like, has this relationship been such a long time coming? And is it driven, I think, by both sides recognition that while the US remains a key partner, it's also unpredictable. And so there's a new impetus behind the Europe-India relationship that perhaps wasn't there before, but is there now?

Garima Mohan: Exactly. That's exactly how I see it. And I would say in the timeline of where I would place things shifting between Europe and India. The first is around 2014, 2015, where we saw increasing outreach from India to Europe and Europe's sub regions. We have a paper on that as well at GMF. We've marked it. We've done some sort statistical mapping and we saw the number of high-level visits from India, envoys, diplomatic engagements with various parts of Europe, not just the big capitals increasing. And then the second important shift in the timeline was 2020, when Europe started feeling the squeeze from China. And that is the bigger element in explaining how and why Europe changed its mind on India in a way. It's really when Europe started feeling the squeeze from China, the conversation around the China shock started picking up and the impact it'll have on jobs and manufacturing and competitiveness of European industry, that there was this sort of awakening and a realization that people in Europe, countries in Europe need to diversify and economically diversify more than anything else. And Europe started speaking the same language that India has been speaking for a long time, diversification, which is central element to Indian foreign policy.

Dhruva Jaishankar: And strategic autonomy, we're hearing a lot of that in Davos as well from Europeans. It's just interesting them adopting a lot of Indian terminology for describing Google. I want to ask you about two acronyms that those of us who follow Europe-India relations throw around a lot. A lot of people don't fully understand. One is CBAM and what it is and how that can factor into potentially be a challenge to Europe and India. And the second is IMEC.

Garima Mohan: Hmm.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah.

Dhruva Jaishankar: The India-Middle East-Europe corridor, which is something we heard lot about. Then developments in the Middle East, it seems to have taken a step back. But what is the interest in Europe, particularly in IMAC? So maybe if you could elaborate on those two issues.

Garima Mohan: Sure. Just to explain the difficult part, the challenge, let's go with the challenge first and then the opportunity in IMEC CBAM. Carbon border adjustment mechanism is a domestic sort of legislation ruling in Europe that will have an impact on industries and imports coming into Europe that have to apply to certain standards when it comes to environmental stuff and green standards where Europe is significantly advanced. CBAM is having a direct impact on the FTA negotiations and one thing that we still know is being negotiated is steel and the impact it will have on Indian steel industry and Europe is very keen on green steel and has different standards there. So I think that is something that needs to be worked out. But from what I've heard, many in Europe, particularly legislators and policymakers understand that European internal laws can actually have a detrimental effect on their external partnerships and relationships. And they do not want this to derail, particularly in the case of India. So hopefully they'll find the solution there. And second on IMEC, the India Middle East Economic Corridor. Back a few years ago, connectivity was the key word that we heard everywhere, at least in think tank conferences, and everybody was talking about, you know laying down roads and physical infrastructure and digital infrastructure connecting these regions. And IMEC is still seen to be what could be a flagship project for Europe and India. And particularly here in Brussels in the EU commission. There is a sense that IMEC is the great deliverable where you connect huge economies across India, Middle East, and Europe, and you create these new trade routes, but also digital routes that will unlock potential possibilities and increase trade traffic, but other sort of ways of growth connecting these three regions closer. It does seem a little bit like a pipe dream till the tensions in the Middle East are resolved. And also a lot of the funding and support around the IMAC idea originally came from the US. So we also need to see what that will look like. And of course there is opposition from countries like Turkey, which are also important partners for Europe. So I think we'll have to see, but for me, security defense partnership and some of the other things that are included in the EU India Summit are more tangible and sort of easily achievable deliverables that I'll be looking at.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Mm-hmm. And sure, yeah, sure. Yeah. Rachel, unless you have a final question for me, but want to give it to you, anything else from you?

Rachel Rizzo: No, mean, I think that, I mean, you really covered this pretty obviously fully. So I think you would say that if we walk away from the visit next week with at least an assigned trade deal, expanded security and defense partnership, that would be considered a successful visit.

Garima Mohan: Yes, and I think the third thing that is important and new in this is the involvement of private sector industry stakeholders.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Mm-hmm.

Garima Mohan: That was not done before and that really broadens the base of the partnership and more people are involved and there are more nodes that will keep the momentum going even when the leaders depart and they get busy in their own geographies. This is important and particularly migration from India, highly skilled folks and mobility on that. I think that's a real opportunity, given the pressures on the H1B visa, this is an opportunity for Europe and India to invest in. And building robust people-to-people ties keeps the relationship strong and going.

Dhruva Jaishankar: One final question for me. I mean, Garima, you really laid out nicely the EU, like Brussels and Delhi, like the connect that's taking place and all that. But we've also seen a pretty high frequency of bilateral visits to India from Europe just in the last few weeks. Last week, Rachel and I discussed German Chancellor Friedrich Merz's visit to India. I think Macron is also there this week or next week.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah.

Garima Mohan: The AI Summit, yeah he’ll come in February.

Dhruva Jaishankar: We have Radosław Sikorski, the Polish foreign minister was there a few days ago, the Spanish foreign ministers in Delhi this week. why all of this, you know, while it's understandable that there's a lot of lead up to the EU India Summit, what explains all these bilateral visits that are taking place as well as flurry of bilateral visits in the run?

Garima Mohan: Yeah, I think there are two reasons for this. One is the immediate pressure a lot of these countries are facing from the US. There is a real sense in the capitals that in a world where alliances cannot be trusted, that they need to look for trusted partners and India is a boat they cannot afford to miss. So we have that sense in the German Chancellor Metz, for instance. The coalition agreement of his government mentioned the need to raise ambition of ties with India. France, of course, France and India is very important deep strategic partnership that has long roots, but also in countries like Spain, where the China element doesn't play that well. Pedro Sanchez has good ties with China. It's one of the few countries that does talk about investments from China and continuing an economic partnership. Even there, the consensus is that the India relationship is as important and needs to be cultivated and invested in, which I think is very interesting development across the board in Europe.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Well, thank you, Garima. Thank you for joining us and perhaps have you on later to discuss developments in a few months time.

Garima Mohan: I hope we can continue on the good way wave and that none of this is proven wrong next week. Thank you. Thank you for having me.

