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Taiwan Detects 17 Chinese Military Assets Nearby - implications

Exclusive TV interview on 20 May 2025 with NewsX World, India's fastest-growing Enlgish-language global news TV channel claiming a total of 100 miliion viewers. 

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Live radio interview on BackChat, Radio Television Hong Kong (RTHK) on 16 May 2025

Comments on the China-brokered historic Saudi-Iran rapprochement

My comments on the China-brokered historic Saudi-Iran rapprochement are as follows –

The two main sects of Islam – Sunnis led by Saudi Arabia and Shiites led by Iran have common fundamental religious beliefs, exemplified by the “Five Pillars of Islam” -

• Shahada (Profession of Faith):Declaring that there is no god but Allah and that Muhammad is his messenger. 
• Salat (Prayer):Performing five daily prayers at specific times, facing Mecca. 
• Zakat (Charity):Giving a portion of one's wealth to the poor and needy. 
• Sawm (Fasting):Abstaining from food and drink from dawn to sunset during the month of Ramadan. 
• Hajj (Pilgrimage):If able, performing a pilgrimage to Mecca, visiting sacred sites, and observing rituals.

The Sunnis and Shiites have historically been split by other religious differences, sectarian conflicts and mutual rivalry for influence in the Middle East, the Levant and beyond. Their hostile relationships, often violent, waxed and waned, being shaped by seismic historical turnings including the rise and fall of the Ottoman Empire, the Iranian Revolution, and the US invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shia%E2%80%93Sunni_relations

What have been driving the historic rapprochement between Saudi Arabia and Iran in March 2023 are as much a reflection of President Xi’s art of diplomacy as the following game-changing geostrategic dynamics –

• Much of the continuing turmoil in the Middle East in recent decades have been caused or worsened by America’s hegemonic unilateralism. Witness the disastrous war on Iraq and Afghanistan. These only serve to destabilize the region and erode its economic development, affecting both Saudi Arabia and Irana’s long-term development interests.

• Emboldened by consistent American support driven by its powerful Jewish lobby, Israel is doubling down on eradicating Hamas, despite a global outcry against the ensuing humanitarian atrocities affecting hundreds and thousands of innocent Arab and Islamic lives, including many women, children and babies. while stifling the Palestinians’ long-fought demand for statehood, a cause finding common resonance amongst the Islamic and Arab communities worldwide, including Saudi Arabia and Iran. Both nations want to play an important role in solidarity for the revival of the Middle East as a more stable region for economic growth and prosperity.

• The United States is no longer the world’s biggest customer of fossil energy which both Saudi Arabia and Iran have in abundance. In fact, the U.S. is now a major competing energy exporter. Their biggest energy customer is now China. The Middle East’s America-centric petrodollar era is gone.

• In any case, the Age of Oil is coming to an end, not for lack of oil, similarly for the Age of Stone, as former Saudi Minister of Petroleum Sheik Yamani presciently forewarned. All Gulf countries have national 2030’s Vision Plans for economic renaissance pivoting away from oil to trade, investments, technologies, new energies, sustainable development, with global partnerships especially in the Asia-Pacific region where China is the world’s largest manufacturer and trader and the largest trading partner for over 120 countries worldwide, compared with some 58 for the United States. China is becoming increasingly tech-savvy. Witness China’s success in building and operating its own space station from scratch (and the recent emergence of its AI marvel DeepSeek).  

The rapprochement has game-changing implications for all parties concerned: China, Iran, Saudi Arabia, (and the United States) -

• For President Xi, the rapprochement would greatly facilitate the expansion of his signature Belt and Road Initiative, harking back to China's glorious past, which would cement his vision for a Global Community of Common Destiny, to be cemented by his Global Security Initiative, Global Development Initiative, and Global Civilization Initiative. 

• It would also strengthen one leg of a pivotal tri-parti partnership - China, Russia and Iran, pushed together by America's unwise aggression against all three countries, forming an "anti-hegemonic alliance" forewarned by the late Zbigniew Brzezinski, Henry Kissinger's mentor, in his seminal book The Grand Chessboard(page 55).

• For Iran, the founder of the Islamic Republic, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, supported good Sunni–Shia relations. (see Wikipedia note above), which unfortunately have been thwarted by internal and external upheavals over centuries. Now the arc of history is turning, fanning prospects of a much united Middle East to usher in another golden era of Islamic prosperity. 

• For Saudi Arabia, the assassination of the Washington Post journalist Jamal Khashoggi in 2018 soured relations with the United States, not helped by the reality that the US, now a net energy exporter, was no longer a big customer of Saudi oil. 

• Trump brokered the Abraham Accords to woo Saudi Arabia for a coalition with Israel against the latter's existential  enemy of Iran. However, as demonstrated by Trump's latest visit to the Kingdom, Saudi Arabia, while wanting to maintain good relations with the United States as a security umbrella (including US military presence within the Kingdom), doesn't want to sacrifice its hard-won rapprochement with Iran. Hence the outcome of Trump's latest Saudi visit was all about investments, walking back on the prospects of a re-energised anti-Iran Abraham Accord.

India-Pakistan military clashes over Kashmir

Live TV discussion on 9 May with NewsX World, India's fastest-growing global English-language world news channel claiming 100 million viewers.