The Chinese air force is sending fighter jets and bombers to Thailand for a joint exercise with the Thai military on Sunday.

The training will include air support, strikes on ground targets and small- and large-scale troop deployment, the Chinese Defense Ministry said in a statement posted on its website.

China's expanding military activities in the Asia-Pacific region have alarmed the United States and its allies and form part of a growing strategic and economic competition that has inflamed tensions between the world's two largest economies.

Cross border institutions in Eurasia were previously tasked with diversifying economic connectivity as the emerging multipolar world demanded reduced dependence on Western-centric institutions reluctant to adapt to new realities.

However, the current European crisis has destabilized the world and discredited the West’s ability to facilitate economic cooperation. Subsequently, these bodies are now asserting a central role in organizing economic recovery and pragmatic cooperation.

Western alliances will collapse in the war over Russian LNG

Josep Borrell, EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs, noted that the EU managed to reduce Russia's share in gas imports from 40% at the beginning of the year to 20%. This was made possible, among other things, owing to an increase the share of LNG. However, it turns out that this LNG is also Russian, and this winter there will be a life-and-death struggle for it.

Secretary of State Antony Blinken assured the Philippines on Saturday that the United States would come to its defence if attacked in the South China Sea, seeking to allay concerns about the extent of the U.S. commitment to a mutual defence treaty.

In meetings in Manila dominated by discussion on simmering U.S.-China tensions over the Taiwan visit of U.S. House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Blinken said a 70-year-old defence pact with the Philippines was "ironclad".

In the past few years, China's PLA-Navy has increased its activities in the Indian Ocean, the region primarily dominated by the Indian Navy so far. In 2020, the Indian Navy chased away a Chinese research vessel after it came near India's strategic Andaman and Nicobar Islands.

Bangladesh has approached the International Monetary Fund (IMF) for a multibillion-dollar loan, making it the third South Asian country – after Sri Lanka and Pakistan – to have sought financial help from the multi-lateral lender in the past two months.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi‘s provocative visit to Taiwan is part of the U.S. escalation against China in what, in Pentagon geography, is referred to as the Indo-Pacific, i.e., the region stretching from the west coast of the United States to that of India. Here RIMPAC, the world’s largest naval exercise under U.S. command, is underway, with naval and air forces from 26 countries participating.

The Sri Lankan government has been accused of a draconian crackdown on protesters who were involved in toppling Gotabaya Rajapaksa as president, with activists facing intimidation, surveillance and arbitrary arrest.

Webmaster addition: You know, like the Jan 6 protesters!

The conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan over the contested Nagorno-Karabakh region has simmered for decades. In 2020, the two sides fought a bloody war for territory — one that ended with a fragile Russian-brokered truce.

On Wednesday, tensions flared again in the mountainous enclave, which is located inside Azerbaijan but controlled by ethnic Armenian separatists. Both sides accused each other of breaching the cease-fire and three soldiers, including two from Nagorno-Karabakh and one from Azerbaijan, were killed.