World
Why is South Africa upset about Iran joining BRICS naval drills?
South Africa has launched an inquiry into Iran’s participation in joint naval drills with BRICS nations last week, apparently against the orders of President Cyril Ramaphosa.
BRICS is a group of 10 countries: Brazil, China, Egypt, Ethiopia, India, Indonesia, Iran, Russia, South Africa and the United Arab Emirates. The acronym BRICS represents the initial letters of the founding members, Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa.
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The group, formed in 2006, initially focused on trade, but has since expanded its mandate to include security and cultural exchanges.
It concluded a week of joint naval drills in South African waters on January 16. The drills have caused controversy in the country and drawn the ire of the United States.
Although South Africa regularly holds drills with Russia and China, the latest maritime training comes amid heightened tensions between the US and many of the group’s members, particularly Iran, which until last week was grappling with mass protests at home that turned deadly.
Pretoria said the exercise, named Will for Peace 2026, was essential for ensuring maritime safety and international cooperation. The training “brings together navies from BRICS Plus countries for … joint maritime safety operations [and] interoperability drills”, a statement from the South African military noted before the exercises.
However, US President Donald Trump’s administration, which has previously accused BRICS of being “anti-American” and has threatened its members with tariffs, has strongly criticised the naval exercises.
Here’s what we know about the exercises and why they were controversial:
What were the drills for?
South Africa hosted the BRICS naval exercise, which included warships from participating countries, on January 9-16.
China led the training, which took place near the southwestern coastal city of Simon’s Town, which is home to a major South African naval base.
Exercises in rescue and maritime strike operations as well as technical exchanges were planned, according to China’s Ministry of National Defense. All BRICS countries were invited.
Captain Nndwakhulu Thomas Thamaha, South Africa’s joint task force commander, said at the opening ceremony that the operation was not just a military exercise but a statement of intent by BRICS countries to forge closer alliances with each other.
“It is a demonstration of our collective resolve to work together,” Thamaha said. “In an increasingly complex maritime environment, cooperation such as this is not an option. It is essential.”
The purpose, he said, was to “ensure the safety of shipping lanes and maritime economic activities”.
South African Deputy Defence Minister Bantu Holomisa told journalists that the drills had been planned before the current tensions between some BRICS members and the US.
While some BRICS countries may face issues with Washington, Holomisa clarified that they “are not our enemies”.
Who participated and how?
China and Iran deployed destroyer warships to South Africa, while Russia and the United Arab Emirates sent corvettes, traditionally the smallest warships.
South Africa, the host country, dispatched a frigate.
Indonesia, Ethiopia and Brazil joined the exercises as observers.
India, the current chair of the group, chose not to participate and distanced itself from the war games.
“We clarify that the exercise in question was entirely a South African initiative in which some BRICS members took part,” India’s Ministry of External Affairs said in a statement. “It was not a regular or institutionalised BRICS activity, nor did all BRICS members take part in it. India has not participated in previous such activities.”
Why is South Africa facing US backlash over the drills?
The US is angry that South Africa allowed Iran to participate in the drills at a time when Tehran was accused of launching a violent crackdown on antigovernment protests that had spread across the country.
The protests broke out in late December, when shopkeepers in Tehran closed up their businesses and demonstrated against inflation and the falling value of the rial. These protests swelled into a broader challenge to Iran’s rulers, as thousands of people took to the streets nationwide to demonstrate over a few weeks.
Security forces in some areas cracked down on the crowds, resulting in the deaths of “several thousands”, according to a statement on Saturday by Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. While activists said thousands of protesters were killed, the Iranian government said this was an exaggeration and claimed police officers and security service members formed a significant chunk of those who were killed.
The Iranian authorities also claimed the US and Israel had armed and funded “terrorists” to inflame the protests. They said agents affiliated with foreign powers, and not state forces, were responsible for the deaths of civilians, including protesters.
The mass uprising is one of the most disruptive the country has witnessed since the 1979 Iranian Revolution. Tens of thousands of people are believed to have been arrested.
Before the BRICS drills, the US warned South African President Cyril Ramaphosa that Iran’s participation would reflect badly on his country, according to a report by the Daily Maverick, a South African newspaper.
Ramaphosa subsequently ordered Iran to withdraw from the exercises on January 9, the paper reported.
However, three Iranian vessels that had already been deployed to South Africa continued to participate.
In a statement on January 15, the US embassy in South Africa accused the South African military of defying orders from its own government and said it was “cozying up to Iran”.
“It is particularly unconscionable that South Africa welcomed Iranian security forces as they were shooting, jailing, and torturing Iranian citizens engaging in peaceful political activity South Africans fought so hard to gain for themselves,” the statement read.
