For specific news about Trump, his regime and its dealings with Russia, I direct you to Olga’s substack. She and Julie Roginsky publish a weekly podcast, “Pax Americana”, which is highly informative.
For a general view of news from various geopolitical threatres, Scott’s EA Worldview is always superb.
Ukraine strikes Kerch Bridge: “SBU conducted a new unique special operation and hit the Crimean Bridge for the third time - this time underwater! The operation lasted several months. SBU agents mined the supports of this illegal facility. And today, without any casualties among the civilian population, at 4:44 am the first explosive device was activated. The underwater supports of the supports were severely damaged at the bottom level - 1100 kg of explosives in the TNT equivalent contributed to this. In fact, the bridge is in a state of emergency.”
At the same time, missile attacks were carried out on the port and military infrastructure of Sevastopol using Ukrainian Neptune-type cruise missiles.
Stories we’re following…
During the night of June 2–3, Ukraine's Air Defense neutralized 75 enemy drones, including Shahed-type UAVs, out of 112 launched by Russia from multiple directions (Kursk, Oryol, Millerovo, Primorsko-Akhtarsk, and Crimea).
Overnight, Russia launched a mass drone attack on multiple Ukrainian cities.
In Chernihiv, a private home burned down, a school, apartment building, and business were damaged—four people are hospitalized.
In Odesa, several homes and infrastructure were hit, vehicles burned, and four people were injured. In Kharkiv region, a civilian facility was struck, destroying a postal terminal—one person was killed and another injured.
Russian commit another war crime in Ukraine: FPV drone pilot loitered around a residential high rise in Nikopol for over 30 seconds before flying full speed into an apartment directly below a large Ukrainian flag.
Explosion are reported in Mykolaiv. Russia may have launched a Kh-47M2 Kinzhal missile from a MiG-31K. There are reports of power outages in the area.
Yevhen Balytskyi, the Kremlin-appointed head of the occupied part of Zaporizhzhia Oblast, claimed that 457 settlements in the region were left without power, affecting more than 600,000 homes.
Russia is putting Ukraine’s industrial heartland at risk by striking infrastructure and businesses. Ukraine World provides the details to this story: “Russia has occupied a number of Ukrainian industrial centres, and now it attacks Pokrovsk, approaching a key mine in Donbas. These actions have already disrupted economic chains.”
Russians attacked civilian cars at random this morning in Sumy, striking people just traveling to work. Russia fired five rockets from an MLRS system on the city at about 9am local time, the according to the head of the city administration, Oleg Grygorov.
Acting mayor Artem Kobzar confirms an explosion occurred today in the city center. One person was killed, several injured. Russia’s war is now fully focused on Ukraine’s civilian population—and with an average of around 300 drones and missiles each day, the pace is only increasing.
Ukrainian delegation was in Washington yesterday. Head of the Presidential Office Andriy Yermak was also on. the trip. Yermak posted on X: “As part of the Ukrainian delegation, headed by the First Deputy Prime Minister - Minister of Economy of Ukraine Yulia Svyrydenko, arrived in Washington The Ministry of Defense and Office team are also with us.”
Our agenda is quite comprehensive. We plan to talk about defense support and the situation on the battlefield, strengthening sanctions against Russia, in particular, the bill by Senator Lindsey Gramham.
And also - about the issue of the return of Ukrainian children deported by Russia and support for this process. We will also discuss Russian propaganda related to church issues. There will be many meetings with representatives of both parties who support Ukraine, the US President's team.
We will talk about the results of the meetings in Istanbul, as well as how Russia is stalling for time with the ceasefire and negotiations for the sake of war.
Zelensky says he's ready to meet with Putin, Trump in Turkey. "I told (Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan) that I support a meeting at the level of leaders, because I have the impression that there will be no ceasefire without our meeting," Zelensky said on June 2.
