South Asia
Italian Foreign Minister Luigi di Maio is currently in the middle of a three-day tour to India and is joined by other high-level officials and a business delegation. He will meet with External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar on Friday, when the pair will review the progress made on the Action Plan 2020-24 they initiated at their virtual meeting in November 2020. Di Maio will also meet Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal and co-chair a business round-table. Furthermore, he will meet Karnataka Chief Minister Basavaraj Bommai. According to a release by the Indian Ministry of External Affairs, the two countries will discuss collaboration in trade, defence and security, clean and green energy, and science and technology. [Indian Ministry of External Affairs]
Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif lamented that the country’s ranking on the Press Freedom Index dropped by 12 points last year and by 18 points over his predecessor Imran Khan’s entire tenure. He said the massive drop “placed our democracy in [a] bad light,” saying that Khan had “earned” the title of “press freedom predator.” In a list of 180 countries compiled by Reporters Without Borders, Pakistan is currently ranked at 157. [Associated Press of Pakistan]
Central Asia and the Caucasus
Armenia’s intelligence agency, the National Security Service (NSS), said on Wednesday that protesters calling for Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan’s resignation are planning to seize the parliament building in Yerevan. The NSS warned participants to refrain from committing illegal actions. Thousands of citizens have been protesting against the government over the possibility of Armenia recognising Azerbaijan’s sovereignty over the entire Nagorno-Karabakh region. [Armen Press]
Kyrgyz security forces detained 12 members of the banned Hizb ut-Tahrir Islamist group on Wednesday, authorities said. Officials said the members will be charged with organising and financially supporting an extremist group. Hizb ut-Tahrir is a London-based radical organisation that seeks to create an Islamic caliphate. Kyrgyzstan banned the group in 2003 and labelled it as extremist. [RFE/RL]
East and Southeast Asia
Myanmar’s Supreme Court on Wednesday rejected an appeal from deposed democratic leader Aung San Suu Kyi against a five-year jail sentence she was sentenced to last week on corruption charges. The dismissal further reduces any chance of a political comeback for Suu Kyi. The Nobel laureate has been charged with at least 18 offences, which carry a combined maximum jail term of nearly 190 years. [The Straits Times]
Japan sent a delegation from its ruling Liberal Democratic Party’s (LDP) Youth Division to Taiwan on Tuesday. The delegation is set to meet with President Tsai Ing-wen on Thursday morning. Experts cited by Chinese state media predict that their “delusional” discussion will be “aimed at dragging Taiwan island into the anti-mainland clique and reaching a consensus that the status quo must not be changed by force.” [Global Times]
Europe
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson will host his Japanese counterpart Fumio Kishida in London today as the two leaders prepare to expand their military partnership in the Indo-Pacific. Johnson has also named a new trade envoy to Japan and is expected to remove all remaining restrictions on food produce from Fukushima. According to a release by the PM’s office, they will also discuss how to reduce dependence on Russian oil and gas and how else to “exert maximum pressure on President Putin’s regime while supporting Ukraine and other European countries affected by the barbaric invasion.” [GOV.UK]
Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba on Wednesday accused Russia of “resorting to the missile terrorism tactics in order to spread fear across Ukraine.” Heavy missile assaults were reported in Kyiv, Cherkasy, Dnipro, Zaporizhzhia, and Mariupol. Russia claimed that it launched missiles from both air and sea, and targeted railway stations, fuel and ammunition depots, electricity grids, and Ukrainian troop strongholds. [Associated Press]
On Wednesday, the German Finance Minister Christian Lindner said his ministry is seeking to make legal amendments that make it easier to target individuals who have been sanctioned over their affiliation with Russia. Lindner said, “We are looking into whether those on sanctions lists could be legally obliged to disclose their assets in Germany.” Lindner’s comments come after the European Commission proposed a sixth package of sanctions against Russia that would target President Vladimir Putin and the country’s oil and banking sector. [Politico]
Latin America and the Caribbean
Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, the former Brazilian President and leading opposition candidate ahead of the election in October, said in an interview with Time Magazine that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is “as responsible as [Vladimir] Putin for the war,” adding, “Because, in war, there's not just one person guilty.” He acknowledged that “Putin shouldn't have invaded Ukraine,” but said that the United States and the European Union are also “guilty,” because they “could have avoided the invasion by stating that Ukraine would not join NATO.” Lula is currently leading incumbent President Jair Bolsonaro in polls. [Time]
Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador will begin a five-day tour to four Central American countries and Cuba today to talk about how they can reduce migration flows amid a huge influx into the United States. [Associated Press]
Middle East and North Africa (MENA)
Ten Burundian peacekeepers were killed during an attack by Somalia’s Al Shabaab terrorist group on an African Union (AU) military base in Mogadishu, Burundi’s army said on Wednesday. 25 soldiers were also injured in the attack, which was carried out a day earlier. The army claimed that 20 Al Shabaab militants were killed in the attack. [Africanews]
Russian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova claimed on Wednesday that Israeli mercenaries are fighting alongside the far-right Azov battalion in Ukraine. “Israeli mercenaries are practically shoulder to shoulder with Azov militants in Ukraine,” she said. Her comments came following tensions between Russia and Israel over Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov’s remarks that Adolf Hitler had Jewish blood. [Times of Israel]
North America
The United States (US) has begun expelling Cubans and Nicaraguans to Mexico under Title 42 authority, a public health legislation that authorities have used to expel migrants on the grounds of preventing the spread of COVID-19. Although the Biden administration claims that it is slowly retracting the policy, an unnamed US official has said that the government has an agreement with Mexico to deport 100 Cubans and 20 Nicaraguans per day between April 27 and May 22. Title 42 is due to expire May 23, unless a judge intervenes. [Voice of America]
The United States (US) central bank has announced its biggest interest rate hike in over two decades. The Federal Reserve said it was lifting its benchmark interest rate by half a percentage point to a range of 0.75-1%. With inflation in the country at a 40-year high, further hikes are expected. [BBC]
Oceania
Australian Defence Minister Peter Dutton announced a defence investment worth $1.45 billion to build three Extra Large Autonomous Undersea Vehicles for the Australian Navy amid rising tensions in the Indo-Pacific region. Dutton said the unmanned submarines would bolster the navy’s fleet and aid in maintaining peace in the region. The project will be co-funded by Anduril Australia, a military technology company, and completed over the next three years. [9 News]
Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison said the Solomon Islands remains “family” even after its leader Manasseh Sogavare slammed Australia for interfering in its security pact with China. Morrison noted that Australia remains the largest provider of development aid to the Solomon Islands and vowed to work “constructively” with the country. [Sky News]
Sub-Saharan Africa
Guinea’s attorney general has initiated legal proceedings against former President Alpha Condé, who was ousted via a military coup last September, over violence during his re-election for a third term in 2020. Condé won the highly disputed election after amending the constitution to remove term limits. He has now been charged with complicity in the violence and civil unrest that surrounded his re-election, including murder and assault, sexual violence, and forced disappearances. It is estimated that at least 50 people died in the run-up to the election and at least 17 people died after he secured another term. [Reuters]
Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari hosted United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres in Abuja on Wednesday. The pair discussed the country's fight against Islamist terror groups such as Boko Haram, which has caused the deaths of over 37,000 people and displaced more than two million since 2011. [CNN]