Return of the Chagos Islands

Rachel Rizzo: Okay, so with that, we've talked a lot about Davos this week. We've obviously talked about the EU visit to India. But that doesn't mean the rest of the world stops. There's other stuff going on. Dhruva, you've been paying close attention. It seems like there's something going on with the Chagos Islands. Care to enlighten us on what's going on there, please?

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yeah, so again, a going on, know, Gaza peace plan to Trump's new border piece. I think we can discuss this in future episodes. But one thing that kind of caught us stray in the Greenland business has been Trump in the context of Greenland sort of resurrected an issue that many thought had been settled last year, which was a deal between the United Kingdom and Mauritius for the return of the Chagos Islands, which are this archipelago in the middle of the Indian Ocean.

Rachel Rizzo: So give us some background on this because this is, it's not new to me, but it's definitely not something that I watch like daily or monthly or even yearly. So tell us what's going on.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yeah yeah, no, it is important for India, and I'll get to why in a second. But in 1965, Mauritius, which was a British colony, gained independence from the UK. And the Chagos Islands, which were governed as initially part of the Seychelles, then later Mauritius by Britain, was kind of hived off. It was detached administratively and retained by Britain as the British Indian Ocean Territory, BIOT was the official name for it. And a base on that island was leased in the 1960s to the United States in Diego Garcia. So you'll sometimes see references to Diego Garcia.

Rachel Rizzo: Did hear about that. Yep.

Dhruva Jaishankar: So in the 60s and 70s, as part of this arrangement, there were about 2,000 Chagosian islanders native to this archipelago who were forcibly removed by the British. And Mauritius, over time, basically tried to build a legal and political case for the return of the Chagos island. And in doing so, particularly over the 2000s, received more and more support initially from the International Court of Justice and then overwhelming support at the United Nations for the sovereignty of these islands to Mauritius from the UK.

Rachel Rizzo: Okay, and so it seems like there some deal between the UK and Mauritius now.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yeah, so in 2022, this was a conservative government, it was in power in the UK, the Tories, and they started negotiations towards the return of the Chagos Islands to Mauritius. It was concluded under a Labour government, they've been changing government in the UK in 2025. The sovereignty of the islands, basically by this deal, would be transferred to Mauritius. Britain would take on the islands on a 99-year lease. So we'd not have sovereign control, but we'd be leasing it. And the US military presence would be allowed to remain there. So this was the deal that was ironed out. And it was initially criticized by pretty much everybody in the opposition in the countries involved. So the deal was criticized by the political opposition in Mauritius for selling out. And then that party, which criticized, it came into power in 2024. it was the government of Navin Ramgulam, who was the opposition leader. But then he went ahead and finalized the agreement. And so there was a sovereignty transfer agreement settled in 2025. This was also tacitly welcomed by India, which is the security sponsor for Mauritius and which the Mauritian National Security Adviser is India and India helps to patrol the waters around Mauritius. It provides a lot of military assistance to that country. And so for India, it squares this dilemma of supporting Mauritius and decolonizing the decolonial agenda, while preserving a US military presence as a check against China and the Indian Ocean. And moreover, there are also plans, also early signs, that India is planning on using some, taking advantage of military facilities at Diego Garcia. Last October, US and Indian P8I, Maritime Aircraft, Maritime Reconnaissance Aircraft, jointly did a training there. And meanwhile, the Trump administration also came in in this period and conducted an interagency review last year in April. Trump gave it a sign off. And Marco Rubio publicly affirmed the United States support for this agreement in May of last year.

Rachel Rizzo: So that May of last year, we are talking about Greenland now, and this issue has now been resurrected. Is there a tie between those things? Like, what's happening with this?

Dhruva Jaishankar: Exactly. In Trump's mind, seems to be he, you know, so the treaty hasn't yet been ratified. Trump is now criticizing the UK for this agreement, which again, he signed off on last year. And he kind of links it to broad European weakness, including on Greenland. So he brought this up again on a Truth Social Post in the context of Greenland criticizing the UK. But I think there's a bit more than meets the eye here because in part, he's responding. This has been a sort of become a campaign issue for Nigel Farage.

Rachel Rizzo: Mm-hmm.

Dhruva Jaishankar: And Reform UK, is sort of the right-wing opposition in the UK, which is gaining ground politically and which is aligned quite closely to some of the Trump MAGA movement in the United States. And they're seeking to turn this return of the Chagos Islands into an election issue in Britain. But all of this is to say, this is threatening to reopen a can of worms on a very tricky issue that many people had thought was resolved and has somehow survived changes in government in the UK, Mauritius and the United States. So something to watch there, but it's playing out in some very weird ways for Indian Ocean security, for US alliances and posture, and for British and European right-wing politics as well.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, absolutely. Super interesting. thanks for giving us a rundown at something that we'll obviously be watching and update everyone. And again, we'll keep an eye on this, but also the EU visit to India, obviously the Greenland discussions and keep everyone up to date on the latest happenings. Be sure as always to tune in every Friday for the latest episodes and like and subscribe to the Around the World podcast on Apple podcasts, YouTube and Spotify.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Thanks for joining us.

Rachel Rizzo: Thanks.

Season 2 Episode 2 : Iran Protests, Germany-India Ties, U.S. Fed Tensions

January 16, 2026 — In this week’s episode of Around the World, Dhruva Jaishankar and Rachel Rizzo dive into the resurgence of protests in Iran and what it means for the country’s economic and political future. They also unpack German Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s visit to India and the growing tensions between the Trump administration and the U.S. Federal Reserve.

Available on Spotify and Apple Podcasts.

Image: Tasnim News Agency, CC BY 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Image: 200886. PM and German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, participates in the International Kite Festival at the Sabarmati Riverfront at Ahmedabad, in Gujarat on January 12, 2026. Courtesy of the Government of India Press Information Bureau, via pib.gov.in.

Image: DSC_0454. Chair Powell answers reporters’ questions at the FOMC press conference on December 10, 2025. Courtesy of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, via Flickr.

Sneak Peak

Rachel Rizzo: On this week's episode...

