Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Russian President Vladimir Putin have held ‌talks in New Delhi, their second meeting in two weeks, that is expected to ‌focus on trade, energy and defence ties.

The ‌talks are being held on the eve of the annual summit of BRICS leaders in the Indian capital, that will see the participation of Chinese President Xi Jinping and Iran’s President Masoud Pezeshkian, among others.

Modi and Putin are expected to discuss cooperation between the two countries ‌in civil nuclear ‌energy, fertilisers, ⁠defence, critical minerals, manufacturing, railways, and steel, an Indian source said.

The ​two leaders met on the sidelines of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation summit in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan, on August 31, where Modi told Putin that the war in Ukraine needed to end for humanity’s sake and that New Delhi would support every peace effort to stop the fighting.

India, along with ⁠China, is one of the biggest buyers ‌of Russian ​oil, which is seen as helping Moscow replenish its budget since it sent tens of ​thousands of ‌troops into Ukraine in 2022 and was hit with sweeping Western sanctions.

New Delhi has also said that the Ukraine conflict can ​be ​resolved only through dialogue and diplomacy and ​not by some countries stopping energy, metal ‌or fertiliser trade with Russia.

Russia’s share of Indian crude imports rose in 2026, reaching a record 51 per cent in July, as disruptions to Middle Eastern supplies increased Indian refiners’ reliance. That share likely moderated in August as China stepped up Russian oil purchases, Indian media ​reported.

Putin visited India in December 2025 as well for the annual India-Russia summit and ​the two countries agreed ⁠to expand their trade and defence relationship.

Leaders of the BRICS nations will meet in New Delhi this weekend as wars in Ukraine and the Middle East and tensions between the United States and China test the group’s ability to act together.

Host India will seek to balance its ties with China and Russia against its growing partnerships with the US and other Western powers.

Russian President Vladimir Putin, Chinese President Xi Jinping and Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian are among the leaders confirmed to attend.

BRICS is a grouping of major emerging markets and developing countries, named after an acronym for Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa. 

It has expanded from its original membership to include 11 countries that together represent about half the world’s population and a large share of its energy, resources and economic output. 

Experts say its growing size has also exposed divisions as its members want greater influence in the global order but often have competing political, economic and foreign-policy interests.

BRICS faces divisions over Iran and Ukraine

The conflicts in Iran and Ukraine are likely to highlight those divisions. Iran is a member of the expanded BRICS, while Russia remains one of its most influential members. China has close ties with both countries, while India maintains relations with Russia, Iran, the United States and Europe.

That diversity makes it difficult for BRICS to take a strong common position on major conflicts. The grouping includes countries with competing regional ambitions, including India and China, Iran and Saudi Arabia, and Egypt and Ethiopia, as well as other nations from the global south.

“The global south is not a homogeneous entity,” said Praveen Donthi, senior analyst with the International Crisis Group. “Hence, the grouping will find it hard to manage and mediate in these conflicts.”

Russia’s war in Ukraine has already exposed the limits of India’s ability to balance competing interests. New Delhi has maintained close ties with Moscow, including through energy and defence pacts, while also deepening its strategic relationship with Washington.

The South Asian nation has consistently called for dialogue and diplomacy rather than taking sides.

The Iran-U.S. conflict poses a similar challenge. BRICS members have differing ties with Washington and interests in the Middle East, making a unified response difficult. 

China and Russia have backed Iran in international forums, while India has taken a cautious approach. Saudi Arabia and the UAE have their own tensions with Tehran.

For India, the summit is an opportunity to manage its relationship with China. Ties have improved since border tensions escalated in 2020, but China remains India’s largest strategic rival.

President Xi’s visit to New Delhi, his first in seven years, could help consolidate the recent diplomatic thaw but there are few signs of a recovery in trade and business ties.

“The upcoming summit offers India an opportunity to engage with China, make progress on outstanding bilateral issues,” Donthi said.

India also has an interest in preventing BRICS from becoming an explicitly anti-Western bloc.

New Delhi has strengthened ties with the US, Israel, Japan, Australia and Europe while maintaining its longstanding relationship with Russia.