Russian representatives warned that “any future strikes on airfields” could jeopardize negotiations, per a Ukrainian delegate cited by UP.
President Zelensky called members of the Russian delegation “idiots” over their proposal to pause fire for 2–3 days to exchange bodies. “I think they’re idiots, because a ceasefire is needed to prevent people from being killed in the first place,” Zelensky said. He added that the U.S. should send a new sanctions package to the Senate to pressure Russia into halting the war.
Combat Situation
Tom Bike spotted satellite images showing possible damage to a Tu-95 bomber at "Ukrainka" airfield in Russia’s Far East. Initially thought spared in yesterday’s attack, drones—launched from a truck—likely managed to hit at least one aircraft. Burned vegetation west of the base also visible.
Russian-installed governor of occupied Kherson region Volodymyr Saldo says Ukrainian drone "debris" hit a new power substation in Henichesk district, leaving 150 towns in occupied Kherson region without electricity — over 104,000 people and 44 key facilities affected. Critical sites are now on backup power.
Explosion and large fire reported at Zavolzhsky Motor Plant in Nizhny Novgorod region. A fuel truck reportedly exploded on site, spreading flames to a production facility. One worker injured with serious burns.
Behind the Lines
Russian demands made at the talks in Istanbul on Monday: Russian media have published a "peace" memorandum allegedly presented to Ukraine, outlining the following demands:
Full withdrawal of Ukrainian forces from Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson, and Zaporizhzhia within 30 days of a ceasefire;
International recognition of Crimea, Donbas, and "Novorossiya" as part of Russia;
Ukraine’s neutrality;
Elections in Ukraine followed by a peace treaty;
Ban on redeployment of Ukrainian troops except for withdrawal;
Prohibition of nuclear weapons on Ukrainian territory;
Ban on Western arms and intelligence support.
US House Speaker Mike Johnson backs toughest possible sanctions on Russia, telling the New York Post: “Many in Congress want sanctions against Russia as strongly as we can—and I'm an advocate of that.”
Rosatom was unable to launch the second nuclear power plant in the Kursk region due to the war in Ukraine and military actions in the region. The head of the corporation, Alexey Likhachev, announced “confident steps” towards the launch, but stipulated that the decision would be made “taking into account the military-political situation.” “ Moving nuclear materials, nuclear fuel, both around the region and around the plant site, which is very large, is not yet possible ,” he admitted ( quoted by TASS).
The Cipher Brief: British PM Keir Starmer announced plans on Monday to build up to 12 new attack submarines and invest billions in weapons, to “build a fighting force that is integrated and more lethal than ever.”
“The threat we now face is more serious, more immediate and more unpredictable than at any time since the Cold War,” Starmer said as he introduced the defense investments as recommended by the UK’s new strategic defense review. Speaking at a shipyard in Glasgow, Starmer said bluntly that Britain "cannot ignore the threat that Russia poses” as it thinks about its own defense posture.
The strategic review was led by Lord George Robertson, a former secretary general of NATO and it calls for increasing production of drones; procuring up to 7,000 British-built long-range missiles and stockpiling more munitions; establishing a new cyber command to bolster cyber defenses; and putting $20 billion towards modernization of the UK’s nuclear warhead program. Now that’s what we call a plan.
“This is the most ambitious defense review for a generation. It needed to be,” said Malcolm Chalmers, deputy director general of the Royal United Services Institute, a research organization in London. Starmer has vowed to increase Britain’s defense spending to 2.5 percent of GDP from April 2027 and reach 3% by the next parliament.
The Security Service of Ukraine has detained a 42-year-old conscript in Kharkiv who was serving in a National Guard assault brigade and working for the Russians.
The SSU reported that the agent was adjusting Russian airstrikes on the facilities belonging to his own unit. Prosecutors revealed that the suspect, who held pro-Russian views, established contact with an officer of Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) via the Telegram messenger app.