“South Africa can’t lecture the world on ‘justice’ while cozying up to Iran.”
South African political analyst Reneva Fourie said Washington was merely fishing for reasons to criticise South Africa for bringing a genocide case against Israel before the International Court of Justice for its war in Gaza.
“The US is looking for an entry point,” she said.
The US “is facing increased infringement on freedom of expression and association, democracy and human rights as well as increased militarisation. The US should focus on its own dire state instead of meddling in the affairs of others.”
Tensions over the military drills are only the latest point of contention between the US and Iran.
During the 12-day war between Iran and Israel in 2025, Washington sided with Israel, and on June 22, the US bombed three nuclear sites in Iran. Initial assessments from US officials noted that all three were severely damaged. Iran retaliated by bombing a military base in Qatar where US troops are positioned, in what was largely seen as a face-saving exercise.
Which other BRICS members have tensions with the US?
Nearly all members of BRICS have problems with the current US government.
Besides the dispute over Iran joining the naval drills, South Africa is also caught up in a battle of narratives with the Trump administration, which alleges, without any evidence, that the country’s minority white population is being subjected to a “genocide“. In 2025, Trump established a refugee programme for white Afrikaners wishing to “flee” to the US.
The US has also condemned South Africa’s decision to take Israel to the International Court of Justice in December 2023.
The US currently levies tariffs on South African exports of up to 40 percent as a result.
China has been locked in a tense trade war with the US for more than a year. After slapping each other with tariffs exceeding 100 percent early last year, these were suspended pending trade talks. But China then restricted exports of its rare earth metals, which are required for technology crucial for defence, and Trump again threatened more tariffs before the two sides reached an agreement in late October, under which China agreed to “pause” restrictions on the export of some metals.
Russia is also on Washington’s radar because of its war in Ukraine.
Just three days before the drills began, the US seized a Venezuela-linked Russian oil tanker in the North Atlantic due to its sanctions on both countries.
On January 3, the US military abducted Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, from the capital, Caracas. Both now face drugs and weapons charges in a New York federal court. In September, the US had begun a campaign of air strikes on Venezuelan boats in the Caribbean, claiming they were trafficking drugs to the US, but providing no evidence.
India has been hit with 50 percent tariffs on its exports to the US, partly as punishment for continuing to buy Russian oil.
This month, the US withdrew from the India-led International Solar Alliance, although this withdrawal was part of a broader move to pull the US out of several international bodies.
Harsh V Pant, a geopolitical analyst at the New Delhi-based Observer Research Foundation think tank, told Al Jazeera that, for India, keeping out of the naval drills was “about balancing ties with the US”.
Pant added that in India’s opinion, “war games” were never part of the BRICS mandate.
While BRICS was founded as an economic bloc, it has widened its mandate to include security.
What has the response been in South Africa?
Ramaphosa’s government has also faced some backlash over the drills at home.
The Democratic Alliance (DA), a former opposition party that is now part of the governing coalition and largely represents the interests of the white minority, blamed Minister of International Relations Ronald Lamola for failing to hold the Department of Defence to account.
Lamola is from the African National Congress (ANC) party, which, until 2024, governed South Africa alone.
“By allowing the Department of Defence to proceed unchecked in these military exercises, Minister Lamola has effectively outsourced South Africa’s foreign policy to the whims of the South African National Defence Force (SANDF), exposing the country to serious diplomatic and economic risk,” the DA said in a statement two days after the exercises started.
“South Africa is now perceived not as a principled non-aligned state, but as a willing host for military cooperation with authoritarian regimes.”
What is the South African government saying now?
South African officials have shifted from initially justifying the drills to distancing themselves from the Iran debacle.
Despite initial statements from officials that the drills would go ahead as planned, Ramaphosa eventually appeared to bow to US pressure and, on January 9, ordered that Iran be excluded, local media reported.
Those instructions do not seem to have been followed by the South African Defence Department or the military, however.
In a statement on January 16, Defence Minister Angie Motshekga’s office said Ramaphosa’s instructions had been “clearly communicated to all parties concerned, agreed upon and adhered to as such”.
The statement went on to say that the minister had established an inquiry board “to look into the circumstances surrounding the allegations and establish whether the instruction of the President may have been misrepresented and/or ignored as issued to all”.
A report on the investigation is expected on Friday.
This is not the first time South Africa has been criticised for its military relations with Iran.
In August, its military chief, General Rudzani Maphwanya, prompted anger from the DA when he embarked on a trip to Tehran and affirmed that South Africa and Iran had “common goals”.
