Ethiopia: Global Weekly Roundup - Geopolitics, Economic Realignments, Historic Milestones and Climate Extremes Define the International Agenda - allAfrica.com

• The 75-year-old global refugee system, established by the Refugee Convention and Protocol, is facing a crisis of effectiveness as it struggles to adapt to modern geopolitical realities. • While 149 state parties officially maintain their commitment to the treaties, the author argues that these obligations are being "hollowed out" in practice.

• Professor Rodrigue Tremblay published an analysis on August 4, 2026, arguing that U.S. President Donald Trump is more corrupt and dangerous than corporate media portrayals suggest. • The piece focuses on Trump's conduct since his second inauguration on January 20, 2025, claiming his actions demonstrate a significant risk to governance.

• President Trump warned that Iran will be "hit very hard" if the Strait of Hormuz is not reopened soon to allow oil shipments to resume. • US Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent reported that talks are currently progressing to resolve the blockade.

• The Middle East is shifting toward "Energy Redundancy Diplomacy," a strategy focused on maintaining energy production, financing, and exports through multiple interchangeable systems. • This approach aims to ensure stability by creating backup infrastructures that can be activated when geopolitical disruptions occur.

• Former Israeli PM Naftali Bennett accused Benjamin Netanyahu of abandoning the goal of defeating Hamas and effectively handing control of Gaza to Qatar. • The IDF is tightening its strike policy in Gaza, now requiring the chief of staff's explicit approval for certain operations.

Joshua Bonehill-Paine, who was convicted of harassing Jewish MP, says Badenoch has offered him advisory role instead• UK politics live – latest updatesA former neo-Nazi activist who was convicted of harassing a Jewish MP has withdrawn as a Conservative election candidate after his selection prompted an outcry from Jewish groups and others.Joshua Bonehill-Paine said on Wednesday he had withdrawn from next year’s local elections, and that Kemi Badenoch had instead offered him a role as an advisor to her party’s culture and integration commission, specifically focusing on how young men become radicalised. Continue reading...

Activist who rallied around a datacenter moratorium will face incumbent Republican Tom Barrett in NovemberUS politics live – latest updatesWilliam Lawrence, a prominent environmental organizer who foregrounded his support for a datacenter moratorium, has won the Democratic primary in Michigan’s seventh congressional district in a victory for progressives.Lawrence was a co-founder of the youth-led climate justice organization the Sunrise Movement, the group that in 2018 mainstreamed calls for a Green New Deal to battle economic injustice while rapidly phasing out planet-warming fossil fuels. The 36-year-old defeated Bridget Brink, a former US ambassador to Ukraine and Slovakia, and Matt Maasdam, a former US Navy Seal and military aide to Barack Obama. Continue reading...

If the progressive wins Michigan’s general election, it could redefine the 2028 presidential contest. If he fails, the establishment will call him a cautionary taleUS politics live – latest updatesIn the final stretch of the state’s Democratic primary for US Senate, Abdul El-Sayed challenged voters at a small event in rural Michigan to think about the message they could send the rest of the country when they cast their ballots.“Who are we? Who do we want to be?” El-Sayed said. “Do we want a state that’s defined by how much money corporations brought in to tell us what we couldn’t have? Or do we want to be a state where we demonstrate to the rest of the country what’s possible when you build a movement of, by, and for the people?” Continue reading...

Lahore police official says all personnel were responsible for preventing and reporting wrongdoing at stationThe alleged rape of a 20-year-old woman with intellectual disabilities in a police station in Lahore, Pakistan has prompted authorities to suspend all 78 police officers and staff at the precinct, in one of the country’s biggest-ever disciplinary actions against its police force.The woman alleges that an assistant sub-inspector apprehended her, took her to Ghaziabad police station, and raped her in a room on the second floor. The woman’s family said she disappeared on the street, before returning home in tears and stating that she had been sexually assaulted at the station. Continue reading...

New data shows the federal government scheme has been used by high-income borrowers, including one couple earning an annual $674,000Get our breaking news email, free app or daily news podcastThe government’s 5% deposit scheme for first home buyers has enabled the purchase of nearly 1,500 properties that were turned into investments, new data shows.The scheme is also helping hundreds of Australians earning more than $300,000 a year, after Labor stopped excluding high-income borrowers. Continue reading...

Add-on fees such as the new overhead locker baggage charge can make it harder to compare air fares, experts sayGet our breaking news email, free app or daily news podcastCut-price fares may now be merely a facade for seemingly endless add-on fees after Jetstar’s new carry-on luggage charge meant the airline joined a growing number monetising basic services in the sky.The new structure, announced by Qantas’s low-cost carrier on Wednesday, will mean from next year tickets will only include one “under seat bag”, such as a backpack, handbag or laptop bag. Continue reading...

The narratives of the right are seeping into mainstream EU policy, and Spain finds itself increasingly isolated in its humanitarian stance on borders• Don’t get This Is Europe delivered to your inbox? Sign up hereIt was over almost as quickly as it began. But the human cost of the mayhem in Ceuta over the last seven days, and the disunity it exposed within the EU, will take a lot longer to fix.To recap: more than 70,000 people swam or waded into the tiny Spanish enclave in north Africa from neighbouring Morocco in a matter of hours at the end of last week. The exact circumstances in which the heavily securitised border came suddenly to be open are still unclear. Continue reading...