: Worldhttps://globalnews.ca/?p=11114902<![CDATA[U.S., China hold 1st military talks on maritime risks since Trump’s return]]>Thu, 03 Apr 2025 22:54:40 +0000
U.S. and Chinese military officials have met for their first working-level talks since U.S. President Donald Trump took office for the second time, with the two sides sharing their respective concerns over military safety on the seas.
The U.S. Indo-Pacific Command said in a statement that the talks, held Wednesday and Thursday in the eastern Chinese city of Shanghai, were focused on “decreasing the incidences of unsafe and unprofessional” actions by China’s naval and air forces.
The Chinese defense ministry said it pointed out that U.S. military ships and aircraft have been conducting “reconnaissance, surveys and high-intensity drills in the sea and air spaces around China, which are prone to cause misunderstandings and miscalculations and jeopardize China’s sovereignty and military security.”
China told the U.S. that it would continue to “respond to all dangerous provocative actions” and “resolutely safeguard national territorial sovereignty and maritime rights and interests,” the ministry statement said.
The talks were held in the same week Beijing conducted large-scale drills in the waters and airspace around the island of Taiwan. The meeting also came shortly after U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth told his Japanese counterpart that Japan is “our indispensable partner in deterring Communist Chinese military aggression.”
Pete Hegseth says Europe must ‘own’ their security, calls NATO membership for Ukraine not ‘realistic’
Ties between Beijing and Washington have been strained in the past several years over issues such as trade, cybersecurity, Taiwan and the South China Sea. Under Trump, a trade war has worsened as his administration imposed tariffs and China announced retaliatory measures.
To push back at China’s aggression in the Indo-Pacific, the U.S. has stepped up its presence in the region, sailing through the Taiwan Strait and conducting drills in the disputed South China Sea. The U.S. opposes any forced takeover of Taiwan, which Beijing claims to be part of Chinese territory and vows to take by force if necessary.
But both governments also are seeking to keep the lines of communications open, including through the semi-annual talks of the working group.
The Chinese defense ministry said the two sides “conducted candid and constructive exchanges on the security situation in maritime and aerial domains” this time in Shanghai and that they discussed measures to improve maritime military security between the two countries.
China war games: Military drills are ‘warning’ to Taiwan and U.S., analyst says
]]>: Worldhttps://globalnews.ca/?p=11113939<![CDATA[Penguins and polar bears outnumber people in some tariff-hit territories]]>Thu, 03 Apr 2025 21:02:03 +0000Some of the world’s least inhabited islands and territories have been hit by U.S. President Donald Trump’s “reciprocal” tariffs on all foreign trading partners — and some appear to have more penguins and polar bears than trade agreements with the U.S.
Tiny tropical islands and remote outposts in the Antarctic and far North were included in the list of dozens of countries and territories that now face a baseline tariff of 10 per cent. Some of the outlier targets face far higher tariffs, based on calculated trade deficits with the U.S., leaving world leaders scratching their heads.
“Nowhere on Earth is exempt from this,” Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, whose country includes many of the territories caught up in Trump’s tariffs, told reporters Wednesday.
Trump’s global tariffs: Which countries will be hardest hit?
The Trump administration has pointed to the report’s findings to justify the new global tariff policy, which is also based on a national emergency on foreign trade that Trump declared in his executive order Wednesday.
“President Trump is taking urgent action to protect the national security and economy of the United States,” Greer said in a statement. “The current lack of trade reciprocity, demonstrated by our chronic trade deficit, has weakened our economic and national security.”
Here are just some of the targets of Trump’s trade war that are raising eyebrows:
This Australian territory comprises two islands in the remote Antarctic that is uninhabited by people, other than temporary Australian scientific expeditions. A permanent research station on Heard Island was closed in 1954.
The islands are home to penguins and seals and are about a two-week sail from the Australian mainland.
Despite hardly any actual trade with the U.S. — government data shows no imports from the islands last year — the territory faces the 10 per cent baseline tariff.
The CIA World Factbook says economic activity on the islands effectively ended in 1877, when elephant seal oil trade ended after the local seal population was nearly killed off.
Three tropical coral islands in the South Pacific make up the New Zealand territory of Tokelau, home to 1,500 people.
It primarily survives on subsistence agriculture, meaning hardly any crops are exported, as well as fishing.
The Australian outpost in the Indian Ocean — located 360 kilometres south of the Indonesian capital Jakarta, with a population of fewer than 2,000 people — has used U.S. heavy machinery to mine phosphate for decades.
“There’s no trade between Christmas Island and America, except that we do buy mining equipment through Tractors Singapore,” said Christmas Island Shire President Gordon Thomson, referring to the regional dealer for the Texas manufacturing giant Caterpillar Inc.
“The trade, if anything, is U.S. product into Christmas Island. The only thing that we export is phosphate and that goes to Malaysia, Indonesia, maybe Thailand and a bit to the Australian mainland,” Thomson said.