While serving as a platoon commander, he passed the Russians the coordinates of command posts, training centres, and backup facilities used by the military unit he served in. He was also expected to send his handler a list of brigade officers and data on the unit’s manpower from company to battalion level.
Meanwhile in Russia & China…
The Telegraph: Trump official who shut down Russia propaganda unit has links to Kremlin
Darren Beattie has provoked alarm within the State Department since being appointed in February for his ardent pro-Russian views and focus on destroying the agency tasked with tackling Kremlin propaganda.
Mr Beattie, the acting under-secretary for public diplomacy and public affairs, is married to a woman whose uncle has taken several roles in Russian politics and once received a personal “thank you” message from Vladimir Putin.
In the years before joining the government, Mr Beattie wrote social media posts suggesting Western institutions should be “infiltrated” by Putin, while he also attacked what he described as the “globalist American empire”. Many of Mr Beattie’s social media posts also concern China, repeatedly calling on the US to surrender Taiwan to Beijing, and labelling Britain a “poor and pathetic kingdom” that would be “far better off under Chinese dominion”.
In May 2021, public records show, he married a Russian woman called Yulia Kirillova in a ceremony in Broward County, Florida. Ms Kirillova, who according to her Facebook page was educated in Moscow before studying abroad in Canada and Washington DC, is the niece of Sergei Chernikov, a Russian drinks magnate who part-owns a flat with her mother, Natalia.
Mr Chernikov, whose net worth was estimated to be $150 million in 2005, reportedly received a letter of thanks from Putin for his help in the election campaign which first brought the Russian leader to power. Both before and after his marriage to Mr Chernikov’s niece, Mr Beattie has repeatedly attacked what he called the “globalist American empire” while praising both Russia and China as counterweights to its “woke” ideology.
“The rise of non-woke (China) and anti-woke (Russia) geopolitical competitors to the Globalist American Empire is not a bad thing,” he wrote in October 2021.
Mr Beattie, and Revolver, the news outlet he founded after leaving the first Trump administration, argues that the US has sought to engineer “colour revolutions” around the world – a common trope in Russia and China to dismiss pro-democracy movements as Western-backed coup attempts.
The businessman has claimed the US is running “colour revolution ops” in Ukraine, Hong Kong, Xinjiang and Myanmar, and that an American “colour revolution brigade” is pushing for a “forever war in Ukraine”.
Two months before Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, he said: “Imagine the whining from the Globalist American Empire if Putin ‘invades’ Ukraine… I love it when our national security bureaucrats fail!” He has also praised Putin as “brave and strong”, and claimed the Russian leader had “done more to advance conservative positions in the US than any Republican”. He also declared: “Nato is a much greater threat to American liberty than Putin ever was.”
“The funny thing is just about every Western institution would improve in quality if it were directly infiltrated and controlled by Putin,” he wrote in September 2021.
According to Ms Kirillova’s Facebook page, she moved to Washington on Jan 28, roughly a week before her husband began his role at the State Department.
Despite his wide-ranging brief at the heart of the US government, Mr Beattie is said to have focused a disproportionate amount of time on seeking to dismantle the Counter Foreign Information Manipulation and Interference hub, known as R/Fimi, while building cultural ties with Russia.
Sources said Mr Beattie had doggedly pursued the agency after being appointed, taking it apart piece by piece. Contractors were sacked and officials were ordered to stop communicating with others in the State Department or external partners without explicit permission. Mr Rubio confirmed in an interview distributed by the State Department the same day that Mr Beattie had played a major role in abolishing R/Fimi.
At the same time as Mr Beattie was working on dismantling the agency, he is said to have pushed to rebuild relations with Russia, insisting on instituting cultural exchange programmes in fields such as ballet and hockey.
He is also said to have taken a significant interest in classified material related to Russia, prompting widespread concern about turning over sensitive information to him.