BRICS’ growing membership also gives it considerable weight, but its influence will ultimately depend on whether the members can agree on practical steps.

The group has called for changes to global financial institutions, greater representation for developing countries and alternatives to Western-dominated systems. Yet its members often disagree on how to achieve those goals.

Donthi said BRICS’ success could be measured in smaller steps. These include keeping the expanded group together, improving ties with China, and deepening trade and financial cooperation. 

The grouping could also show that it can give developing countries a platform without forcing them to choose between Western and non-Western blocs, he said.

The Australian share market is careening toward its worst week since the US-Iran war began, as surging oil prices pressure bond yields and squeeze central banks to hike borrowing costs. 

The benchmark S&P/ASX200 index fell 112.2 points by midday on Friday, to be down 1.27 per cent to 8,707.2, as the broader All Ordinaries tumbled 120 points, or 1.33 per cent, to 8,888.3.

The top-200 is on track for a 3.2 per cent slump since Monday and its worst week since early March’s 3.8 per cent plunge, when US-led strikes killed Iran’s supreme leader and triggered a broader regional conflict.

Brent crude hit four-month highs just below $US110 a barrel after Iran-aligned Houthis seized Yemen’s port city of Mocha overnight, giving them more power to disrupt tanker traffic through the Red Sea.

“On top of that, unconfirmed reports are circulating this morning of multiple tankers being attacked near the Strait of Hormuz and that the Houthis may have scored a direct hit on Saudi Arabia’s East-West pipeline,” IG market analyst Tony Sycamore said.

The pipeline, which can carry up to seven million barrels a day, has been a lifeline for the global economy since the war began.

Making matters worse, inflation expectations and firming US producer prices sent bond yields to multi-year highs, narrowing bets the US Federal Reserve will hike the federal funds rate next week.

Local mining stocks have been hit hard, with basic materials down 4.3 per cent as commodity prices suffered on multiple fronts.

Copper dived more than five per cent from recent record highs amid US tariff uncertainty, iron ore futures fell on easing demand from China, while US interest rate worries hit precious metals.

BHP shares slumped 4.8 per cent to five-week lows of $60.41, while Rio Tinto traded almost four per cent lower.

Gold stocks were a sea of red as the precious metal sank 1.7 per cent to $4,329 ($A6,042), while silver prices crashed more than five per cent.

The financial sector softened the damage to the broader index, climbing 0.5 per cent as dip buyers bought up banks and major insurers.

The energy sector traded flat as gains in Woodside, Santos and refinery operators Ampol and Viva were offset by steep drops in uranium stocks and Whitehaven Coal.

Good news was limited elsewhere, with narrow early gains in the defensive communications, utilities and consumer staples sectors.

Consumer discretionary stocks fell 0.3 per cent, while real estate and IT stocks continued to face selling pressure, with the sectors falling 1.7 and 2.1 per cent, respectively.

In company news, GQG Partners crumpled by seven per cent after its funds under management shrank $US4.3 billion ($A6 billion) to $US149.2 billion ($A208.3 billion) in August.

WiseTech, CAR Group and Cleanaway went ex-dividend, with Virgin Australia and Credit Corp to follow on Monday.

The Australian dollar was buying 71.56 US cents, down from 72.16 US cents on Thursday at 5pm.

The federal and Queensland treasurers are pointing the finger at one another over an impending downgrade to the Sunshine State’s credit rating, which will heap more borrowing costs on its already-straining budget.

Queensland Treasurer David Janetzki all but confirmed on Friday morning the state was set to lose its AA+ rating with credit agency S&P Global.

Since taking control of the state’s coffers in October 2024, Mr Janetzki has warned a downgrade was inevitable due to the previous Labor government’s “fiscal vandalism”.

He also stepped up criticism of the federal government, including its tax changes in the May budget, which have contributed to a housing downturn.

Lower house prices have hit Queensland’s stamp duty revenue to the tune $223 million in the first two months of the financial year, which Mr Janetzki said would result in around a billion dollars in reduced revenue in 2026/27.

