BLACKWATER USA | DAILY BRIEF - Blackwater Worldwide

Posted by BW Actual on Nov 25th 2025

Ukraine

U.S. and UK officials aligned on a new, 19-point ceasefire proposal that tempers some of the pro-Russia bias that analysts called out in the original, 28-point plan Pres. Trump proposed.
U.S. Army Secretary Dan Driscoll then flew from the U.S.-Ukraine talks in Geneva to Abu Dhabi, where he'll present the new draft to Russian officials. Moscow doesn't seem interested yet.
Still, analysts think there's a chance this proposal could evolve into something that both Ukraine and Russia could accept.
However, their acceptance will depend on how key details unfold. In particular, Ukraine will need strong post-war security guarantees - which are yet to be laid out in an annex to the agreement - and Pres. Putin will need to show Russians his war won some territory.
Meanwhile, Ukraine and Russia traded drone attacks. Ukraine targeted the port city of Novorossiysk - which exports much of Russia's foreign oil sales - and Russia targeted Kyiv.

China

China's leader, Xi Jinping, apparently surprised Pres. Trump with a phone call yesterday, and the two spoke for an hour about a wide range of issues, including Ukraine, fentanyl, and U.S. farm goods.
Though the U.S. readout didn't mention Taiwan, Beijing's summary of the call characterized it as a focal point of the conversation and said Xi had "clarified China's principled position" on the matter.
Taiwan didn't come up when Trump and Xi met in South Korea last month either, but Xi may have felt it necessary to reiterate Beijing's stance on Taiwan now because of the recent escalation in rhetoric between China and Japan over the self-governing territory (which Beijing claims).

Sudan

The leader of Sudan's Rapid Support Forces (RSF), Gen. Mohammed Hamdan Dagalo (aka Hemedti), declared a unilateral three-month humanitarian truce and challenged his rival, Gen. Abdel-Fattah al Burhan to accept the same terms.
Al Burhan quickly rejected Hemedti's challenge as "a blatant political maneuver" and accused Quad mediators - Egypt, Saudi, the UAE, and the U.S. - of pushing the RSF's agenda by encouraging consideration of Hemedti's proposed truce.

Afghanistan and Pakistan

Afghanistan's Taliban government accused Pakistan of launching overnight airstrikes in Khost, Paktika, and Kunar provinces, and said the strikes killed 10 civilians - mostly children.
Pakistan denied carrying out any airstrikes at all inside Afghanistan - probably to preserve the fragile truce in which the two neighbors recently agreed to respect each other's sovereignty.
Despite its dubious denial, Pakistan likely did carry out airstrikes across the border in pursuit of Pakistani Taliban militants that it blames for this week's suicide attack on Peshawar.
Nonetheless, both sides seem to want their fragile ceasefire to hold and will probably try to downplay this apparent violation and move on.

Guinea-Bissau

Both incumbent president Umaro Embalo and his leading challenger for the presidency, Fernando Dias, claimed victory in Sunday's election ahead of official results, which are due Thursday.
Embalo and Dias both claimed to have won over 50% of the vote, and thus to have secured an outright victory with no need for a run-off. Alas, that's not how math works: given that 10 other candidates were also on the ballot, either Emballo, Dias, or both must have secured less than 50%.