In 2023, the U.S. exported US$49 million in American goods to Christmas Island, while importing just US$4.4 million, according to the U.S. Census Bureau — an outlier year in a trade relationship that is otherwise relatively small.
The Trump administration lumped together Svalbard, a Norwegian archipelago home to about 2,500 people, and Jan Mayen, a volcanic island 1,100 kilometres away, in its tariff list and imposed a 10 per cent levy on the combined territory.
Jan Mayen is completely uninhabited, other than a combined Norwegian military and meteorological research outpost and a local population of polar bears, and is partially covered by glaciers.
The Norwegian military’s main role there is to oversee Norway’s claim to sovereignty over the island.
U.S. Census data shows the U.S. has actually had a longstanding trade surplus with Svalbard and Jan Mayen for years, exporting far more than it imports.
The most the U.S. has imported from the territory in the past five years is around US$100,000.
This overseas British territory comprises over 1,000 individual islands in the Chagos Archipelago between Indonesia and Tanzania, with a combined area of just 60 square kilometres.
The largest island, Diego Garcia, is home to a joint U.K.-U.S. military base and 4,000 British and American troops, but the territory has zero permanent residents.
U.S. government data shows millions of dollars of American goods are exported to the territory every year — likely military equipment — with far less goods imported in return.
Another Australian territory in the Indian Ocean, this one is made up of two atolls with a combined total of 27 coral islands, with less than 600 people calling it home.
It primarily relies on tourism, and most food and other necessities are imported from Australia, yet the U.S. is a top export market for shipbuilding.
Long disputed between the United Kingdom and Argentina — including a military conflict in the 1980s — the Falkland Islands is home to roughly 3,600 people in the southern Atlantic Ocean.
It relies mostly on fishing, agriculture and tourism for its economy, and wool from its sheep farming sector is a top export.
The Trump administration claims the territory’s tariffs, trade barriers and “currency manipulation” amounts to an 82 per cent tax on U.S. imports, leading it to impose a 41 per cent tariff in return.
Last year it imported US$18.7 million more in goods than it exported, down from a US$31.2 million deficit two years prior.
This Pacific island, another Australian territory with a population of around 2,000 people, also received more severe tariff treatment with a 29 per cent levy.
That’s based on what the Trump administration claims is a total 58 per cent extra charge on U.S. goods.
The island’s economy primarily revolves around tourism, and most of its minimal agricultural exports are to Europe. Albanese told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation the separate, higher tariff for an Australian territory “was somewhat unexpected and a bit strange.”
“To my knowledge, we do not export anything to the United States,” Norfolk Island Administrator George Plant, the Australian government’s representative on the island, told the AP.
“We don’t charge tariffs on anything. I can’t think of any non-tariff barriers that would be in place either, so we’re scratching our heads here.”
Norfolk Island business owners who spoke with Reuters could think of no manufacturing industry on the island.
According to U.S. government data, two-way trade with Norfolk Island amounted to less than $US1.5 million over the past three years combined.
According to the Trump administration, this French overseas territory right next to Newfoundland and Labrador with a population around 5,000 people tariffs U.S. goods at a 99 per cent rate — justifying a 50 per cent tariff, one of the highest rates on the entire list released Wednesday.
The archipelago of eight small islands relies on fishing exports and tourism for its economy.
Besides a US$3.4 million import of goods from the territory in July 2024, trade with the U.S. is minimal, U.S. government data shows.
—With files from the Associated Press and Reuters
]]>: Worldhttps://globalnews.ca/?p=11114623<![CDATA[U.S. egg imports meant to drive down prices could now face Trump tariffs]]>Thu, 03 Apr 2025 20:58:37 +0000U.S. President Donald Trump’s new tariffs could apply to eggs being imported to ease a supply shortage, Agriculture Secretary Brooke Rollins said on Thursday, a move that industry experts said could boost prices just as they have started to decline from record highs.
Rollins said in a Fox News interview that tariffs on egg imports were possible and negotiations with affected countries were ongoing. On Wednesday, Trump announced sweeping tariffs that have been mostly criticized by agricultural and food groups for their potential to shrink markets for farmers and raise consumer prices.
The U.S. has increased imports of eggs from Turkey, Brazil and South Korea in an attempt to increase supplies amid an ongoing bird flu outbreak that has killed nearly 170 million chickens, turkeys and other birds since 2022.
If levies are imposed on eggs, manufacturers that import them for processing into food products would either need to absorb the cost or pass it on to consumers, said Greg Tyler, CEO of the USA Poultry & Egg Export Council industry group.
“You will see increases in processed egg prices here in the United States as a result,” he said.
Potential fallout from Trump’s global tariffs plan
The U.S. Department of Agriculture did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Egg prices have declined in recent weeks from all-time highs, though the wholesale price is still up 60% from this time last year at $3 per dozen, according to USDA data. Weaker demand and a lull in new cases of bird flu have helped cool prices, analysts said.
The agriculture secretary, however, said tariffs would cause short-term uncertainty.
