Author: staff
Hello, it’s Mared Gwyn writing from Brussels, where temperatures are slowly easing off as the heatwave which has gripped Europe in recent days moves eastwards. In store for you this morning: the still sizzling debate on whether Europe needs to bet big on air con to deal with climbing temperatures, the latest on the brewing trade tensions between Beijing and Brussels, and more. Stars, Stripes, VIPs and Protests: But first, a flavour of the United States’ independence day bash hosted by the US embassy in Brussels’ Cinquantenaire Park last night. Spotted among the thousands of VIPs in attendance were Belgian…
A company can say almost anything about itself. Its website can claim growth, its sales team can promise stability, its brochure can radiate confidence. What a company cannot do is rewrite the record of what it has actually filed, and when. That record — its filing history — is the one part of a business’s public story it does not get to spin, which is exactly why it tells you more about a company’s health than anything the company would choose to tell you itself. Reading it is a quiet skill. The headline documents matter, but so does their timing,…
Thousands of people gathered at Brussels’ Cinquantenaire Park as the US Embassy in Belgium celebrated the 250th anniversary of American independence with its “Freedom 250” event. Belgian Prime Minister Bart De Wever, NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte, European Parliament President Roberta Metsola and several US ambassadors joined the festivities, which featured military ceremonies, a commemorative cake, live music, a drone show and fireworks. While officials highlighted the longstanding ties between Belgium and the United States, some attendees voiced concerns about the current US administration, citing disagreements over foreign policy and domestic issues despite celebrating the historic milestone.
Grid access is becoming another major bottleneck. Even where operators are ready to invest, deployment is often slowed by limited capacity, long connection times, power delivery certainty and unpredictable electricity costs. The three A’s of the grid — accessibility, affordability and assurance — will be decisive for the business case of electrification. At the same time, charging and refueling infrastructure must scale much faster. Around 70 percent of heavy-duty vehicle charging is expected to happen at depots, logistics centers and operational bases, yet policy support remains heavily focused on publicly accessible charging. Public charging is essential, but it will not…
Russian President Vladimir Putin acknowledged for the first time on Sunday that his country was facing a “certain deficit” of fuel, as Ukraine continues to strike Russian energy infrastructure, setting fire to yet another major oil refinery in the south According to regional Governor Veniamin Kondratyev, the falling debris killed one person in Sloviansk and wounded another in a nearby village, in eastern occupied Crimea, Processing close to 4 million tons of crude per year, the facility is one of southern Russia’s major refineries and a key source of petroleum products for export through Russia’s Black Sea ports, including fuel…
“Film directors are a bunch of wretches who devote themselves to doing something that is, technologically, almost obsolete,” Orson Welles declared in a 1985 interview, recorded by ‘Arte TV’ (source in Spanish), months before his death. Alonso Quijano could have said something similar about the profession of chivalry, already obsolete in the Renaissance Spain that witnessed his exploits, which may explain why one of the most influential filmmakers in history felt compelled to adapt Cervantes’ classic. Nearly 40 years later, a project led by the Spanish Film Archive, in collaboration with the Cinémathèque Française, Italy’s Cineteca Nazionale and Munich’s Filmmuseum,…
The EU’s diplomatic service is losing power, people and influence to Ursula von der Leyen’s Commission. Zoya Sheftalovich and Nick Vinocur look at how the EEAS is fighting for its future — and whether the bloc’s top diplomat, Kaja Kallas, can turn it around. Plus, Europe tries to reset trade ties with China without backing away from tougher defenses, and Greece puts a bounty on poisonous pufferfish. And hear Finnish President Alexander Stubb on Trump, Ukraine and the future of NATO in his full interview with Dasha Burns on POLITICO’s The Conversation: Questions? Comments? Send us a voice note or…
Weltweit stehen 100.000 Jobs bei VW auf der Kippe, vier deutsche Werke könnten langfristig schließen. Aber ist nur der unfaire Wettbewerb aus China schuld? Gordon Repinski analysiert mit Romanus Otte von Industrie & Handel die toxische Mischung aus hohen Energiepreisen, Bürokratie und der schleppenden E-Mobilitäts-Wende in Deutschland. Im 200-Sekunden-Interview fordert der baden-württembergische CDU-Fraktionschef Tobias Vogt ein sofortiges Eingreifen aus Brüssel bei den strengen Flottengrenzwerten. Laut Vogt dürfe die Politik der Industrie nicht länger vorschreiben, welcher Antrieb sich durchsetzt, sondern müsse Technologieoffenheit zulassen, um die Wettbewerbsfähigkeit zu retten. Friedrich Merz beruft das Kabinett in den abhörsicheren Konferenzraum des Verteidigungsministeriums. Mit Rixa…
A decade and a half on, that messy EU compromise is unraveling. Facing budget cuts, a battle for talent and a lack of policy tools to back up its diplomatic role, the EEAS, now headed by former Estonian Prime Minister Kaja Kallas, has been losing out in a protracted turf war with the Commission headed by Ursula von der Leyen ― while national governments, which have largely kept their foreign policy independence, are also weighing reform. In more than a dozen conversations with POLITICO over the past three months, 10 current and former EU officials and diplomats described an EEAS…
Thousands of guests, including diplomats, politicians and military personnel, attended an event organised by the US Embassy to Belgium in Brussels on Sunday to celebrate the 250th anniversary of US independence. “The US Embassy in Belgium will host an invitation-only celebration to celebrate this historic milestone: 250 Years of Independence: Building Our Future Together. The lavish celebration took place at Parc du Cinquantenaire, an iconic park in the Belgian capital near the European Union institutions. Guests tried their hand at baseball, rode a mechanical bull and participated in a linedance. The festivities also featured music, performances, a ceremonial flyover and…