Welcome again to World Temporary, the place we’re escalating tensions over U.S. President Donald Trump’s threats towards Greenland, Venezuela’s crackdown on political dissent, and sweeping protests in Iran.
The Battle Over Greenland
The leaders of seven NATO members issued a joint assertion on Tuesday pushing again towards U.S. ambitions to annex Greenland, which is a semi-autonomous area of Denmark.
“The Kingdom of Denmark — together with Greenland — is a part of NATO. Safety within the Arctic should subsequently be achieved collectively, along side NATO allies together with the US, by upholding the rules of the UN Constitution, together with sovereignty, territorial integrity and the inviolability of borders,” wrote the leaders of Denmark, France, Germany, Italy, Poland, Spain, and the UK.
“Greenland belongs to its individuals,” they added. “It’s for Denmark and Greenland, and them solely, to resolve on issues regarding Denmark and Greenland.”
The rebuke echoes a few of the strongest statements but made by Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen, who advised native broadcasters on Monday that NATO should take Trump’s annexation threats critically or else danger the alliance’s very survival.
“If the US have been to decide on to assault one other NATO nation, then all the pieces would come to an finish,” Frederiksen mentioned. “The worldwide neighborhood as we all know it, democratic guidelines of the sport, NATO, the world’s strongest defensive alliance—all of that will collapse if one NATO nation selected to assault one other.”
Trump has lengthy expressed curiosity in buying Greenland. “We’d like Greenland from the standpoint of nationwide safety,” Trump advised reporters aboard Air Pressure One on Sunday. The island is thought for its huge crucial mineral deposits and its strategic location within the Arctic.
All through 2025, the White Home exerted a strain marketing campaign on each Greenland and Denmark to pursue its targets. In March, a high-level U.S. delegation traveled to the island to showcase Trump’s eagerness to amass the territory. In August, Danish media reported that people with ties to Washington seemed to be making an attempt to “infiltrate Greenlandic society” to attempt to weaken its relationship with Denmark. And final month, Trump appointed Louisiana Gov. Jeff Landry, a MAGA loyalist, to be a particular envoy to Greenland.
Below a 1951 settlement between the US and Denmark, Washington already has expansive entry to the territory, together with the presence of a U.S. army base on the island.
Nonetheless, although, the Trump administration has refused to rule out utilizing army pressure or financial coercion to realize its goals. And with the US deposing Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro on Saturday and threatening intervention in a number of different nations, many NATO members are involved that Trump is pushing a brand new world order that will enable the US to grab overseas territory and assets—whereas solely being beholden to the whims of its personal nationwide pursuits.
“We reside in a world … that’s ruled by power, that’s ruled by pressure, that’s ruled by energy,” U.S. deputy chief of employees Stephen Miller advised CNN on Monday. “No one’s going to battle the US militarily over the way forward for Greenland.”
That seems to immediately contradict Tuesday’s joint assertion, through which NATO members demanded that Washington uphold the rules of the United Nations Constitution. “These are common rules, and we is not going to cease defending them,” the leaders wrote.
Immediately’s Most Learn
What We’re Following
Crushing dissent. Tensions look like escalating in Venezuela following the U.S. seize of Maduro over the weekend. Below interim chief Delcy Rodríguez, Maduro’s No. 2, authorities authorities revealed a decree increasing the presidency’s powers and ordering safety forces to detain “any particular person concerned within the promotion or help” of the U.S. operation.
Throughout the nation, Rodríguez has deployed cops, army troops, and pro-Maduro armed teams often known as “colectivos” to execute the federal government crackdown, together with with armed checkpoints and compelled searches. Already, at the least 14 journalists working inside or close to the nation’s Nationwide Meeting in Caracas have been quickly detained—eliciting condemnation from rights activists and media professionals.
“Delcy Rodriguez … is without doubt one of the essential architects of torture, persecution, corruption, narcotrafficking,” Venezuelan opposition determine María Corina Machado mentioned in an interview with Fox Information on Monday, calling the crackdown “actually alarming.” Machado has vowed to return to Venezuela as quickly as attainable to assist set up free and truthful elections.
Machado went into hiding—and finally, self-imposed exile—after being barred from working within the 2024 presidential election; impartial vote screens argue that her ally Edmundo González rightfully gained that contest.
Lethal protests in Tehran. Iranian protesters clashed with safety forces on Tuesday over the nation’s ailing financial system. Demonstrations first erupted on Dec. 28, 2025, at Tehran’s Grand Bazaar after inflation charges soared and the nation’s foreign money plummeted; on Tuesday, the rial hit a report low of 1.46 million to the U.S. greenback. In an effort to appease Iranians, Tehran introduced plans on Monday to present most residents a month-to-month stipend equal to roughly $7.
A minimum of 36 individuals have been killed because the demonstrations started, and greater than 1,200 others have been detained. Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian ordered the federal government on Tuesday to analyze one protest incident however has in any other case appeared to indicate that the scenario was progressing out of his management. “We should always not anticipate the federal government to deal with all of this alone,” Pezeshkian mentioned. “The federal government merely doesn’t have that capability.”
On Friday, Trump threatened U.S. intervention in Iran if authorities authorities used pressure towards the demonstrators. “If Iran pictures and violently kills peaceable protesters, which is their customized, the US of America will come to their rescue,” the U.S. president wrote on Fact Social. Iranian officers have denounced any U.S. involvement.
Looking for safety ensures. Ukraine’s Western allies convened in Paris on Tuesday to suggest binding safety ensures for Kyiv. In line with a press release ready forward of the session, “these commitments might embrace the usage of army capabilities, intelligence and logistical help, diplomatic initiatives, adoption of further sanctions.”
The draft textual content reveals a shift within the focus of the coalition of the prepared, a bunch of greater than 30 nations dedicated to Ukraine’s safety. Whereas previous conferences have prioritized army support pledges, many European leaders are actually arguing that higher significance must be positioned on safety ensures, as these will likely be obligatory to forestall Russia from attacking Ukraine sooner or later or increasing its aggression farther into the continent.
France has tried to color the presence of U.S. particular envoy Steve Witkoff and Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner at Tuesday’s session as a signal of U.S. help for the coalition’s plans. Nevertheless, the White Home’s typically temperamental angle towards Ukraine means that it might take extra for the US to completely log out.
Odds and Ends
New 12 months, new costs. Starting Jan. 1, Chinese language authorities imposed a value-added tax to contraceptive medication and units, together with condoms, in an effort to reverse low birthrates which are threatening to gradual the nation’s already sluggish financial system. The 13 p.c levy is the primary of its form in additional than 30 years. And it provides to a sequence of different authorities measures aimed toward countering inhabitants decline brought on by Beijing’s decades-long one-child coverage. That’s a technique of doing it, pun meant.
