The safety of all 24 crew members “has been secured” after the attack on a Kuwaiti oil tanker, the Dubai media office is saying. Authorities in the UAE city are continuing firefighting operations after the incident “involving a drone”, it has posted on social media, while confirming no injuries were recorded.
Dotted across the mountainous roads of Sichuan and just a few hours’ drive from some of China’s most bustling cities, the crumbling ruins of an abandoned military experiment are eerily quiet. Top secret factories that once housed thousands of workers are now overgrown with vegetation; nearby villages, empty of young people who were once shipped in from across the country to build China’s future, are plastered with advertisements for hearing aids and, in once case, a bundle deal on coffins. Millions of workers were deployed to these remote mountain locations as part of a huge defence program that stayed secret for over a decade. The factories in south-west China were once part of its grandest industrial strategy project to date. Launched by Mao Zedong in 1964, the ambitious national defence program mobilised 15 million people to fortify China’s defences against the possibility of an attack from its cold war enemy, the United States, or from the Soviet Union, whose relationship with China was becoming increasingly strained. It attracted more than 200bn yuan of government investment, and took place nearly entirely in secret for around 15 years. The project was called the Third Front. Mao’s idea was to create a third line of national defence facilities that were less exposed than the “first front” of factories on China’s east coast and the “second front”, which referred to smaller inland cities behind the first front. The Third Front project placed factories in remote, mountainous regions of Sichuan province, as well as in other inland provinces such as Gansu and Ningxia, far from the reach of any potential invading forces. In Sichuan, many of the factories are shielded by the natural fortress of the Huaying mountain range, whose peaks crest in the distance. After Mao’s death in 1976, and as relations with the US warmed, the factories were gradually abandoned. In 1985, China’s leader Deng Xiaoping declared: “There will be no large-scale war for a fairly long time … after analysing the general trends in the world and the environment around us, we have changed our view that the danger of war is imminent.” Fearing a war with either the Soviet Union or the US, Mao’s program mobilised 15 million people to fortify China’s defences. Now, as relations between Beijing and Washington sour, Deng’s words seem quaint. China is once again turning to its Third Front heartlands to build a national defence program capable of foiling any US attack. In some areas of military strength, China may already be ahead. Recent reports based on satellite imagery show that China appears to be building up its nuclear arsenal near the old factories. In July 2024, the Communist party leadership passed a resolution to “develop China’s strategic hinterland and ensure backup plans for key industries,” a reference to using China’s remote inland provinces to boost the country’s resilience against the threat of invasion or isolation from international markets. Xi Jinping, China’s most powerful leader since Mao, has put national self-resilience at the core of his ideology. In 1964, the year that Mao launched the Third Front, China conducted its first nuclear weapons test. Now it is estimated to have 600 warheads, with the US government expecting that number to more than double in the next decade. Much of that nuclear build-up is taking place in the remote regions that once hosted the Third Front. Although China still spends significantly less on its military than the US does, the gap is shrinking. According to the Center for Strategic and International Studies, in 2012, the year that Xi took power, China’s defence spending was one-sixth that of the US’s. By 2024, that figure had risen to a third, at $317.6bn. “The thing that’s different than before is that China is in such a stronger position than it was before,” says Covell Meyskens, a China historian at Naval Postgraduate School, a US Navy funded university, who has written a book about the Third Front. “They’re trying to build up their ability to make sure they have a second strike capability against the United States. Before, they had no strike capability”. Second strike capability refers to the ability of a nuclear-armed state to respond to a nuclear attack with a counterstrike. In the 1960s, China was “a very poor third world country”. Now, at least in the western Pacific, “China is a peer. They could fight us either to win or stand still,” Meyskens says (his comments do not represent the view of the US Navy). A key difference between 2026 and 1964 is how intertwined the US and Chinese economies are, something that should in theory reduce the risk of a conflict erupting. But as a trade war has seen both