His statement came just weeks after the Iran-Israel war. He was also reportedly critical of Israel while in Tehran.
Some ANC critics called for Maphwanya’s firing, but he has remained in office.
US diplomat Alan Eyre says despite the US-Iran ceasefire announcement, there is no deal until it has been formalised – and likely Israel’s strike on Beirut pushed the US into last minute action.
Published On 15 Jun 2026
World
Georgia’s vote-counting method will soon be banned. Lawmakers will try to find a fix this week
ATLANTA (AP) — When Georgia lawmakers return to the Capitol this week for a special session, they are expected to try to clean up an election mess of their own making.
The election system used throughout the political battleground state relies on a QR code printed on ballots to tally the votes. Legislators passed a law two years ago barring the use of that barcode for the official vote count beyond July 1 of this year, but no replacement method of tabulating votes was ever implemented.
One of the instructions Republican Gov. Brian Kemp laid out for lawmakers when he called the special session is to “address issues created” by that law. Meanwhile, the secretary of state’s office and the State Election Board have further muddied the waters by issuing conflicting guidance for county election officials about how votes should be cast and counted.
If the issues are not resolved soon, there is likely to be confusion and possibly litigation over the state’s elections after July 1. A special election to fill a U.S. House seat is scheduled for that month.
How did we get here?
Georgia’s current election system was first used statewide during the 2020 primary. After the general election that year, when Republican President Donald Trump narrowly lost the state to Democrat Joe Biden, Trump and his supporters claimed without evidence that the machines had deleted or switched votes.
Trump’s backers continued to complain about the touchscreen voting machines, with some loyalists espousing wild conspiracy theories. Election integrity advocates also criticized the machines, saying they are vulnerable to hacking and that voters cannot be sure their selections are accurately reflected because people can’t read QR codes.
Republican lawmakers in 2024 tried to address those concerns by passing a law banning barcodes for the “official tabulation count” after July 1, 2026. But in the two years since, neither the secretary of state’s office nor the General Assembly has taken action to comply. Now, the deadline is fast approaching and a major midterm election looms.
Trump singled out those machines, which are used in at least some counties in more than a dozen states, in his first executive order on elections shortly after he took office for his second term in January 2025. That order has been blocked by multiple courts and is not being enforced.
The governor steps in
Last month, Kemp announced a special legislative session, scheduled to start Wednesday, to draw new congressional maps for the 2028 elections and to address the QR code issue.
It’s possible that lawmakers could extend the deadline in the law to allow the QR codes to be used for now and give themselves some breathing room to come up with a new system before elections in 2028. But in the waning hours of the regular legislative session earlier this year, they rejected a proposal that would have done that.
Even if lawmakers agree on a solution, it might be tough to implement before a special election to fill the remainder of the term of U.S. Rep. David Scott, who died in April. The special election is set for July 28, with early voting beginning July 6.
Secretary of state offers guidance to election offices
The secretary of state’s office last week issued guidance to election officials in the six counties included in that congressional district. The office says it’s preliminary and subject to change based on any developments from the special session.
The ballots will be run through the scanners, which will read the QR code to generate the election night vote count. Then, before county certification, electronic images created by the scanners for each ballot will be uploaded to a server, where optical character recognition software will be used to tally the votes using the human-readable text. The results of that second process will be the official tabulation count.
The secretary of state’s guidance expressly says counties must continue to use the current election system, including the touchscreen voting machines, and that there is nothing in the law that authorizes the use of hand-marked paper ballots for in-person voting.
Conflict with the election board
The State Election Board weighed in two days later with conflicting guidance. Board members argued the plan proposed by the secretary of state is not authorized by law.
The board passed a resolution instructing counties on what to do if the special legislative session does not result in an extension of the deadline for using QR codes. The resolution directs counties to use their emergency backup, which calls for hand-marked paper ballots with scanners used to count voters’ selections.
When asked about the conflicting guidance during the election board meeting, Elizabeth Young, a lawyer with the state attorney general’s office, said that while the guidance is not binding, “obviously it would cause confusion for elections superintendents if they are getting differing instructions from two agencies, both of which have some authority over what they’re doing.”
The election board has been controlled by a Trump-aligned majority and is often at odds with Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, a Republican who is a frequent Trump target.
Local election officials are in the middle
Henry County in Atlanta’s suburbs is one of the counties where voters will go to the polls for next month’s special election. Axiver Harris, interim elections director, said the county is aware of the conflicting guidance and is awaiting further clarification from the state.
“Given the uncertainty surrounding the guidance currently available, we believe it is wise to wait for further direction to ensure that any decisions made are consistent with state requirements and election administration best practices,” he wrote in an email.
