BRUSSELS — There is “no logic” to U.S. President Donald Trump’s recent moves to take Russia’s side in the Ukraine war, and he should remember his true allies lie in Europe, Finland’s prime minister said Thursday. 

In an exclusive interview with POLITICO, Petteri Orpo summed up the shock and dismay among Ukraine’s allies after Trump announced a diesel deal with Russia’s leader, Vladimir Putin, and reportedly imposed limits on Kyiv’s access to the military intelligence and technology needed to counter Russian attacks.

“My message to him [Trump] is that we are allies,” Orpo said on the sidelines of the European Council summit in Brussels. “We are in NATO. And what is the biggest threat against NATO? It’s Russia — and that is why there is no logic. I don’t have answers. I have many questions.” 

Trump alarmed European leaders and horrified Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy this week by announcing a deal to release Russian diesel onto the market, apparently in an attempt to lower fuel costs for American consumers. Ukraine’s allies fear the move will boost Russia’s revenue from fuel sales, giving it more money to spend on war. 

Trump also said Ukraine should stop hitting Russian fossil fuel facilities — as part of what he said was a ceasefire on energy infrastructure — and should replace Zelenskyy. 

Finland is an influential voice among Ukraine’s European allies: The country has the EU’s longest land border with Russia, at 1,300 km, and its president, Alexander Stubb — a talented sportsman — won Trump’s respect on the golf course, giving him leeway to try to influence White House policy.

Orpo said if he were in Trump’s position “I would not trust Putin.” Zelenskyy has said he fears Ukraine is losing the U.S. to Russia’s side in the war, warning the Americans and their president are on “the wrong side of history”. Orpo said he agreed: “I think he is, and they are.” 

Ukraine now faces grave danger, he said. “The sky is open for Russia, there are missiles. They need more military support, air defense,” Orpo said. “Also, the situation is dangerous because of the latest deal between Trump and Putin.”

Midterms move

One possible reason Trump turned against Ukraine with that diesel deal is the U.S. midterm elections on Nov. 3. “I think it is because of domestic reasons — elections are coming,” Orpo said. “But we need to get them back.” Nonetheless, he said the amount of Russian diesel that could be sold to the U.S. is too small to make much of a difference for American consumers. 

Whatever happens, EU leaders must equip Ukraine with weapons and cash, whether or not they can rely on the U.S., he said. “Today, we need to find a solution [on] how to support Ukraine, how to finance Ukraine in this winter, but also in next year,” Orpo said. “It’s crucial.”

Finland and Sweden are among the countries pushing the European Commission to reopen the fractious debate over how to use Russia’s financial assets currently frozen in European banks, especially in Belgium, which blocked a deal to raid the funds last year over legal concerns. 

“The best solution would be that we will have a solution on how to use frozen assets,” he said. “We have to try again,” Orpo said. 

Finland has asked the Commission “to continue work with Belgium, and the other member states, to find a solution.” He said he hoped to hear an update from the Commission during the summit. “It’s a better solution than using our own money.”

Budget blues

European leaders are arguing this week over their long-term budget, which Brussels officials want to finalize by the end of the year. Many diplomats do not expect a deal this year, and some leaders say they’re in no hurry. 

But others want the budget, worth around €2 trillion, signed off by December because they fear next year’s European elections — especially if far-right leader Marine Le Pen wins the French presidency — will derail negotiations. 

The longer budget negotiations last, the “more difficulties we will have,” Orpo said. “So we have to work to find a solution this year. I understand very well that it is difficult, a huge challenge, but I cannot see how it would be easier next year, because in France elections are coming, for example.”

Finland also has an election coming up in April 2027. Orpo’s center-right National Coalition Party is struggling in the polls. “This time has been very difficult,” he said. “But, finally, our economy is growing.”

Orpo’s Swedish sister party, the Moderates, mounted a late surge in last month’s election. Although that seems unlikely to keep them in office, Sweden’s Moderates still have a slim chance, even though many commentators had written them off long before the vote.

“They did excellent campaign work, and in the end of the day, people vote Moderates, not populist or socialist,” Orpo said. “I would like the same in Finland.”

BRUSSELS — French president Emmanuel Macron warned fellow EU leaders they need to get a deal on the bloc’s seven-year budget by the end of the year because it’ll be too politically difficult after that, four European diplomats said.

His words rachet up the pressure on the EU to overcome their significant differences over the coming weeks.

