The week that was: Azerbaijan and Armenia sign peace deal; Munir uses US trip to brandish Pakistan's nuclear arsenal; and more

Welcome back to another edition of My Take 5, your weekly wrap of top international news. It’s been a blockbuster week and here are the stories we are covering this week. Trump and Putin are about to meet in Alaska, Azerbaijan and Armenia sign a peace deal, a concert riot in Poland with possible geopolitical consequences, Munir’s nuclear sabre-rattling, and Netanyahu’s push to take over Gaza city.

So let’s get to it:Trump-Putin meet: The biggest global international story is certainly the Alaska summit between Trump and Putin today. Missing at the table will be Zelenskyy and European representation. Trump has described the meeting as a “feel-out” to see if Putin is serious about a ceasefire in Ukraine. He has also threatened serious consequences if Putin refuses to end the war in Ukraine. But this isn’t the first time Trump has signalled tough measures only to not follow through.

So, big question marks remain over the outcome of the summit.From the Ukrainian perspective, certain things are clear. First, Russia must agree to a ceasefire. Any negotiations over territorial issues or a final peace deal must include Ukraine’s participation. That Ukraine will only negotiate on territorial issues on the basis of the current contact line. There is no question of legally recognising the Russian-occupied territories – forbidden under the Ukrainian constitution.

And there is no chance of demilitarisation of Ukraine or pullback of Ukrainian forces from areas they currently control in the four provinces of Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson. These positions were firmed up in the pre-summit meet between Zelenskyy and European partners, and between them and Trump.Trump, on his part, has said that he will prioritise a ceasefire in his talks with Putin. But it’s still not known what terms will Putin actually put forward.

According to some commentators, Putin has two gaols in mind – either get Ukraine to give up Donetsk and Luhansk and withdraw from Ukrainian-controlled areas of Kherson and Zaporizhzhia plus permanently close Nato’s door to Ukraine; or convince Trump to stop supplying military aid to Ukraine in total.

Trump has already stated that Nato membership for Ukraine is off the table. But the Europeans have insisted that Russia can’t be allowed to dictate Nato membership.

Trump, however, appears to have accepted security guarantees for Ukraine which, at the moment, appears to be taking the shape of a multi-nation reassurance force once ceasefire or peace takes hold.But the bottomline is that a deal that does not take into account Ukraine’s sovereign interests and seems to reward the aggressor simply won’t hold. Tens of thousands of Ukrainians have had to evacuate from Russian-occupied territories, leaving behind their home and hearth.

Russians are taking over their properties. This internally displaced population in Ukraine will never accept an unjust peace and force future Ukrainian dispensations to reclaim their homes through covert and overt security measures.

In any case, peace won’t hold then. Plus, what is the guarantee that Russia won’t use the occupied territories to launch future aggression against Ukraine, just as it did from occupied Crimea in 2022?So these are very complicated issues.

Ukraine has lost and sacrificed its best and bravest in this war. The people of Ukraine want justice. They won’t allow Zelenskyy to settle for less. Concert riots in Poland: In an unfortunate incident, Poland is expelling 63 people, including 57 Ukrainians and six Belarusians, after concert riots in Warsaw. More than 100 people were detained following the performance of hugely popular Belarusian rapper Max Korzh.

The concert turned into chaos after concert-goers got into fights with security guards. But a parallel controversy erupted when some of the concert-goers displayed flags of the World War II-era Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA).

The UPA was a Ukrainian resistance force that fought against the Soviets, Nazis and Polish resistance groups for Ukraine’s independence. But in Poland, the UPA is associated with the Volyn massacre, a dark chapter in Ukraine-Poland history.Although the people accused of carrying the UPA flag have apologised, as has Ukraine’s ambassador to Poland, the incident is likely to be exploited by Russia to sow discord between Ukraine and Poland. Warsaw, after all, has stood steadfast in supporting Ukraine throughout the war, taking in vast numbers of displaced Ukrainians, and coordinating military aid to Ukraine. Moscow, therefore, would like nothing more than to disrupt this solidarity.

Polish PM Donald Tusk has already warned against this. In the current geopolitical moment, Poland and Ukraine have no choice but to avoid bilateral controversies and stand together, Armenia-Azerbaijan deal: In a hugely significant deal that sees the US expand its interests in the Caspian Sea region, leaders of Armenia and Azerbaijan signed a peace treaty in the presence of Trump to effectively end their 35-year-old conflict.

