Latest Updates

Erdogan told: For Turkey’s sake at a time of great peril, ease up on your authoritarianism

As war threatens Middle East, just outcomes for the Kurds and the president's jailed chief rival are needed to build solidarity, say analysts.

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17,000 US troops to arrive in the Gulf for possible ground invasion of Iran

17,000 US troops arrived in the gulf ahead of what could possibly be a land invasion by the Trump administration in an effort to bring the war in Iran to a speedy end.

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Ukraine and Qatar sign defence cooperation agreement

Ukraine and Qatar have signed a defence cooperation agreement covering joint projects, technology development and investment in missile and drone defence, according to a statement released during a Ukrainian delegation’s visit to Doha.

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Russians’ trust in Putin falls to lowest level since Ukraine invasion

Trust in Russian President Vladimir Putin has fallen to its lowest level since before the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, as economic pressures and prolonged war fatigue weigh on public sentiment, according to new survey data reported.

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Pakistan confirms passage for 20 ships through Strait of Hormuz

Pakistan has confirmed an agreement with Iranian authorities allowing 20 Pakistani-flagged vessels to transit the Strait of Hormuz. It is a development presented by Islamabad as a step towards substantially easing the nation's energy disruption.

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Yemen’s Houthis enter the Gulf war on Iran's side

Yemeni Houthis officially entered the war on March 28 and announced its first operation, firing a ballistic missile against "Israeli military targets."

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Israel hits Iran’s biggest steel plants, Tehran to retaliate

Three co-ordinated Israeli strikes hit all of Iran’s largest steel plants simultaneously on March 28. Iran issued evacuation orders for six of the largest steel plants in neighbouring Gulf countries as well as Israel as it prepared to retaliate.

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COMMENT: Could Iran target undersea cables?

Iran's deadliest weapon is not airborne. Seventeen submarine cables on the Persian Gulf floor carry 30% of global internet traffic and the world's financial bloodstream. The IRGC may already have orders to cut them. EU and GCC leaders are not.

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EU enlargement rethink as divisions emerge among key member states

Bulgaria backs EU deal on Vertical Gas Corridor to secure regional gas supplies

Croatian ex-ski federation chief detained in €30mn graft probe

EU enlargement rethink as divisions emerge among key member states

Ukraine has dominated recent discussions, but a new DGAP paper argues Montenegro and Albania are closest to membership and should receive greater attention.

Bulgaria backs EU deal on Vertical Gas Corridor to secure regional gas supplies

Operators of the Vertical Gas Corridor have agreed with the European Commission on a long-term framework to secure reliable gas supplies to Southeastern Europe.

Latest Updates

News

Satellite imagery indicates significant damage at Qatar’s Ras Laffan LNG plant that was hit by Iranian missiles on March 18, including the apparent collapse of primary heat exchangers at Train 6 and structural damage to adjacent facilities.

Pashtun tribal leaders in Pakistan voiced support for Iran during a gathering at the Iranian consulate in Peshawar, signalling the potential for broader regional unrest.

Turkey and regional states are preparing measures to protect US-Iran talks from sabotage, a Turkish diplomatic source says, as both sides trade accusations of bad faith over the negotiating process.

Iran's navy commander has threatened to strike the USS Abraham Lincoln with shore-to-sea missiles along the Makran coast.

Iran's military and parliament speaker have warned that US troops attempting a ground operation will "burn," with Ghalibaf saying fighters are waiting and that missiles, protests and the Strait of Hormuz have America "by the throat."

Tech

Core district with 272-metre landmark skyscraper to offer panoramic views of surrounding Tian Shan mountains.

Six financial institutions agreed to finance Firebird AI’s artificial intelligence data centre project in Armenia.

Montenegro has chosen Hungary’s 4iG Group to implement large-scale ICT projects aimed at modernising law enforcement technology and establishing a state-of-the-art data centre.

Plans to scale the service to thousands of robotaxis in the coming years, with potential expansion into other European cities and international markets.

WhatsApp is effectively dead in Russia and Telegram is "dying right now."