“Then there’s (federal treasurer) Jim Chalmers’ cost shifting: NDIS, stranded Australians, natural disaster funding. So there is a clear range of problems that we have that the federal government has failed to appropriately fund,” Mr Janetzki told reporters.

In a separate broadside on his fellow banana bender, Dr Chalmers said Queensland had done very well out of the Commonwealth government under Labor.

Stamp duty had soared 58 per cent in Queensland in the last two years, he said, while GST payments from the federal government were almost $20 billion this year, up $2.6 billion compared to the year prior.

“State Treasurer David Janetzki is getting billions more in Commonwealth support, billions more in stamp duty and GST, and billions more in coal royalties,” Dr Chalmers said in a statement.

“At the same time, he has been softening Queenslanders up and telling them that a credit downgrade is ‘inevitable’.

“That’s a damning indictment on the Queensland government’s economic credibility after almost two years in charge of the coffers.

“A credit downgrade risks higher debt costs and less money for the services Queenslanders deserve.

“David Janetzki has some real questions to answer.”

S&P declined to comment on whether a rating change was in the works.

In a June report, the agency reaffirmed Queensland’s negative rating outlook, reflecting the state’s structurally weaker finances following its latest budget.

The report warned rising public sector wages and health services costs risked delaying the state’s recovery.

“Downward rating pressure may arise if Queensland delays its return to operating surpluses, or if higher infrastructure spending drives up overall cash deficits and debt,” S&P said at the time.

Queensland’s budget forecast a deficit of $6.2 billion in 2026/27, with gross debt projected to exceed $200 billion by 2028/29.

Doctors are effectively being left homeless by a migration policy designed to fix rural healthcare shortages, a parliamentary committee has been told. 

A requirement for foreign physicians to spend 10 years working outside urban centres after arriving in Australia has resulted in doctors being dumped in remote areas without any consideration of how to settle them, witnesses said.

“They’re a pretty resourceful bunch, but couch-surfing isn’t a long-term recruitment and retention strategy,” Australian Medical Association president Danielle McMullen told the federal probe into skilled migration.

“We’ve got doctors essentially living in even short periods of homelessness.”

Areas where new doctors were needed most were also being misclassified, the committee heard.

More than half the rural medical workforce, including almost 60 per cent of rural GPs, are from overseas.

The Labor-led inquiry comes as major parties jostle over migration numbers, with the government aiming for 225,000 per year and the coalition proposing to tie the figure to housing completions as it fends off a One Nation surge. 

The anti-immigration party has proposed slashing net overseas migration by more than half from about 300,000 to 130,000.

ABS figures show there were about 86,200 skilled migrants in the year to June 2025,  about half of them permanent, representing a marginal drop from the previous year.

“Knee-jerk” decisions responding to public anti-immigration sentiment could have unintended consequences, migration agency chief executive Melanie Macfarlane told the inquiry.

“With offshore applications de-prioritised, there is a risk that applicants will do anything to remain onshore, including further protection visa applications, indeed also unlawfulness,” she said. 

She described how a migrant chef refused to leave Australia despite being barred from applying for the visa he needed because he thought once he left the country he’d never come back.

“He’s too scared that he will never return,” Ms Macfarlane said.

“Bridging visas are also a complex nightmare and need to be overhauled.”

Debate about net overseas migration was drowning out discussion about fixing the country’s dilapidated skilled migration pathways, the inquiry heard. 

“I’m not going to say that numbers are irrelevant, but there seems to be almost an attitude that that number should be cut for the sake of cutting it,” Law Council of Australia senior policy lawyer Alan Freckleton said.

Global bond yields spiked to new highs and sharemarkets slumped on Friday as soaring oil prices inflamed inflation risks, sending investors scrambling to price in ‌more policy tightening from central banks across the globe.

Oil prices jumped 6.0 per cent overnight, with Brent crude futures hitting a four-month high of $US109.97 ($A153.43) a barrel on Friday. Oil ‌flows remained restricted through the Strait of Hormuz as the US and Iran traded attacks, while Iran-aligned Houthis seized control of Yemen’s port of Mocha, threatening Saudi oil exports in the Red Sea.