It will be recalled that Armenia and Azerbaijan relations have been bedevilled by two competing territorial issues – access to Azerbaijan’s Nakhchivan exclave through Armenia, and the previously ethnic Armenian dominated region of Nagorno-Karabakh in Azerbaijan.

Both those issues now stand resolved after Azerbaijan took the breakaway Nagorno-Karabakh region by force in 2023, and the US-sponsored peace treaty now giving Baku access to its Nakhchivan exclave through a strategic Armenian corridor which will be controlled by a US private consortium on a 99-year lease from Armenia.Importantly, the said strategic corridor – being dubbed as Trump Route for International Peace and Prosperity – runs along Armenia’s border with Iran. Note also that Russia has a military base in Armenia. But neither Tehran nor Moscow was able to influence the outcome here. In fact, it is safe to surmise that Russia’s involvement in the Ukraine war, and Iran’s recent military battering by Israel and US have made Moscow and Tehran unable to protect their strategic interests in the region.

In fact, this has been the trend since last December when the Bashar al-Assad regime fell in Syria. In other words, Russia’s preoccupation with Ukraine and Iran’s with Gaza and Lebanon have allowed the US to press the advantage and push back Russian and Iranian strategic influence in West Asia. The Armenia-Azerbaijan deal further bolsters this trend.As Trump prepares to meet Putin in Alaska, the message for Moscow is that the more it pursues its aggression against Ukraine, the more it will lose strategically elsewhere. Munir’s nuclear sabre-rattling: Pakistan army chief Asim Munir used another trip to the US to brandish his country’s nuclear arsenal. In what could only be described as highly irresponsible statements, Munir said that Pakistan would take “half the world down” if it was pushed to a desperate situation. That he would make such a comment from US soil tells us two things. First, Pakistan has managed a new compact with America based on Munir currying favour with Trump.

By pumping up Trump’s ego and nominating him for the Nobel Peace Prize, Pakistan feels that it can reset ties with Washington at a critical geopolitical moment. This is also Pakistan’s way of hedging against China, whose influence over Pakistan has grown tremendously. This was amply demonstrated by China’s military help to Pakistan during the clashes with India this summer.That said, while Trump might be impressed with Munir, the US system by now knows Pakistan quite well.

It is essentially an economic basket case that thrives on playing all sides. India, on its part, should have seen this coming. New Delhi should have know that its relations today are with Trump, not the US government. Nonetheless, Pakistan’s honeymoon period with Trump is expected to be short-lived. Trump perhaps has forgotten that it was Pakistan that sheltered Osama bin Laden.

Therefore, given Trump’s mercurial ways, this relationship can flip any time.

Plus, Munir’s irresponsible statements need to be examined in the light of integrity and safety of Pakistan’s nuclear weapons. The world can’t let rogue actors get their hands on nukes. Netanyahu wants to conquer Gaza: In a catastrophic decision, Israeli PM Netanyahu’s cabinet approved the seizing of Gaza city. The UN and Israel’s allies like UK, Germany and France have criticised the move, saying it would only exacerbate the suffering in Gaza.

In fact, even Israel’s military brass is said to be against the plan. However, this was Netanyahu’s plan all along. He wants to eradicate the possibility of a Palestinian state once and for all.

And backed by the most right-wing cabinet in Israel’s history, he apparently has a free hand to implement his long-held agenda.But a viable Palestine state existing side by side with Israel is the only viable solution to the Israel-Palestine conflict.

But Netanyahu doesn’t see it that way. He used Israeli military operations in Gaza to raze the enclave to the ground and create hell on earth so that the Palestinians would be desperate to leave to any Arab nation willing to take them. This cleansing of Gaza is a huge blot on the international community.

Yes, the October 7, 2023 Hamas attack on Israel was horrific. Hamas needs to be banished, sanctioned and eliminated. But now Israel is just attacking Palestinian civilians and starving them to death. That will only keep Hamas going. The big question now is: How long before opinions in the Arab world reach a point where Arab governments can no longer turn a blind eye to what Israel is doing in Gaza?