Category World News

United States President Donald Trump has said he expects a US-coordinated international stabilisation force to be on the ground in Gaza “very soon” as part of his post-war plan for the enclave, which is still suffering a full-blown humanitarian crisis amid continued Israeli bombing.

“It’s going to be very soon. And Gaza is working out very well,” said the president on Thursday, adding that an alliance of “very powerful countries” had volunteered to intervene if any problems arose with the Palestinian armed group Hamas, which has not yet confirmed it will disarm.

The president’s projection came as the United Nations Security Council prepares to start negotiations to authorise a two-year mandate for a transitional governance body and the stabilisation force, which is supposed to protect civilians, secure border areas and train Palestinian police.

Secretary-General Antonio Guterres told Al Jazeera on Tuesday that any stabilisation force must have “full international legitimacy” to support Palestinians in Gaza.

A senior US government official told the Reuters news agency that negotiations were expected to start on Thursday, following his country’s circulation of the draft resolution to 10 elected UNSC members and several regional partners this week.

The resolution, which was reportedly seen by Egypt, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia and Turkiye, would permit a stabilisation force of 20,000 troops to “use all necessary measures” to carry out its mandate, meaning it will be allowed to deploy force, according to Reuters.

Hamas has not said whether it will demilitarise, a key tenet of Trump’s 20-point plan, but part of the stabilisation force’s task would be to destroy its capacities and “offensive infrastructure” and to prevent it from rebuilding.

Trump’s plan helped lead to a captive release deal and a fragile ceasefire between Israel and the armed group on 10 October, which the former has repeatedly breached with its repeated bombing and heavy restrictions on aid to the enclave.

Turkiye played a crucial role in the negotiations by encouraging Hamas to accept the peace plan and rallying support for the stabilisation force by hosting foreign ministers from Qatar, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Jordan, Pakistan, and Indonesia in Istanbul this week.

Turkiye has repeatedly condemned Israel’s genocidal war in Gaza and demanded at the top-level meeting that Israel stop violating the truce and allow crucial humanitarian aid to enter the embattled Palestinian territory.

But Israeli officials – including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Foreign Minister Gideon Saar – are adamant that their country will not accept a Turkish presence in Gaza.

Israel appears to have its own narrative on the stabilisation force. During a joint news conference with Trump back in September, Netanyahu told reporters that “Israel will retain security responsibility, including a security perimeter, for the foreseeable future” in Gaza.

China’s latest aircraft carrier has officially entered service after extensive sea trials, according to Chinese state media, with experts saying the ship will help the world’s largest navy expand Beijing’s sphere of influence farther beyond its own waters.

President Xi Jinping boarded the carrier Fujian – named after the Chinese province facing Taiwan – for an inspection tour in the city of Sanya in southern Hainan province on Wednesday, state news agency Xinhua reported on Friday.

More than 2,000 representatives from China’s navy and aircraft carrier construction units attended the commissioning and flag-presenting ceremony, according to state media.

The Fujian is China’s third aircraft carrier, but its first indigenously designed and built model.

The vessel looks set to be a far more effective naval weapon than China’s first two Russian-designed carriers, Liaoning and Shandong, which are smaller and rely on ramps to launch aircraft.

With a flat flight deck and electromagnetic catapults for take-offs – only found elsewhere on the latest United States Navy Ford-class carriers – the Fujian will be able to carry significantly more and heavier-armed jet fighters.

During the Fujian’s sea trials, the Chinese navy launched its new carrier version of the J-35 stealth fighter and an early-warning aircraft, the KJ-600, as well as a variant of its established J-15 fighter jet.

The ability to carry its own reconnaissance aircraft also means that, unlike the Liaoning and Shandong, the Fujian will not be operating blind when out of the range of land-based support, allowing it to operate its most advanced aircraft further afield.

It remains to be seen how quickly the Fujian will become combat-ready, but the vessel is perhaps the most visible example yet of President Xi’s deep overhaul and rapid expansion of China’s military.

The Chinese leader has previously said his goal is for China to have a modernised military force by 2035 and a “world-class” force to rival the US by 2050. With the Fujian, Beijing has taken another significant step towards closing that gap.

Greg Poling, director of the Asia Maritime Transparency Initiative at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, told The Associated Press news agency that aircraft “carriers are key to Chinese leadership’s vision of China as a great power with a blue-water navy”.