“Fighting between Houthi and Saudi-backed forces has surged in the past week, marking the most significant violence in Yemen in years, with maritime traffic through the Bab el-Mandeb gravely imperiled by the Houthi advances,” said analysts at RBC Capital Markets, tipping Brent could hit $US121.99 ($A170.20) ‌a barrel in ‌the fourth quarter.

That was a ⁠wake-up call for markets that are finally starting to price in the risk of a protracted ​war. Comments from President Donald Trump that the war could last beyond the November midterm elections haven’t helped, with bond yields surging globally on heightened inflation fears.

The benchmark 10-year Treasury yields jumped overnight to close in on the critical 5.0 per cent level, the 30-year hit the highest since 2007 and two-years surged 12 basis points overnight as markets ramped up bets that the US Federal Reserve will have to raise interest rates this month to tame inflation, currently priced ⁠at 68 per cent probability.

Asian bonds fell steeply on Friday, with Australia’s three-year government bond ‌yields surging 17 ​basis points to a 15-year high of 5.037 per cent. Japan’s 10-year government bond yields rose 5.5 basis points to 2.965 per cent.

“We expect eight of the nine ​DM central banks ‌to hike rates between now and year-end. This includes the Fed, BoJ, all four European central banks we cover, Australia, and New Zealand,” said ​analysts at JPMorgan in a note.

“Canada is expected to remain the lonesome dove. The tightening is for now expected to remain shallow, but risks to our forecasts lean in the direction of more action in the face of resilient growth, sticky core inflation, and ​commodity ​price pressures.”

The surge in oil prices has raised the stakes ​for US consumer prices data for August due later in the day, ‌which may make or break the case of a Fed rate hike next week.

Forecasts are centred on a 0.2 per cent monthly rise in the core measure of CPI, although risks are skewed towards a higher number as the PPI data overnight showed some stickiness.

Higher bond yields raised the discount rates used for corporate valuations, leaving Asian stocks in the red. Australia’s resources-heavy slid 1.0 per cent, Japan’s Nikkei tumbled 2.8 per cent and South Korea’s KOSPI dived 2.7 per cent.

Nasdaq futures fell 0.2 per cent ​and S&P 500 futures were little changed.

The US dollar lifted with higher Treasury yields, having gained 0.4 per cent overnight against its major peers. It ​was steady on Friday at 99.06.

In commodity ⁠markets, gold held at $US4,317 ($A6,023) an ounce after dropping nearly 2.0 per cent overnight, failing to catch some of ​the safe-haven bids.

A ‌US appeals court has declined to allow President Donald Trump’s administration to implement a new Postal Service rule that would tighten mail-in voting requirements before November’s congressional elections.

The ruling on Thursday comes as ‌the US Supreme Court weighs a similar request.

A three-judge panel of the Boston-based 1st US Circuit Court of Appeals declined to put on hold an injunction that a lower-court judge issued ‌last week that has prevented USPS from enforcing the new rule it adopted at the Republican president’s direction.

The fate of that rule will be decided soon by the 6-3 conservative-majority US Supreme Court. In a rare step, the administration did not even wait for the 1st Circuit to issue a decision before asking the high court to lift the injunction on Sunday.

Boston-based US District Judge Indira Talwani, an appointee of Democratic President Barack Obama, had issued the injunction on Friday at the behest of voting rights groups and numerous Democratic-led states.

In asking the 1st Circuit ⁠to lift Talwani’s order, the US Department of Justice argued the plaintiffs’ case appeared based on an unfounded premise ​that USPS intends to seize control of the administration of federal elections when it was instead adopting just a “modest” mail-related regulation.

But the three-judge panel, composed entirely of judges appointed by Democratic President Joe Biden, said that argument focuses on the “trees while ignoring the forest.” The panel said that under the US Constitution, states and Congress have the authority to regulate elections, not the executive branch.

The court said it saw no error in Talwani’s conclusion that allowing the rule to take effect “will likely result in the disenfranchisement of millions of voters across the ⁠country while providing minimal — if any — gains in combating voter fraud.”

