Welcome again to the penultimate 2025 version of International Coverage’s State of affairs Report, as we method the vacation break and begin looking forward to a probable even busier 2026.
Right here’s what’s on faucet for the day: Humanitarian assist staff are struggling to do their jobs, U.S. President Donald Trump and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi maintain a cellphone name, and European leaders weigh in on Ukraine peace negotiations.
Assist businesses and humanitarian staff working in battle zones are going through historic challenges which are making it more durable to soundly and adequately present help to a number of the world’s most susceptible individuals.
Working within the humanitarian sector has turn out to be more and more harmful in recent times—2024 was the deadliest yr on report for assist staff, with 383 killed, and 2025 could also be worse. With a number of weeks left within the yr, there have already been 326 assist staff killed, in keeping with the Assist Employee Safety Database.
The hazards are notably pronounced in Gaza. Almost half of the help staff killed in 2024 have been within the coastal enclave, and this pattern has continued into 2025. In only one incident again in March, 15 emergency staff have been killed by Israeli forces in southern Gaza.
“I actually fear so much in regards to the security and safety of my groups,” Tjada D’Oyen McKenna, the CEO of Mercy Corps who leads a crew of greater than 4,300 humanitarian staff, mentioned throughout an interview on the Doha Discussion board.
McKenna expressed concern in regards to the “demonization of assist,” saying there’s been an evident erosion of area and respect for “humanitarian legislation and norms” throughout the globe in addition to “much more open, flagrant atrocities” dedicated by a wide range of gamers in battle zones worldwide.
Hostile governments. From Gaza to Sudan and past, limitations to the motion of each personnel and assist additionally proceed to make delivering help troublesome. Although a cease-fire has been declared in Gaza, assist businesses working there are nonetheless struggling to do their jobs. “The humanitarian state of affairs in Gaza stays dire on account of the 2 years battle, the restrictions on the help entry, the entry of meals, [and] the famine that was declared,” Tamara Alrifai, UNRWA’s director of communications, mentioned throughout an interview on the Doha Discussion board.
“The cease-fire comes with a situation for round 600 vans of meals and different provides per day. We’re very distant from that determine for a wide range of causes. Whereas the amount and the standard of what’s going into the strip have elevated and improved, they’re nonetheless very distant from the minimal requirement,” Alrifai added.
UNRWA, which has been banned in Israel and just lately had its East Jerusalem headquarters raided by Israeli authorities, continues to function in Gaza, the occupied West Financial institution, and different locations within the Center East, offering assist, education, well being care, and different providers to tens of millions of Palestinians. Israel has accused the United Nations company of being “infiltrated by Hamas,” a declare that UNRWA rejects. The Trump administration can be now reportedly contemplating placing terrorism-related sanctions on the company.
The “yellow line” that Israeli forces pulled again to in Gaza, dividing the territory, as a part of the cease-fire provides yet one more complication to doing humanitarian work there. “UNRWA is working within the crimson zone whereas acknowledging that the state of affairs may be very fluid, and the strains hold shifting every single day,” Alrifai mentioned.
Trump’s assist cuts. Assist organizations are additionally going through severe challenges introduced on by main cuts to U.S. international assist below Trump.
On account of these cuts, in addition to diminished assist from Europe, the U.N., which closely depends on donations from member states to fund humanitarian help, has minimize its fundraising objective for 2026 in half. “We’re overstretched, underfunded, and below assault,” Tom Fletcher, the United Nations under-secretary-general for humanitarian affairs, mentioned in a press briefing on Dec. 3.
It’s estimated that tens of millions may die on account of the U.S. international assist cuts. The Trump administration’s dismantling of United States Company for Worldwide Growth has already resulted in a whole bunch of hundreds of deaths, in keeping with one estimate.
The issues tied to U.S. funding cuts are particularly obvious in Sudan, assist teams say, the place a civil conflict has fomented one of many world’s worst humanitarian crises.
Mercy Corps has “at all times been underfunded” for the response in Sudan, McKenna mentioned, however assist is required there now greater than ever. “Folks want the funding. They want to have the ability to purchase meals, and medication, and provides for his or her households,” McKenna mentioned. “The worldwide funding state of affairs simply continues to be a pressure on that.”
Kirsten Hillman, Canada’s ambassador to america and its high bilateral commerce negotiator, introduced this week that she shall be stepping down in 2026 after greater than eight years in Washington. “It has been the best privilege of my skilled life to have served and represented Canada and Canadians throughout this vital interval in Canada-U.S. relations,” she wrote in a letter saying her resolution.