sides, especially Beijing, leverage the export of vital commodities such as rare earths, policymakers in Beijing and Washington have been working on disentangling their supply chains, reducing the mutual dependence. In Sichuan, many of the factories are shielded by the natural fortress of the Huaying mountain range, whose peaks crest in the distance. Millions of workers were deployed to these remote mountain locations to help fortify China’s defences. One man who still lives near the empty ruins of Huaguang instrument factory, which made military lasers, says that “very few” people are left in his neighbourhood; most of the apartments in the dilapidated buildings are empty. “Back in 1990s, it was prosperous, a lot of people were here,” he says. “People have more money now, so they’re all heading to the cities.” Hongguang instrument factory is now carpeted in rows of cabbages and canola. Nearby, Hongguang instrument factory, which opened in 1966, was built to manufacture fighter jets and housed nearly 2,000 workers. Now it is carpeted in rows of cabbages and canola, harvested by an elderly farmer who carries his crop in a traditional woven basket. It is as if the slingshot of China’s industrial ambition briefly flew the locals into the future, before they ricocheted back to a slower, pastoral, existence. An elderly farmer carries his crop in a traditional woven basket. Despite the huge levels of investment, the factories were largely abandoned or transformed into civilian operations in the 1970s, as relations with the west warmed. China no longer feared being attacked, and started focusing on economic development. “Why would you have a car factory in a cave 300 miles away from any sort of major city? It [didn’t] make any sense economically,” says Meyskens. Xi has prioritised self-sufficiency and greatness on the world stage. His rhetoric echoes Mao’s dreams of making China a global superpower, but at a time when that dream can become a reality. China’s arms imports fell by more than 70% between 2021–2025 compared to the previous five years, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, thanks to increased domestic capacity. Six decades on, the ideas behind the Third Front are being revived, along with, some fear, the geopolitical environment. “It’s definitely going back to the hostile,” says Meyskens. “We’re in some sort of cold war”. The goal, he says, is to keep the war cold. Better to have munitions factories that are crumbling than cranking out new supplies. Additional research by Lillian Yang
Donald Trump has threatened to “obliterate” Iran’s power stations and fresh water plants if Tehran does not agree to peace terms “shortly”, even as he claimed diplomatic progress in ending the war that was instigated by the US and Israel. Tehran has remained defiant during the month-long conflict, describing US peace proposals as “excessive, unrealistic and irrational” and firing waves of missiles at Israel. The risk of further escalation, including a US ground operation to seize Kharg Island, continued to send tremors through financial markets. Oil prices are on course for a record monthly rise. In a post on his Truth Social network, Trump expressed confidence that a negotiated settlement would soon be reached, adding that the US was in “serious discussions” with what he characterised quixotically as “a more reasonable regime” in Tehran. But he said if a deal was not struck – including to reopen the strait of Hormuz shipping lane – US forces would destroy “all of their Electric Generating Plants, Oil Wells and Kharg Island (and possibly all desalinization plants!)”. Destroying civilian infrastructure such as power and water facilities would be illegal under international humanitarian law and would probably constitute a war crime. Later on Monday, the White House press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, said Trump would be willing to ask Arab countries to help foot the bill for the Iran war. “I think it’s something the president would be quite interested in calling them to do,” she told reporters. “It’s an idea that I know that he has.” The proposal adds a striking new dimension to the warfare, suggesting Washington may seek to offload war costs on to the very Gulf states now scrambling to broker a peace deal. The US president’s social media post and indications from the White House press team came amid continued garbled messaging. In an interview with the Financial Times, Trump said his preference would be to “take the oil in Iran”, which analysts believe would require using US troops to seize Kharg Island, the terminal through which nearly all of Iran’s oil exports pass. Esmail Baghaei, the Iranian foreign ministry spokesperson, on Monday acknowledged Tehran had received a 15-point proposal from the Trump administration after talks on Sunday between the foreign ministers of Pakistan, Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Turkey. However, he said there had been no direct negotiations with Washington, adding that the US demands were “excessive, unrealistic and irrational”. Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, Iran’s parliamentary speaker, dismissed the talks in Islamabad as cover for more US troops being brought to the region, adding that Iranian forces were “waiting for the arrival of American troops on the ground to set them on fire and punish their regional partners for ever”, according to state media. Human rights groups criticised Trump’s threat of punitive strikes on civilian infrastructure. Erika Guevara-Rosas, Amnesty International’s senior director for research, advocacy, policy and campaigns, said: “Intentionally attacking civilian infrastructure such as power plants is generally prohibited. Even in the limited cases that they qualify as military targets, a party still cannot attack power plants if this may cause disproportionate harm to civilians. “Given that such power plants are essential for meeting the basic needs and livelihoods of tens of millions of civilians, attacking them would be disproportionate and thus unlawful under international humanitarian law, and could amount to a war crime.” While Trump officials, most prominently Pete Hegseth, his bellicose defence secretary, have sneered at conflict law, Washington’s conduct of its joint war with Israel against Iran has had serious diplomatic ramifications. Spain announced on Monday that its airspace was closed to US planes involved in the conflict. Keir Starmer, the UK’s prime minister, reiterated: “This is not our war and we are not going to get dragged into it.” And in an unusually forceful intervention, Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, the Egyptian president, called on Trump to end the Middle East war, now in its second month. “I say to President Trump: no one will be able to stop the war in our region, in the Gulf … Please, help us to stop the war, you are capable of it,” Sisi said at a press conference in Cairo, underlining the growing international discomfort. There is a lack of clarity over the status of Pakistan’s efforts to mediate talks aimed at ending the war, which is threatening to plunge the global economy into recession and trigger shortages of food and pharmaceuticals. Oil rose to almost $117 a barrel, close to the $119.50 a barrel figure reached earlier in March, before easing back. Brent crude is now on track for its largest ever monthly gain. It is up by 54% since the start of March, beating the previous record of 46% in September 1990 after Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait. The International Monetary Fund said “all roads lead to higher prices and slower growth worldwide” should the conflict in the Middle East continue to throttle flows through the Gulf. Amid weekend reports in the US media that the Pentagon was preparing for weeks of ground operations in Iran, Tehran appeared to be calling for volunteers for a so-called Janfada – “sacrificing life” – operation, recalling the human wave of assaults from the Iran-Iraq war of 1980 to 1988, which included young volunteers. Experts have warned that a US ground operation would probably push the conflict towards an ever deepening regional war. Maziyar Ghiabi, the director of the Centre for Persian and Iranian Studies at the University of Exeter, said: “As the US president prepares for a ground invasion – even though it may be limited to Iranian islands in the Persian Gulf – the trajectory of the war is moving towards a point of no return.” Ghiabi warned of the risk of “a full regional conflict involving Yemen and the Bab-el-Mandeb strait, Iraq, as well as Lebanon, which is already going through an Israeli ground invasion. The effects of this turn of events will be unpredictable and very long-lasting in terms of humanitarian as well as economic outcomes.” Meanwhile, Tehran struck a critical water and electrical plant in Kuwait and an oil refinery in Israel, while Israel and the US launched a new wave of strikes on Iran. Fighting continued to spread in Lebanon as Israel moved to seize more territory in the country’s south. At the weekend, Yemen’s Houthi rebels fired missiles at Israel for the first time since the war began. The UN peacekeeping mission in Lebanon said two of its personnel were killed on Monday in the second deadly incident in 24 hours in the country’s south. The UN interim force in Lebanon (Unifil) said two Indonesian peacekeepers were killed “when an explosion of unknown origin destroyed their vehicle”. Two other peacekeepers were wounded, one of them seriously. Unifil said it had launched an investigation into Monday’s deaths, which came a day after another Indonesian peacekeeper was killed and three others wounded by a projectile, also of unknown provenance, that exploded near a Unifil position. Elsewhere, Syria’s military said a large-scale drone attack had targeted its bases near the border with Iraq, in the latest such incident since the outbreak of the war. It was not immediately clear who had launched the attack.
