Situation Reports

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and Saudi Arabia's Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman signed a military cooperation agreement to develop defense ties and potential contracts, Bloomberg reported on March 27.

China's commerce ministry on March 27 initiated two probes, one into U.S. actions affecting global trade and another into U.S. actions impacting trade in "green products," including curbs on imports and technology cooperation.

Russian President Vladimir Putin asked leading businessmen to make large voluntary contributions to the state budget and reiterated that Russia would continue fighting Ukraine until it captured the remaining parts of the Donbas region, The Bell reported on March 27, citing people familiar with the matter.

Pro-Iranian hacktivist group Handala publicly stated on its website that it breached and leaked data from the personal inbox of U.S. FBI Director Kash Patel on March 27, Reuters reported the same day.

China has intensified inspections on Panamanian ships and detained at least 70 vessels from the country as of March 8, according to a U.S. Federal Maritime Commission estimate, Reuters reported on March 26.

U.S. President Donald Trump announced a delay until April 6 of the deadline for Iran to fully reopen the Strait of Hormuz or risk U.S. attacks against power plants after claiming that U.S.-Iran discussions were going "very well," AP reported on March 26.

The Rwandan-backed M23 rebel group has withdrawn from several localities in the Lubero and Walikale territories of the Democratic Republic of the Congo's North Kivu province since the night of March 23-24, Jeune Afrique reported on March 27.

On March 26, the Philippines and France signed a status of visiting forces agreement, allowing their militaries to deploy personnel in each other's territories for joint training, exercises and operations, The Philippine Star reported the next day.

The CSCL Indian Ocean and CSCL Arctic Ocean -- two container ships linked to China's state-owned COSCO Shipping Corp. -- attempted to exit the Persian Gulf through the Strait of Hormuz before making abrupt U-turns and heading back into the Gulf, Bloomberg reported on March 27.

A federal judge issued a preliminary injunction temporarily blocking the Department of Defense from labeling Anthropic, the artificial intelligence lab behind the Claude family of AI models, a supply chain risk, NPR reported on March 26.