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Following last month’s dramatic capture of former Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, the Trump Administration is now shifting into high gear to expand the footprint of Western companies in Venezuela’s oil sector. Through the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC), a series of new Venezuela General Licenses (GLs) have been published, including GL 50, which authorizes companies, including BP, Chevron, Eni, Repsol, and Shell to begin oil production operations in Venezuela. These new authorizations come just after U.S. Energy Secretary Chris Wright visited some of the South American nation’s oil-producing facilities, accompanied by its Chavista acting president, Delcy Rodríguez.
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On January 21, 2026, U.S. President Donald Trump announced a framework for a potential deal over Greenland after meeting with NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte. “We have formed the framework of a future deal with respect to Greenland and, in fact, the entire Arctic Region,” Trump wrote. This agreement prompted the U.S. president to back down from earlier threats to impose tariffs on the exports of eight European countries, which were scheduled to take effect on February 1st.
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President Donald Trump promised to reconsider tariffs on India if New Delhi ceases purchasing Russian crude oil. Targeting Moscow’s second-largest crude oil buyer strikes directly at the Kremlin’s financial underbelly in its war of attrition against Ukraine. While this leverage may prove consequential as peace talks are limping, some in Washington worry that pressure on India is strengthening those in New Delhi arguing for “strategic autonomy”, including the India’s Foreign Minister S Jaishankar. Speaking to the media in at the Munich Security Conference, he refused to a give a clear answer to the question whether India is cutting its Russian oil purchases. In the meantime, a political row exploded in New Delhi as the Congress-led opposition has accused Narendra Modi’s government of “selling out under pressure”. Overplaying Washington’s hand could reduce future avenues for cooperation to contain China in Southeast Asia or the Middle East with Indian support, through the I2U2 and other frameworks.
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Japan’s 2026 election results signal a major energy shift for the country. Sanae Takaichi of the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) reclaimed her position as Prime Minister of Japan, winning by a landslide during the snap general election. She effectively gave her party control of the lower house with a two-thirds supermajority without any coalition obligations. With control over three-quarters of the chamber, 352 seats out of the 465, the ruling party will be able to overridevetoes by the upper house. The ability to push its policies will provide the LDP with certainty over its proposed energy and industrial policies.
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The vision for a rebuilt Gaza that Jared Kushner unveiled at the World Economic Forum in Davos this January is nothing if not audacious. A “New Gaza,” defined by skyscrapers and high-tech data centers, aims to replace a century of terrorism and wars — and grievance politics with the promise and logic of the free market.
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Each new crisis in Iran revives fears of a repeat of 1979, when Iranian oil production collapsed by 80 percent, removing 7 percent of supply from the global market and triggering a historic energy shock. Today, with Iran’s Supreme Leader, the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC), including its bloody volunteer Basij militia, killing the citizens en masse, and with President Donald Trump weighing his options, events in and around Iran are prompting similar anxieties. But the conditions that turned Iran’s 1979 upheaval into a global oil shock no longer exist. Leadership change in Iran — as very recently advocated by Trump — would create short-term market disruption, but these risks are manageable.
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The rise of AI, the shift from renewables to fossil fuels and nuclear, and other changes in Trump Administration policies indicate that 2026 will continue to reshape U.S. energy. The growing focus on energy as a national security instrument is driving a chain reaction, shifting priorities across sectors, easing restrictions, and prioritizing the expansion of conventional energy infrastructure. In 2026, nuclear energy and reactor development, as well as grid build out, will be at the forefront, generating winners and losers in capital markets.
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With acting President of Venezuela Delcy Rodrigues coming to Washington on Tuesday, January 13th, all eyes are on whether the Chavista regime can negotiate its way out of the crisis caused by the rendition of its leader, Nicolás Maduro, by the U.S. military on January 3rd.
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The Russia-Ukraine war has been brutal to the Russian energy sector. New problems are emerging, and old issues are accumulating as Russia enters 2026. Losing Syria in December of 2024 and Venezuela in January 2026 exposes Russia’s global ambition as an emperor with no clothes. Ukraine’s bloody slog comes at a huge cost.
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Exporting energy has long been recognized as a money-making machine for Moscow. It has not only filled the Kremlin’s war chest but also generated immense personal wealth for Russian leaders and affiliated oligarchs. But in 2025, the picture of Russian energy became much more complicated. The Russian energy sector now functions not only as a strategic asset but also as a source of vulnerability exposed by war, sanctions, and asymmetric attacks.
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A year after former Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s Ba’athist dictatorship collapsed under the blows of Ahmed El-Sharaa’s Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (Organization for the Liberation of the Levant) Islamist militia, the Kremlin, the patron of the deposed regime has not disappeared. Despite expectations, Russia has not withdrawn from Syria, but instead has retrenched itself “under new management.”
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In 2025, artificial intelligence underwent a transformative shift from scientific advancement to practical economic force multiplier. As technological capabilities developed, AI use rose exponentially. Much of the discourse around the new technology focuses on the major players and their political struggles. China and the U.S. see AI in geopolitical terms, as a tool to transform their military capabilities and shape the international order. AI is also defining great power rivalries and is increasingly embedded in the national security policies of countries large and small around the world. Emerging markets are facing a major challenge in dealing with articifial intelligence.
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Russia’s war machine is showing unmistakable signs of strain. After nearly four years of fiscal overreach caused by injecting trillions of rubles into the Russian economy, the Kremlin can no longer disguise its distress. American envoys met in Geneva on Sunday, November 23rd with Ukrainian officials to discuss a permanent ceasefire, however, this is no time to go easy on Moscow, as U.S. sanctions seem to be working.