Dhruva Jaishankar: So late last month in late December 2025, widespread protests erupted in Iran against the government of the Islamic Republic and have really spread and intensified since then. There are estimates in the last few days of at the very least several hundred up to maybe 2000 people having been killed in these protests, which is quite an astonishing number. US President Donald Trump has threatened 25 % tariffs against any country that does trade with Iran. And some of the protests have been specifically against Ali Khamenei, the 86-year-old Iranian supreme leader and the successor of Ayatollah Rouhallah Khomeini, who was the one who sparked the ⁓ Iranian revolution in 1979.

Rachel Rizzo: German Chancellor Friedrich Merz made his first official visit to India this week, January 14th. He was accompanied by 23 German CEOs. And for those who watch Germany closely, you'll know that this is a huge deal. The business community has always been this thermometer for policy discussions in many ways. It's a huge reason, that Germany hasn't distanced itself from China faster

Dhruva Jaishankar: The United States has been pretty careful about coordinating monetary policy with central banks, particularly of the G7 countries and the G20 economies. This year, we're likely to see a sort of divergence amongst the, particularly the developed economy. And this could play havoc with currency exchange rates around the world.

Welcome to Around the World

Dhruva Jaishankar: Hello, I'm Dhruva Jaishankar.

Rachel Rizzo: And I'm Rachel Rizzo. Welcome to the Around the World podcast. Your essential guide to understanding the forces shaping our world today. Every week, we cut through the noise to bring you clear, insightful analysis of the most important developments in geopolitics.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Whether it's security challenges across Europe, power dynamics in Asia, domestic updates from the United States, or regional updates in Latin America or the Middle East, we make sure you're up to speed on what's happening and more importantly, why it matters.

Rachel Rizzo: Thanks for tuning in. And also be sure to like and subscribe to the Around the World podcast on both Youtube, Spotify and Apple Podcasts.

Rachel Rizzo: Dhruva, how's it going?

Dhruva Jaishankar: Hi Rachel, how are you?

Rachel Rizzo: Pretty good, pretty good. Just got back from Bihar, was at the ORF Think Tank Forum at Nalanda University. So a fun few days of cultural and ideas exchanges.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yeah, and a place that lot of visitors to India don't actually go to. it's ⁓ great that you managed to get there.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, it was a new state for me, new visit for me. So a lot to get through today, excited to be here.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Mm-hmm.

Rachel Rizzo: I think today we're gonna be talking about protests sweeping Iran. We had a major visit here in New Delhi from Chancellor Friedrich Merz of Germany. And there's also been a lot in the news about the ongoing I guess you could call it a conflict between the chairman of the Fed Jerome Powell and the president of the United States Donald Trump. So a lot to get through. I want to start with you and get right into it with the Iran protests. I mean, this has been one of the biggest things in the news. Can you tell us a little bit about what's going on and what you're watching here?

Protests Resurge in Iran

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yeah, so last week we hinted at this, I think a little bit because there were some reports of protests in the first week of January.

Rachel Rizzo: Yep.

Dhruva Jaishankar: They have picked up and intensified. So late last month in late December 2025, widespread protests erupted in Iran against the government of the Islamic Republic and have really spread and intensified since then. Now, information coming out of Iran is quite spotty in part due to widespread internet blackouts. But there are estimates in the last few days of at the very least several hundred up to maybe 2000 people having been killed in these protests, which is quite an astonishing number. US President Donald Trump has sought to take advantage of the protests. He's encouraged them quite publicly, threatened 25 % tariffs against any country that does trade with Iran and amongst the countries, China is the number one trading partner of Iran, Turkey, Iran, Germany are amongst others who do trade. Barring China is really…the trade with Iran's trade with the rest of world isn't actually that much because of years of sanctions. So far, there hasn't been that much clarity about enforcement of those tariffs, or even an executive order to that effect. But again, that's some of the ripple effects that we're seeing from these protests.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, absolutely. And there was, I think, a video of him today from the White House saying to the protesters, help is on the way. So that's something to watch closely. As you hinted at, mean, these protests have been going on for a while over last couple of months. But in general, these are not the first protests of this kind that Iran has seen, correct?

Dhruva Jaishankar: Right. in the 1980s, you know, in 1979, we had the Islamic, the Iranian revolution. In the 1980s, there was Iran-Iraq war, but large scale incarceration against any political dissidents in that period. But this is in some ways the third major protest in the last 15, 20 years against Islamic Republic. In 2009, after elections were disputed, this was the election of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who was considered a hardliner. You had what was called the Green Movement. And those disputed election results kind of sparked sort of younger Iranians to take to the streets and express dissatisfaction with the way the elections have been conducted. Those protests eventually died down. Then three years ago, a little over three years ago, there was the death of a woman named Mahsa Amini, who is a 23-year-old woman.

Rachel Rizzo: Yep.

Dhruva Jaishankar: She died in the hands of law enforcement. There are disputes about what exactly happened. But reportedly she was taken in for not properly wearing a hijab. And that led to widespread protests and anger, particularly at the Iranian morality police. The latest wave of protests appeared to have been in some ways a continuation of that, but also triggered by economic factors. And some of the protests have been specifically against Ali Khamenei, the 86-year-old Iranian supreme leader and the successor of Ayatollah Rouhallah Khomeini, who was the one who sparked the Iranian revolution in 1979.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, and with Mahsa Amini, I mean, that set off the woman life freedom movement, which was a major movement for not just women's rights, but rights in general in Iran.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Mm-hmm.

Rachel Rizzo: And so it seems like sort of that coming back in a much maybe even stronger way. ⁓ But there's always kind of this discussion or this like question mark about the restoration of the Shah. Can you talk a little bit about that? I don't follow Iran super closely, so I would love kind of your insights here.

Dhruva Jaishankar: I mean, neither do I. I mean, what's been interesting about this wave of protests is it seems to have been enough that people are actually talking about what comes next. And many of the dissident groups, particularly those outside Iran, are already seemingly, I mean, maybe it's a premature, but sort of jostling for position.

Rachel Rizzo: Mm-hmm.

Dhruva Jaishankar: And one of the things that has come up is sort of the possibility of the restoration of an Iranian monarchy. The heir to the Shah of Iran who was deposed in 1979 and died in 1980 is his eldest son Reza Pahlavi, who has been living in Potomac, Maryland outside Washington, DC for the past several decades.