“I’m not going to sit here and say, ‘Oh, everything’s going to be perfect and the prices are going to come down tomorrow,’ because this is an uncertain time,” Rollins told Fox News’ Maria Bartiromo.
The Brazilian government said it was evaluating its response to Trump’s tariffs, while South Korea ordered emergency support measures for affected industries.
Imported eggs are generally brought into the U.S. on ships, transported to processing facilities, and then unloaded by hand, said Brian Moscogiuri, global trade strategist for egg supplier Eggs Unlimited.
“There’s more costs associated with the imports already, and now you add tariffs on top it,” he said. “It makes everything more costly and makes imports that much less likely to have a major impact.”
The U.S. imported more than 1.6 million dozen consumer-grade chicken eggs in January and February, mostly from Turkey, compared with none a year earlier, USDA data show.
Turkey may not be as big of a supplier going forward because of tariffs and its own outbreak of bird flu, Moscogiuri said.
]]>: Worldhttps://globalnews.ca/?p=11114552<![CDATA[Hegseth faces Pentagon watchdog probe over Houthi attack plan Signal chat]]>Thu, 03 Apr 2025 20:17:35 +0000
The Pentagon’s acting inspector general announced Thursday that he would review Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s use of the Signal messaging app to convey plans for a military strike against Houthi militants in Yemen.
The review will also look at other defense officials’ use of the publicly available encrypted app, which is not able to handle classified material and is not part of the Defense Department’s secure communications network.
Hegseth’s use of the app came to light when a journalist, Jeffrey Goldberg of The Atlantic, was inadvertently added to a Signal text chain by national security adviser Mike Waltz. The chain included Hegseth, Vice President JD Vance, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard and others, brought together to discuss March 15 military operations against the Iran-backed Houthis.
“The objective of this evaluation is to determine the extent to which the Secretary of Defense and other DoD personnel complied with DoD policies and procedures for the use of a commercial messaging application for official business,” the acting inspector general, Steven Stebbins, said in a notification letter to Hegseth.
The letter also said his office “will review compliance with classification and records retention requirements.”
Hegseth and other members of the Trump administration are required by law to archive their official conversations, and it is not clear if copies of the discussions were forwarded to an official email so they could be permanently captured for federal records keeping.
U.S. defense secretary denies texting “war plans” to reporter in major security gaffe for Trump admin
The Pentagon referred all questions to the inspector general’s office, citing the ongoing investigation.
In the chain, Hegseth provided the exact timings of warplane launches and when bombs would drop — before the men and women carrying out those attacks on behalf of the United States were airborne.
The review was launched at the request of Sen. Roger Wicker, R-Miss., chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, and Rhode Island Sen. Jack Reed, the committee’s top Democrat.
In congressional hearings, Democratic lawmakers have expressed concern about the use of Signal and pressed military officers on whether they would find it appropriate to use the commercial app to discuss military operations.
Both current and former military officials have said the level of detail Hegseth shared on Signal most likely would have been classified. The Trump administration has insisted no classified information was shared.
Signal chat leak contains ‘no classified information’, White House insists
Waltz is fighting back against calls for his ouster and, so far, President Donald Trump has said he stands by his national security adviser.
On Thursday, Trump fired several members of Waltz’s staff after far-right activist Laura Loomer urged the president to purge staffers she deemed insufficiently loyal to his “Make America Great Again” agenda, several people familiar with the matter said.
In his Senate confirmation hearing Tuesday, Trump’s nominee for chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Lt. Gen. Dan Caine, would not say whether the officials should have used a more secure communications system to discuss the attack plans.
“What I will say is we should always preserve the element of surprise,” Caine told senators.
]]>: Worldhttps://globalnews.ca/?p=11114038<![CDATA[Cuban national arrested after attempting run across Ontario bridge: RCMP]]>Thu, 03 Apr 2025 18:38:22 +0000
A Cuban national was arrested in mid-March after attempting to enter Canada illegally by running across the Fort Erie International Railway Bridge from the United States.
Authorities responded quickly and apprehended the individual under the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, the RCMP said Thursday.
The man was taken to the Canada Border Services Agency at the Peace Bridge port of entry in Fort Erie, where they were found ineligible to enter the country. They were returned to the U.S. the same day.
This arrest comes at a time when Canadian authorities have significantly ramped up border security measures, particularly between official ports of entry, in response to growing concerns about drug trafficking and illegal migration brought up by the Trump administration earlier this year.
Since then, Canada has invested heavily in cross-border surveillance and enforcement. These investments have led to more arrests at irregular crossing points such as rail bridges and remote roadways.
RCMP say this area continues to be a hotspot for illegal border crossings. Several recent attempts have been intercepted at the railway bridge, with all individuals eventually returned to the U.S.
Sgt. Lepa Jankovic with the RCMP Border Integrity Unit says efforts to maintain security around the borders have improved.
“The RCMP continues to see positive operational impact from new investments in law enforcement between ports of entry and collaborative efforts with CN Police, OPP and CBSA in maintaining the security and integrity of Canadian borders,” she said.
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