The appeal before the Supreme Court remains pending. It had previously lifted an ​earlier injunction Talwani issued that had blocked USPS from moving forward with the rule before it was finalised.

USPS issued the rule to implement an executive order the Republican president signed in March after years of Trump calling for tighter rules on voting by mail and pushing the false claim that his 2020 presidential ​election ​defeat to Biden was the result of widespread voter fraud.

All 50 states ​allow for some form of mail-in voting. Twenty-nine states allow voters to ask to ‌cast ballots by mail without providing a reason, and eight conduct their elections entirely by mail.

Under the rule, states must supply the USPS with lists of mail ballot recipients, and all outbound and return ballot envelopes must bear unique barcodes.

The USPS, under the rule, may refuse to deliver ballots that do not comply with the new standards or are associated with voters who do not appear on the lists.

Talwani prevented the USPS rule from going into effect after concluding it risked disenfranchising voters, and was likely unlawful and adopted in ​violation of the US Constitution, which gives states the authority to administer elections.

A study on the death rate among welfare recipients has highlighted “profound” inequality in health between average people and those on the lowest incomes.

The report from the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare compared mortality rates and causes of death for people receiving and not receiving various income support payments by linking data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics and government systems.

People receiving an income support including disability, unemployment or carers payments had an average mortality rate more than nine times higher than people who did not access the welfare system.

Of the 287,000 people aged 22 to 64 who died between 2012 and 2022, almost three in five received income support payments. 

The report showed the main cause of death for people on income support was cardiovascular disease but there were also higher rates of “deaths of despair” associated with alcohol, drugs and self harm, University of Queensland social science research fellow Mark Robinson said.

“The findings point to the profound health inequities in Australia despite its comparatively strong health record,” Dr Robinson said.

“It demonstrates Australians facing economic disadvantage are carrying a much higher burden of premature mortality than others.”

Income support recipients had higher death rates from suicide and accidental poisoning, with alcoholic liver disease fatalities being 21 times more prevalent.

The independent federal agency produced the report to aid policy-makers.

The government would have to tackle complex issues around mental health services, the cost-of-living crisis and raising income support in order to improve health among welfare recipients, Dr Robinson said.

An Australian Institute of Health and Welfare spokesperson said the statistical report had identified higher death rates for people on income support but not the causes.

“Further research could help build a better understanding of how factors such as economic participation, service use and other life circumstances are linked to mortality outcomes,” the spokesperson said.

Lifeline 13 11 14

beyondblue 1300 22 4636

What should have been a routine international trip with the prime minister quickly devolved into chaos and the start of a new era of global paranoia.

James Grubel was AAP’s chief political reporter covering then-prime minister John Howard’s first meeting with then-US president George W Bush in Washington DC for the 50th anniversary of the ANZUS treaty.

Day one of the visit had gone smoothly.

Day two was to start with a press conference before the prime minister was to deliver a speech later in the day.

News of two planes striking the World Trade Centre in New York had reached the press pack in Washington moments before Mr Howard spoke to the media.

“It had become a little bit more obvious that this was a serious event,” Mr Grubel told AAP.

“The prime minister gave his condolences. And still, at that stage, we were thinking the day was going to go ahead as as normal.”

But as the curtains were opened in the Willard Hotel at the close of the press conference, smoke was billowing from across the Potomac River.

A third plane had struck the Pentagon just 5km away.

The gathered journalists were forced to evacuate, walking one mile down the road to the Australian embassy as thousands of people scrambled to get out of the city.

“The whole of Washington was in gridlock,” Mr Grubel said.

“There were armed police and soldiers on the corners … I think every building in Washington and everybody was evacuating.

“It was a totally different city to the one that we’d been wandering around in for the past couple days.”

The mood in the Australian embassy was sombre according to Mr Grubel as journalists continued writing for the media back home.

“The magnitude of this awful event slowly, slowly hit, and you had to occasionally stop yourself and just focus on what you were doing and try and put it out of your mind so you could write about it clearly.

“Otherwise, you’d kind of get a bit caught up in it.It was very unclear whether there were going to also be attacks on on London, on Paris and Sydney, on Canberra.”