Rachel Rizzo: Oh wow. Okay.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Now, it's unclear how much support he actually enjoys amongst the Iranian diaspora, let alone the people of Iran. Some surveys suggest actually not that much. the dynasty, the Pahlavi dynasty, was actually established only in the early 20th century. The founder having deposed the previous gudger dynasty that sort of was responsible for reunifying Iran in the late 18th century. So there's already been some questions, some criticism of his legitimacy, his standing, including by supporters of the MEK, which is a sort of leftist Iranian dissident group that is quite active outside of Iran. So, I mean, I would just say watch this space. It's unclear what the end game will be. They might be, these might definitely be the most violent protests in the Islamic Republic's history. The comeback time for the government is really on the back foot following the conflict with Israel. The economy is weak. There questions about succession to the aging Ayatollah Khamenei and those are swirling. So let's watch this space.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, absolutely. And a big question mark over what Donald Trump will do. So maybe something that will be in the news next week.

Merz Meets Modi

Dhruva Jaishankar: Mm hmm. Turning to you, we you you've been a long time follower of European politics, including Germany. You were just in Berlin a few weeks ago. ⁓ And now you're in India. And we had German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, not often seen as the most charismatic leader coming to on a trip to India, which seems to be quite significant. And I should add, comes on the heel of or in the in anticipation of a bunch of major European visits to India. We'll have Macron coming.

Rachel Rizzo: Yep

Dhruva Jaishankar: Many other European leaders making their way to India. Talk us through what that visit accomplished.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, absolutely. We do have Ursula von der Leyen, president of the European Commission, coming to India as the guest of honor for the Republic Day celebrations on the 26th, so something that we're going to be watching closely. Yeah, I mean, so like you said, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz made his first official visit to India this week, January 14th. So this was a meaningful trip for a few reasons. First, it's taking place with the backdrop of these ongoing threats to Greenland and the desire for Europe and European member states themselves to deepen their relationships with other partners in the midst of this uncertainty emanating from the United States. So he basically, what he's done is positioned New Delhi as a central partner in things like trade, technology, security. These were all notable. But I think perhaps even more notable is who came with him to this trip. He was accompanied by 23 German CEOs. And for those who watch Germany closely, you'll know that this is a huge deal. The business community has always been this thermometer for policy discussions in many ways, maybe even more so than in the United States. So it's a huge reason, for example, that Germany hasn't distanced itself from China faster because of what it means for the business community, what it means for exports and imports. And in turn for people's future political positioning. So Merits, among other things, backed a conclusion of the India-EU free trade agreement. We'll see if that's signed in the next few weeks. He announced a CEO forum, expanded defense industrial cooperation. So overall, a hugely meaningful and successful visit.

Dhruva Jaishankar: You hinted at this a little bit, again, I think in this climate, the security cooperation aspect of Germany-India relations and Europe-India relations stands out a little bit. What exactly happened on the security side?

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, the free trade agreement between the EU and India gets a lot of the attention, obviously, as it should. But there's also discussions about a potential security and defense agreement between the EU and India. So that's something to watch closely. But under that backdrop or with that backdrop, Mertz and Modi talked about expanded military to military engagement through things like joint exercises, senior level exchanges, and perhaps most importantly, they endorsed a new roadmap for defense industrial cooperation focused on things like long-term technology partnerships, co-development of equipment in India, which is a huge thing for Modi with his made in India efforts. The biggest one I would say is this submarine deal that maybe you've heard about, maybe you haven't. For our listeners, New Delhi has been negotiating with Berlin to procure six diesel electric submarines from German Thyssenkrupp Marine Systems. These are going to be manufactured in Mumbai by an Indian company. So India has confirmed that these negotiations are ongoing, they're moving positively, but the deal hasn't quite been sealed yet. during this trip, you had senior government officials basically say that the discussions covering things like technical issues, finance, commercial aspects, they're all ongoing. moving in a positive direction, something to watch.

Dhruva Jaishankar: And finally, what were the CEOs interested in when they came to India?

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, absolutely. mean, as I mentioned before, I don't need to go into it again. Like, I just want to drive home the point of how important it was to have these German CEOs here. First, it's important to note that India or Germany is India's largest trading partner within the European Union. More than 2000 German companies have pretty long standing presence in India. So this is already a major market for German companies. So they talked about future oriented sectors like innovation, aerospace, and defense as pretty key areas where cooperation can deepen even further. They want to combine things like German engineering precision with India's scale and talent. And they highlighted specifically that German machinery manufacturers and Indian equipment producers can expand the global equipment market. So overall, especially with the creation of a CEO forum, this is one of the things that came out of the visit. I think we really see a landscape where this relationship could flourish and strengthen even more in the coming year. Years, I guess.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yeah, and I think it comes at a pretty pivotal time, I mean the German economy hasn't been doing great the last couple of years.

Rachel Rizzo: No, it hasn't.

Dhruva Jaishankar: There's been an over-dependence on Chinese, the export market, which is, you know, they understand this vulnerability increasingly, with the possible exception of the auto manufacturers. I know Merz has been to Bangalore, which is sort of a place where a lot of German companies are headquartered as well in India. again, interesting to see, you know, the space because there does seem to be that complementarity between the two economies at this particular point in time.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, and Merz is in a tough spot because, as you mentioned, the economy is not doing well. And they have sort of a perfect storm brewing in terms of debt, in terms of having to increase spending on things like infrastructure, defense spending. So they're kind of facing a difficult future at the moment. So important to build new relationships. Yeah.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Mm-hmm. Actually, and speaking of difficult political futures, I don't know if you followed, but the AfD, the right-wing German party, their head, Alice Weidel, kind of criticized Mertz's visit to India as sightseeing. Did you see that?

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, of course. This is her favorite thing to do.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yeah, and yeah, so, but what some people point out is she hasn't criticized similar visits to China, which has just been interesting. something to watch in German politics as well.

Trump v. Powell

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, absolutely. And then finally, shifting it to the United States, can you tell us what's up between the chairman of the Fed, Jerome Powell, and President Trump?