MIT Technology Review reported this month that Mr Beattie had launched a sweeping effort to obtain records from R/Fimi staff shortly before it closed, apparently with the intention of characterising it as an organisation dedicated to smearing conservatives.
He asked for communications with or about reporters who write about foreign disinformation, along with references to Mr Trump and his allies. One official said the move amounted to a “witch hunt”.
Mr Beattie would need confirmation by the Senate to take on the under-secretary role full-time: as an acting official, he is limited to 210 days.
Russian central bank head under pressure to slash key interest rate, Bloomberg reports. The reason is the growing toll on the federal budget and civilian industries, three officials told Bloomberg, with some calling for the decision to be made at the bank's meeting on June 6.
Russia proposed 2-3-day ceasefire in some areas of front to retrieve bodies of the fallen at the talks in Istanbul on Monday. According to a source in the President's Office, who spoke on condition of anonymity, Russia declined a ceasefire proposed by Ukraine.
In Bashkortostan, the one-time payment for signing a contract to participate in the war against Ukraine has been reduced. From June 5, it will be 1 million rubles instead of the current 1.6 million. The decree was signed by the head of the republic, Radiy Khabirov. The regional part of the payment in Ufa will be cut in half - from 1.2 million to 600 thousand rubles, but the municipal supplement of 700 thousand rubles will remain there. The federal part of 400 thousand rubles is valid indefinitely throughout Russia. Thus, the person who signed the contract in Ufa will receive 1.7 million, and in other military registration and enlistment offices of the region - 1.4 million.
Rospotrebnadzor has given permission to operate 80% of children's camps on the Black Sea coast, said the head of the agency, Anna Popova. According to her, sanitary and epidemiological conclusions were also received by children's recreation facilities in Anapa and the Temryuk district of Krasnodar Krai, but they were prohibited from using beaches and sea waters due to ongoing fuel oil emissions. (Mo: placing children’s camps on the BS coast puts them in danger: the Russians also use them as shields.)
Starting from September 1, 2026, Russian authorities will introduce a new mandatory propaganda subject into the school curriculum — “Spiritual and Moral Culture of Russia” (SMC), TASS reports . This “worldview course” will be taught by history teachers in grades 5–7, said Alexey Lubkov, rector of the Moscow State Pedagogical University (MPGU).
Children will be told about heroes of Russian history and their exploits in DNCR lessons, instilling in them “spiritual and moral values of Russian and Russian civilization,” the rector noted. “We are trying to make sure that these are not just values and heroes detached from the lives of our children, but images that are close to them and understandable for their age group. Therefore, perhaps the word “values” itself will be heard rarely, and to a greater extent we will talk about the main words in a child’s life,” Lubkov explained.
Indo-Pacific News: Philippines defence chief rips China officials in testy exchange. “To envision a China-led international order, we only need to look at how they treat their much smaller neighbours in the South China Sea, which runs counter to the ‘peaceful rise’ they initially promised,” Teodoro said.
Philippine Defense Secretary Gilberto Teodoro engaged in a testy back-and-forth with Chinese officials at a Singapore security forum on Sunday, accusing leaders in Beijing of grabbing territory in disputed waters and repressing their own people.
Teodoro thanked the pair for “propaganda spiels disguised as questions,” a line that received rare applause from those in attendance. He went on to lambast China’s territorial claims in the South China Sea.
“That deficit of trust, which I think any rational person — or any person that is not ideologically biased, with freedom of thought and freedom of speech — will agree with,” Teodoro said. He added that he couldn’t trust a country that “represses its own people.”
“To envision a China-led international order, we only need to look at how they treat their much smaller neighbours in the South China Sea, which runs counter to the ‘peaceful rise’ they initially promised,” Teodoro said.
In an interview with Bloomberg Television’s Haslinda Amin later on Sunday, Teodoro said China’s military was “grabbing territory in the South China Sea” and expanding its presence to the Arctic and off Australia. “For us, our biggest threat is China,” he said. “And on that, we converge not only with the United States but with other countries.”