During a closed-door discussion on Thursday evening, Macron said he wouldn’t have a political mandate to sign a deal close to the French presidential elections in April 2027, the diplomats, all briefed on the conversation, said.

Macron “said that, starting from January, there will be no political room” for concluding an agreement, one of the diplomats said.

The EU’s 27 governments are divided over the total size of the 2028-2034 budget. Leaders gathering in Brussels are discussing the Irish plan, which envisions cuts of €159 billion in current prices to the Commission’s nearly €2 trillion proposal. 

European Council President António Costa is pushing leaders to finalize negotiations during a summit in December — before elections in France, Italy and Poland in 2027 threaten to derail the talks — but some governments and EU officials have said such a timeframe is very unrealistic.

One EU diplomat dismissed Macron’s intervention as a threat to support Costa on the December deadline. “EU would be ungovernable if we were to take into account all the local elections,” they added.

French far-right leader Marine Le Pen, who is leading the polls to replace Macron, pledged to halve France’s contributions to the EU budget if she comes to power.

During a press conference in Brussels on Wednesday, Le Pen accused the EU of speeding up talks to prevent France’s next leader to have a say.

Several leaders are unwilling to commit to the end-of-year deadline, fearing that time pressure will undermine their leverage in the negotiations.

“We will not sign an agreement that is not beneficial to us just to meet a deadline,” Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni told the country’s parliament on Wednesday. “We will sign an agreement only when it is right for Italy.”

BRUSSELS — It was meant to be a debate on how to curb Europe’s soaring energy prices.

But the first session of talks at an EU leaders’ summit in Brussels Thursday quickly descended into a three-hour fight over whether the EU should put a carbon price on driving cars and heating buildings.

The delay got so bad, the roast veal and fig tartlet lunch awaiting European leaders was driven well into the afternoon.

Countries including Italy, Poland, Czechia and Hungary called for ETS2 — an already-legislated law that will put a carbon price on heating and transport from 2028 — to be delayed for two more years. Estonia suggested it could be scrapped altogether.

The push was rejected by a majority of the bloc, with several EU diplomats telling POLITICO it was, as one put it, an “unacceptable” offer. Another said the ETS2 launch date would never be changed. But the debate reflects a growing sense from right-leaning governments that the EU’s ambitious green agenda runs against their push to bring down energy costs. 

While the main topic of today’s discussion was ETS2, its predecessor, the Emissions Trading System — which puts a price on carbon emissions from factories and power plants — was arguably the real target.

Put together, these two emissions trading schemes will be the EU’s most powerful policy tool for bringing down planet-warming emissions.

A proposed reform of the original ETS is currently being debated in the European Parliament and in the Council of the EU. Italy and Poland have been leading a gang of 10 member-countries which have been railing against the ETS since American and Israeli bombs started falling on Iran in March. 

What they want is for the European Commission’s July review of the ETS to be further weakened, even though the proposal already softens carbon restrictions over the next decade to give industry more time to invest in cleaner production methods.

But by framing the ETS as a scourge on household bills, both Warsaw and Rome have found ready audiences at home and abroad. On Monday, hours before a meeting of EU environment ministers convened in Luxembourg, Poland led a meeting of member countries with concerns on the ETS. Their gang, which originally counted 10 countries in March, had now grown to 16.

While Italy and Poland did manage to get Czechia, Slovakia, Hungary and Greece to back their ask for a “reassessment of the ETS2” and to “further postpone its entry into force until at least 2030,” inside the room of European leaders the position mostly fell flat.

Five EU diplomats granted anonymity to discuss the ongoing negotiations said Nordic countries and the Netherlands were firmly against changes to ETS2 — a position backed by France and Germany.

But Paris and Berlin’s long-term reliability as ETS defenders is in doubt. French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Friedrich Merz both face threats from the far-right, where the ETS has become a dirty word.

Germany’s far-right Alternative für Deutschland, which is no fan of the ETS, is politically ascendant, having won the largest share of votes in two regional elections in September. In France, with elections only months away in 2027, Marine Le Pen’s far-right National Rally is leading in the polls. 

How Le Pen would deal with the ETS isn’t certain, but Jordan Bardella, the French far-right lawmaker and rising star of National Rally, offered a clue  in recent comments.

“ETS: three letters, an acronym that reeks of detached bureaucracy, with one question that keeps coming up: who’s going to pay?” he said to European Parliament in May.

