The key facts

  • The idea of a Xi — Putin — Trump meeting on Ukraine belongs to Putin; Trump is not opposed, and Beijing, according to American outlets, also agrees
  • Parliamentary elections will be held in Israel on 27 October; Netanyahu's bloc is a slight favorite
  • In Brazil, Lula da Silva is competing with Flavio Bolsonaro, the son of the ex-president who is in prison

A possible trilateral meeting on Ukraine

Chinese President Xi Jinping, Russian President Vladimir Putin and US President Donald Trump may hold a trilateral meeting on the issue of the war in Ukraine. According to Kun.uz, the proposal came from Putin during a phone call with Trump. Trump said he was not opposed, provided Xi agrees. According to American outlets, Beijing also agrees. The occasion for the meeting could be the Asia-Pacific economic cooperation summit to be held in China in November.

Trump's statement and the main topic of the meeting

Trump said that at the meeting he would discuss nuclear weapons «wholeheartedly» — in his words, «so many big people should not gather for Ukraine alone». At the same time, as Kun.uz notes, there is no doubt that the main topic, because of which Trump is «tired of saying no», is precisely the war in Ukraine.

Parliamentary elections in Israel

Parliamentary elections will be held in Israel on 27 October. In Kun.uz's assessment, for the world the Israeli elections matter more than the Brazilian ones, since Israel is «at the very center of the world», and after Netanyahu's latest return to power the Middle East has been drawn into a major war. In the Arab and Muslim world and in most Middle Eastern countries, people wish to see Netanyahu defeated. The prime minister himself uses this in his political PR, frightening Israelis: «All our enemies are against me, they want me to lose; vote for me, or they will create a Palestinian state». Netanyahu's bloc, according to the outlet, is nevertheless a slight favorite, although it is not hard to notice that Israelis are tired of the war. If the opposition unites and sends Netanyahu into retirement despite the powerful military propaganda of his team in recent years, that would be a surprising result.

Elections in Brazil: Lula versus the younger Bolsonaro

In Brazil, a country of 215 million people, the 80-year-old incumbent president Lula da Silva is running against Flavio Bolsonaro, the eldest son of former president Jair Bolsonaro. Last time Lula defeated Bolsonaro senior, after which the losing ex-president was jailed; his imprisonment now serves as political PR for his son. Lula and the younger Bolsonaro have been competing in live televised debates for several days now. Kun.uz notes a common feature of both campaigns — in Israel and Brazil, the rivals are not engaged in substantive speeches about what they can give people, but in «mudslinging» against their opponent.

Why this matters

These events set the agenda for the coming weeks: a possible trilateral meeting of the leaders of China, Russia and the US would for the first time bring all key parties together around the Ukrainian issue, and its practical venue could be the November summit in China. The elections on 27 October in Israel directly affect the situation in the Middle East, where, in Kun.uz's assessment, the fate of Netanyahu's government will determine the country's further course. For readers, this means that in the coming days they should expect news both about the agreement on the format of the «big three» meeting and about preliminary results of the Israeli vote.