Tag: War in Ukraine
Can anybody stop Ursula von der Leyen? – POLITICO
BRUSSELS
For a brief moment last year, it looked like Ursula von der Leyen’s bid for a second term as European Commission president just might be in trouble.
In an unscheduled trip to Israel in October, she had stood next to Benjamin Netanyahu and expressed unreserved solidarity in the country’s battle against Hamas.
Her statement would not have been out of place in the mouth of a U.S. president or, indeed, a German politician (which is, after all, what von
Taiwan at election crossroads as war threat looms – POLITICO
This story was originally published in German by WELT, a sister publication of POLITICO in the Axel Springer Group.
Nate Lin wants to be prepared for war.
On a Saturday morning in November, Lin, a 35-year-old Taiwanese man, practices how to apply a tourniquet to his right arm. In this fictive scenario, he’s been shot and is in danger of bleeding to death.
“It has to be pulled tighter to stop the bleeding,” warns the instructor.
It’s not the kind
POLITICO Europe’s most-read stories of 2023 – POLITICO
Well, here we are folks, at the end of another turbulent year.
When we put this list together at the end of 2022, its contents largely covered something many of us thought we would not see again in our lifetime: a major war in Europe. Now, we are grappling with two wars in our immediate neighborhood, as the slaughter drags on in Ukraine, and conflict rages between Israel and Hamas in Gaza.
In Ukraine, the long-awaited counteroffensive against Russia, which
Germany chokes on its own austerity medicine – POLITICO
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BERLIN — Germans gave the world schadenfreude for a reason. And southern Europe couldn’t be more pleased.
For countries that spent years on the receiving end of Europe’s German-inspired fiscal Inquisition, there’s no sweeter sight than to see Germany splayed on the high altar of Teutonic parsimony.
The irony is that Germany put itself there on purpose and has no clue how it will find redemption.
Last week’s jaw-dropping
Anti-green backlash hovers over COP climate talks – POLITICO
This article is part of the Road to COP special report, presented by SQM.
LONDON — World leaders will touch down in Dubai next week for a climate change conference they’re billing yet again as the final off-ramp before catastrophe. But war, money squabbles and political headaches back home are already crowding the fate of the planet from the agenda.
The breakdown of the Earth’s climate has for decades been the most important yet somehow least urgent of global crises,
Putin rakes in extra €1B for his war chest via Bulgaria sanctions loophole – POLITICO
BRUSSELS — The Kremlin raked in an extra €1 billion for its war effort this year after Russia’s largest private oil firm exploited loopholes in EU sanctions rules — with help from Bulgaria.
Taking advantage of a unique exemption to the EU’s Russian oil ban, Bulgaria allowed millions of barrels of Russian oil to reach a local Russian-owned refinery, which then exported various refined fuels abroad including to EU countries, according to an investigation by the NGO Global Witness, the
Big hopes but no quick fixes – POLITICO
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WARSAW — The campaign language ahead of this year’s Polish general election is apocalyptic — painting it as an existential battle for the soul of the EU’s fifth most populous country — but the likeliest outcome is a chaotic stalemate.
If the ruling nationalist Law and Justice (PiS) hangs on to power for a third term there isn’t much more it can do to wreck Poland without quitting the
Inside the fall of Nagorno-Karabakh – POLITICO
KORNIDZOR, Armenia — Many of the men waiting at the Armenian border have been there for days.
When news broke on Tuesday that Azerbaijan had launched a major attack into the ethnic-Armenian enclave of Nagorno-Karabakh, dozens of them pulled on warm jackets and wooly hats and drove towards the checkpoint. Now they can only watch the road, once the sole highway cutting through the mountains to the breakaway region where their families live, hoping their relatives are able to get
WTF is Christine Lagarde up to? – POLITICO
Deep in the Wyoming wilderness last month, Christine Lagarde, president of the European Central Bank, stood before a large audience of elite central bankers and casually predicted the collapse of the international financial order. Resplendent in red and black, she resembled a humanoid Lindor chocolate truffle — and though her warning was diluted by the usual impenetrable jargon, the subtext was sufficiently clear and dramatic.
“There are plausible scenarios where we could see a fundamental change in the nature of
What being thrown out of Russia taught me about the Kremlin’s war on the media – POLITICO
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During my 10 years as a Moscow-based journalist, I struggled to imagine how and when I would eventually leave Russia.
Half Russian myself, I had moved there in 2013, keen to learn more and report on a country that I felt was often misunderstood by many in the West.
In the end, the decision was made for me last month when a representative of Russia’s foreign ministry called to