Author: staff

Switzerland will become a member of the EU’s initiative to facilitate the mobilization of military forces and equipment, already including third countries such as the United Kingdom, the United States, Norway and Canada. Switzerland will join the EU’s military mobility project, which aims to ensure the rapid and smooth movement of military staff, equipment, and assets, after member states agreed on Monday evening to send the country an official invitation.  The Federal Council of the neutral country decided last August that Switzerland would participate in the EU initiative to cut red tape when mobilising armies through or between EU member states,…

TikTok has shut down reports that China is discussing selling its US operations of the group to tech billionaire Elon Musk. The social media platform said the preliminary talks for China to involve Elon Musk as a possible buyer for its US operations are “pure fiction”.TikTok shut down the original Bloomberg report and referred Euronews Business via email to a comment it had earlier made to the BBC. “We can’t be expected to comment on pure fiction,” a spokesperson said.TikTok faces 19 January banIt comes as the popular app, used by 170 million Americans, faces a ban on 19 January…

Israeli and Hamas negotiators are set to take a proposed ceasefire deal to their leaders for final approval within the next 24 hours — a truce that, if agreed, would put an end to over a year of war in the Gaza Strip. An official familiar with a ceasefire deal negotiations between Israel and Hamas said there had been a breakthrough in discussions to end hostilities, and each side was taking a draft deal to their leaders for final approval. The person, who spoke on condition of anonymity, added the next 24 hours would be critical in agreeing a deal…

Should Bonne depart — his resignation had not been accepted as of early Monday evening — it would leave Macron without one of his most trusted foreign policy advisers as he prepares to navigate a world order rife with instability and dominated by Donald Trump, who will be inaugurated as U.S. president next week. “It’s a mess,” said one former French diplomat. “The domestic political situation, the impossible budget talks, the future relation[ships] with Trump and Algeria, France’s waning influence in Europe and Africa …. We are going to have to work hard to bounce back.” It’s an open secret in…

Es ist eine Kehrtwende, die Außenministerin Annalena Baerbock verärgern und auch Verteidigungsminister Boris Pistorius wenig positiv stimmen dürfte. Anders als noch vor Weihnachten will das Bundeskanzleramt nun doch vorerst keinen weiteren drei Milliarden Euro an Ukraine-Hilfen zustimmen. Es sei unredlich, dies vor der Wahl zu tun, sagt die SPD. Die Grünen dagegen nennen es unverantwortlich. Was der Streit mit Scholz’ Rentenversprechen im Wahlkampf zu tun hat, wie sich die Stimmung zwischen SPD und Grünen dadurch deutlich eintrübt und wie die Ukraine dabei das Nachsehen hat, analysiert Gordon Repinski. Im 200-Sekunden-Interview spricht er dann mit dem Vorsitzenden des Auswärtigen Ausschusses im…

Yet that doesn’t mean only European providers can offer sovereign cloud solutions. American providers might also be able to protect customer data from United States government access through technical measures such as client-side encryption, encryption with third-party key management or confidential computing. If securely implemented, the American provider can then only disclose data in its encrypted form. In addition, United States law allows cloud providers to challenge production orders under certain circumstances, including on the basis of comity. Whether such measures can reduce the risk of foreign government access to an acceptable level depends on the nature of the data…

Saudi Arabia, the world’s biggest crude oil exporter, was the ringleader of a group of oil-rich nations including Russia and Iran that successfully blocked efforts to limit plastic production during last month’s talks in Busan, South Korea. And there’s no reason to think they won’t try to pull the same thing this year. “Saudi Arabia is now investing heavily in its environmental diplomacy,” said one negotiator from within the self-named high-ambition coalition, who was granted anonymity to discuss the closed-door talks. “I think there aren’t many delegations that can boast such a talented team of negotiators. [It] has the firing…

L’extrême droite nationaliste allemande se tourne de plus en plus vers des alliés idéologiques à l’étranger pour gagner la légitimité qu’elle rêve d’avoir dans son pays. Cette ambition paraissait évidente samedi. Lors du congrès de l’Alternative pour l’Allemagne (AfD), Alice Weidel, candidate pour devenir la prochaine chancelière, a remercié Elon Musk d’avoir diffusé l’événement sur son compte X, où il a été vu par des millions de personnes dans le monde entier, offrant au parti d’extrême droite une audience bien plus grande que celle à laquelle il est habitué. “Je voudrais remercier Elon Musk, qui retransmet en direct cette conférence…

That also comes to building up Europe’s own defense industry. Rutte applauded the EU’s European Defense Industry Programme, a €1.5 billion cash pot that will be aimed at spurring local arms production, calling Europe’s current weapons sector “too small, too fragmented and too slow.” There is a dispute over whether non-EU companies should have easy access to EDIP, but Rutte warned that it should not be used to exclude allies. “Involving non-EU allies in EU defense industrial efforts is vital, I believe, for security of Europe,” he said. “Transatlantic defense industrial cooperation makes us all stronger.” Better together In his…

“It was an obvious mistake for Fico to believe that his shadowy schemes with Moscow could go on indefinitely,” he wrote, adding that although Kyiv offered its assistance to Slovakia, Fico “arrogantly refused.” Fico began Monday’s video statement, also released as an open letter, by saying he wouldn’t comment on Zelenskyy’s remarks because he didn’t want to “further escalate tensions.” He reiterated that the decision to stop the transit of Russian gas through Ukraine was causing “extensive damage to Ukraine itself, to Slovakia and to the European Union in particular.” “I want to fully focus on resolving the situation related…