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US President Donald Trump said Wednesday that he may go to the Middle East at the end of this week as a peace deal between Israel and Hamas in Gaza is “very close.””I may go there sometime toward the end of the week, maybe on Sunday, actually. And we’ll see, but there is a very good chance. Negotiations are going along very well,” Trump told reporters during an event at the White House.”Our final negotiation, as you know, is with Hamas, and it seems to be going well. So we’ll let you know, if that’s the case, we’ll be leaving probably on Sunday, maybe on Saturday.”Trump said he had just come off the phone with officials in the Middle East, where his special envoy Steve Witkoff and son-in-law Jared Kushner had just joined discussions in Egypt.”‘Peace for the Middle East,’ that’s a beautiful phrase, and we hope it’s going to come true, but it’s very close, and they’re doing very well,” Trump added.”We have a great team over there, great negotiators, and they’re, unfortunately, great negotiators on the other side also. But it’s something I think that will happen.”Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi said earlier that he had received “encouraging” signs and hailed the support of Trump, whose 20-point peace proposal forms the basis of the talks. Hamas too expressed “optimism” over the indirect discussions with its foe Israel.Trump’s plan calls for a ceasefire, the release of all the hostages held in Gaza, Hamas’s disarmament and a gradual Israeli withdrawal from the territory.

By joining the indirect talks in Egypt between Israel and Hamas, Turkey hopes to use its longstanding relationship with the Palestinian Islamist movement to help end the Gaza war.Speaking late Tuesday, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Donald Trump had “specifically requested that we meet with Hamas and persuade them” to accept the peace plan the US leader laid out last month.Erdogan has led this Muslim-majority nation of 86 million inhabitants since 2003 and is known for his Islamic-leaning conservatism. He has repeatedly accused Israel of “genocide” in Gaza — a charge denied by Israel.He said a Turkish team led by spy chief Ibrahim Kalin would join negotiators in the Egyptian resort town of Sharm El-Sheikh as they met for a third day seeking to halt the two-year war alongside US and Qatari officials.Last week, Kalin joined Egyptian and Qatari officials in Doha to discuss Trump’s 20-point peace plan with Hamas negotiators, Qatar said.While Hamas is blacklisted by Washington, Brussels and Israel as a terrorist organisation, Erdogan has always referred to it as “a liberation movement”. He nurtures close ties with it and frequently hosts its leaders.Since 2011, when Ankara helped broker an agreement for the movement to release Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit whom it had held captive for five years, Turkey has provided a place of refuge for Hamas officials. – ‘Strong support’ – Ozgur Unluhisarcikli, the German Marshall Fund’s Ankara office director said Erdogan had always offered “strong” support for the group.He “equated Hamas’ resistance with Turkish resistance (to European powers) during World War I,” he said.”But right now, there is only one position in Turkey: Israel is committing genocide and it needs to be stopped,” Unluhisarcikli added.When Hamas staged its deadly October 7, 2023 attacks, media reports said several of its leaders — including the late Ismail Haniyeh — were in Turkey at the time.According to these reports, Erdogan discreetly asked them to leave as he was trying to rebuild bridges with Israel at the time.The October 7 attacks caused the deaths of 1,219 people in Israel with another 251 taken hostage. It sparked a retaliatory military campaign that has killed more than 67,183 people, according to Gaza’s health ministry — figures the UN considers credible.”The fundamental criteria for Turkey is Hamas’s resistance to Israeli occupation and its legitimacy for the Palestinian people,” said Mustafa Yetim, an international relations expert at Osmangazi University in Eskisehir.According to Talha Ismail Duman, a Middle East researcher at Sakarya University, many Hamas officials have used Turkey as a safe haven in recent decades.”Some live here and Hamas delegations often come to meet with Turkey’s political and security leaders,” he told AFP.Over the past eighteen months, senior Hamas official Osama Hamdan and political bureau member Bassem Naim have both been interviewed by AFP in Istanbul.Duman said Hamas’s ties with Turkey were “particularly good under (its former chief) Khaled Meshaal” over their shared position on the Arab Spring and the war in Syria.Another part of the Palestinian group aligned itself more with Iran and its Hezbollah proxy. But “the rise of Haniyeh (who took over) in 2017 and that of Yahya Sinwar” — the late Hamas leader accused by Israel of masterminding the October 7 attacks — “progressively reduced Turkey’s influence”, he said. “Today Hamas has a policy of balancing its ties with Iran and Turkey”, meaning Ankara can leverage its influence over the group in its dealings with the White House, he said.

