920 stories · Page 68 of 92
On 8 Feb 2026, Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi turned a risky winter snap poll into a mandate, with the Liberal Democratic Party and its Ishin ally crossing the two-thirds threshold in the 465-seat Lower House, giving her the numbers to override the upper chamber and pursue constitutional change.
On 8 Feb 2026, Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi publicly ruled out “zero enrichment,” hardening Iran’s stance just two days after the first indirect U.S.–Iran nuclear meeting in Oman and amid a visible U.S. military build-up.
On the night of 3-4 Feb 2026, hours before U.S.–mediated peace negotiations were to restart, Moscow unleashed the largest airborne strike of the war—70-plus missiles and roughly 450 drones aimed at Ukraine’s power grid—abruptly ending the week-long pause brokered by President Trump.
After U.S. envoys met Iran’s foreign minister in Muscat on 6 Feb 2026, Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu pulled his White House visit forward a week to lobby President Trump against a nuclear-only deal.
Within 48 hours (Feb 6-7 2026) President Trump both signed a US$1.15 b Taiwan security appropriation and issued an “America First Arms Transfer Strategy,” clearing procedural hurdles and signalling a pending arms package that could reach US$20 b.
On 6 Feb 2026, one day after New START lapsed, Washington publicly alleged Beijing carried out a covert, yield-producing nuclear explosion in June 2020 and demanded that any successor arms pact become a US-Russia-China agreement.
Four days after a U.S. F-35C downed an Iranian drone near the USS Abraham Lincoln, envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner met Iranian FM Abbas Araghchi in Muscat on 6 Feb 2026 for the first Oman-based negotiating round since the June 2025 war.
On 4-5 Feb 2026, Russian and Ukrainian envoys, joined for the first time by NATO’s SACEUR, met for a two-day U.S.-mediated session in Abu Dhabi even as Moscow’s forces intensified attacks, culminating in a nationwide power-grid bombardment on 7 Feb.
At 00:00 GMT on 5 Feb 2026 the New START arms-control pact expired for lack of a signed extension, while negotiators in Abu Dhabi failed to clinch a formal deal, leaving both powers legally unconstrained for the first time in 54 years.
On 4 Feb 2026 Xi Jinping first spent 85 minutes online with Vladimir Putin deepening strategic-energy alignment, then hours later told Donald Trump China would markedly boost U.S. soybean imports—signalling Beijing’s bid to hedge by tightening ties to both its chief energy supplier and its chief export market in one calendar day.
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