East Timor joined the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN) bloc as its 11th member state on Sunday, after 14 years of campaigning.

Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim, whose country currently chairs ASEAN, said East Timor’s accession “completes the ASEAN family — reaffirming our shared destiny and deep sense of regional kinship”.

“Within this community, Timor-Leste’s development and its strategic autonomy will find firm and lasting support,” Anwar told an ASEAN summit in the Malaysian capital of Kuala Lumpur.

East Timor, also known by its Portuguese name Timor-Leste, is the youngest country in the region, having gained independence from Indonesia in 2002 after 24 years of occupation.

President Jose Ramos-Horta has long campaigned for ASEAN membership, and an application was first submitted in 2011 during his first term.

The signing of a declaration on East Timor’s admission on Sunday is also seen as one of the crowning achievements of Malaysia’s ASEAN chairmanship.

East Timor was granted observer status to the regional body in 2022 but its full membership was delayed by various challenges.

The country continues to grapple with high levels of inequality, malnutrition and unemployment.

It remains heavily reliant on oil, with little diversification into other sectors, and some concerns remain over its ability to participate meaningfully in ASEAN’s development agenda.

It also faces challenges in infrastructure development and human resource capacity, seen as critical for effective participation in ASEAN’s economic community.

In September, thousands of student-led protesters demonstrated against a multi-million dollar plan to purchase Toyota Prado SUVs for each of the country’s 65 members of parliament and lifetime pensions for former MPs.

Demonstrators and police clashed for two days, before the parliament cancelled the vehicles’ procurement.

The parliament has also bowed to public pressure over MPs’ pensions.

ASEAN began as a five-member bloc in 1967 and has gradually expanded, with Cambodia the most recent addition in 1999.

• Washington could apply more banking, oil sanctions, sources say.
• Some US officials say Trump wants Europe to make next move.
• Trump: won’t meet with Putin unless there’s a peace deal.

US President Donald Trump’s administration has prepared additional sanctions it could use to target key areas of Russia’s economy if President Vladimir Putin continues to delay ending Moscow’s war in Ukraine, according to a US official and another person familiar with the matter.

US officials have also told European counterparts that they support the EU using frozen Russian assets to buy US weapons for Kyiv, and Washington has held nascent internal conversations about leveraging Russian assets held in the US to support Ukraine’s war effort, two US officials said.

While it is not clear whether Washington will actually carry out any of those moves in the immediate term, it indicates that the administration has a well-developed toolkit to escalate further after Trump imposed sanctions on Russia on Wednesday for the first time since returning to office in January.

Trump has positioned himself as a global peacemaker, but has admitted that trying to end Russia’s more-than-three-year war in neighbouring Ukraine has proven harder than he had anticipated.

His meeting with Putin in Alaska in August failed to make progress. Trump told reporters in Doha on Saturday that he would not meet with Putin again unless a peace deal appeared likely. “I’m not going to be wasting my time,” Trump said.

European allies — buffeted by Trump’s swings between accommodation and anger toward Putin — hope he will continue to increase pressure on Moscow.

One senior US official told Reuters that he would like to see European nations make the next big Russia move, which could be additional sanctions or tariffs. A separate source with knowledge of internal administration dynamics said Trump was likely to hit pause for a few weeks and gauge Russia’s reaction to Wednesday’s sanctions announcement.

Those sanctions took aim at oil companies Lukoil and Rosneft. The moves spiked oil prices by more than $2 and sent major Chinese and Indian buyers of Russian crude looking for alternatives.

Trump said on Saturday that when he meets with President Xi Jinping on Thursday, China’s purchases of Russian oil may be discussed. But China is cutting back “very substantially” on Russian oil and “India is cutting back completely,” Trump told reporters.

Banking sector, oil, and infrastructure

Some of the additional sanctions prepared by the United States target Russia’s banking sector and the infrastructure used to get oil to market, said a US official and another person familiar with the matter.

Last week, Ukrainian officials proposed new sanctions that the US could levy, said one source with knowledge of those conversations. Their ideas included measures to cut off all Russian banks from the dollar-based system with US counterparts, two sources said. It is not clear, however, whether Ukraine’s specific requests are being seriously considered by US officials.

Some US senators are renewing a push to get a long-stalled bipartisan sanctions bill over the line. The person with knowledge of internal administration dynamics said Trump is open to endorsing the package. The source warned, though, that such an endorsement is unlikely this month.

The Treasury Department did not respond to a request for comment.

Kirill Dmitriev, Russian President Vladimir Putin’s special envoy for investment and economic cooperation, said on Friday he believes his country, the United States and Ukraine are close to a diplomatic solution to end Russia’s war in Ukraine.

Halyna Yusypiuk, Ukrainian Embassy spokesperson in Washington, said the recent sanctions decision was appreciated, but did not otherwise comment.

“Dismantling Russia’s war machine is the most humane way to bring this war to an end,” Yusypiuk wrote in an email.

A week of whiplash

Trump’s decision to hit Russia with sanctions capped a tumultuous week with respect to the administration’s Ukraine policy.

Trump spoke with Putin last week and then announced the pair planned to meet in Budapest, catching Ukraine off guard.

A day later, Trump met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy in Washington, where US officials pressed Zelenskiy to give up territory in the Donbas region as part of a lopsided land swap to end the war. Zelenskiy pushed back, and Trump left the meeting with the position that the conflict should be frozen at its frontlines.

Then last weekend, Russia sent a diplomatic note to Washington reiterating previous peace terms. A few days later, Trump told reporters the planned meeting with Putin was off because “it just didn’t feel right to me.”

Speaking to CNN on Friday after arriving in Washington for talks with US officials, Dmitriev said a meeting between Trump and Putin had not been cancelled, as the US president described it, and that the two leaders will likely meet at a later date.

Two US officials argued privately that, in hindsight, Trump’s abortive plan to meet with Putin was likely the fruit of irrational exuberance. After sealing a ceasefire in Gaza, those officials said, Trump overestimated the degree he could use momentum from one diplomatic success to broker another one.

Trump ultimately decided to slap Russia with sanctions during a Wednesday meeting with Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Secretary of State Marco Rubio, a senior White House official said.

DUBAI: The city of superlatives is preparing to add another landmark to its skyline — one that will quite literally float.

The Dubai Arts Museum (DUMA), announced by Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, vice president and prime minister of the UAE and ruler of Dubai, is set to rise on an island in the heart of Dubai Creek.

Unlike conventional museums anchored on land, DUMA’s design incorporates the waters of the creek into its architectural identity. The museum, conceived by world-renowned Japanese architect Tadao Ando, aims to merge minimalist modernism with Dubai’s vibrant cultural narrative.

Sheikh Mohammed described the project as “a mirror of Dubai’s artistic identity and cultural spirit,” emphasising its role in shaping the city’s creative ecosystem.

By floating on the creek, DUMA is not just a museum, but a symbolic statement of Dubai’s ambition to redefine how art interacts with urban space.

The project is being delivered in partnership with Emirati businessman Abdullah Al Futtaim and his son Omar Al Futtaim, highlighting a collaboration between the public and private sectors.

Sheikh Mohammed described their involvement as “a bright example of how private enterprise can contribute meaningfully to the city’s cultural and creative economy.”

Officials indicate that DUMA will host a mix of contemporary and classical art, while its architecture will allow the museum to function as a public space, promenade, and cultural hub, providing residents and visitors with a unique vantage point of Dubai Creek.

Construction is expected to begin later this year, with completion projected within three years.