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yeah, we're in some pretty extraordinary territory regarding the US Federal Reserve. And this may seem like a domestic issue in the United States, but this has pretty significant potential international implications. the US Federal Reserve is the United States equivalent of a central bank. Every major economy has a central bank, which guides monetary policy. And in the past week, the US Department of Justice, an arm of the executive branch, launched an investigation, a criminal investigation into the Fed and the chairman of the board of governors Jerome Powell for allegedly lying to Congress about the renovation, the $2.5 billion renovation of a Fed building. Now this has been criticized as implying this is politically motivated, including by Republican senators and stock markets also fell following the news.

Rachel Rizzo: Mm-hmm.

Dhruva Jaishankar: But Powell responded by issuing a pretty unprecedented two minute video statement calling the Department of Justice's threat of criminal indictment as a pretext to undermine the feds independence. Now the chair of the feds board of governors, Powell is appointed by the president to a four year term and is confirmed by the Senate. And Powell's term expires in May of this year. And he says that the president basically cannot remove him before then. So that's kind of where the standoff is at the moment.

Rachel Rizzo: Mm-hmm. So, what are you gonna be watching between now and May?

Dhruva Jaishankar: So I think the reason this is important is the Fed has a dual mandate to use monetary policy to keep inflation low and unemployment low.

Rachel Rizzo: Mm-hmm.

Dhruva Jaishankar: That's been always the tricky balance. And to do this, its independence from short-term political expediency has often been deemed necessary. It shouldn't be vulnerable to the whims of the short-term whims of elections and so forth. That's part of the underlying principle of central bank independence. But Trump has been quite publicly dissatisfied with Powell, whom I should, you know, it's interesting Trump appointed him to this role in his first term.

Rachel Rizzo: Yes, he did.

Dhruva Jaishankar: He was, he was then he was then renewed under Biden. And Trump essentially wants the Fed to lower interest rates, believing that this would be popular, would be popular with businesses, it would give a boost to the short term boost to the economy and he and his advisors seem to believe that employment figures in the United States are good enough that they can withstand a slight increase in unemployment that would come from this. Many members of the Fed, including Powell, seem to disagree with this assessment. They believe that US inflation is higher than they would like still. It hasn't come down as much as they had hoped for. That net hiring has stalled. Unemployment is looking not great. And so this is I think the crux of their disagreement with the Trump administration last year. There was an attempt to remove one of the Fed board members Lisa cook who was a Democratic appointed member over allegations of mortgage fraud. So it's a personal issue, but the Supreme Court blocked that attempt and so meanwhile Trump has been trying to populate the Fed board with some of his key advisors Stephen Myron who is until recently chairman of his Council of Economic Advisors was confirmed as a member of the Fed. And then there is some already speculation about who the next chairman of board might be. It may be Kevin Warsh, who is a former Fed governor, who's been speculated as a candidate to succeed. Another one of Trump's advisors is also sort of in the running. So I think that speculation has already come, but it's just sort of interesting that there has been this such a public spat between these two institutions at this time.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, it's super public and the Fed is supposed to be independent, as you mentioned. So the fact that this is playing out so publicly is sort of unprecedented territory in the US. But you mentioned in your opening remarks on this specific topic that this might seem like a domestic issue, but it's actually not just a domestic issue. This reverberates through the global economy in many ways. Can you tell us why and maybe why that matters, why people should be watching this?

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yeah, so the interest rates set by the Fed have implications for banks, including private banks in the United States, but also international implications. And especially since the global financial crisis of 2008, 2009, the United States has been pretty careful about coordinating monetary policy with central banks, particularly of the G7 countries and the G20 economies. This year, we're likely to see a sort of divergence amongst the, particularly the developed economy is with Canada, Japan, much of Europe actually increasing their interest rates, even as the United States and a few other UK and a few others actually lower their interest rates. And this could play havoc with currency exchange rates around the world.

Rachel Rizzo: Mm-hmm.

Dhruva Jaishankar: So potentially wide international implications, including for the US economy for global exchange rates, and just international monetary policy coordination writ large. One thing that's sort of interesting to see is in the last couple of days, I'm not sure if this is a pretty smart move, but a bunch of other international central bankers actually publicly backed Jerome Powell. And I'm not sure again, that helps his case domestically because he sort of feeds into this narrative that he's part of a globalist elite, right?

Rachel Rizzo: Mm-hmm.

Dhruva Jaishankar: So again, I understand the spirit behind it that sort of central bank independence, you know, stand together with one of your own, but I'm not sure that necessarily sends the right message to the White House.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, I'm not entirely sure, but certainly not the last that we're going to be hearing about this or talking about this. you said, Powell's chairmanship goes at least until May. We're not sure what's going to happen between now and then. But as always on our, on the Around the World podcast, we're going to be keeping an eye on all of these developments and making sure we're keeping all of you, our listeners up to date. So as I mentioned before, be sure to tune in every Friday for the latest episodes. We're on Spotify, YouTube, and Apple podcasts.

Dhruva Jaishankar: As always, thank you for joining us on the Around the World podcast and we'll see you next week.

Rachel Rizzo: See you, Dhruva.

Season 2 Episode 1 : Venezuela Operations, Greenland Tensions, and Recognition of Somaliland

January 9, 2026 — To kick off Season 2 of Around the World, hosts Dhruva Jaishankar and Rachel Rizzo recap what went down in Venezuela and the U.S. military’s capture of Nicolás Maduro and his wife. They also discuss the revived tensions between the United States and Greenland, and touch on Israel’s recent recognition of Somaliland as an independent state. 

Available on Spotify and Apple Podcasts.

Image: SWinxy, CC BY 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Image: www.horndiplomat, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

SNEAK PEAK

Dhruva Jaishankar: On this week's episode of Around the World.

Dhruva Jaishankar: So there were strikes against Venezuelan facilities, both military bases, port communications, antennas and such. This then led to a pretty targeted special forces operations with law enforcement officials, because again, Maduro is being tried. They went in straight and managed to get him in the middle of the night, and his wife, and extract them. it was a pretty daring military operation. It really showcases some of the unique capabilities of US military. There are not too many other military forces around the world that they're capable of doing such an operation. So seemingly effortlessly,

Rachel Rizzo: Greenland is an autonomous territory, but it is a part of Denmark. It's the largest island in the world. It is strategically located in the Arctic. Because of climate change, northern shipping routes, the seasons that those shipping routes can be used are becoming longer and China and Russia are working together to sort of consolidate control over those potential shipping routes. And so I think Trump wants to make sure that the United States is not only a player in this region, but is the dominant player in this region.