The global economy is doing better than expected, even as it faces prolonged uncertainty and underwhelming medium-term growth prospects, the head of the IMF said Wednesday. The world economy is doing “better than feared, but worse than we need,” International Monetary Fund Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva told reporters in Washington.She added that the Fund now expects global growth to slow “only slightly this year and next,” propped up by better-than-expected conditions in the United States, and among some other advanced, emerging market and developing countries. Georgieva’s remarks came ahead of next week’s gathering of finance ministers and central bank governors at the World Bank and the IMF in Washington. Trade is once again likely to dominate the agenda at the annual meetings, following US President Donald Trump’s decision earlier this year to unleash sweeping tariffs against many trading partners.- ‘Multiple shocks’ -“All signs point to a world economy that has generally withstood acute strains from multiple shocks,” Georgieva said, pointing to “improved policy fundamentals,” the adaptability of the private sector, lower-than-expected tariffs, and supportive financial conditions. “The world has avoided a tit-for-tat slide into trade war — so far,” she added. She noted that the average US tariff rate has fallen from 23 percent in April to 17.5 percent today, while the US effective tariff rate of around 10 percent remains “far above” the rest of the world.But, she warned, the full effect of those tariffs “is still to unfold,” adding that the resilience of the world economy has yet to be “fully tested.” Against this backdrop, the Fund still expects global growth to remain at roughly three percent over the medium term, in line with previous forecasts — below the 3.7 percent, on average, seen before the Covid-19 pandemic.”Global growth patterns have been changing over the years, notably with China decelerating steadily while India develops into a key growth engine,” Georgieva said. To boost lackluster growth prospects elsewhere, she called on countries to act swiftly to “durably” lift output, rebuild fiscal buffers, and address “excessive” trade imbalances. The Fund’s prescriptions for policymakers differed by region, with Asia urged to deepen its internal trade, and to strengthen the service sector and access to finance. Carried out correctly, this could raise economic output by as much as 1.8 percent in the long run, Georgieva said. African countries should promote “business-friendly reforms” and continue with efforts to build up the Continental Free Trade Area which, she said, could lift their real GDP per capita by “over 10 percent.””Gains from this region can be especially large,” she said. – Tough love for Europe -Georgieva reserved her harshest criticism for Europe, which has struggled with economic growth in recent years, in marked contrast to the United States.To raise competition in the bloc, Georgieva called on the European Union to appoint a new “single market czar” to drive reforms, a move that would simplify the EU’s structure and consolidate the power to make the changes required. These changes include steps to deepen EU single market integration in financial services and energy. “Catch up with the private sector dynamism of the US,” she said, adding that Europe must “recognize that there will be some sacrifices on the way.”For the world’s largest economy, Georgieva urged the Trump administration to address the country’s federal deficit and to take steps to incentivize household savings. And for China, the world’s second-largest economy, Georgieva reiterated the IMF’s ongoing calls for fiscal reforms to boost private consumption and reduce dependence on industrial policy to drive growth. 

The global economy is doing better than expected, even as it faces prolonged uncertainty and underwhelming medium-term growth prospects, the head of the IMF said Wednesday. The world economy is doing “better than feared, but worse than we need,” International Monetary Fund Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva told reporters in Washington.She added that the Fund now expects …

World economy not doing as badly as feared, IMF chief says Read More »