Marcye Scott, who is running in the special election to serve the remainder of her late father’s term, said she is not sure most voters are even aware of the issue and is focusing her attention elsewhere.
“My goal is to get people to the polls, get my people to the polls and get them to vote for me,” she said.
But Carlos Moore, another of the six candidates running in the special election, said he is worried about legal challenges if a new method of vote-counting is implemented without enough time. He hopes lawmakers extend the deadline to allow the use of the QR codes for now.
“I would ask that legislators do the right thing, leave well enough alone for the special election,” he said. “Otherwise, it’s almost certain there will be challenges in court.”
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This is part six of a series examining the challenges confronting the NATO alliance.
Germany is pledging to become a more powerful military force inside NATO, with Berlin’s ambassador to Washington telling Fox News Digital that the country is ready to assume greater responsibility for European security after decades in which the United States carried much of the alliance’s military burden.
“Germany is stepping up — we heard the call!” German Ambassador to the United States Jens Hanefeld told Fox News Digital in an exclusive interview.
Chancellor Friedrich Merz has said Germany’s armed forces should become the strongest conventional army in Europe, a goal Hanefeld said is now backed by Berlin’s new military strategy.
UK, GERMAN DEFENSE OFFICIALS DEFEND MILITARY BUILDUP UNDER RUSSIAN THREATS
Germany is pledging to become a more powerful military force inside NATO, with Berlin’s ambassador to Washington telling Fox News Digital that the country is ready to assume greater responsibility for European security. (Kira Hofmann/Photothek via Getty Images)
“Russia’s illegal war of aggression has shaken old certainties in Europe and Germany as the international rules we have relied on are being challenged,” Hanefeld said. “This changes the strategic environment we operate in.”
“Today, Germany is Ukraine’s largest supporter,” Hanefeld said in written answers. “Germany’s decision to become Europe’s strongest conventional army, well anchored in the NATO alliance, is an ongoing commitment.”
Germany’s historic military shift
The shift marks a historic turn for a country whose postwar military identity was built around restraint.
After World War II, West Germany was allowed to rearm only within a Western alliance framework, joining NATO in 1955 and building the Bundeswehr as a force embedded in collective defense rather than independent German power. For decades after reunification, Germany relied heavily on the U.S. security umbrella and often lagged behind NATO spending targets, feeding repeated American complaints that Europe’s largest economy was not pulling its weight.
Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022 forced Berlin to begin rethinking that posture. Then-Chancellor Olaf Scholz called the shift a “Zeitenwende,” or turning point. Merz is now seeking to turn that phrase into a long-term military buildup.
In Germany, Hanefeld said, the changes underway are often described as a “Zeitenwende,” but he acknowledged that the transformation does not come easily given the country’s history.
GERMAN DEFENSE MINISTER SAYS MILITARY DRAFT COULD RETURN IF VOLUNTEER NUMBERS FALL SHORT
Ammunition for a howitzer is displayed during NATO training at a German army base in Munster, Germany, on May 10, 2022, involving up to 7,500 soldiers from nine nations. (Fabian Bimmer/Reuters)
Trump–Merz tensions complicate NATO politics
The effort is unfolding against a backdrop of public friction between President Donald Trump and Merz, a dispute that a U.S. defense expert warned could complicate critical decisions on deterring Russia.
The tension escalated after Merz criticized Washington’s handling of the Iran war, saying the United States was being “humiliated” by Iran’s leadership in negotiations and questioning the Trump administration’s exit strategy. Trump fired back by accusing Merz of being soft on Iran’s nuclear program, even though Merz has said Iran must not obtain a nuclear weapon.
The dispute quickly spilled into NATO politics. Trump later threatened to review possible U.S. troop reductions in Germany and said Merz should spend more time ending the war in Ukraine and “fixing his broken country” than commenting on Iran.
Then Merz added another irritant. Speaking to a young audience in Germany, he said he would not advise his children to live, study or work in the United States “today,” citing America’s changing social climate, while also saying he remained “a great admirer of America,” but “My admiration isn’t growing at the moment.”
GERMANY’S MERZ TO ‘ADAPT’ TO TRUMP DURING HIGH-STAKES MEETING ON TARIFFS, DEFENSE
President Donald Trump and German Chancellor Friedrich Merz met in the Oval Office at the White House in Washington, D.C., on March 3, 2026, to discuss issues including recent U.S. and Israeli strikes on Iran. (Win McNamee/Getty Images)
Retired Rear Adm. Mark Montgomery, a senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies and former U.S. European Command official, told Fox News Digital that Merz was wrong to speak that way about Trump at a moment when Germany needs Washington’s support.