Dhruva Jaishankar: There has been some activism for some time, both by the people, by the de facto government of Somaliland, but also certain others to recognize it as an independent country. the United Arab Emirates has been amongst the most vocal in pushing for such recognition, not publicly, but certainly lobbying quite heavily to do that. For Israel, I think there is an added benefit. it's seeking greater recognition from different places. It's been attacked by Houthis in Yemen, who are just across the Red Sea from Somaliland. And so Israel obviously has an added incentive.

Welcome to Around the World

Dhruva Jaishankar: Hi, I'm Dhruva Jaishankar.

Rachel Rizzo: And I'm Rachel Rizzo. Welcome to the Around the World podcast. Your essential guide to understanding the forces shaping our world today. Every week, we cut through the noise to bring you clear, insightful analysis of the most important developments in geopolitics.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Whether it's security challenges across Europe, power dynamics in Asia, domestic updates from the United States, or regional updates in Latin America or the Middle East, we make sure you're up to speed on what's happening and more importantly, why it matters.

Rachel Rizzo: Thanks for tuning in. And also be sure to like and subscribe to the Around the World podcast on both Youtube, Spotify and Apple Podcasts.

Rachel Rizzo: Hey Dhruva and happy 2026. How was your break?

Dhruva Jaishankar: Happy New Year to you too. Good. I was in New Mexico and enjoying being out West and now back in Washington, DC. And how are you?

Rachel Rizzo: Things are good. Just was in Utah with family, now back in New Delhi, and it has been a newsy six days, hasn't it?

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yes, absolutely. So we're starting season two of Around the World with what promises to be a very exciting year. Just a few things, I think, to watch out for. I mean, we're going to get into what happened in the last week and the last few days. But I think in the next few months and the rest of year, we'll be looking out for a possible Donald Trump visit to China in April.

Rachel Rizzo: Mm-hmm.

Dhruva Jaishankar: We'll have the FIFA World Cup here in the US in the summer, the 250th anniversary of the United States. Trump also plans to host the G20 leaders in Miami this fall. And we'll have perhaps one of the most consequential midterm elections in the United States in long time.

Rachel Rizzo: Absolutely.

Dhruva Jaishankar: And all of that will have international repercussions as well. And also, again, I think we'll be tracking some big uncertainties. I'm sure you've been following, of course, the Ukraine ceasefire talks.

Rachel Rizzo: Yep, it's a big one.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Which seem to be two steps forward, two steps back.

Rachel Rizzo: Always.

New Year, New Venezuela

Dhruva Jaishankar: And then we'll see also whether the US-China trade ceasefire holds until April and then again until the rest of the year. So a lot of things to watch out for. And then of course, these big uncertainties. And the first one we'll get into, I think, is Venezuela.

New Year, New Venezuela

Rachel Rizzo: And that is the big news topic of the last couple of days. I woke up here, I think I was going to bed here maybe on Sunday and started getting texts from people about the United States, the Trump administration specifically nabbing Nicolas Maduro, former, I guess now leader of Venezuela. So can you just give us a quick overview? What just happened in Venezuela and what's happening now?

Dhruva Jaishankar: So we had actually discussed Venezuela, I think on the third episode of the show, I think back in about October or so, and there was already a US military buildup underway in the Caribbean, the deployment of an aircraft carrier group to the region. But what we saw happen in the early hours of early in the new year was two and a half hour operation by US special forces led by the Army's Delta Force that went to Caracas following bombing, so a bombing campaign, targeted bombing campaign, nabbed Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro and his wife, brought them back to New York where they're facing now charges related to drug related charges in a US court. And so it's in some ways quite a pretty bold operation that came, you know, I can't think of a recent precedent like this against a head of state or government.

Rachel Rizzo: No, absolutely. And like you said, we did discuss this. I think it was on episode three, as you mentioned. So this wasn't completely unanticipated. But can you explain a little bit about the buildup and maybe a little bit more about some of the military actions that were taken, not just leading up to this, but actually in the operation?

Dhruva Jaishankar: So there were strikes against Venezuelan facilities, both military bases, port communications, antennas and such. It appears as if more than 30 Cuban soldiers who were there, Cuba had a good relationship with Venezuela, were killed in the operation.

Rachel Rizzo: Interesting.

Dhruva Jaishankar: The US says no American soldiers were killed. This then led to a pretty targeted special forces operations with and they were coordinating with law enforcement officials, because again, Maduro, being tried. It was a self-targeted operation where they went in straight and managed to get him in the middle of the night, him and his wife, and extract them. So brought them back to a US Navy ship and then from after that flew him back to New York to face charges. So it was a pretty daring military operation.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah.

Dhruva Jaishankar: In some ways, think, much like the US bombing campaign against Iran's nuclear facilities last year. It really showcases some of the unique capabilities of US military. There are not too many other military forces around the world that they're capable of doing such an operation. So seemingly effortlessly, it was a high risk operation, but still the fact that it went off operationally quite successfully for the US is quite significant.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, I think you're right. And just setting the geopolitics aside, setting the decision aside, arguably it was a very successful military operation. What do you think this, what kind of signal would you say that this sends across the region now?

Dhruva Jaishankar: So Maduro and the government in Venezuela wasn't exactly popular in other parts of Venezuela. I partly the mismanagement of the economy had led to a big refugee outflow. And so in some ways it's being welcomed by Venezuelans abroad, including in the United States, who are quite a powerful political constituency. Also some in Latin America. I mean, for example, the Argentinian president Javier Mele, who is very aligned with the Trump administration, has been very enthusiastic. But at the same time, it's going to generate a lot of worries in other countries, particularly Cuba, with which the US has the most antagonistic relationship. But it's also been followed by some threatening rhetoric against Colombia and even Mexico. And so again, many others will be worried about the precedent it would set.