Iran has released a 19-year-old Franco-German national days after throwing out spying charges against him, France’s foreign minister told AFP on Wednesday. Lennart Monterlos is the latest French national to be released from Iranian detention this year, even as others remain in custody.”Lennart Monterlos is free,” said Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot, with sources close to the case saying the young man would travel to France on Thursday. Monterlos was arrested on June 16 in the southern city of Bandar Abbas, on the third day of the brief war between Iran and Israel.The sports and travel enthusiast had been cycling alone across Iran on a Europe-to-Asia bike trip. Iran’s judiciary announced the espionage accusations against Monterlos would be dropped on Monday. He had been released from prison over the weekend and was hosted by the French embassy in Tehran while awaiting the paperwork to allow him to leave the Islamic republic, several sources close to the case told AFP.Monterlos, who has a German mother and a French father and grew up in eastern France, was arrested as he was headed toward the border with Afghanistan, his Iranian visa near expiration.”We are relieved that our son will return to us,” his parents said in a written statement to AFP through their lawyer, Chirinne Ardakani. – ‘Not forgotten’ -France, which has several other nationals imprisoned in the Islamic republic, had condemned Monterlos’s detention as arbitrary. French couple Cecile Kohler and Jacques Paris, accused of spying for Israel, have been in detention in Iran for nearly three and a half years and face the death penalty. “I have not forgotten Cecile Kohler and Jacques Paris, whose immediate release we demand,” Barrot said.Along with other European countries, France suspects Iran of taking Western citizens hostage to trade their freedom for concessions, notably on its nuclear plans and the lifting of economic sanctions.Iran is believed to hold about 20 Europeans in detention. Kohler and Paris, who were on the last day of a tourist trip in May 2022, are slated to be part of a potential prisoner swap for an Iranian woman held in France. Mahdieh Esfandiari was arrested in France in February on charges of promoting terrorism on social media, according to French authorities. Iran has repeatedly called her detention arbitrary but maintains that the French couple were spying on behalf of Israel. But there have been positive signals from France and Iran for a swap, with Iranian top diplomat Abbas Araghchi saying last month a deal was nearing its final stages. Barrot said in a media interview on Monday there were “strong prospects of being able to bring them back in the coming weeks”. In March, Frenchman Olivier Grondeau, who had been detained in Iran since October 2022, was released. Before landing in an Iranian jail, Monterlos was aiming to reach Japan by bike, having set off last year after finishing high school on a 400-day cycling journey across 35 countries. He had documented his trip on social media, his last post the day before his arrest. “Am I reckless or brave? You decide in the comments,” he wrote on Instagram shortly after he started his trip.

Palestinian journalists and local officials rallied against Israeli attacks on Gaza media workers Wednesday in the occupied West Bank city of Ramallah, AFP journalists reported.Dozens of journalists and Palestinian officials marched towards the city’s UN headquarters carrying coffins bearing the names and photos of journalists killed in the Gaza Strip since the war started on October 7, 2023.”All of them, every single one of them has his own story,” said Nasser Abu Baker, head of the Palestinian Journalists Syndicate, which organised the event.Among the names was Anas Al-Sharif, a prominent correspondent for Qatari news channel Al Jazeera in the Gaza Strip, who was killed in August in an Israeli air strike outside Al-Shifa hospital in Gaza City.The UN and media rights groups have strongly condemned Sharif’s killing, while Israel has accused him of having “posed as a journalist”, maintaining he in fact was “the head of a terrorist cell”.After the speeches, Abu Baker said he would hand over a letter to the UN representative in Ramallah asking for the Secretary General Antonio Guterres to take measures “to protect our journalists in Gaza because they are daily under the fire, under the bombing strike, in a very dangerous situation”.Abu Baker said that his syndicate had reported the killing of 252 Palestinian journalists in Gaza since October 7, 2023.Other journalists have gone missing during the ongoing war, and Israel prevents foreign journalists from entering Gaza except during brief excursions accompanying its forces.Islam Abu Ara, director of digital media for the Palestinian Authority-affiliated newspaper Al-Hayat Al-Jadida, said that the situation had also deteriorated for journalists in the West Bank, which Israel has occupied since 1967.”There are also restrictions on journalists in the West Bank — assaults by settlers and pressure from the Israeli army,” Abu Ara told AFP.He said that he personally faced restrictions, particularly when moving between cities.”When (soldiers at checkpoints) find out I’m a journalist, they search my car much more thoroughly than they do for ordinary people,” he said, noting his phone was also checked.Between 2024 and 2025, Israel fell 11 places on Reporters Without Borders’ (RSF) World Press Freedom Index, from 101 to 112.RSF also says the Palestinian territories have become the most dangerous place in the world for journalists since the start of the war.This includes the West Bank, “where journalists were already the victims of abuses by both the Palestinian Authority and the Israeli occupying forces”, it said.

