CIA Director William Burns met with the Taliban’s top political leader, Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar, in Kabul yesterday, the Washington Post reports, as Washington tries to gauge whether to extend the August 31 deadline to complete evacuations from Afghanistan. France and the United Kingdom have called for more time (FT) for evacuations, which will be debated during a virtual Group of Seven (G7) meeting today.

G7 leaders are also expected to discuss plans (WaPo) for resettling Afghan refugees. The United States has evacuated or facilitated the evacuation of around forty-eight thousand people (CNBC) from Afghanistan since August 14, the White House said. Many of the evacuees will be temporarily housed on U.S. bases in Germany, Italy, Kuwait, Qatar, and Spain, among other countries. Meanwhile, UN human rights chief Michelle Bachelet said at an emergency session of the Human Rights Council today that she had received credible reports of summary executions (Reuters) by the Taliban. She called for a mechanism to monitor the group’s actions.

While giving a speech during her visit to Singapore, U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris said (SCMP) Washington seeks to strengthen the global rules-based order and criticized Beijing’s attempts to “coerce and intimidate” in the South China Sea. She also said U.S. engagement in the Indo-Pacific is not “designed to make anyone choose between countries.”
 
For Foreign Affairs, Bonnie S. Glaser and Gregory Poling discuss how to build a coalition to confront Beijing in the South China Sea.
 
Malaysia: New Prime Minister Ismail Sabri Yaakob said he will not appoint any opposition leaders (Star/Asia News Network) to his cabinet and that it is not a unity government. Ismail Sabri’s swearing in put control of the government (Al Jazeera) back in the hands of the country’s longest-ruling party, the United Malays National Organisation, after it was voted out of power in 2018 following a corruption scandal. 

New Delhi announced plans to lease out public infrastructure (Hindustan Times) to private operators over the next four years to raise around $81 billion for new infrastructure investments. 

Egypt closed its main border crossing with the Gaza Strip yesterday in connection with efforts to broker a long-term cease-fire between Israel and Hamas, the Palestinian militant group that governs Gaza, Egyptian officials told the Associated Press. The move is reportedly meant to pressure Hamas into making progress in negotiations.
 
CFR’s Steven A. Cook discusses Egypt’s role in managing the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
 
Iran: The head of Iran’s prison system confirmed the authenticity of videos published by the Associated Press that showed abuse at the country’s Evin prison, saying he took responsibility for “unacceptable behaviors.” The prison has often held political prisoners and those with ties to the West.

The U.S. Treasury Department imposed sanctions (Reuters) on Filipos Woldeyohannes, the chief of staff of the Eritrean Defense Forces, saying the forces were responsible for massacres, sexual assaults, and intentional shootings of civilians during the conflict in Ethiopia’s Tigray region.
 
South Africa: Authorities said they will extradite (News24) former Mozambican Finance Minister Manuel Chang back to Mozambique, where he faces corruption charges. Chang has been in a South African jail for two years.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky held a summit (Politico) with envoys from more than forty countries to call for the reclamation of Russia-annexed Crimea. European Council President Charles Michel spoke at the event. French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Angela Merkel did not attend.
 
This timeline looks at Ukraine’s post-independence struggles.
 
Europe: A study by scientists at the World Weather Attribution project, which uses peer-reviewed research methods to evaluate climate change’s impact on extreme weather events, found that human-caused climate change increased the likelihood and intensity (Axios) of the heavy rains that caused deadly floods in Europe last month.

A fire at an offshore oil platform owned by Mexican state oil company Pemex killed at least five people (BBC) and injured six. Production was halted at more than one hundred oil wells.
 
Mexico: The United States handed over (Reuters) former Tijuana drug cartel boss Eduardo Arellano Felix to Mexico to face criminal charges after he was granted an early release from a U.S. prison sentence for cooperating with authorities.

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) fully approved (Bloomberg) Pfizer and BioNTech’s COVID-19 vaccine, prompting President Joe Biden to call for hesitant Americans to get vaccinated and for companies to require employees to do so. The Pentagon said an order making COVID-19 vaccination mandatory for U.S. troops will be issued (Military) in the coming days.