China has built artificial islands with military infrastructure in contested waters to bolster its expansive claims. The Philippines has a “variety of options” in the event Beijing seizes a reef that’s close to Philippine shores. “We have to uphold our territorial integrity and sovereignty,” Teodoro said. “And we have devised options in our toolkit to deal with contingencies, and we plan for these and train for them accordingly.”
China Times: China is expanding cooperation with Sri Lanka and Bangladesh in areas such as industrial and supply chains during the visit of Chinese Commerce Minister Wang Wentao to the two countries, during which several cooperation documents were signed, according to press releases from the Chinese Ministry of Commerce. The visit once again highlights China’s open approach in cooperation with developing countries amid global economic and trade uncertainties, a Chinese expert said.
CT is a Chinese propaganda outlet run by the Chinese United Front Work Department, which is under the supervision of the Chinese Communist Party. All narratives are created and disseminated via CCP ‘guidance’. I include it here so that readers can understand the narratives that the CCP dictates when dealing with Western audiences. In the video below, follow Prof Anne Marie Brady’s lecture on the UFWD and its influence operations abroad. She is the world’s leading figure on Chinese influence operations.
Theresa Fallon: China seeks to undermine democracy, acquire new technology and quash dissent
Although almost all nation-states spy and seek influence, the scope and intensity of the PRC’s activities are overwhelming both in the United States and in Europe. FBI Director Christopher Wray testified before a U.S. Senate panel in 2021 that his agency opened a new China-related counterintelligence investigation in the U.S. every 12 hours on average, and that it had more than 2,000 such cases. Smaller intelligence services in Europe are confronted with a rising tide of influence cases and lack the language and regional expertise needed to effectively respond.
In the post-Cold War period, the PRC was not perceived as a threat because of the “end of history” mindset that asserted free-market economics would inevitably lead to democratization. In Germany, Wandel durch Handel — “change through trade” — was first used to describe the country’s trade approach toward Russia and then was repurposed for the PRC. What it did not anticipate was that increased trade with authoritarian regimes would introduce dangerous dependence and import corruption as well. Business interests and financiers lobbied on behalf of Beijing and eventually the PRC entered the World Trade Organization, which turbocharged its economy.
Belgium, which is home to NATO headquarters and most EU institutions, is a prime PRC influence target. Even though the Belgian State Security Service (VSSE) has increased the number of its staff to about 1,000, it continues to be challenged in monitoring ever-expanding foreign interference operations, especially from China and Russia. Compare this number with the PRC’s Ministry of State Security (MSS) department in Zhejiang, their center for European operations, with an estimated 5,000 intelligence officers.
At the time of this writing, the latest case concerned a Chinese aide to Maximilian Krah, a member of the European Parliament from the far-right Alternative for Germany party. The aide, Guo Jian, was arrested by German police on charges that he had been passing information about the European Parliament’s deliberations to China for years. He was also thought to be monitoring the Chinese diaspora community in Dresden. Such activities are often the work of the CCP United Front Work Department (UFWD).
Pro-China supporters gather during Chinese President Xi Jinping’s trip to Budapest, Hungary, on May 9, 2024. The Associated Press reported that Xi’s Hungarian visit was to “one of the few places in the European Union where his country is considered an indispensable ally rather than a rival.” REUTERS
In Europe…
Dutch PM steps down after Geert Wilders pulled his party from the ruling coalition in the Netherlands.
The Dutch prime minister Dick Schoof has stepped down from his post following Geert Wilders’s decision to quit the coalition government over a dispute about asylum and immigration policy.
The Dutch government, a coalition between Wilders’ anti-Islam Freedom party (PVV), the largest party, the populist Farmer-Citizens Movement (BBB), the centrist New Social Contract (NSC) and the liberal People’s Party for Freedom and Democracy (VVD), has now effectively collapsed.