Florida Rep. Anna Paulina Luna hosted Alexander Darchiev, the Russian ambassador to Washington, at her Christmas reception on Capitol Hill. “Proceed working to make Russian-American relations nice once more!” the Russian embassy posted on X with a photograph of Luna and Darchiev collectively.
The Trump administration plans to nominate a U.S. two-star common to command the worldwide stabilization power devoted to peacekeeping in Gaza, Axios reported.
What ought to be excessive in your radar, if it isn’t already.
Trump-Modi name. The gradual thaw between Washington and New Delhi seems to be progressively progressing, with Modi talking with Trump on the cellphone Thursday. Modi described the dialog as “heat and interesting” in a submit on X, including that the 2 nations would “proceed to work collectively for international peace, stability and prosperity.” Trump, as of this writing, has not publicly acknowledged the decision.
It stays to be seen whether or not the dialog shall be sufficient to clinch an India-U.S. commerce deal that has remained out of attain, with Indian exports to america nonetheless topic to the 50 p.c tariffs that Trump imposed over New Delhi’s purchases of Russian oil. A U.S. State Division crew, led by Undersecretary of State Allison Hooker, visited New Delhi earlier this week to debate “key bilateral points,” together with commerce, protection, and vitality cooperation, the Indian Embassy in Washington mentioned in a press release.
Trump takes a tanker. The USA on Wednesday seized an oil tanker carrying Venezuelan crude certain for Cuba, opening up a brand new entrance within the Trump administration’s escalating marketing campaign towards Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro. U.S. Lawyer Normal Pam Bondi mentioned in a submit that the tanker has been topic to U.S. sanctions for a number of years for its position in transporting “sanctioned oil from Venezuela and Iran.”
The tanker seizure follows months of U.S. army strikes on alleged drug trafficking boats off the coast of Venezuela and the specter of further land strikes within the nation. When requested what america plans to do with the oil from the tanker, Trump mentioned, “We hold it, I assume.”
Tens of hundreds of protesters reveal towards the federal government in Sofia, Bulgaria, on Dec. 10. The anti-corruption protests resulted within the resignation of Bulgarian Prime Minister Rossen Zhelyazkov and his cupboard.Dobrin Kashavelov/AFP through Getty Pictures
Because the Trump administration continues to push for a Russia-Ukraine peace deal, SitRep spoke to present and former European officers on the sidelines of occasions in Doha, Qatar, and Washington to get their tackle the efforts.
“There aren’t any peace talks” for the time being, Norwegian International Minister Espen Barth Eide mentioned bluntly on the Doha Discussion board. “There are talks between the U.S., Ukraine, and Europe, however they aren’t at conflict.” These talks, whereas helpful, are “only a platform,” Barth Eide added, “after which the peace talks will begin—as a result of the peace talks, on the finish of the day, must be between those that are at conflict, and that’s Russia and Ukraine.”
Former Estonian President Kersti Kaljulaid expressed issues about Ukraine being compelled into an unfavorable deal. “Ukrainians should have a say, and so they should make the choice. Our job is to create circumstances for them to be free in making that call,” she mentioned on the Aspen Safety Discussion board in Washington. “If the Ukrainian persons are disillusioned with any peace association, Russia may have that nation for breakfast just by messing with its democratic course of, which shall be troublesome sufficient after this sort of cease-fire,” she added.
Monday, Dec. 15 The European Union’s international affairs council meets.
Qatar hosts a U.N. anti-corruption convention.
China holds a month-to-month press convention on its financial information.
Tuesday, Dec. 16 Argentina releases GDP figures for the third quarter of the yr.
Thursday, Dec. 18 The European Council leaders’ summit convenes.
Central banks within the European Union and United Kingdom launch rate of interest selections.
$10.5 billion—the shortfall in army assist that Ukraine is about to face in 2025 in comparison with the annual common assist since Russia invaded in 2022, in keeping with a brand new report by the Kiel Institute, a German assume tank. That scarcity is essentially as a result of Trump administration’s halt of U.S. assist to Ukraine. Though European nations have stepped up with $38 billion in assist to date this yr, it hasn’t been sufficient to offset the U.S. pullback.—Sam Skove
“I perceive why China [would] do that. I don’t perceive why the U.S. is attempting to do that.”
—Yehor Cherniev, head of the Ukrainian delegation to the NATO parliamentary meeting, talking at an occasion in Washington, referring to efforts to “rebalance” the post-World Conflict II liberal order that america helped create.
