Welcome back to World Brief, where we’re looking at Iran shooting down a U.S. fighter jet, Myanmar electing ex-junta leader Min Aung Hlaing to be president, and China’s latest probe into the Politburo.
Search-and-Rescue Operation
Iranian forces shot down a U.S. fighter jet on Friday, igniting a daring search-and-rescue mission that threatens to upend U.S. diplomatic and military maneuvers in the region. U.S. special forces have already rescued one of the two crew members aboard the F-15E Strike Eagle. But the other remains unaccounted for; they are believed to be somewhere inside Iran after ejecting from the aircraft.
Welcome back to World Brief, where we’re looking at Iran shooting down a U.S. fighter jet, Myanmar electing ex-junta leader Min Aung Hlaing to be president, and China’s latest probe into the Politburo.
Search-and-Rescue Operation
Iranian forces shot down a U.S. fighter jet on Friday, igniting a daring search-and-rescue mission that threatens to upend U.S. diplomatic and military maneuvers in the region. U.S. special forces have already rescued one of the two crew members aboard the F-15E Strike Eagle. But the other remains unaccounted for; they are believed to be somewhere inside Iran after ejecting from the aircraft.
Washington now faces a tough call. It must balance carrying out its scheduled military operations against Iran while also searching for a member of the U.S. military in enemy territory. A U.S. official told NBC on Friday that two U.S. military helicopters involved in the rescue mission were struck by Iranian fire; the service members were reportedly safe. Israel has already canceled its planned strikes on Iran so as not to hinder the United States’ search-and-rescue efforts.
Iranian officials called on civilians to look for any survivors, offering rewards for information on their whereabouts. Yadollah Rahmani, the governor of Kohgiluyeh and Boyer-Ahmad province, has said that anyone who captures or kills the crew member will be “specially commended.”
Iran’s downing of a U.S. fighter jet—the first such instance since the Iran war began on Feb. 28—could impact U.S. public opinion on the conflict. According to a Reuters/Ipsos poll published on Tuesday, around 66 percent of Americans want the United States to end its involvement in the conflict, even if that means the Trump administration does not achieve all of its goals. So far, 13 U.S. service members have been killed and more than 300 wounded in the war. On Friday, a second U.S. plane, an A-10 Warthog, crashed in the Persian Gulf region. The lone pilot was rescued safely, and officials did not comment on the cause of the incident.
The White House has repeatedly portrayed Iran’s armed forces as defeated and touted the U.S. military’s unequivocal success in its campaign against Tehran. On Tuesday, U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said that U.S. troops had achieved such control over Iranian airspace that it is now flying B-52 bombers over the country’s territory. And on Wednesday, U.S. President Donald Trump claimed during a nationwide address that Iran’s “ability to launch missiles and drones is dramatically curtailed, and their weapons, factories, and rocket launchers are being blown to pieces. Very few of them left.”
Yet U.S. intelligence appears to show that Iran still has extensive missile and drone capabilities. Sources told CNN on Thursday that around half of Iran’s missile launchers remain intact and thousands of one-way attack drones are believed to be in the country’s arsenal. “They are still very much poised to wreak absolute havoc throughout the entire region,” one source said.
Iranian officials had a similar message. “After defeating Iran 37 times in a row, this brilliant no-strategy war they started has now been downgraded from ‘regime change’ to ‘Hey! Can anyone find our pilots? Please? 🥺’” Iranian parliamentary speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf wrote on X on Friday. “Wow. What incredible progress. Absolute geniuses.”
Ghalibaf is believed to be the highest-ranking Iranian official involved in indirect peace talks with the United States. However, his mockery-filled message does not bode well for ongoing negotiations. On Friday, mediators said that Tehran has rejected U.S. demands to end the war and is refusing to meet with U.S. diplomats in Islamabad in the coming days.
Today’s Most Read
What We’re Following
New title, same policies. Myanmar’s rubber-stamp parliament elected ex-junta leader Min Aung Hlaing to be the country’s next president on Friday. Min Aung Hlaing stepped down as head of the armed forces just last week to seek Myanmar’s highest civilian office, which he has long coveted. Under the country’s constitution, two separate people must hold the positions of president and commander in chief.