Wilder’s decision will now mean snap elections will be called, although it is unclear when at this stage.
Germany: The remaining Russian "diplomats and agents" must be expelled from Germany, said Roderich Kiesewetter of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU), deputy head of the Bundestag's intelligence committee.
This is due to the growing number of cyberattacks and sabotage, the politician noted. He said that the attacks primarily come from Russia, which has accumulated an "arsenal of software and cyber warriors." "Russia has taken cyberwarfare to a new level in terms of the complexity and simultaneity of attacks, their volume, effectiveness and cost-effectiveness," the CDU representative emphasized. Kiesewetter recalled that the German government expelled 40 employees of the Russian diplomatic mission back in April 2022. However, in his opinion, these measures were insufficient.
DTEK to build one of Europe's largest energy storage facilities, company announces. Ukraine's largest private energy company DTEK secured a $72-million loan to build one of the largest battery energy storage complexes in Eastern Europe, the company said on June 3.
Poland: Zelensky's message to Nawrocki acknowledged the role Poland plays as a key neighbour, ally and hub for Western weapons sent to Kyiv. The Ukrainian president called Poland "a pillar of regional and European security."
While Nawrocki supports Ukraine in its fight against Russia, he is more critical of Zelenskyy than previous Polish leaders. He also opposes NATO membership for Kyiv - which has been a key sticking point.
Sky News Europe correspondent Adam Parsons wrote: "Poland is a crucial EU member - it has the sixth biggest budget in the bloc and it borders seven different countries, including Germany, Ukraine and the Russian territory of Kaliningrad. "Strategically, Poland is pivotal. Politically, it now looks volatile."
Following on from the announcement on Tuesday that a vote of confidence in the Polish government will take place on 11 June, the Polish prime minister Donald Tusk said the vote was due to a “new political reality” facing the country. He requested the vote after his political ally, the liberal Warsaw mayor, lost Poland’s weekend presidential election to conservative Karol Nawrocki.
Featured chapters nearly always include political extremism, terrorism, espionage, proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, protection of critical infrastructure and, since their emergence, sometimes also cyber threats.
Several paragraphs in the chapter “International Illicit Arms Trade and Proliferation” [“Internationaler Illegaler Waffenhandel und Proliferation”] have drawn international attention. The proliferation section deals with a number of states that can be described as partly or fully antagonistic to “the West”. In addition to Russia, China, Pakistan and North Korea, the Islamic Republic of Iran and its activities are described in the chapter. Regarding the Shia theocracy and its nuclear program, the report states:
In order to assert and enforce its political claims to regional power, the Islamic Republic of Iran is striving for comprehensive armament. Nuclear weapons are intended to make the regime untouchable and to expand and consolidate its dominance in the Middle East and beyond. The Iranian program to develop nuclear weapons is well advanced. An arsenal of ballistic missiles is ready to carry nuclear warheads over long distances. [Emphasis added]
All efforts to prevent Iran’s armament with sanctions and agreements have so far proved ineffective. On the contrary: the Islamic Republic of Iran is producing weapons and weapons delivery systems on a large scale—and not just for its own use. [p.158]
Iranian intelligence services are entrusted with the development and implementation of circumvention structures for the procurement of armaments, proliferation-relevant technologies, and materials for weapons of mass destruction. They use front companies and networks inside and outside the Islamic Republic of Iran for this purpose. In particular, the [Islamic] Revolutionary Guards Corps’ widely ramified and difficult to oversee company empire serves proliferation purposes. [p.159]
In other news…
E-Stories analyst, Francesca Lancini: “It seems that the leftist leader Lee Jae-myung will win with over 51% of the vote; the vote should bring stability but the country is deeply divided and Lee is a controversial, corrupt figure, let's hope he does not abandon his Western alliances.”
The Korea Times: The winner of this election will assume office immediately Wednesday — bypassing the customary 60-day transition period — with a presidential term set to continue until June 2030.
