Author: staff

But according to new research, between the ban on direct imports coming into force in 2022 and the end of 2025, the U.K. has nonetheless imported £4 billion of jet fuel and other oil products made at refineries in India and Turkey, which run partially on Russian crude.   The analysis, by the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air (CREA), estimated that £1.6 billion worth of the products imported from these refineries would have been made with Russian oil.   India remains the second-largest international buyer of Russian crude oil after China, while Turkey is also a major importer. Both process much of the oil in refineries, producing oil…

Published on 21/01/2026 – 7:30 GMT+1 Since trade tensions with the US kicked into high gear last year, the EU has consistently shied away from targeting American services, despite the sizeable US trade surplus in those sectors. As EU leaders prepare to meet on Thursday night to discuss their response to President Donald Trump’s tariff threats over Greenland, the question is once again on the table: why are services off-limits? Officials say the countermeasures package prepared last year, which focused on goods, is already viewed as the first line of response should US threats materialise. Targeting services, by contrast, is…

Published on 21/01/2026 – 7:00 GMT+1 If you think the red caps popping up across Greenland and Denmark look surprisingly familiar — you’d be right. The hats, embossed with the words “Make America Go Away”, are designed to parody the MAGA movement spearheaded by US President Donald Trump, also known as the “Make America Great Again” campaign. The caps, originally created by Copenhagen vintage clothing store owner Jesper Rabe Tonnesen, flopped last year following their launch. Now that US-EU tensions have notched up, the design is seeing a fresh wave of interest. Despite protests from European leaders, Trump is doubling…

Published on 21/01/2026 – 7:01 GMT+1 Answers from OpenAI’s ChatGPT favour wealthy, Western countries and sideline much of the Global South, according to a new study. Artificial intelligence (AI) bias could lead to worse care for racialised people in the healthcare system, or inaccurate predictions on a person’s employability based on whether they speak a racialised language. The University of Oxford’s Internet Institute study, published in the journal Platforms and Society, analysed more than 20 million responses from ChatGPT’s 4o-mini model to a range of subjective questions that compared countries, such as “where are people more beautiful?” or “where are…

Friedrich Merz reist heute zum World Economic Forum nach Davos und bereitet sich auf ein hoch brisantes Treffen mit Donald Trump vor. Während Trump weiter mit der Veröffentlichung privater Nachrichten provoziert und versichert, er werde die neuen Zölle wegen Grönland durchziehen, sucht Merz nach einer europäischen Antwort auf den US-Präsidenten. Gordon Repinski  analysiert den entscheidenden Mittwoch für die deutsche und europäische Handlungsfähigkeit. Im 200-Sekunden-Interview: Die Grünen-Sicherheitsexpertin Sara Nanni. Sie fordert „klare Kante“ gegen Washington und spricht darüber, warum Deutschland beim Thema Energie-Importe den Druck auf Trump erhöhen muss. Dazu mehr Insights aus Davos: Gordon berichtet direkt aus dem verschneiten Davos…

Published on 21/01/2026 – 5:53 GMT+1 During an unexpected appearance at the White House briefing room on Tuesday, US President Donald Trump said only “you’ll find out”, when asked how far he was willing to go to seize Greenland. At the same time, Trump remained confident NATO allies “will work something out”, ahead of his departure for the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. “I think that we will work something out where NATO is going to be very happy, and where we’re going to be very happy,” he said, without providing specifics. “We have a lot of meetings scheduled…

The transatlantic row over Greenland comes at a critical juncture of the war in Ukraine. Russia has been wrecking Ukraine’s energy infrastructure with intense missile and drone barrages. And with this winter turning into an exceptionally frigid one — with temperatures dropping below minus 20 degrees Celsius — there’s mounting worry in Kyiv about how the country can persevere without much greater assistance from Western allies, including the United States, when it comes to air defense. “This winter is different from the three previous wartime ones for several reasons,” said Maxim Timchenko, CEO of Ukrainian energy company DTEK. “With stations…

We are living through what happens when an unchecked superpower is allowed to kill at will. Russia’s goal is to break our defiance, mentally and physically. Weapons designed to sink warships are being turned against our power plants, government buildings and apartments.  Keep going When you’re forced to shiver in the dark for so long, deprived of sleep by nightly missile barrages, you can quickly slide into despair.   “What can I do to cheer you up, Mom?” I asked via a late-night WhatsApp message. “Do something with Putin,” she replied sarcastically, adding she can handle everything else. That means…

Published on 20/01/2026 – 13:39 GMT+1 What do these countries export to the US? Denmark, the home of Lego, exports pharmaceuticals and wind turbines to the US. Norway is the top supplier of industrial metals used in American cars and salmon in your sushi Sweden is not just meatballs but a hub for vehicles and telecoms. Remember Nokia? In Finland, they do not make phones anymore but build 5G networks for your iPhone and export the paper for your Amazon packages. France is the global capital of luxury fashion and aerospace, so the factories making Airbus parts are in Alabama.…

Europe “should not hesitate to deploy” tools at its disposal to protect its interests, French President Emmanuel Macron said in his address at the World Economic Forum on Tuesday, amid diplomatic fallout from private messages made public and escalating trade threats from Donald Trump in the run-up to the US president’s own highly anticipated speech. The French president, wearing aviator glasses in front of an audience eager to hear his take, denounced the US competition stating it aims to “subordinate Europe”. “Europe clearly has to fix its key issues,” he emphasised in a strongly-worded message to the continent, pushing for…