Canada’s embattled New Democratic party (NDP) has elected the former broadcaster and self-proclaimed socialist Avi Lewis as its new leader, as it looks to rebuild following a devastating federal election last year that saw it lose official party status. A record number of members voted in the three-day NDP leadership convention, giving Lewis a first-ballot win that underscored widespread support. Lewis pledged to convert the “tremendous momentum” of the convention into an “NDP comeback”. Speaking to supporters on Sunday after his win, the 58-year-old documentary film-maker and former television host pledged to centre the party around the pursuit of equity, promising higher wealth taxes, green energy and tuition-free education. “We can already hear the howls from the establishment: ‘But how will you pay for all this?’ It is time, far past time, to properly tax the corporations and billionaires that have been riding a tidal wave of profits while the 99% have been suffering and struggling,” he told a cheering crowd in Winnipeg. Lewis took aim at the moral failings of the governing Liberals, telling energised supporters that an NDP government would challenge the dominance of oil companies and “grocery baron[s]” that enjoy billions in profits. “The NDP will start winning again because we will become that beacon to the 99%, illuminating the darkening sky of these terrifying times with the energising light of collective struggle.” Lewis, the grandson of the former party leader David Lewis and son of the former Ontario NDP leader Stephen Lewis, was joined on stage by supporters and his wife, the acclaimed author Naomi Klein. He faces a daunting set of tasks in rebuilding a party that has just six MPs, weak polling and about C$13m in debt. That effort will probably be complicated by the fact that he has never held political office and does not hold a seat in parliament. In winning at the leadership convention, he beat the MP Heather McPherson, who placed second, the union organiser Rob Ashton, the British Columbia city councillor Tanille Johnston and the farmer Tony McQuail. The prime minister, Mark Carney, and the Conservative party leader, Pierre Poilievre, each issued statements of congratulations to Lewis, saying they looked forward to working with the newly appointed leader. Both Carney’s Liberals and Tories were beneficiaries of the party’s collapse in the last election, which saw the NDP lose 17 of its 24 seats, as well as official party status. The then leader Jagmeet Singh resigned after losing his own riding. Now polling at about 6% federally, the party was dealt another blow earlier this month when the MP Lori Idlout crossed over to the Liberals, leaving it far short of the 12 MPs needed for official party status. In 2011, under former leader Jack Layton, the party won 103 seats in parliament. Unlike other federal parties, the NDP has deep ties with its provincial counterparts. Lewis appeared on stage with the Manitoba premier, Wab Kinew, whose NDP party won a strong majority in the province in 2023, and who consistently polls as the country’s most popular premier. But reactions from some provincial leaders following Lewis’s victory underscore the challenges he faces in unifying the party. While British Columbia’s NDP premier, David Eby, applauded Lewis’s win, he also noted his government’s aim of increasing jobs in the technology and mining sectors – both industries criticised by Lewis. “Our priority is lifting up working people and growing prosperity,” said Eby. Lewis has looked to bolster the party’s environmental credentials, calling for a green energy deal and an export tax to be placed on oil and gas shipped to the US. He also wants to invest 2% of Canada’s gross domestic product in the fight against the effects of the climate crisis. Alberta’s NDP leader, Naheed Nenshi, who has clashed with Lewis over oil and gas development, warned that a perceived ideological shift in the federal party would not be helpful to its provincial version in Alberta. “It is clear that the direction of the federal party under this new leader, someone who openly cheered for the defeat of the Alberta NDP government, is not in the interests of Alberta,” he said. In Saskatchewan, the NDP leader, Carla Beck, said she had declined to meet with Lewis, calling his positions “ideological and unrealistic”. She pointed to a video Lewis had posted in which he opposes new pipeline projects. The interim leader, Don Davies, said the party was ready to rebuild after a devastating result last April, telling convention attenders that he believed voters were concerned that Carney was becoming increasingly conservative. “There is something I’d like to clear up arising from my speech at the press-gallery dinner,” Davies said on Sunday. “I erroneously said, when Prime Minister Carney played hockey, that he was a goalie. I was mistaken. He’s clearly a rightwinger.” • This article was amended on 30 March 2026 to correct a reference to Heather McPherson as a former MP; she is the sitting MP for Edmonton Strathcona. A misspelling of Lori Idlout’s surname was also corrected.