According to several opinion polls released Wednesday — the last day poll results were allowed to be published before the election — the liberal Democratic Party of Korea candidate Lee Jae-myung was polling between 45 and 49 percent, while conservative People Power Party candidate Kim Moon-soo trailed at around 36 percent. Lee Jun-seok of the minor conservative Reform Party stood at 9 to 10 percent, and Kwon Young-gook of the progressive Korean Democratic Labor Party was polling between 0.7 and 1 percent.
The Cipher Brief:Breaking Defense reports that the U.S. commercial satellite imagery industry is growing increasingly anxious about expected cuts to the U.S. government’s budget for space imagery.
The U.S. military, Intelligence Community and national weather organizations all buy commercial satellite imagery for their missions. The space-based photos cover everything from the battlefield in Ukraine to mercenary activity in Africa. And despite how important this imagery is, industry representatives say they are being warned of impending cuts.
Take the National Reconnaissance Office, which acquires space-based intelligence for warfighters and the rest of the IC. Industry representatives said the NRO is facing a cut of up to 30 percent to its funds for commercial imagery under its Electro-Optical Commercial Layer (EOCL) program, which includes contracts with Maxar Technologies, BlackSky and Planet. An NRO spokesperson had not commented on the reported cuts when we last checked. NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) are reportedly facing similar bad news.
U.S. officials warn that a decrease in the government’s intake of commercial space imagery could also be detrimental to military and IC operations. National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency Director Vice Admiral Frank Whitworth has repeatedly spoken with The Cipher Brief about the importance of private sector products, including when it comes to getting commercial satellite space imagery.
The Trump administration has offered Iran a nuclear deal that would allow limited low-level uranium enrichment on Iranian soil, according to Axios.
Under the latest proposal, which White House envoy Steve Witkoff reportedly delivered to Iran on Saturday, Tehran cannot build any new enrichment facilities and would have to "dismantle critical infrastructure for conversion and processing of uranium," Axios reported. Iran would have to stop new research and development of centrifuges, used for uranium enrichment. It would also be required to reduce its enrichment concentration to 3%, a level sufficient for a power plant but far short of the 90% enrichment level typical in nuclear weapons. Iran would additionally shut down its underground enrichment facilities, and its above-ground facilities would be limited to the level needed for nuclear reactor fuel, according to International Atomic Energy Agency guidelines.
Even if Iran agrees, the Trump administration would likely brook fierce opposition from Israel, where Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government has insisted that Iran cannot have the capability to enrich uranium at all. There may also be pushback from Capitol Hill from American lawmakers who strongly support Israel and agree with Netanyahu that the red line should be zero nuclear enrichment and full dismantlement of Iran's nuclear program.
WSJ: The Trump Organization Has Expanded Globally Since the 2024 Election. See Where.
Since the November election, the Trump Organization, the family’s flagship real-estate firm, and its partners have publicly announced 12 international projects including residential high-rises, hotels and golf courses—far outpacing the two overseas deals announced during his first administration.
The Trump Organization released an ethics agreement in January barring the company from doing business directly with foreign governments. Yet several of the deals involve foreign governments, especially in the Middle East.
The Trumps say there is a crucial distinction. The company isn’t transacting directly with foreign governments. Rather, some of the Trump deals are joint ventures with companies that are doing business with foreign governments.
The 12 developments were under contract before November, according to a Trump representative. Since Trump’s re-election, however, company executives say international partners are more eager to do business because the Trump name is now associated with his victory. “We’re the hottest brand in the world right now,” said Eric Trump, the president’s son who is running the Trump Organization on a day-to-day basis.
State-backed entities have also been involved in several recent Trump deals in the Gulf region, including a resort featuring luxury villas with private beach access in Qatar. The real-estate company is expanding beyond the property business, striking a $2 billion cryptocurrency deal with the United Arab Emirates state fund in May.