While China’s navy wishes to dominate the waters of the South China Sea, East China Sea and Yellow Sea – the so-called First Island Chain around Japan, Taiwan and the Philippines – it also seeks to challenge US dominance deeper into the Pacific, according to Poling.

North Korea has fired at least one ballistic missile towards its eastern waters, the South Korean military has said, just days after United States Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth visited South Korea for annual security talks.

South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff confirmed the development on Friday, saying the short-range missile flew 700km (435 miles) towards the East Sea, otherwise known as the Sea of Japan.

The Japanese government also said North Korea had launched a missile, adding that it is likely to have fallen in waters outside of Japan’s exclusive economic zone.

Pyongyang’s latest launch comes four days after South Korea said its neighbour had fired 10 rounds of artillery into its western waters, and about a week after US President Donald Trump gave Seoul permission to build a nuclear-powered submarine.

Experts say the move, which will see South Korea join a small club of countries using such vessels, will greatly enhance its naval and defence capabilities.

South Korea wants to receive enriched uranium from the US to use as fuel for the nuclear-powered submarine, which it plans to build at home, a South Korean presidential official said on Friday.

Since they both took office earlier this year, Trump and his South Korean counterpart Lee Jae Myung have sought to restart dialogue with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.

However, Kim has shunned any talks with Washington and Seoul since previous discussions with the US collapsed in 2019.

North Korea’s leader said in September that he was open to talks provided that the US drop its demand for Pyongyang to give up its nuclear weapons. He has repeatedly said his country is an “irreversible” nuclear state.

Last month, Kim attended a major military parade in Pyongyang, along with high-level officials from allied countries, including Russia and China. It showcased some of his nation’s most powerful weapons, including a new intercontinental ballistic missile.

North Korean and Russian military officials met in Pyongyang this week to discuss strengthening cooperation, North Korea’s official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) said on Friday.

Pak Yong Il, vice director of the Korean People’s Army’s General Political Bureau, met a Russian delegation led by Vice Defence Minister Viktor Goremykin on Wednesday.

KCNA said the allies discussed expanding ties as part of the “deepened bilateral relations” agreed between Kim and Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Earlier this week, South Korea’s spy agency said it had detected possible recruitment and training activities in North Korea, noting this could signal a potential further deployment of troops to Russia.

So far, Seoul estimates that Pyongyang has sent 15,000 soldiers to Russia to aid it in its war against Ukraine, and large numbers have died on the battlefield there.

Peru has declared Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum a “persona non grata” who is unable to enter the country, days after severing ties with Mexico amid an escalating diplomatic dispute.

Peru’s Congress voted 63 to 34 on Thursday in favour of symbolically barring Sheinbaum from the country after her government granted asylum to former Peruvian Prime Minister Betssy Chavez, after she fled to the Mexican embassy in Peru’s capital Lima.

The designation of “persona non grata” is typically reserved for foreign diplomats and compels them to leave a host country, and is seen as a rebuke to their government.

President of Peru’s Congress Fernando Rospigliosi said the move was a show of support for the government and its decision to break off relations with Mexico, according to Mexico’s El Pais newspaper.

During a debate on Thursday, Ernesto Bustamante, an MP who sits on Peru’s Congressional Foreign Relations Committee, also accused Sheinbaum of having ties to drug traffickers.

“We cannot allow someone like that, who is in cahoots with drug traffickers and who distracts her people from the real problems they should be addressing, to get involved in Peruvian affairs,” Bustamante said, according to El Pais.

Chavez, who is on trial for her participation in an alleged 2022 coup attempt, earlier this week fled to the Mexican embassy in Lima, where she was granted political asylum.

Peru’s Foreign Minister Hugo de Zela called the decision by Mexico City an “unfriendly act” that “interfered in the internal affairs of Peru”.

Mexico’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs has maintained that it was acting in accordance with international law, and the move in “no way constitutes an intervention in Peru’s internal affairs”.

Lima has yet to offer safe passage for Chavez to leave the embassy and travel to Mexico.

Chavez, a former culture minister, briefly served as prime minister to President Pedro Castillo from late November to December 2022.

Charges against the former minister stem from an attempt by President Castillo in December 2022 to dissolve the Peruvian Congress before he was quickly impeached and arrested.