Ukraine, environment to top agenda as Biden meets UK politicians and royalty

NATO leaders have celebrated their unity in the face of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. However, this will be tested at the alliance’s annual summit in Vilnius, Lithuania, next week.

South Korean opposition lawmakers have sharply criticized the head of the United Nations nuclear watchdog over his approval of Japanese plans to release treated wastewater from the damaged Fukushima nuclear power plant.

What comes to mind when you hear the phrase Y2K? Here’s a hint: It’s no longer a computer glitch that could have caused the world to collapse in late 1999.

With the Earth breaking average heat records, cities are sure to take a fresh look at their plans to prepare for temperatures that can kill.

While not a full state visit with military honors and palace banquet, the royal stamp and backdrop of the 1,000-year-old castle help underline the importance of the proven transatlantic “special relationship” by Brexit but strengthened by unity The Russian invasion of Ukraine.

Sunak and the president will hold talks focused on Ukraine before both attend this week’s NATO meeting in Vilnius, which will discuss how broad the military alliance should be. open the door to Ukraine. NATO leaders said in 2008 that Ukraine would become a member, but have set no roadmap, despite President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s impassioned pleas.

“This is an area where the US hesitates a bit more than many other NATO allies,” said Julie Norman, co-director of the Center on US Politics at University College London. “There may be some discussions behind closed doors about where the UK stands before we go into the whole (NATO) meeting.”

The United States and the United Kingdom are among Kiev’s staunchest Western defenders. Norman said that “if the United Kingdom has taken a bit of a lead on some of the military commitments,” he pushed the Biden administration to go further on issues such as tanks and an international effort to give Ukraine fighter jets. F-16 fighter.

“I think in some ways that has worked to Biden’s advantage, as he’s gotten more resistance at home from some wings of the Republican Party for not giving excessive aid to Ukraine,” he said. “The fact that the UK is pushing and leading this gives Biden some momentum and some strong ally support going forward.”

Biden is facing dismay from allies, including the UK, over his decision to donate to Ukraine dispersion bombswhich are banned under a convention signed by more than 120 countries, including Britain, Sunak said on Saturday that Britain “discourages their use”.

Determined to show unity among Ukraine’s allies, Britain has refrained from complaining about its failure to secure Washington’s support for Defense Secretary Ben Wallace to become the next head of NATO. Instead, the mandate of the current Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg has been extended by one year.

The transatlantic relationship has been strained in recent years by Britain’s departure from the European Union, an act Biden has made clear he believes harmed Britain.

The president, who proudly celebrates his Irish roots, was particularly concerned about the impact of Brexit on the Northern Ireland peace process. Washington was relieved when Britain and the EU reached a deal in February to resolve a thorny dispute over trade rules for Northern Ireland, the only part of the UK that shares a border with an EU member .

Biden briefly visited Belfast in April to mark 25 years of Northern Ireland’s Good Friday peace agreement, before spending several days visiting ancestral towns in the Republic of Ireland. He upset some in the UK by later saying he had visited Northern Ireland to make sure “the British hadn’t screwed up”.

While some UK conservatives are sensitive to the Democratic president’s perceived slights, this is Biden’s sixth meeting with Sunak, who has been in office since October. The British leader visited Washington last month, with an “Atlantic Declaration” promising closer economic cooperation in areas such as artificial intelligence, clean energy and critical minerals.

This was a consolation for the UK’s failure to secure a free trade deal with the US, a now-buried dream of Brexit supporters.

For Sunak, being by the US president’s side offers a brief respite from his growing domestic woes over a stuttering economy and a fractious party. Like Biden, he faces an election trial next year, with a deadline of late 2024 to call national elections. UK inflation of 8.7% in the year to May, double the US rate, is putting millions under a cost-of-living squeeze, with ruling Tories falling behind of Labor in opinion polls.

It’s also a profile moment for 74-year-old Charles. Biden attended the funeral of the late queen in September, but he didn’t get there The coronation of Charles in May, sending first lady Jill Biden.

Charles lacks the star power of his mother, who met 13 US presidents and made more than 100 state visits during her 70 years on the throne. But he has built a reputation as an environmental advocate, fighting to protect wildlife and combat climate change long before it became popular.

“Charles is an important figure in the world of green energy and climate,” said George Gross, royal historian at King’s College London. “He’s a very well-known face. So I don’t think there’s any downside (to) a president of the United States being photographed next to him.”

Gross said the British monarch has no real political power, but “a great deal of soft power” because many world leaders want to experience the royal mystique.

“There are things that the UK government can push for Charles, if he wants to, that can be said and talked about in a way that the prime minister can’t do in the same way,” he said.