Opinion

The world has fixated on oil prices and LNG disruption. It has almost entirely missed the far more consequential story: Iran’s asymmetric strike on Qatar’s Ras Laffan facility has severed one-third of the global supply of helium.

Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MbS) is taking a big gamble. He is pressing Washington for a more aggressive stance in its Iran campaign betting the short term damage cost is the price of leaving the Kingdom as the dominant regional power.

As critical elections approach in Hungary and Armenia this spring, the recent experience of Moldova is increasingly being brought up by politicians, analysts and election observers.

Russia’s oil industry has been handed a short-term reprieve by the war in Iran and the closure of the Strait of Hormuz, but the boost from triple-digit crude prices does not alter the sector’s deeper trajectory, Sergey Vakulenko says.

Will GCC be drawn into war and unite against Iran? The foreign ministers of Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Pakistan met in Riyadh on March 18 to discuss a possible security pact and taking up arms against Iran.

Data

Iran’s oil revenues have climbed sharply in March, rising by an estimated $25mn per day from the previous month to reach $139mn per day, as exports increase and price discounts narrow despite tensions in the Middle East, says Goldman Sachs.

Protests in the United States against President Donald Trump or the Trump administration by far outweigh rallies organized by Trump supporters, Statista reports.

All of Nato’s members have met the alliance’s 2% of GDP defence spending target for the first time, pushing total military expenditure to a record $1.4 trillion, according to data reported by Euractiv on March 20.

Qatar Airways has parked 22 jets at Spain's Teruel airport in under a week as Gulf airspace closures force carriers to store surplus capacity, echoing fleet grounding patterns last seen during Covid-19.

Fitch has kept Israel's credit rating at A with a negative outlook, forecasting a 5.7% deficit in 2026 and warning that debt will keep rising beyond 2028 unless post-war fiscal consolidation is pursued.

Features

There are 14,000 Russian companies registered in the UAE, and 150,000 Russians live there. Without the need for visas and the can-do attitude to business, Dubai has become a favourite destination for Russian entrepreneurs escaping from sanctions.

The world was already dedollarising thanks to rising East-West tensions and the US decision to weaponize the dollar in 2022 by seizing the Russian central bank’s reserves. Trump has gone a step further.

The Israeli Army took its heaviest tank losses in over 40 years after Hezbollah ambushes destroyed 21 Merkavas main battle tanks in a single day on March 26. Israel and the US have armed themselves for the wrong war.

The biggest short term vulnerability for Indian energy security is liquified petroleum gas using in cooking - of which India imports over half of its consumption demand via the Strait of Hormuz.

Mexico is caught between two giants: courting the US with tariffs on Chinese goods while risking a trade backlash from Beijing that could undermine its own industrial base.

Blogs

For more than 3,000 years, Nowruz has been Iran's national festival, but this year's war has darkened the mood.

US Commander-in-Chief, meanwhile, says he told Netanyahu “don’t do that”. But he did do that.

America and Iran have two very strategies for fighting this war.The US is still using the old school approach of building extremely powerful and incredibly accurate flying bombs that will definitely destroy anything they hit and are hard to stop.

A “permits-for-passage" system emerges as the US heads towards a strategic defeat in Iran after the White House makes a string of strategic blunders.

Caracas stands to gain from surging crude prices triggered by the closure of the Strait of Hormuz, but Washington's control over its oil income means the bonanza may consolidate authoritarian rule rather than rebuild a broken state.

bneGREEN

Dubai was underwater after torrential rain overwhelmed the sewage system and left roads under water and street level shops swimming in water on March 28.

Three quarters of the world's population live in fossil importing countries and bleed out at least 3% of GDP every year to import oil to run their cars and power plants.

With the Middle East in turmoil, the new Bangladesh government faces a critical moment in its power and energy landscape.

Poorer countries are projected to suffer sharply higher mortality from the increasing frequency of extreme heatwaves than wealthier nations, with death rates potentially rising by as much as tenfold.

A powerful storm system has hit Dubai with torrential rain, hail and strong winds, compounding aviation disruption at Dubai International Airport as Emirates works to restore full operations by March 29.

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Nato General Secretary Mark Rutte warned that the West needs to prepare of the possibility that Chinese President Xi Jinping will ....

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