The International Monetary Fund has warned that “all roads lead to higher prices and slower growth worldwide” should the conflict in the Middle East continue to throttle the amount of oil, gas and fertiliser making its way out of the Gulf. In a stark message that countries on all continents will be affected, the Washington-based organisation said a rise in energy and food costs would harm economic growth this year and could leave lasting scars on the global economy. Coming only hours after Donald Trump threatened to obliterate Iran’s energy infrastructure unless it agreed to a peace deal, the IMF’s analysis is likely to be viewed as a warning to the White House over the war’s lasting consequences for struggling households. In a blogpost by the IMF’s main department heads, including the chief economist, Pierre-Olivier Gourinchas, the IMF said governments with high levels of borrowing will also have limited access to funds that could be used to cushion the worst effects of the crisis. “Although the war could shape the global economy in different ways, all roads lead to higher prices and slower growth,” it said. While some countries that are net exporters of oil and gas, such as the US, will gain from higher fossil fuel prices, the rise in bills for petrol, diesel and food will harm living standards, the analysis found. Businesses are also forecast to come under pressure to raise prices, possibly forcing central banks to raise interest rates to combat inflation. “A short conflict might send oil and gas prices soaring before markets adjust, while a long one could keep energy expensive and strain countries that rely on imports,” the blogpost warned. “Or the world may settle somewhere in between – tensions linger, energy stays costly, and inflation proves hard to tame – with ongoing uncertainty and geopolitical risk.” “Much depends on how long the conflict lasts, how far it spreads, and how much damage it inflicts on infrastructure and supply chains,” it said, adding: “Historically, sustained oil‑price spikes have tended to push inflation higher and growth lower. About a third of fertiliser production travels through the strait of Hormuz, pushing up prices. UN Food and Agriculture Organisation projections indicate that global prices could average 15% to 20% higher in the first half of 2026 if the crisis persists. Natural gas prices have more than doubled in the UK since last December to about £140 a therm, while a barrel of Brent crude that cost about $60 before the conflict hit more than $116 on Monday before falling back to $112. Forecasts for sharp rises in the cost of gas and electricity in Europe next winter are forcing governments to consider higher subsidies and welfare payments to the worst-affected households. The IMF added: “In Europe, the shock is reviving the spectre of the 2021–22 gas crisis, with countries such as Italy and the UK especially exposed by their reliance on gas‑fired power, while France and Spain are relatively protected by their greater nuclear and renewables capacity.”