Top US negotiators joined discussions Wednesday aimed at bringing the Gaza war to an end, with the negotiations’ Egyptian host saying he had received “encouraging” signs so far.Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi hailed the support of US President Donald Trump, whose 20-point peace proposal forms the basis of the talks, while Hamas, too, expressed “optimism” over the indirect discussions with its foe Israel.Both warring sides have responded positively to Trump’s plan, which calls for a ceasefire, the release of all the hostages held in Gaza, Hamas’s disarmament and a gradual Israeli withdrawal from the territory.Egyptian state-linked media aired footage of Trump’s Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff and son-in-law Jared Kushner pulling up to the talks in Sharm El-Sheikh on Wednesday.Sisi said the word he had received since their arrival in the city the night before was “very encouraging”, adding the US envoys came “with a strong will, a strong message, and a strong mandate from President Trump to end the war in this round of negotiations”.Sisi also invited Trump himself to travel to Egypt for a signing ceremony if a deal were reached.At the Oval Office on Tuesday, Trump told reporters “there’s a possibility that we could have peace in the Middle East” if Hamas and Israel did agree on a ceasefire.- ‘Optimism prevails’ -Senior Hamas official Taher al-Nunu told AFP from Sharm El-Sheikh that “mediators are making great efforts to remove any obstacles to the implementation of the ceasefire, and a spirit of optimism prevails”.The militant group submitted a list of Palestinian prisoners it wants released from Israeli jails in the first phase of the truce “in accordance with the agreed-upon criteria and numbers”, Nunu added. In exchange, Hamas is set to free 47 hostages, both alive and dead, who were seized in its October 7, 2023 attack on Israel that sparked the war.Qatari Prime Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani and Turkish intelligence chief Ibrahim Kalin are also expected at the talks on Wednesday, while Hamas said it would be joined by delegations from Islamic Jihad — which has also held some of the hostages in Gaza — as well as the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine.The negotiations were taking place under the shadow of the second anniversary of the 2023 Hamas attack, which resulted in the deaths of 1,219 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally based on official Israeli figures.Militants also took 251 people hostage into Gaza, where 47 remain, including 25 the Israeli military says are dead.Israel’s military campaign in Gaza has killed at least 67,183 people, according to the health ministry in the Hamas-run territory, figures the United Nations considers credible.The data does not distinguish between civilians and combatants but indicates that over half of the dead are women and children.A spokesman for the territory’s civil defence agency, a rescue force operating under Hamas authority, said the bombardment of Gaza had not stopped, reporting three bodies retrieved on Wednesday.An AFP journalist in Israel near the Gaza border reported hearing multiple explosions in the morning.- Protests -Global pressure to end the war has escalated, with much of Gaza flattened, a UN-declared famine unfolding and Israeli hostage families still longing for their loved ones’ return.In Israel, people marked the second anniversary of the October 7 attack with music, tears and speeches.In Gaza, meanwhile, people were desperate for an end to a war that has upended their lives, interrupted their children’s education, and left many families scarred by loss and grief.”We’re back to famine again in Gaza. There is no flour, no rice, no food,” said Umm Ahmad al-Zayyan, from Gaza City’s Tel al-Hawa neighbourhood, adding her “children have been going to bed hungry every night for weeks”.A UN probe last month accused Israel of genocide in Gaza, while rights groups have accused Hamas of committing war crimes and crimes against humanity during the October 7 attack. Both sides reject the allegations.- Prisoners -Key to the negotiations will be the names of the Palestinian prisoners Hamas will push for.According to Egyptian state-linked media, high-profile inmate Marwan Barghouti — from Hamas’s rival, the Fatah movement — is among those the group wants to see released.He has been imprisoned since 2002, and was sentenced to life behind bars in 2004 on murder charges.Regarded as a terrorist by Israel, he often tops opinion polls of popular Palestinian leaders and is sometimes described by his supporters as the “Palestinian Mandela”.More broadly, Hamas’s top negotiator, Khalil al-Hayya, said the Islamist group wants “guarantees from President Trump and the sponsor countries that the war will end once and for all”.A Palestinian source close to the Hamas negotiating team said Tuesday’s session included Hamas discussing “the initial maps presented by the Israeli side regarding the withdrawal of troops as well as the mechanism and timetable for the hostage-prisoner exchange”.burs/smw/ser