Why it matters: It's unusual for such a high-ranking official to make this kind of visit, according to national security analyst Evelyn Farkas. Whelan is facing up to 20 years in prison if found guilty. Some intelligence experts believe he was detained as retribution for the arrest of confessed Russian agent Maria Butina.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is helping to open doors in Washington for Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernández as part of his effort to push the Latin American nation to move its embassy in Israel to Jerusalem. Israeli officials said this was one of the reasons Netanyahu organized a trilateral meeting with Hernández and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo Tuesday in Brasilia on the sidelines of Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro's inauguration.
Why it matters: U.S.-Honduran relations are currently tense over immigration issues, specifically migrant caravans. President Trump even threatened to cut U.S. aid to Honduras and other Central American countries if they do not stop their migrant flows to the U.S. Israeli officials said that Honduras had requested Israel's help in warming relations with the Trump administration as one of its conditions for moving its embassy to Jerusalem.
During their meeting in Brasilia on Tuesday, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu failed to make a deal regarding the Trump administration's objections to a proposed $500 million deal for F-16 jets between Israel and Croatia, a senior Israeli official told reporters.
Why it matters: Croatian Prime Minister Andrej Plenković said earlier this week that he was waiting for the outcome of the Pompeo-Netanyahu meeting and threatened to cancel the deal if Israel and the U.S. could not resolve their differences. The deal was supposed to be implemented before the end of 2018, but has been held up by the U.S. for almost two months.
North Korean leader Kim Jong-un expressed a willingness to hold another summit with President Trump this year in his televised New Year’s address and issued a warning that continued U.S. sanctions could block a path to denuclearization, reports the AP.
The backdrop: The country's rhetoric on sanctions was similar last month, when it warned that such measures could lead "relations back to the status of [2017] which was marked by exchanges of fire." Since Trump and Kim’s June summit, denuclearization efforts have seen few concrete successes as Trump administration has moved to sanction North Koreans over issues like cyberattacks, money laundering and "serious human rights abuses and censorship."
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo told Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu that President Trump's decision to pull U.S. forces out of Syria "in no way changes anything that this administration is working on alongside Israel" during a meeting in Brasilia on Tuesday.
Why it matters: Pompeo's meeting with Netanyahu is one of a series of high-level discussions between Israeli and American officials as the U.S. attempts to reassure Israel that the withdrawal from Syria will not endanger Israeli security. On Sunday, Netanyahu is set to meet with Trump's national security adviser John Bolton in Jerusalem to continue the discussion on the issue.