“Talking trash about the president at a meeting with school kids in Germany is not professional diplomacy, and especially a president who is well-known to be prickly as President Trump,” Montgomery said. “Germany is not the big country in this relationship, the United States is, and Merz needed to show more discipline as a national leader.”
Montgomery said those tensions risk affecting hard security decisions, including long-range strike capabilities in Germany.
He criticized recent U.S. moves to delay or potentially cancel a rotational deployment of long-range strike systems to Germany, which he said would have included Tomahawk, SM-6 or Precision Strike Missile capabilities. Reuters reported in May that Germany’s defense ministry said there had been no “definitive cancellation” of the deployment.
“Both of these are bad decisions being made by our Department of Defense,” Montgomery said. “These are weapons systems that are incredibly important to deterring Russia.”
He said the goal is not to fight Russia in Poland, the Baltics or the Suwałki Gap, but to prevent Moscow from attacking in the first place.
“And those long-range strike weapons are a big part of that. And I’m very disappointed in our Department of Defense,” Montgomery said.
A source with knowledge of the matter said that despite briefings about possible decreases in U.S. involvement, the U.S.–Germany defense relationship remains strong and cooperation remains close.
‘PUTIN IS PUSHING THE LIMITS’: EASTERN ALLIES WARN TRUMP NOT TO PULL US TROOPS
U.S. Army soldiers carry a simulated casualty into a MEDEVAC vehicle during NATO’s Sword 26 exercise, which tests new battlefield evacuation methods using drones and AI-assisted medical technology in Bemowo Piskie, Poland, May 11, 2026. (Kuba Stezycki/Reuters)
Europe’s future defense industrial base
“Germany developing a large, impressive defense industrial base is good for NATO, it’s good for Western security, and it’s even good for our primes,” Montgomery said, arguing that Germany, not Poland, France or the United Kingdom, is most likely to become the “beating heart” of Europe’s future defense industrial base.
Germany has long been central to the U.S. military presence in Europe. Hanefeld pointed to Ramstein Air Base, Landstuhl Regional Medical Center and the training area in Grafenwöhr as examples of Germany’s continuing importance to American power projection and NATO deterrence.
“These facilities serve U.S. national security interests and U.S. military personnel and further NATO’s ability to deter and defend,” he said. “I am confident: NATO will remain transatlantic at its core, but will become more European over the next decade.”
At the 2025 NATO summit in The Hague, allies agreed to invest 5% of GDP annually in defense and defense-related spending by 2035, including core military spending and broader security investments. Merz said at the time that the decision was meant to safeguard “freedom, security and prosperity,” according to the German government.
Hanefeld said Germany is already moving to meet that standard, saying Berlin will increase defense spending to 5% of GDP “well before” 2035 and recruit almost 100,000 new active-duty soldiers into the Bundeswehr.
He also pushed back against U.S. critics who argue that Germany and other European allies are still not carrying their fair share of the defense burden. Hanefeld said Germany has signed more than 380 contracts worth more than $33 billion with U.S. defense companies to procure and manufacture fighter jets, transport helicopters, air defense systems and ammunition.
“It’s a down payment on the transatlantic future and on our political commitment to shift the burden for deterrence and defense to Europe,” Hanefeld said.
TRUMP PUSHED NATO TO SPEND BIG — NOW COMES THE HARDER QUESTION: CAN EUROPE ACTUALLY FIGHT?
Sept 24, 2025; Augusta, Georgia, USA; H.E. Jens Hanefeld, Ambassador of the Federal Republic of Germany to the U.S., speaks during the Aurubis first melt ceremony at Aurubis Richmond. Aurubis is a metal recycling plant. (Katie Goodale – Augusta Chronicle/USA TODAY NETWORK)
Defending NATO’s eastern flank
One of Germany’s most visible commitments is its permanent brigade in Lithuania, expected to include around 5,000 German military and civilian personnel. The Bundeswehr says the force is intended to become fully operational for the defense of NATO’s eastern flank in the Baltic region within three years.
Hanefeld called the brigade one of Germany’s “signature efforts” to reassure Baltic allies that NATO “will defend every inch of allied territory.”
For Germany, the change is not only about money. It is a political and cultural break with decades of caution about military power. For the United States, it is also a test of whether the ally long criticized by Trump and other U.S. leaders for underspending can now become the European backbone Washington has demanded.
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NATO peacekeeping mission KFOR marks its 20th anniversary during a ceremony in Pristina. (Laura Hasani/Reuters)
Hanefeld said that is exactly where Berlin intends to go.
“NATO will remain transatlantic at its core,” he said, “but will become more European over the next decade.”
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