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China is becoming the most formidable rival America has faced, and the risk of confrontation with Russia, North Korea or Iran still looms. Authoritarians are rising, the chaotic Afghanistan exit revealed the limits of U.S. power, and the pandemic, climate change and other critical challenges continue to pose grave threats.

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Chinese President Xi Jinping is signaling solidarity with his "dear friend" Vladimir Putin this week in Moscow — a visit that also underscores Russia's reliance on China to keep its economy and war machine running.

Why it matters: China has helped shield Russia from Western efforts to isolate it following the invasion of Ukraine, significantly increased imports of Russian oil, and become an even more crucial source for Russia of key inputs like microchips.

The visit follows warnings from Washington that Xi might start backing the Russian war effort with weapons — claims Beijing denies.

Thus far, China has not openly breached Western sanctions or provided arms to Russia. In fact, Beijing is attempting to position itself as a mediator.

Putin said Monday that he looks forward to discussing Xi's recent peace proposal in detail.

Putin also thanked Xi in an article published in Chinese state media for understanding the "true causes" of the conflict. Chinese officials and state media have echoed Putin's arguments that NATO is to blame.

More recently, Beijing condemned the “double standards” at the International Criminal Court after it issued a warrant for Putin’s arrest on Friday.

Between the lines: Xi's pseudo-neutrality can be summed up by his itinerary this week: a three-day state visit with Putin; a planned phone call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

A European official recently told reporters in Washington that one potential "nightmare" scenario is that the military balance of the war shifts toward Russia, Western influence diminishes, and Chinese mediation starts to seem far more plausible.

The big picture: While Xi may consider Putin his “best friend,” he has more practical reasons for aligning with Moscow.

Russia remains a key source of oil, arms and military technology for China. It’s also an ideological ally for China in its rivalry with the U.S., with a seat on the UN Security Council, says Alexander Gabuev, an expert on the Russia-China relationship at the Carnegie Endowment.

In an article of his own published Monday in the Russian press, Xi called for cooperation to confront “damaging acts of hegemony, domination and bullying.”

Chinese leaders often make Moscow the first trip of a new term, but Xi’s decision to opt for a full state visit “is a statement that ‘we will stand by Russia,’” Gabuev says.

Between the lines: Expect three days of handshakes, smiles, pomp and circumstance in Moscow, at least in public. Dinner tonight was a seven-course affair featuring quail blinis, Siberian salmon, venison in cherry sauce and wine from Russia's Black Sea coast, according to menus posted on Twitter.

But the balance of power between the neighbors has flipped since the Soviet era, particularly since the invasion. Trade with China now accounts for more than 30% of Russia’s total imports and exports, but just 3% of China’s. That gives Xi a lot of leverage with his giant neighbor.

“Continuing the war for Putin is more important than any attempt to keep balance or strategic autonomy,” Gabuev says. “Since the war is the organizing principle of Russian foreign policy now, whoever gives you the ability to continue is your best friend.”

What Putin and Xi each get out of their "friendship"

Xi Jinping is visiting his "dear friend" at a very difficult time.

Xi meets Putin at the Kremlin on Monday. Photo: Sergei Karpukhin/Sputnik via Getty Images

China

Xi meets "dear friend" Putin in Moscow

The three-day state visit is a major display of solidarity with Russia from its most important global partner.

Xi Jinping (L) meets Vladimir Putin in the Kremlin. Photo: Sergei Karpukhin/Sputknik via Getty

Russia

Jeff Woodke, an American aid worker who had been held hostage for more than six years, has been released, White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan confirmed Monday.

The big picture: Woodke was kidnapped from his home in Niger by jihadists in October 2016 and was believed to have been taken to neighboring Mali, according to the New York Times.

“He is safe,” his wife, Els Woodke, told the Times in an interview. “I don’t yet know if he is healthy.”

Secretary of State Antony Blinken, who visited Niger last week, lauded Woodke's release as "very good news" at a press briefing Monday.

"I have no higher priority or focus than bringing home any unjustly detained American, wherever that is in the world," he added.

What they're saying: "I’m gratified & relieved to see the release of U.S. hostage Jeff Woodke after over 6 years in captivity," Sullivan tweeted Monday, thanking the government of Niger for its help in "bringing him home."

Els Woodke told the Times that she had been informed that her husband was in Niamey, Niger's capital.

"He's safe and he is in the hands of U.S. government officials," White House National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby said at a press briefing later Monday.

Woodke will receive the "best medical care possible," Kirby said, adding that, "after a full medical screening he will be reunited with his loved ones in the near future."