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President Trump is definitely changing the course of American foreign policy, trying to pull China’s allies away from Beijing. It may not work as well as he hopes. After Moscow rebutted his entreaties to cease fire in Ukraine, the White House began trying to woo Islamabad. Despite Pakistan’s tumult with India and Afghanistan, President Trump has moved to deepen ties with the nuclear-armed Muslim power.
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The British Anglo American and Canadian Teck Resources mining companies announced an agreement on one of the most significant mining mergers in recent history that will create a new giant with a combined market value exceeding $53 billion. The all-share deal is expected to close within 18 months, pending regulatory approval, and will establish Anglo Teck as one of the top five global copper producers. This marks a tectonic shift in global mineral supplies with major geopolitical implications.
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While Russia’s economic performance has been lackluster as its war economy struggles to underpin growth, a clear bright spot remains: nuclear energy. Following the Shanghai Cooperation Organization Summit, where the Power of Siberia 2 pipeline progress dominated headlines, Rosatom signed a memorandum with China National Nuclear Corporation (CNNC) on personnel collaboration, building on recent wins in Central Asia, Europe, and North Africa. Rosatom has customers lined up worldwide, but as financing problems and global competition build, the jury is out on whether they can expand on their recent success. As the United States seeks to modernize its moribund nuclear power capabilities, Russia’s Rosatom stands as both a competitor and a model.
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The spectacular displays at the 2025 Shanghai Cooperation Organization summit in Tianjin were carefully crafted to showcase the evolution of Xi Jinping’s Beijing-centric political bloc which aspires to rival Washington. The U.S. administration is embracing an “America First” agenda and using tariffs as a foreign policy battering ram. Meanwhile, President Trump may be on to something in writing “Please give my warmest regards to Vladimir Putin and Kim Jong Un as you conspire against the United States of America.”
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Turkey sits at the intersection of Europe, Russia, the Caucasus, and the Middle East—a prime geopolitical piece of real estate in the Eastern hemisphere. As Europe and the U.S. seek to reduce reliance on Russian energy corridors as well as Iranian oil and gas, Ankara is moving quickly to position itself as the key transit hub linking Asia and Europe. Lacking significant reserves of its own, Turkey is leveraging its geographical position, including Russia/the Black Sea, the Caucasus, Iraq, post-war Syria, and access to Europe. President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is balancing alliances to expand his country’s regional influence.
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This past Sunday, President Donald J. Trump and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen announced preliminary terms of a trade deal between the U.S. and the EU from the Trump Turnberry golf resort in Scotland. A key component of the agreement is a pledge from the European Union to purchase $750 billion worth of energy exports from the U.S. over the next three years. The deal also involves commitments by the EU for European companies to invest $600 billion in a number of U.S. industries. In return, the EU received only a maximum 15% tariff on most of its exports rather than the 30% many had feared. However, announcement of the “big ticket” items averted what many had feared would devolve into a trade war as Trump’s declared August 1 deadline for 30% tariffs to kick in loomed.
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The U.S.-Russian confrontation is escalating. President Trump has threatened 100 percent secondary tariffs on countries buying Russian oil and other exports, promising to impose them within 50 days unless Russia and Ukraine reach a ceasefire. The Senate, led by Sens. Lindsay Graham (R-SC) and Richard Blumenthal (D-CT), is proposing a 500 percent tariff package targeting nations that purchase Russian energy resources, including oil, gas, and uranium.
Russia, meanwhile, is opening a new front in the strategic South Caucasus. Ukrainian military intelligence (HUR) recently published a military order directing reinforcements to the Russian base in Armenia, a move HUR spokesperson Andrei Yusov described as part of Moscow’s strategy to “destabilize the global security situation.”
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U.S. President Donald Trump's Energy Dominance Council plans to host a liquified natural gas summit in Alaska on June 2, where it hopes to announce that Japan and South Korea have committed to the long-pursued Alaska LNG project to ease American gas shipments to Asia.
Since his return to the Oval Office, Trump has positioned hydrocarbons as the backbone of the U.S. energy portfolio and also as a lever for exerting America’s geopolitical influence on the global stage.
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The tariffs announced by the Trump Administration at the beginning of April have cast a shadow across international energy supply chains. The new policies were delayed for ninety days less than a week later, and the much-feared shortages and price hikes haven’t yet materialized. Nevertheless, the mood in the industry remains pessimistic.
In May, the U.S. Department of Commerce announced that companies based in Cambodia, Malaysia, Thailand, and Vietnam are dumping solar panel cells at low rates into the U.S. market while receiving subsidies from the Chinese government, setting the stage for the imposition of tariffs on all parties involved.
This edition of the Global Take features Dr. Ariel Cohen's appearance on i24 News, where he analyzes developments in the talks between Russia and Ukraine in Istanbul as President Trump visits the Middle East.
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Governments are seeking to leverage AI investment to accelerate societal and economic development and bootstrap to the next level of economic development. While some observers express concerns that the growth of AI could widen the gap between the developed world and emerging markets, it also provides an opportunity for energy-rich developing countries to technologically leapfrog. Few regions are better equipped to exploit this uranium and AI boom than the world’s largest exporter of uranium: Kazakhstan.
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Dr. Ariel Cohen joins Belsat TV to discuss President Donald Trump's impact over the first 100 days of his second term in office.
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