Politico Europe

The United States cannot credibly defend freedom around the world while treating the survival of a democracy under attack as a bargaining chip. Russia’s war against Ukraine is not simply a territorial dispute. It is a test of whether democratic nations will defend the principles that sustain their freedom — or allow an authoritarian aggressor to destroy these principles through military force, terror and economic coercion. Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine was unlawful. Its conduct h

LONDON — Andy Burnham will avoid making “arbitrary” cuts to Britain’s rising social security budget, a top Cabinet minister said Friday, as he defended days of mixed government messaging on welfare. Defense Secretary Wes Streeting accused Labour’s opponents — and the Keir Starmer government he served in as health secretary — of not properly thinking through plans to reduce the welfare bill, leading to a collapse in political support. Streeting told the BBC Today program: “I saw it, f

PARIS — France’s economy shrunk by 0.1% in the third quarter of 2026, according to fresh estimates from national statistics agency Insee, pushing the country closer to recession and further complicating the government’s efforts to stave off a debt-driven financial crisis. Economy and Finance Minister Roland Lescure said Friday that this summer’s extreme heat and spiking energy prices were responsible for the negative growth. In an interview with Franceinfo, he said the new figures give ad

KYIV — The local governor of Russia’s Samara region blamed Ukraine for an early morning drone attack that struck an oil refinery in Novokuibyshevsk city. “In the course of terrorist attacks on the civil infrastructure of our region and country, the vile enemy from Kyiv launched a record number of drones. There were no casualties, which is the most important thing,” Samara Governor Viacheslav Fedorischev said in a statement on Russian state messaging app Max. Russian air defense forces shot

TALLAGHT, Ireland — In a suburban industrial park south of Dublin, a sprawling mass of tubes, vents and steel stretches as far as the eye can see, forming a dense web of gray monoliths that encircle the city. As the EU’s tech capital, where most of the world’s technology giants have their European headquarters, Ireland was ground zero for the backlash against the energy-guzzling data centers needed to power the promised revolution of artificial intelligence.

At some point, maybe around the time Joe Biden declared on the debate stage that he “finally beat Medicare,” Washington got the idea that defeating an old man in an election was easy. Not always. Just days before an American election viewed by many voters as an opportunity to neuter an unpopular 80-year-old president, voters in Brazil and Israel delivered a vivid reminder that an old man in his country’s highest office usually didn’t get there by accident. In Brazil, a decisive majority

LONDON — Andy Burnham’s love affair with beans is well documented. Asked what items he would stockpile in case of an emergency, the prime minister picked the store-cupboard staple, together with soup and Twiglets. Now bean makers are screaming betrayal. As part of a stream of “everyday fixes” aimed at easing the cost of living, Chancellor John Healey said the government would suspend tariffs on more than 100 products, including imported chocolate, marmalade and Burnham’s beloved baked b

BRUSSELS — British Prime Minister Andy Burnham has expressed openness toward restarting free movement between the United Kingdom and the European Union as the two sides prepare for next month’s leaders’ summit. A return to free movement would not be a red line for talks, he suggested, as immigration trends had changed since the U.K. voted to leave the EU in 2016. However, Burnham said he would not “jump to a firm position” on the issue just yet. “Freedom

BERLIN — As she was climbing the ranks of far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) a decade ago, Alice Weidel privately denounced one of her party’s most influential figures for using racist arguments and Nazi-era language, and sought to have him expelled. Years later, she praised his leadership, said a bid to ban him from the party was “exaggerated” and that he was suitable for a federal cabinet position. That striking reversal emerges from a massive leak of internal Af

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Steve Witkoff, the United States’ special envoy, praised Russian ruler Vladimir Putin during face-to-face talks in St. Petersburg, calling him “a humanitarian.” “You talk so much about my president, President Trump, being a humanitarian. You are a humanitarian also, sir, and I salute that, I commend you, and I thank you again,” Witkoff said Wednesday in a Russian state media video clip posted on social media. Witkoff’s visit is the latest U.S. attempt to bring Mosco

PARIS — French President Emmanuel Macron on Wednesday hit out at the “unacceptable and stupid comments from many foreign leaders” in the aftermath of unrest which rocked several French cities over the weekend. “Some people have claimed that we’ve been overrun by hordes of migrants and Islamists, which is completely false,” Macron told reporters during a trip to Qatar. His comments were a clear swipe at U.S. President Donald Trump, who this week railed that France

Barcelona’s former mayor Ada Colau on Wednesday accused U.S. President Donald Trump of barring her from a summit in Puerto Rico over her pro-Palestinian activism. “Trump defends a curious concept of freedom,” she wrote on Telegram. “The same man who decides the fate of Puerto Rico’s citizens without respecting their sovereignty also bars those of us who risked our lives in the flotilla from traveling,” referring to her participation in the Global Sumud Flotilla that attempted to reach Gaza in

PARIS — Suspicious drones flew over military facilities in southeastern France earlier this month, the French navy said on Wednesday. During a large-scale armed forces exercise that lasted from Oct. 5 to Oct. 16, “unauthorized drones were detected in the no-fly zone, near and above military sites,” the navy said in a press statement. “In each instance, the planned security measures were activated by the deployment of anti-drone devices, in coordination with domestic secur

Liechtenstein’s Hereditary Prince Alois vetoed a bill on Tuesday that would have legalized abortion during the first 12 weeks of a woman’s pregnancy, blocking a citizens’ initiative co-signed by a quarter of voters and passed in the micro-state’s parliament. Performing an abortion is currently illegal in the principality, unless the pregnancy presents a severe risk to the pregnant woman’s health or if it is the result of a sexual assault. Women seeking an abortio

Nigeria has become the fifth country to detect the rapidly-spreading Ebola strain, with its first confirmed case in a woman who traveled from Uganda. The patient started showing symptoms on Oct. 7, four days after her arrival in the Western African country. She was later admitted to a private hospital in the capital Abuja, where laboratory testing confirmed the Ebola diagnosis, the country’s health minister and the World Health Organization said Tuesday. She is currently in isolation and

STRASBOURG — The EU will not ease sanctions on Russian fossil fuels even after the U.S. struck a diesel deal with Moscow, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said Wednesday morning. In a speech to EU lawmakers, she warned “Russia is not a trusted supplier of energy because it would, this is our experience, at any time weaponize energy dependencies to blackmail others,” arguing it was Russia that cut gas supply to Europe. “That is a lesson Europe certainly will not forget.”