Editor's note: This story has been updated with additional details.

U.S. citizen kidnapped in Niger released after more than 6 years

Jeff Woodke was kidnapped from his home in Abalak, Niger, in October 2016.

A video grab made on October 18, 2016 shows U.S. aid worker Jeffery Woodke during a ceremony to introduce his NGO in Abalak, two days before he was captured. Photo: STR/AFP via Getty Images

Hostages

Jordan accused far-right Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich of violating the peace agreement between the two countries after he gave a speech in Paris at a podium featuring a map that included Jordan and the occupied West Bank as part of Israel and said the Palestinian people were "an invention."  

Why it matters: Smotrich's speech increased tensions at a time when the Biden administration, Jordan and Egypt are trying to de-escalate the violence between Israelis and Palestinians in the occupied West Bank ahead of the historically sensitive period of the holy month of Ramadan and Passover.

Several hours before Smotrich gave his speech, senior officials from the U.S., Jordan, Egypt, Israel and the Palestinian Authority met in the Egyptian city of Sharm el-Sheikh to continue the diplomatic and security consultations ahead of Ramadan.

Driving the news: Smotrich spoke on Sunday in Paris at a memorial ceremony for a former far-right political activist. During his speech, he said there is no such thing as a Palestinian people.

"The people in the Elysee palace and the White House should also hear this truth," Smotrich said, claiming the Palestinian people are "an invention" of the last 100 years and saying his family members who were born in Jerusalem in the 19th century are the "real Palestinians."

"There is no such thing as a Palestinian people," he said. 

What drew a lot of attention, however, was the map on the podium from which Smotrich spoke. It showed "Greater Israel" with Jordan and the West Bank as part of Israel's borders.

The big picture: The peace agreement between Israel and Jordan ended all territorial claims each of the countries had and set the determined borders between them.

The Jordanian government is highly sensitive to any attempts by Israeli far-right politicians to claim that Jordan is Palestine or that Jordan is not a legitimate country.

What they're saying: The Jordanian Foreign Ministry summoned the Israeli ambassador in Amman over Smotrich's comments.

A Jordanian Foreign Ministry spokesperson in a statement accused Smotrich of violating the peace agreement with his speech and his appearance with the map. 

"We condemn the racist, inciting and extremist statements by the extremist Israeli minister against the Palestinian people and its right to exist," the statement said.

The Jordanian Foreign Ministry said Smotrich's statements were "dangerous" and called on the international community and the Israeli government to denounce them.

The Palestinian presidency called Smotrich's statement a "falsification of history and racism."

"The Palestinian people’s indigenous narrative strongly debunks Israeli fundamentalist attempts to rob Palestine and the Palestinian people of their history and forge it to make room for Israeli fabrications," the Palestinian presidency's statement said.

The Israeli Foreign Ministry tweeted on Monday that Israel is committed to the 1994 peace agreement with Jordan.

"There has been no change in the position of the State of Israel, which recognizes the territorial integrity of the Hashemite Kingdom," the tweet read. 

The tweet came after Jordanian officials pressed the Israeli government to issue a clarification over Smotrich's appearance with the "Greater Israel" map, Israeli officials said. 

Israeli national security adviser Tzachi Hanegbi said in a tweet later Monday that he spoke to Jordanian Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi and assured him "of the commitment the Government of Israel has to uphold the peace treaty between our two countries which has strengthened the stability and the security of our region for nearly 30 years."

Smotrich has not commented on the Jordanian Foreign Ministry's accusation. 

Go deeper: U.S. says Israeli minister's call to wipe out Palestinian town is "disgusting"

Editor's note: This story has been updated with Hanegbi's comment. 

U.S. says Israeli minister's call to wipe out Palestinian town is "disgusting"

Jordan condemns far-right Israeli minister over "Greater Israel" map

Bezalel Smotrich spoke from a podium featuring a map that included Jordan and the occupied West Bank as part of Israel.

Israel's Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich on March 20. Photo: Gil Cohen-Magen/AFP via Getty Images

Israel

President Biden told Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in their call on Sunday that he was concerned about the Israeli government's judicial overhaul plan because in all the years he has followed Israel, he has never seen such a high level of domestic anxiety over the political situation in the country, two U.S. sources briefed on the call told Axios.

Why it matters: Sunday's call was the first time Biden directly discussed the controversial judicial overhaul plan with Netanyahu. It is rare that a U.S. president weighs in on domestic issues of one of the country's closest allies.

