President Donald Trump’s repeated threats to dramatically expand tariffs are now a reality. Tariffs of 25% on goods from Mexico and Canada went into effect Tuesday morning, alongside an additional 10% tax on Chinese goods. It’s a move that affects trillions of dollars in trade and will reshape prices for everything from cars to medication — while straining relationships with key U.S. trading partners. Imported goods are a key driver of the American economy, totaling $2.9 trillion in 2024, according to the U.S. Census Bureau — with China, Canada and Mexico accounting for more than 40% of that volume. It’s these top trading partners that Trump has frequently criticized. The U.S. has a trade deficit, meaning it imports more goods than it exports. Tariffs could help close that gap by raising the prices of foreign goods and encouraging Americans to purchase domestic alternatives. In some cases, even the threat of tariffs might accomplish some of that by incentivizing manufacturers to move operations elsewhere. However, those operations won’t necessarily be relocated to the United States.China was long the biggest exporter of goods to America. But its export total began to fall after Trump levied tariffs on the country during his first term, when companies began moving manufacturing from China to Mexico. As a result, Mexico surpassed it for total exports in 2023. Tariffs often lead to higher costs for consumers, as affected companies pass their new costs along. One economic study concluded that the costs of Trump’s 2018 trade war were “passed on entirely to U.S. importers and consumers.” A 2019 report from the Federal Reserve concluded the 2018 tariffs led to U.S. job losses and higher consumer prices.Among all categories of goods, the most imported in the U.S. are machinery-related products, electronics and automotive products. Canada, China and Mexico account for a meaningful share of these imports, which means consumers could soon see prices ratchet up on everything from new cars to smartphones to bicycles. While tariffs will increase the price of consumer goods, Trump has hinted at reducing or eliminating the personal income tax with the new tariff revenue.If that’s the case, it could ease consumer pain in the face of sky-high mortgages and rising prices on essentials including eggs and milk. However, income taxes make up most of the trillions in revenue the government collected last year.

Only 26 African countries had achieved independence when, in February 1961, Ethiopian Emperor Haile Selassie ascended a sloping staircase to inaugurate Africa Hall in Addis Ababa, which he gifted as the new headquarters for the UN Economic Commission for Africa (ECA). A dominating presence in the heart of the Ethiopian capital, adorned with a sweeping 150-square-meter (1,614-square-foot) stained-glass window, the structure, designed by Italian architect Arturo Mezzedimi, had taken just 18 months to build. Fittingly then, it didn’t take long before the building became the site of a landmark event in the story of modern Africa. Just over two years later, Selassie once again made the climb to welcome the founding members of the newly formed Organization of African Unity (OAU) to their home — a meeting place intended to foster cooperation, drive economic progress and eradicate colonialism across the continent. Addressing representatives of the then-32 independent African states, Selassie declared that the continent was “at midcourse, in transition from the Africa of yesterday to the Africa of tomorrow.” “We must act to shape and mold the future and leave our imprint on events as they slip past into history,” he continued. More than 60 years later, Selassie’s message has come full-circle: Africa Hall has been shaped and molded anew. Last October marked the completion of a decade-long renovation across the entirety of the 12,800 square-meter site, commissioned by the ECA in 2013 with a $57 million budget to revitalize the landmark as a world-class conference and cultural venue. Australian design practice Architectus Conrad Gargett was entrusted with leading the re-design, giving project architect Simon Boundy a mission with dual themes — modernization and conservation. “The two go hand-in-hand with projects like this,” Boundy told CNN, “Where you’ve got an aging asset, but if it doesn’t get used, it falls into disrepair.” “It’s about bringing the building back to life, making it accessible to the public and celebrating the story of the building for future generations.” Building balance The conundrum for Boundy and his team was that those two aims threatened to undermine the historical significance of Africa Hall. In essence, how do you modernize a historical landmark without losing some of its soul? As a heritage architect — regularly tasked with making sensitive changes to buildings of historical or cultural importance — Boundy is well-versed in answering that question. The first step was understanding Africa Hall’s importance and history, which was aided by hiring local architects and engineers to work on the renovation. Among them was Mewded Wolde, who, a day before her university graduation in 2014, found herself on the roof of Africa Hall taking measurements. Born and raised in Addis Ababa, Wolde says the building — which hosted OAU meetings until the organization was replaced by the African Union (AU) in 2002, which eventually moved into new headquarters in Addis Ababa — is a source of pride for herself and many others given its role in helping countries across the continent achieve independence from colonial rule. “This building, still for the African Union, is a symbol,” Wolde told CNN. “It’s an artwork in itself that symbolizes the struggle that we have gone through in the past 60, 70 years to get to African unity.” Total Liberation Protective measures also included a strengthened frame for the crown jewel of Africa Hall: the two-story stained-glass window that has adorned the foyer since 1961. Titled “The Total Liberation of Africa,” it was Ethiopian artist Afewerk Tekle’s signature piece and is split into three panels; Africa Then, Africa Then and Now, and Africa Now and in the Future. Featuring a knight in shining armor emblazoned with the UN logo, a dragon and the grim reaper, the work tells a story of liberation, of “slaying the demons” of colonization, Boundy explained. Tekle’s work is Africa Hall’s definitive symbol, and can be seen splashed across shirts, ties and more in the city. “The symbolism of the artwork is something that’s really hard to overstate, how important that is,” Boundy said. “It really tells the story of what Africa Hall is trying to represent, which is the very best of what Africa can do, quite literally shedding the recent history, and looking very much forward … You can sit and spend hours staring at it.” With various original pieces either loose or missing, the entire artwork was meticulously disassembled, cleaned and restored panel-by-panel by Emmanuel Thomas, the grandson of the person who originally made the stained glass from Tekle’s design. Its refreshed look was unveiled alongside a new permanent exhibition to highlight the key events at Africa Hall that have helped to shape Pan-African history. For Wolde, both the artwork and the renovation itself are reflective of Selassie’s 1963 address, where he spoke of molding the Africa of tomorrow. “Even now, even with all the upgrades that have happened in Africa Hall, this quote is actually true,” Wolde said. “This is the space that we’re going to use to shape the future. Even then it was where they were having meetings … t