Rachel Rizzo: Can you also talk a little bit about maybe what this means about Trump's willingness to use force or what it says about his administration's approach, not just to foreign policy, but his approach to getting other states to potentially bend to his will? And maybe what signal does it send to states like Russia and China?

Dhruva Jaishankar: So, you know, one, I'd say two aspects to that. One is that a lot of people have characterized the Trump administration's worldview as isolationist. And I've been at least personally a little skeptical of that term because that suggests a real withdrawal from the world.

Rachel Rizzo: I agree, yeah. Yeah.

Dhruva Jaishankar: And instead, even in his first term, you saw his willingness to use force quite and quite daring, some would argue reckless, but certainly bold ways to use force to achieve certain decisive outcomes. And I'm thinking back to the assassination of Soleimani, Qasem Soleimani in Iraq, the Iranian al-Quds force leader six years ago, his use of like a really large weaponry against ⁓ ISIS and ISIL in Afghanistan in the first term. And then again, the bombing of Iran, Iran nuclear facilities and this, right? So there's been a track record of using force quite to achieve specific outcomes. And I think that, again, the isolationist characterization sometimes tends to gloss over that leading to people under underestimating the ability of the United States to use force under Trump. But it also, I think reinforces this view that might is right in this world in this day and age, know, so much for rules and norms.

Rachel Rizzo: Mm-hmm.

Dhruva Jaishankar: And if you're in Beijing or Moscow, I think it sends very mixed signals. It's been interesting to see some of the commentary emerging out of China and Russia in the last couple of days. On the one hand, it's a reinforces this view of spheres of influence. And at the same time, there's this grudging admiration of US capabilities. If you see the way Russia struggled in Ukraine, attempting something similar, change of government, a change of leadership there, again, shows the contrast in US capabilities.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, I think that's right. I think too that there's a lot of comparisons being made or lots of questions being asked about where or how Russia and China might be looking at this and how that might affect their own geopolitical decisions when it comes to, say, a Chinese decision to move against Taiwan, US decisions against Venezuela or Trump's decisions in the Western Hemisphere wouldn't magically decrease the costs that China would incur both militarily, politically, economically for a move on Taiwan. So whether they can look at it and say, well, the United States doesn't abide by international law, so we shouldn't either, but it doesn't change, I think, the calculus that much, I would say.

Dhruva Jaishankar: I think that seems to be the, there's been a lot of commentary on that exact issue over the last 48 hours.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah.

Dhruva Jaishankar: And I think most of people who are sort of close followers of China and cross-strait relations believe that, it doesn't really change that much.

Rachel Rizzo: Mm-hmm.

Dhruva Jaishankar: If China wants to do something on Taiwan, they're going to do it anyway. There have been years of planning that has gone into this. For the most part, they don't believe the US is particularly law abiding anyway. They think there's a hypocritical double standards. So I think the general consensus is it doesn't make that much of a difference. Although I think some people are trying to use that argument to criticize the Trump administration's legality and appropriateness of the Trump action in Venezuela.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, that seems right. I think too that the big questions people are asking now, not just when it comes to Russia and China, but when it comes to the willingness of Trump potentially to use force elsewhere. And the Europeans are clearly on edge about this, given the comments that he's made about Greenland, for example. So I think this does bring in the question about whether or not Trump would be willing to assert that same kind of dominance over other countries that he deems not necessarily problematic in the same way as Venezuela, but as countries that are not bending to his will in a way that he would want them to.

Buying Greeland?

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yes. So actually I was going to pivot to you. fact, what, you know, the Greenland issue came up very early in the Trump term, Trump's second term, in his shortly after his inauguration. seemed to have died down for a little while, but is now back. Talk us through what does this mean for Greenland? Why is it back, back in focus?

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, so I mean, the idea that Trump has wanted to purchase Greenland is not a new one. He first floated it back in 2019 during his first presidency. The idea then became sort of resurgent early last year in 2025 when he said again that the United States, quote, needs Greenland for national security reasons and then sent Vice President Vance on a visit there with the second lady. They received a very chilly reception from the locals, no pun intended. But then, like you said, the issue sort of died down last year. And even for me, as a person that was actually kind of watching this pretty closely, I sort of thought that that was going to be it. But with Trump, there's always a surprise around the corner. And when he was talking to reporters after the action in Greenland, he said yet again that the United States needs Greenland for national security. And he has thus far and continues to refuse to rule out the use of military force to acquire it for the United States. And so you've had comments from European leaders, from the Greenland prime minister, from the Danish prime minister. As most people know, Greenland is an autonomous territory, but it is a part of Denmark. And so a lot of issues, I think, are at play here. But the Danes, the Greenlanders, the Europeans are clearly concerned.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yeah, and I saw one Katie Miller, who's the wife of Stephen Miller, who's the deputy national security advisors, tweet or put out on social media a map of Greenland with an American flag over it that triggered a response. And then there was a statement, think yesterday, was Tuesday of this week, which was it was a bunch of European leaders, Macron, Sanchez. was most of the top leaders sort of having unified position on Greenland and that any kind of it's up for Greenlanders to decide their future and Denmark and that this would threaten the need essentially implying this would threaten NATO as an alliance, right?

Rachel Rizzo: Absolutely.

Dhruva Jaishankar: But quick question. Why does Trump want Greenland?

Rachel Rizzo: So I think this is a really good question. mean, it's the largest island in the world. It's, I think, three times the size of Texas, if I'm not mistaken. It is strategically located in the Arctic. And there are a few things at play here. There are strategic issues at play. The US has ballistic missiles based in Greenland. We have space-based assets in Greenland. We have military personnel there as well. Because of climate change, for example, northern shipping routes, the seasons that those shipping routes can be used are becoming longer and China and Russia are working together to sort of consolidate control over those potential shipping routes. And so I think Trump wants to make sure that the United States is not only a player in this region, but is the dominant player in this region. It's also home to a lot of natural resources, albeit hidden under at some places, it's two miles worth of ice. So we're looking at things like critical minerals, lithium, cobalt, nickel. And so as this green transition continues and China continues to have most control over these critical minerals, Donald Trump wants to make sure that the United States sort of rests control of those critical mineral productions from China. And so this is where Greenland could really come into play here, although we are looking at years down the line and hundreds and hundreds of billions of dollars of effort here. This is not a quick fix or something that would happen overnight. So lots of issues that play both economic, political, military, strategic.