The judicial overhaul plan, presented by the most right-wing government in Israel's history, has deepened political divisions in Israel and prompted protests, including within the ranks of the Israeli military, against Netanyahu's government.

The Biden administration has expressed concerns over what the plan will mean for Israel's democracy.

Behind the scenes: During Sunday's call, Biden urged Netanyahu to reach a compromise and get a broad consensus on judicial reforms, according to a U.S. official. 

Netanyahu told Biden that he is trying to solve the issue but needs time and space to do it, the two U.S. sources told Axios.

An Israeli official said Netanyahu told Biden he "doesn't want to fix one imbalance by creating another imbalance."

The White House and the Israeli Prime Minister’s Office declined to comment.

White House National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby said in an interview on Israel's Channel 13 that the purpose of Biden's call with Netanyahu was to discuss judicial reform.

State of play: After the call with Biden, Netanyahu held a meeting with the leaders of the ruling coalition parties, including Justice Minister Yariv Levin who was the key player in pushing the government’s plan to weaken the Supreme Court.

Following the meeting, Netanyahu’s office announced that most of the legislation that is part of the judicial plan would be postponed until after Passover, which takes place from April 5-13. 

But the key element of the judicial plan — changing the process of appointing judges — will be brought to a final vote by the end of the Knesset session in the first week of April.

According to the coalition plan, six out of the 11 members on the committee that appoints judges to the Supreme Court will be from the ruling coalition, giving the government full control over the process.

The coalition will be able to appoint the next two Supreme Court judges and the new president of the high court by a simple majority in the committee, the plan states.

If implemented, it will be the first time since the committee was formed in 1953 that Supreme Court judges will be appointed by only politicians from the coalition.

What they're saying: The coalition statement portrayed the decision as “a softening” of the judicial overhaul plan and called on the opposition to use the postponement of part of the legislation in order to begin a dialogue.

But the leaders of the opposition and the organizers of the anti-government protests quickly rejected the new coalition plan and claimed it was a tactical maneuver aimed at trying to kill the nationwide protests while politicizing the Supreme Court.

The attorney general also warned on Monday that the new coalition plan will politicize the Supreme Court, hamper its independence and damage the status of the president of the Supreme Court.

The White House hasn’t commented on the new coalition plan.

Scoop: Biden tells Bibi he's never seen such anxiety over Israel's political situation

Netanyahu told Biden that he is trying to solve the issue but needs time and space to do it, sources said.

Joe Biden and Benjamin Netanyahu in March 2010. Photo: Baz Ratner-Pool/Getty Images

Former Taiwanese President Ma Ying-Jeou will make a landmark visit to China next week — the first such trip by a former Taiwanese leader since the end of the Chinese civil war in 1949. 

The big picture: Ma will not visit Beijing and didn't arrange any political events, but he will "suit the convenience of the host" if Chinese officials wish to meet him during his 12-day trip, Hsiao Hsu-tsen, the director of the Ma Ying-jeou Foundation told reporters on Monday.

Tensions between Taipei and Beijing have escalated since then-U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi made a historic visit to Taiwan last year. The Chinese military conducted live-fire drills around the island for days, and Taiwan vowed to deepen military ties with the U.S.

The backstory: Ma, a senior member of the opposition Kuomintang party who served as Taiwan's president between 2008 and 2016, promoted stronger economic ties between the self-ruled island and Beijing. 

The cross-strait relations sharply deteriorated after the nationalist Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) took power in 2016, which emphasized Taiwan's sovereignty and bolstered its ties with Washington.

Details: From March 27 to April 7, Ma will lead a delegation of Taiwanese academics and students for a visit to several southern Chinese cities, including Nanjing, Wuhan, Changsha, Shanghai and Chongqing, where the youth will interact with their Chinese counterparts, Hsiao said.

Ma will also pay respects to his ancestors in Hunan province ahead of Tomb Sweeping Day on April 5, Hsiao added.

What they're saying: Beijing welcomed Ma's visit to the mainland and is willing to provide necessary assistance, China's Taiwan Affairs Office said in a statement.

“He’s not really representing the government to go and negotiate, I think he just wants to transmit the idea of peaceful exchange,” Kao-cheng Wang, a professor at Taiwan's Tamkang University, told AP about Ma’s plan to bring students.

Between the lines: Ma's trip to China will overlap with Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen's stopover in the U.S. on her way to Central America.

Hsiao said the overlap is a coincidence since Ma had already planned his trip ahead of the Lunar New Year and wasn't aware of Tsai's itinerary.

Taiwan's presidential office said Ma had notified Tsai of his plans and it hoped that as a former head of state, Ma "can show the value of Taiwan’s democracy and freedom and the position of equality and dignity in cross-strait exchanges.”