Since leading a military-backed coup to overthrow democratically elected leader Aung San Suu Kyi five years ago, Min Aung Hlaing has pursued a ruthless campaign against pro-democracy activists, rebel groups, and political dissidents. During his tenure, he oversaw the killing of thousands of people as well as the forced displacement of more than 5 million Rohingya Muslims. In March 2022, the U.S. government recognized the military’s ethnic violence against the Rohingya minority group as a “genocide.”
Little is expected to change with Min Aung Hlaing at the helm. “His ascension to the presidency would formalize the same violent system that has already caused immense suffering, deepened social fractures, and undermined democracy and human rights,” said the ASEAN Parliamentarians for Human Rights, a network of current and former lawmakers in Southeast Asia.
Xi’s latest purge. The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) placed former Xinjiang party chief Ma Xingrui under investigation for “severe violations” of unspecified laws and discipline, Chinese officials revealed on Friday. He is the third Politburo member to be investigated under Chinese President Xi Jinping’s anti-corruption crackdown in less than six months, making this the widest purge of the committee in a single term since the Cultural Revolution. (The Politburo’s current term began in 2022.) Xi previously launched probes against China’s top two generals, He Weidong and Zhang Youxia.
Ma was once considered a rising political star within the CCP. But, as FP’s James Palmer wrote in this week’s China Brief, “Ambition and talent can be dangerous at the top. Xi has often purged potential successors—among them Ma Xingrui. Once a rising technocrat who held senior posts in Shenzhen and Guangdong, Ma was appointed party secretary of the highly sensitive Xinjiang region in 2021 only to be abruptly removed last year.” Ma’s right-hand man is also under investigation for corruption, Palmer noted.
Progress in peace talks? A third day of China-mediated peace talks between Afghanistan and Pakistan took place on Friday, as the two neighbors seek to end their worst conflict since the Taliban returned to power in 2021. “Both Pakistan and Afghanistan attach importance to, and welcome, China’s mediation, and are willing to sit down for talks again, which is a positive development,” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Mao Ning said.
After a bout of heavy fighting in October followed by a cease-fire, conflict re-erupted in February, when Islamabad accused the Afghan regime of harboring the Pakistani Taliban, an Islamist militant group that has killed hundreds of Pakistani security personnel in recent years. Kabul has denied the allegations despite evidence that Afghanistan has provided the Pakistani Taliban with weapons.
So far, the three parties have “reached consensus and arrangements on a specific operational mode, including media coverage,” Mao said on Friday, without providing details. Yet such progress has not stopped the violence. Pakistani authorities reported on Thursday that a suicide bomber drove an explosives-laden vehicle into a police station in the Pakistani city of Bannu, killing at least five people and injuring several others. No group has claimed responsibility thus far.
What in the World?
Mexico’s president on Wednesday tapped Roberto Velasco, a lawyer, to be the country’s new foreign minister. Velasco is considered a leading expert in what field?
A. International trade and energy policy
B. Bilateral relations with the United States
C. Latin American history and culture
D. Behavioral disorders
Odds and Ends
It was not an April Fools’ joke. Someone really stole 413,793 Kit Kat candy bars. Last weekend, Nestlé confirmed that a truck carrying 12 tons of chocolatey goodness was stolen while traveling from a factory in central Italy to Poland. Desperate to track down the missing goods, Kit Kat launched a public tracker on Wednesday to find the elusive batch. “Whilst we appreciate the criminals’ exceptional taste, the fact remains that cargo theft is an escalating issue for businesses of all sizes,” a Kit Kat spokesperson said.
And the Answer Is…
B. Bilateral relations with the United States
Velasco’s appointment comes at a time of increased tension in U.S.-Mexico relations, with Washington’s economic blockade of Cuba serving as another pressure point for Mexico City, as Oscar Lopez wrote in February.
To take the rest of FP’s weekly international news quiz, click here, or sign up to be alerted when a new one is published.