The US government is resuming operations at its embassy in Venezuela, the state department announced on Monday, nearly three months since former president Nicolás Maduro was abducted from the country and locked up in the US. The resumption of US diplomatic operations in Venezuela marks a significant step in the US-Venezuela relationship, as the Trump administration begins to work closely with the government of Delcy Rodríguez, the acting president who replaced Maduro after his forcible ousting by US troops. Rodríguez was Maduro’s vice-president. The US embassy in Venezuela has not been operational since March 2019. Heightening tension between both countries, escalating for decades, led to the rupture of diplomatic relations between the two. The US government has not had an ambassador in Venezuela since 2010. In 2018, Maduro expelled the charge d’affairs in Venezuela, leading to the US government to withdraw all its diplomatic personnel from the country the following year. Since then, US relations towards Venezuela have been carried out from the US embassy in neighboring Colombia. Many of the typical US government operations housed in the embassy, including law enforcement investigations, also had to be performed from outside the country. Following the US military’s invasion of Venezuela and abduction of Maduro and his wife, the US has been working to forge ties to the country. “Today, we are formally resuming operations at the US embassy in Caracas, marking a new chapter in our diplomatic presence in Venezuela”, a state department spokesperson announced. The US government has accused Maduro and other high-ranking Venezuelan officials of participating in drug trafficking and of providing cover to other Latin American criminal groups. The Delta Force raid that led to Maduro’s capture earlier this year, based on a federal indictment, was widely condemned internationally. Maduro and his wife are currently sitting inside a federal prison in New York, waiting for their court case to proceed. Since the abduction, Laura F Dogu, a longtime US diplomat and intelligence official who served as US ambassador to Honduras and Nicaragua, has been in Caracas, working to restore the US embassy in the country. Dogu is the current charge d’affaires to Venezuela. “Dogu’s team is restoring the chancery building at the US embassy in Caracas to prepare for the full return of personnel as soon as possible and the eventual resumption of consular services,” the state department said. “The resumption of operations at US embassy Caracas is a key milestone in implementing the president’s three‑phase plan for Venezuela and will strengthen our ability to engage directly with Venezuela’s interim government, civil society and the private sector.”
Harrods has been accused of being “neither fair nor just” over its decision to close a compensation scheme for survivors of alleged sexual abuse by the luxury department store’s former owner Mohamed Al Fayed. Kingsley Hayes, partner at KP Law, which is representing nearly 280 survivors, questioned why the scheme was being closed on Tuesday 31 March, before Harrods had completed an internal investigation into what happened and who knew about it. “We are concerned that the decision appears to be driven by financial considerations rather than what is fair and appropriate for survivors,” the law firm said in a statement. Harrods set up a compensation scheme in March last year which it said at the time would only run until 31 March this year. The scheme was set up after dozens of women came forward with allegations of abuse by the late entrepreneur going back as far as 1977 after the broadcast last year of the BBC documentary Al Fayed: Predator at Harrods. Hayes said the scheme provided an alternative resolution for survivors who did not wish to pursue litigation. “It is therefore wrong to impose a self-serving deadline,” he said. “Today we are calling on Harrods to ‘do the honourable thing’ and delay the closure of the redress scheme and commit to publishing the findings of its long overdue internal investigation into what happened and who knew. Survivors are being asked to make life-altering decisions without access to the full picture. That is neither fair nor just.” Harrods said more than 220 people had now engaged with the redress scheme which it said had been designed in consultation with specialist barristers, survivors and their legal representatives. It said compensation had been paid to more than 70 survivors and it added “any partial submissions will continue to be recognised and progressed to completion after this date”. A spokesperson for Harrods said: “We recognise differing views, however Harrods has always stated that the scheme represents only one form of redress available to survivors. “It was designed to provide resolution without the need for a protracted legal process and to ensure all reasonable legal fees could be paid and the full compensation award would go to the individual. Our commitment to redress does not end with the application deadline. “Harrods recognises the remarkable bravery of survivors who come forward and continue to shed further light on this dark chapter to our history. The intention of the Harrods redress scheme has been to support survivors of the despicable sexual abuse perpetrated by Fayed, for which we have accepted vicarious liability and utterly condemn. We stand by the progress made through this scheme, and our commitment to these survivors continues.” The Metropolitan police said last year that 111 women had made allegations against Fayed; the youngest is thought to have been 13 at the time. In documents on the scheme’s website, Harrods “apologises unreservedly” for the sexual abuse survivors suffered and “wants everyone who is eligible to receive this compensation”. Those eligible for its redress scheme could apply for a number of types of redress including general damages of up to £200,000 and a work impact payment of up to £150,000 as well as payments for “wrongful testing” and treatment costs. All eligible applicants are offered a meeting with a senior Harrods representative to receive an apology in person or by video, as well as an individual written apology. The scheme, developed with the law firm MPL Legal and funded by Harrods did not require survivors to undergo medical assessment and claims could be based on “documentary evidence” without alleged victims having to speak in person about their experiences.