Ten Australians were among the almost 3000 people who died when al-Qaeda militants hijacked four planes on September 11, 2001.

The hijackers flew two planes into the twin towers at the World Trade Centre in New York and one into the Pentagon just outside of Washington.

The fourth plane crashed into a field in rural Pennsylvania.

John Howard decided to invoke the ANZUS treaty three days later on the advice of his foreign minister. If the United States was under attack, Australia had an obligation to send troops.

It’s a poignant end to an event which Mr Grubel says has rippled out to the present day.

“Now with AUKUS, we’re still going through these issues and these debates about our national security,” he said.

The shift in political rhetoric to security and defence bolstered support for the Liberal government heading into the 2001 federal election which it ultimately won.

A quarter of a century on, Mr Howard said the lesson to be learnt was in being vigilant to the world around us.

“We must be alive to the threats that face us but not live in constant fear,” Mr Howard said in a statement.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, who was a Labor backbencher at the time of the attack, said it remained a harrowing anniversary a quarter of a century on.

“Alongside the many Americans who lost their lives, were people from nations across the world, 10 Australians among them,” Mr Albanese told the parliament on Thursday.

“America was shaken to its core, but it did not yield. It did not break.”

Australian businesses need to get their innovation mojo back on track after flatlining following the COVID-19 pandemic, when breakthroughs were hampered by stubborn inflation and global disruption.

But hiccups could lie ahead given the current state of the world, dominated by the US war on Iran and the war in Ukraine, feeding a general malaise in the enterprise sector.

The Melbourne Institute of Applied Economic and Social Research has just finished crunching a massive set of hard data for an 18-year peek at the nation’s innovation pathway.

It tracked innovation activity from 2006/27 to 2023/24, drawing on de-identified information provided by businesses to governments and other agencies to create a performance index.

The CommBank/MI national innovation index reflects a respectable average growth of 1.94 per cent a year in the 18 years since 2026/07 in “new to the world” innovations and “new to the firm” changes.

However, actual growth has been stagnant since 2021/22, despite edging up to an index peak of 110 points in 2023/24, the leading research centre attached to the University of Melbourne found.

“Businesses lost confidence,” study co-author Beth Webster told AAP.

“It changed a lot of behaviours and hasn’t been totally reset.” 

At its core, innovation is the process of creating value by applying novel solutions to problems to drive business growth.

Some real-world Australian examples include ticketless public transport and the invention of the Gardasil vaccine, which protects against cervical cancer, by Melbourne-based CSL.

Professor Webster said the local biotechnology sector had benefited from investment by governments, universities and research institutes since the 1980s.

“It’s certainly had a fair run and it’s still gathering strength,” she said.

But Australia also seems to be very good at wholesale trade innovation, which came in as the biggest winner of the past 18 years, followed by manufacturing, then professional, scientific and technical services.

The wholesale trade sector is involved in designing, servicing and selling goods and includes businesses that have trademarks or patents and highly skilled workers.

Some of its success stems from shifting processing offshore.

“They might be designing heaters or split systems and they’ve just outsourced the processing part,” Prof Webster said.

At the same time, not enough Australian companies are integrating well enough into the international innovation system, including financing.

“Innovation is a team sport … you have to have people who are integrated into what else is going on,” Prof Webster said.

“We’re doing well in mining technology, in agricultural technology, but I think we’ve fallen behind in other areas.”

Looking beyond 2023/24 is difficult given the current geopolitical uncertainty.

“People aren’t necessarily withdrawing money, but they’re stopping reinvesting it – they are saying ‘I might wait a little longer and see what happens’,” Prof Webster said.

While the next index report is a way off, it’s likely to signal the extent of artificial intelligence-related innovation, including machine learning and language models. 

“There’s too much uncertainty, I think, about the value,” Prof Webster said.

The best piece of advice to would-be innovators is “relationships matter”.

“Embed yourself in the ecosystem, and bring in the finance sector early; talk to your financial manager,” Prof Webster said.

“It’s only when they’ve got confidence in you that they will lend to you, and financing is going to be one of your biggest hurdles.”

* The index was developed in partnership with the Commonwealth Bank of Australia.