Former Taiwan President Ma Ying-jeou plans landmark visit to China

It will be the first such trip by a former Taiwanese leader since the end of the Chinese civil war in 1949.

Former Taiwan president Ma Ying-jeou speaks at an awards ceremony

Former Taiwan president Ma Ying-jeou plans to visit China next week, but his itinerary will not include Beijing. Photo: Sam Yeh/AFP via Getty Images

Taiwan

An estimated 43,000 people, half of them children under the age of 5, died last year due to prolonged drought in Somalia, a report released Monday by the UN and Somali government estimates. 

Driving the news: The Horn of Africa, which includes much of Somalia, Kenya and Ethiopia, is experiencing the worst drought in 40 years. The region faces a sixth straight rainy season this year. 

Drought and other factors, including conflict and political instability, have displaced millions across the region. 

In Somalia alone, about 7.9 million people — nearly half the population — are in need of humanitarian assistance, according to the UN.

The big picture: More people were estimated to have died last year than in the first year of the 2017-2018 drought crisis, according to Monday's report, which was released by the UN children's agency, World Health Organization and the Somali government and put together by the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine. 

The report projects at least 135 people will die each day in Somalia due to the drought crisis, with a total of 18,100 to 34,000 drought-related deaths in the first six months of this year. 

The multi-partner body, known as the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC), that monitors global hunger said earlier this year that the food insecurity and acute malnutrition situation did not meet the threshold for an official famine declaration in the last three months of last year, but "the underlying crisis ... has not improved and even more appalling outcomes are only temporarily averted."

Humanitarian groups have long warned, however, that an official famine declaration will be too late. They point to the fact that half of nearly 260,000 deaths during the last famine occurred before it was officially declared in 2011. 

What they're saying: "We are racing against time to prevent deaths ... that are avoidable," WHO representative Mamunur Rahman Malik said in a statement about the new report.  

"We have seen deaths and diseases thrive when hunger and food crises prolong. We will see more people dying from disease than from hunger and malnutrition combined if we do not act now," Malik added. 

"The cost of our inaction will mean that children, women and other vulnerable people will pay with their lives while we hopelessly, helplessly, witness the tragedy unfold."

Somalia's Health Minister Ali Hadji Adam Abubakar said the government continues to be "concerned about the level and scale of the public health impact of this deepening and protracted food crisis in Somalia." 

But it is also "optimistic that if we can sustain our ongoing and scaled-up health and nutrition actions and humanitarian response to save lives and protect the health of our vulnerable, we can push back the risk of famine forever, else those vulnerable and marginalized will pay the price of this crisis with their lives." 

What to watch: Humanitarian groups and the UN warn the crisis is only set to get worse, as the country contends with climate change-induced extreme weather, political instability, ethnic tensions, rising global food prices, and insecurity.

The drought itself has its roots in a combination of human-induced global warming and La Niña conditions in the tropical Pacific Ocean, Axios' Andrew Freedman writes. 

Go deeper: Famine at Somalia's door — explained

Integrated Food Security Phase Classification (IPC)

43,000 died last year due to drought in Somalia, report estimates

"We are racing against time to prevent deaths and save lives that are avoidable," the WHO said.

Rural herder Baar Omar, aged 42, stands by one of her dead goats on scorched land in a small village located 25km outside Doolow on October 17,2022 i

A rural herder stands by one of her dead goats on scorched land in a small village located outside Doolow, Somalia, on Oct. 17,2022. Photo: Giles Clarke/UNOCHA via Getty Images

Africa

COVID-19 has killed millions and caused widespread disruptions to people's lives and global economies — but a major new study finds people are slightly happier than before the pandemic began.  

The big picture: The 11th annual World Happiness Report, published Monday to coincide with the International Day of Happiness, surveyed over 100,000 people and found that Finland was the happiest country for the sixth straight year. The U.S. was ranked the 15th happiest nation.

Afghanistan was the least happy, with the Taliban-controlled nation ranking last at No. 137.

Meanwhile, the report found global misery declined slightly during the pandemic.

Driving the news: The "undoubted pains" the world faced over the pandemic "were offset by increases in the extent to which respondents had been able to discover and share the capacity to care for each other in difficult times," according to the report.

Benevolence to others has risen roughly 25% since the pandemic began, John Helliwell, a professor of economics at the University of British Columbia and a co-editor of the report, told CNN.

"Even during these difficult years, positive emotions have remained twice as prevalent as negative ones, and feelings of positive social support twice as strong as those of loneliness," Helliwell said in a statement accompanying the report.