Dhruva Jaishankar: And what I mean, look, we can never rule anything out, but what would you say is like the probability or possibility of any kind of US military action against Greenland? Again, this is a NATO part of a NATO ally, right? So.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah, it is. And which means it's protected by NATO's Article 5, which states that an attack against one is an attack against all. What it doesn't say is what happens when one NATO ally attacks another, especially when that ally is the United States. We've had issues like that in the past with Greece and Turkey back in the day.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Greece and Turkey, yeah.

Rachel Rizzo: Yeah. But I think this would be, I mean, this you never say impossible, but it would be unprecedented. And like I said about China earlier, what happened in Venezuela wouldn't in turn decrease the costs that the United States would incur for some sort of military action against Greenland. And I think the Europeans, as they have stated many times, would be very serious about defending it, although a different conversation would be how and what sort of assets would they actually be able to use here. But I think when you look at the statements that the White House has made, you have to contrast them to some of the statements that say Secretary of State Marco Rubio has made in the last day or so to a closed door session of Congress. said that the United States is interested in quote, buying Greenland, not invading it. And so I think that the likelihood of military action against it is still low. But I do think that the likelihood of economic pressure against it is very high. I think it's clear that the United States doesn't need to own Greenland in order to strategically benefit from it. The Greenlanders don't want to be part of the United States, poll after poll says this. And also earlier last year, polls also said that this was not a popular idea in the United States as well. Also remember that Trump ran on a campaign of peace and you know, what happened in Venezuela, Iran, you can argue about that, but imagine really getting bogged down in some sort of military conflict over Greenland. What would that look like? That would put him on par with the very Washington elites that he continuously lambast. So I think it's unlikely, but I do think that this is not the end of this conversation. It's just the beginning and there's a lot to watch.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yeah.

Recognizing Somaliland

Rachel Rizzo: I mean, just like moving from Venezuela and Greenland to an issue that is pretty niche, but you happen to be paying attention to this. Can you tell us what's going on with Somaliland?

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yeah, I think, you know, it's nice to use this podcast to sometimes shed light on things that are not like in the news, or in the US news and sort of top level.

Rachel Rizzo: Totally.

Dhruva Jaishankar: This past week or so, Israel became the first country to recognize Somaliland. And I will just explain a little bit like why and why, because it may seem random.

Rachel Rizzo: Okay, please.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Israel's foreign minister actually made a visit there. This is in the Horn of Africa, the kind of northeastern or easternmost tip of Africa. And for background, Somaliland has been a sort of de facto independent state for much of the past couple of decades. It has a separate colonial history from the rest of Somalia. If you look on a map, you'll see it as part of Somalia, but it was a British protectorate rather than an Italian one. And it has the strategic location on the Gulf of Aden just at the mouth of the Red Sea. It's had peaceful transitions of power. So it's self-governing, but it's been pretty economically backward and disadvantaged over time. There's not been a lot of investment there. And there are some reports now of mineral resource wealth, which has excited naturally that seems to be something everyone is chasing that's excited some interest in the region and and some renewed interest. But most of all, it's that strategic location right at the Gulf of Aden at the mouth of the Red Sea. And there's a port in Berbera in particular, which is of considerable interest.

Rachel Rizzo: So you mentioned right at the top of your comments that Israel recognized Somaliland. Why now?

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yeah, so there has been some activism for some time, both by the people, by the de facto government of Somaliland, but also certain others to recognize it as an independent country. And most recently, the United Arab Emirates has been amongst the most vocal in pushing for such recognition, not publicly, but certainly lobbying quite heavily to do that. This would be welcomed by some, including landlocked Ethiopia which wants to have access to the sea.

Rachel Rizzo: Mm-hmm.

Dhruva Jaishankar: It's a large country and a landlocked country in Africa. But for Israel, I think there is an added benefit. The Abraham Accords, it's seeking greater recognition from different places. It's been attacked by Houthis who are across in Yemen, who are just across the Red Sea from Somaliland. And so Israel obviously has an added incentive. At the same time, there's been resistance to recognition, particularly from the African Union, which has a sort of informal understanding amongst its members that it won't recognize breakaway regions, as many countries in Africa are worried about the precedent it would set.

Rachel Rizzo: Hmm. Yeah.

Dhruva Jaishankar: And for example, Ethiopia itself has been dealing with the issue of breakaway regions in Tigray. And there others, I think, who are opposed to it. Saudi Arabia is actually opposed to recognizing Somaliland. Somalia naturally is, because they claim it's still part of Somalia. Djibouti is opposed because Djibouti kind of has a monopoly right now on a major strategic port in the region. It hosts Chinese, American, Japanese, French bases. And so I think there's now been this renewed push by the UAE and Israel to recognize it and also to get others, the United States, the United Kingdom, India, amongst others, to recognize Somaliland as an independent country. But again, all of that has been complicated by other equities, the US, for example needs cooperation from some of the leaders in Mogadishu and Somalia's capital for counter-terrorism purposes and anti-piracy operations.

Rachel Rizzo: So something to keep our eye on and watch closely. It's interesting that you mentioned the precedent of recognizing breakaway regions. have, for those of us that watch Europe pretty closely, we have the same issue with Kosovo.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Yeah.

A country like Spain won't recognize Kosovo or independence because of the precedent that could, exactly. So you have those issues that are always there and it's gonna be interesting to see sort of how that plays out going forward.

Dhruva Jaishankar: Well, an eventful first week of the year in 2026 and a lot more to watch out for. have been protests in Iran, elections in Myanmar. Just today, there's been this issue of an oil tanker by the United States and reportedly a Russian submarine was dispatched to protect it. we're seeing, so again, a going on, lot for us to talk about in future episodes. But thank you to listeners for joining us this week.

Rachel Rizzo: Yep. And as always, as Dhruva said, thanks for joining us on the Around the World podcast and be sure to like and subscribe to our podcast on YouTube, on Spotify and listen to us on Apple Podcasts as well. We'll see you next week