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النسخة العربية
  • Politics
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  • China

Axel Rangel García

China's Gordian knot: why it has no good options in Iran

Caught between Iranian collapse, Gulf instability, and a closed Strait of Hormuz, Beijing faces a geopolitical dilemma with no neat solution

Shirley Ze Yu 15 April 2026
People shout slogans as they gather after a two-week ceasefire in the Iran war was announced, in Tehran, Iran, 8 April 2026. Majid Asgaripour / Reuters

US-Iran ceasefire unlikely to hold

If the ceasefire collapses, China has an interest in getting the two sides back to the table, but it would be a difficult task given Tehran's deep mistrust of the US and Israel.

Xiaotong Yang 08 April 2026
Tugboats help an oil tanker dock at Qingdao port in Shandong province, eastern China, on 4 August 2019. AFP

The US-Iran war could consolidate China’s energy dominance

Crises often reorder energy geopolitics in unexpected ways. This one may ultimately strengthen, rather than weaken, China's strategic position.

Jason Bordoff and Erica Downs 11 March 2026
Children watch the Indian Air Force (IAF) Surya Kiran aerobatics team performing during Aero India 2025, a military aviation exhibition at the Yelahanka Air Force Station in Bengaluru on 13 February 2025. Idrees MOHAMMED / AFP

India’s record defence budget turns heads

A $86.7bn budget, rapid naval expansion, and longer-range missile development underline New Delhi's drive to modernise its forces and compete more assertively with China and Pakistan

Shakir Husain 17 February 2026
AFP/Reuters/Al Majalla

Bigger than Maduro: Trump’s real designs on Latin America

Christophe Ventura, a French expert on Latin America, speaks to Al Majalla about Venezuela, Cuba, Colombia, and China's role in a continent that the US president considers his backyard.

Elie Kossaifi 11 February 2026
Burkina Faso's Capt. Ibrahim Traore, left, and Russian President Vladimir Putin shake hands before an official ceremony to welcome the leaders of delegations to the Russia Africa Summit in St. Petersburg, Russia, July 27, 2023

Why the ‘unreliable allies’ narrative doesn't track in Africa

A growing 'unreliable allies' narrative claims Russia and China are abandoning their African partners. The evidence suggests otherwise

Sergey Eledinov 08 February 2026
Russian President Vladimir Putin and his Iranian counterpart Masoud Pezeshkian after signing the association treaty in the Kremlin on 17 January 2025. AFP

What would regime change in Iran mean for Russia?

Moscow and Tehran cooperate militarily to an extent, but bilateral trade is low, and Russia doesn't consider Iran a strategic ally

Anton Mardasov 06 February 2026
Eduardo Ramon

The G7 gets serious about critical minerals

With China dominating the 'rare earths' needed to power the technology of the future, the West is playing catch-up in a race that began years ago. Finally, a plan is emerging.

Abdulfattah Khattab 20 January 2026
Gregori Saavedra

China’s grand strategy reaches a critical juncture

This could be a decisive year for Beijing as long-running strategies collide with harsher geopolitical realities. The outcomes will shape global power balances well beyond 2026.

Shirley Ze Yu 19 January 2026
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov meets China's Foreign Minister Wang Yi in Moscow on 2 December 2025. Ambassador Sylvie Bermann thinks Donald Trump will not drive a wedge between Moscow and Beijing. AFP

French diplomat Sylvie Bermann: Trump won’t divide Russia and China

The experienced French envoy had front-row seats as relations between Beijing and Moscow blossomed, but as she recalls from her days studying in China: it wasn't always so.

Elie Kossaifi 11 December 2025
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Nash
Business & Economy

The tiny waterway that put the global economy into a chokehold

18 April 2026

Disruption in the Hormuz can have major implications for global trade, but it also creates opportunities for smaller nations like Iran to become global political players

Steve Hewitt
Pete Reynolds
Politics

Glimpses of Bush's Iraq debacle appear in Trump's Iran war

15 April 2026

The Iraq war was viewed as disastrous in retrospect, while the Iran war was unpopular from the get-go. Al Majalla highlights the similarities and differences between the two.

Robert Ford
Al Majalla
Business & Economy

The US plan to turn Syria into an oil transit hub

16 April 2026

Pipelines have a chequered history in the Middle East, but the closure of the Strait of Hormuz has led US Tom Barrack to conclude that a new route through Syria could solve some problems.

Al Majalla - London
An Iranian woman flashes the V-sign as she takes part in a rally to pay tribute to women killed during war, in Tehran on 17 April 2026. AFP
Politics

Has Iran's ideology actually hardened?

16 April 2026

The change in tone and presentation of policy isn't a fundamental redirection, but rather the consolidation of a system under pressure

Alex Vatanka
Egyptian director Daoud Abdel Sayed holds two awards during the opening ceremony of the Alexandria Film Festival for Mediterranean Countries in the Egyptian port city of Alexandria, late on 14 September 2010. AMR AHMAD / AFP
Culture & Social Affairs

Daoud Abdel Sayed and the cinema of quiet rebellion

16 April 2026

Throughout his career, the renowned Egyptian film director challenged authority, rejected easy answers, and remained rooted in lived experience

Hazem Massoud

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OPINIONS

Iran’s strategic depth in Latin America: benefits and limits

Stefanie Butendieck Hijerra
Stefanie Butendieck Hijerra

Assessing the options for bypassing the Hormuz Strait

Alice Gower
Alice Gower

Ana Paula Maia: we are all, in some way, displaced

Nesrein El-Bakhshawangy

Hormuz games: Trump's blockade on Iran's blockade

Fares Garabet
Fares Garabet
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