Of note: Co-author Jan-Emmanuel De Neve, director of the Wellbeing Research Centre at the University of Oxford, noted in an accompanying statement that "well-being in Ukraine has taken a real hit" since Russian forces invaded the country last year.

However, De Neve said the decline in well-being was less than in 2014 "when Russia annexed Crimea." 

This was in part due to "the extraordinary rise in fellow feeling across Ukraine as picked up in data on helping strangers and donations," De Neve added.

Context: The United Nations set up the International Day of Happiness as "a way to recognise the importance of happiness in the lives of people around the world," per a UN statement.

The report is published as part of the UN Sustainable Development Solutions Network.

How it works: The World Happiness Report research examines six key factors arising from self-reported levels of happiness across the world: social support, income, health, freedom, generosity, and absence of corruption — analysis the report states governments are increasingly using "to orient policies towards happiness."

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Report: People happier during pandemic due to kindness

Happiness has risen slightly since the pandemic began amid acts of kindness, global report finds.

Ice hockey fans and revellers crowd the Kauppatori square in Helsinki on May 29.

Revellers in Helsinki last May celebrate Finland winning the 2022 Ice Hockey World Championship. Finland was ranked the world's happiest country for the sixth consecutive year following a World Happiness report survey. Photo: Alessandro Rampazzo/AFP via Getty Images

World Happiness Report

Coronavirus

The U.S. faces a range of health care flashpoints — unaffordable drugs, opioids, vaping — as we debate whether to adopt universal care. For now, the Affordable Care Act is the law of the land, but Republicans want to issue it a final death blow.

Health

President Biden has made the COVID-19 crisis and a post-Trump return to national unity and traditional democratic ideals his top priorities. From vaccinations to stimulus to schools, Biden is seeking bipartisan compromise while showing a willingness to use executive authority and bare Democratic majorities in the U.S. House and Senate to implement his policies. Republican leaders are navigating deep party divisions over if and how to move beyond former President Trump.

Politics & Policy

China's leader Xi Jinping described his upcoming meeting Monday with Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin as a "journey of friendship, cooperation and peace" in an op-ed carried by the two countries' state media.

The big picture: Xi's first Moscow summit with Putin since the Russian invasion of Ukraine began comes three days after the International Criminal Court issued an arrest warrant for Russia's leader for war crimes charges.

Xi's comments that touted a peace plan that Beijing announced last month came hours after Putin praised his "good old friend" Xi in an article published in a Chinese newspaper.

What they're saying: Xi said in his op-ed that he looked forward to "working with President Putin to jointly adopt a new vision, a new blueprint and new measures for the growth of China-Russia comprehensive strategic partnership of coordination in the years to come."

Putin praised Beijing's "willingness to play a constructive role in resolving the crisis."

Between the lines: Beijing is seeking to take a leading role in one of the world's most high-profile current crises — and to bolster its own geopolitical interests by doing so, per Axios China author Bethany Allen-Ebrahimian.

Flashback: Xi and Putin hold first meeting since Ukraine invasion began

Xi and Putin hold first meeting since Ukraine invasion began

Putin praises "good old friend" Xi ahead of Chinese leader's Moscow visit

Xi  described his visit as a "journey of friendship, cooperation and peace."

 Russian President Vladimir Putin (L) and Chinese President Xi Jinping pose for a photograph during their meeting in Beijing, on February 4, 2022.

Russian leader Vladimir Putin and his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping during their meeting in Beijing in February last year. Photo: Alexei Druzhinin/Sputnik/AFP via Getty Images

Xi Jinping

North Korea's leader Kim Jong-un oversaw tactical drills "simulating a nuclear counterattack" over the weekend, the state-run Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) claimed Monday.

The big picture: The drills that included a fifth missile test this month came as the U.S. and South Korean militaries conducted a days-long joint exercise that Seoul described as a "defense posture in the face of North Korea’s continued regional instability," but which Pyongyang regards as hostile.

Details: Kim expressed his "satisfaction" over the drills that included test-firing a "tactical ballistic missile tipped with a mock nuclear warhead," according to KCNA.

The state-run agency shared photos of Kim with his middle-school-aged daughter attending the missile test.

South Korea's Joint Chiefs of Staff said Sunday it detected that Pyongyang had fired a short-range ballistic missile that flew some 500 miles before landing in the East Sea.

North Korea drills simulated "nuclear counterattack," state media claims

Kim's young daughter attended missile test, per KCNA.

Monday's world stories