LONDON — If President Donald Trump wants a Nobel Peace Prize, he should hold off negotiating a ceasefire between Ukraine and Russia, Britain’s former top spy told NBC News on Thursday. Richard Dearlove, the ex-head of British intelligence agency MI6, said that rushing a truce — and giving too many concessions to the Kremlin — could encourage President Vladimir Putin to launch other hostile forays into Europe. The Russians badly need a ceasefire, said Dearlove, citing waning Kremlin cash reserves and the falling price of crude oil, which Moscow exports to fund its war machine. “Ukraine is pretty close to a tipping point,” he said in a wide-ranging interview. “But the worry at the moment is that Trump will do a premature deal with the Russians” and make too many concessions. The “highly undesirable” consequences would be to “embolden the Russians, over time, to be more aggressive and assertive in Europe,” said Dearlove over a coffee at one of London’s historic private members clubs. His remarks come as Ukraine’s military chief said Russia had launched a new offensive in the Eastern European country. While often less critical of Trump’s unorthodox approach than many other foreign policy experts, Dearlove said he finds Trump’s general “lack of grace” and “lack of decent behavior” to be “very disconcerting” — specifically his Oval Office bust-up with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in February. “My general view of Americans is they’re gracious and they behave very respectfully,” said a gently amused Dearlove, 80, an Olympic rower’s son who spent a year at Connecticut’s preparatory Kent School before gaining his degree back in Britain at the University of Cambridge. “It’s extraordinary the way that Trump has blown up all of that.” The jovial, outspoken grandee of the British foreign policy establishment joined MI6 in 1966 and served as its chief — code-named “C” — between 1999 and 2004. He now co-hosts the “One Decision” podcast, covering global news, alongside former U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta. He says he “strongly supports” the American president’s campaign to pressure European allies to spend more on defense, decrying the imbalance of Europe enjoying a relatively generous health care and benefits system while letting the U.S. foot the bill for Western defense. “Why should American taxpayers pay for indulgent social security programs in countries like Germany, France and Italy?” he said. He dismisses “Signalgate” — in which Trump’s team discussed bombing Yemen on the messaging app Signal — as a “stupid” and “silly mistake” that showed “a degree of amateurism.” And he said it wouldn’t have a long-term impact on Western intelligence sharing. Reached for comment on Dearlove’s remarks, White House principal deputy press secretary Harrison Fields said, “President Trump is a master negotiator who has done more to bring about world peace during his tenure than any president in modern history.” “The President’s Peace Through Strength agenda has delivered historic achievements across the globe and restored American dominance on the world stage,” Fields added. “The ‘experts’ have been wrong for decades, and doing the same thing while expecting a different result is the definition of insanity.” The ex-MI6 head says his biggest short-term worry revolves around Trump’s approach to Ukraine, which has involved parallel talks with both Kyiv and Moscow and has been lambasted by Trump’s critics in the West as being too favorable to the latter. “If you want to get the Nobel Peace Prize, don’t do a premature deal with Ukraine — wait,” Dearlove said. (According to former aides, the president still covets the landmark award won by four of his predecessors, and for which Trump has been nominated at least twice before.) Dearlove believes the Russians are on the back foot and will only come under more pressure to accept terms. “The Russians themselves badly need a ceasefire, but Putin is incapable of seeking one because he “doesn’t have a reverse gear,” Dearlove said. On Iran, responding to Trump’s announcement that the U.S. will hold direct talks with Tehran over its nuclear program, Dearlove says he believes the administration will “demand a very high price” — namely that Iran give up its entire nuclear program, both for energy and weapons. “I think there’s a bottom line for Trump and Israel that Iran must not have nuclear capability,” he said. “I think it’s pretty clear that if Iran were to try to weaponize or if the intelligence suggests that they are weaponized, then there would be a joint Israeli-American attack.” Trump didn’t rule out military action if the talks don’t succeed, saying Tehran would have a “very bad day” if diplomacy failed. Dearlove agreed: “If the Iranians don’t negotiate, or if they mislead, which they’re quite capable of doing, they’re ones heading for a crisis.” Dearlove was head of MI6 when the U.S. invaded Iraq in 2003, and was later criticized by a public inquiry for his handling of intelligence alleging that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction, a key argument steering Britain into the war alongside Washington. At the inquiry in 2017, he described claims he was too close to the British government as “complete rubbish.” And, according to a BBC interview in 2023, he is among a minority of people who believe that Iraq did have some kind of weapons program, but that its components may have been moved into neighboring Syria. Looking ahead, Dearlove believes by far the biggest issue is how the West deals with China. “Pax Americana” — the “American peace” that has largely held since 1945 and is a byword for Washington’s postwar global dominance — has “definitively disintegrated,” he said. In its stead, there has to be “some sort of understanding between the United States and China,” whose President Xi Jinping “wants to create a world by 2050 which is aligned with China’s value system,” he added. “China and the West are intimately intertwined: You can’t take them apart, you can’t disentangle them,” he said. “But at the same time, it’s totally opposed to the Western value system.” He characterizes Xi’s Chinese Communist Party as “talking about global domination” — something vehemently rejected by Beijing. “There’s going to have to be some sort of international agreement which accommodates what I would describe as the two spheres of influence,” he said. Otherwise, China is “going to end up in a confrontation with the United States at some point in the 21st century.”