BRUSSELS — European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen wants EU leaders to look into the idea of developing bloc-wide strategic gas reserves amid concerns the continent faces a winter shortage, three diplomats and two EU officials told POLITICO.

Europe’s existing gas storage caverns — which are typically refilled over the course of the year by commercial actors — are running at record lows this year after high summer prices linked to the war in Iran undercut market incentives to restock, leaving the bloc underprepared for winter.

While it wasn’t immediately clear to diplomatic officials what form the reserve idea would take, one senior EU official described it as a long-term measure to cushion the bloc against future supply risks, as countries already do with oil and refined products. The Commission president’s comments came at a major summit of European leaders in Brussels on Thursday.

Documents detailing November plans to revamp the bloc’s gas security architecture, seen earlier this year by POLITICO, include plans to encourage better crisis management by companies. However, they stop short of explicitly endorsing strategic reserves that governments would have to fill to a set level to offset supply shortages, regardless of market conditions.

Countries that typically rely on commercial refilling have already been forced to change tack this year as the limits of the existing model became clear. The Netherlands has moved to subsidize energy purchases, costing it almost €1 billion, while Germany is exploring whether to develop its own strategic stockpile.

A separate Commission proposal to set up an EU-wide mechanism to carry out joint energy purchases was received without enthusiasm by EU leaders on Thursday, two diplomats said.

Une rude bataille s’engage pour faire adopter le prochain budget de l’Union européenne. Non seulement les 27 pays sont divisés sur son montant et sur ses priorités mais plusieurs élections nationales compliquent l’équation politique. En amont du sommet du Conseil européen de jeudi et vendredi, Marine Le Pen s’est d’ailleurs rendue à Bruxelles pour mettre en garde contre la conclusion d’un accord avant le scrutin français. Que se joue-t-il réellement avec ces discussions ? La demande du RN de repousser l’adoption du budget est-elle justifiée ? Marine Le Pen propose-t-elle une sortie déguisée de l’UE en voulant couper dans la contribution française ? Anthony Lattier en discute avec Marion Solletty et Giorgio Leali, journalistes à POLITICO.

BRÜSSEL — Die EU will sich im Wettbewerb mit China voraussichtlich besonders auf die Chemieindustrie und den Maschinenbau konzentrieren. Das sagten zwei mit den Gesprächen vertraute Personen gegenüber POLITICO.

EU-Kommissionspräsidentin Ursula von der Leyen werde den Staats- und Regierungschefs am Donnerstag voraussichtlich mitteilen, dass Brüssel nach Möglichkeiten sucht, diese beiden Branchen zu schützen, so die Personen, die wegen der Vertraulichkeit der Beratungen anonym bleiben wollten. Als derzeit wirksamstes Instrument gelten dabei Safeguards, da sie von der EU schnell und breit angewendet werden können.

Handelskommissar Maroš Šefčovič schloss vergangene Woche ein Abkommen mit Peking, wonach die jährlichen Importe chinesischer Hybridautos im nächsten Jahr auf 350.000 Einheiten begrenzt werden sollen – weniger als die Hälfte der für dieses Jahr erwarteten Lieferungen. Die Staats- und Regierungschefs haben gefordert, weitere Sektoren vor den stark steigenden chinesischen Importen zu schützen, da das bilaterale Handelsdefizit weiter wächst.

EU-Hersteller stehen unter dem Druck billiger Importe aus China, was zu einer Welle von Entlassungen und Werksschließungen im gesamten Binnenmarkt führt.

Bei einer Rede in Peking in der vergangenen Woche erklärte Šefčovič, das Abkommen über Hybridfahrzeuge solle als „Vorlage“ für andere Branchen dienen. Ein hochrangiger Beamter der Kommission teilte am Montag mit, dass die Kommission auch Beschwerden über chinesische Importe aus der Windkraft- und der Möbelindustrie erhalten habe.

Beamte der Kommission arbeiten derzeit an Schutzmaßnahmen für Kunststoffe und Epoxidharze, doch wurde bislang noch keine formelle Untersuchung eingeleitet, die den Schutzmaßnahmen vorausgehen müsste.

Dieser Artikel erschien zuerst auf Englisch.

The West Nile virus is spreading across the EU at record levels and is reaching new regions of the continent, health authorities said Thursday.

In a statement, the European Center for Disease Prevention and Control said 1,715 cases were reported this year, with 130 people dying from the virus, which is mainly transmitted through mosquito bites.

Greece, Italy and France are the worst affected countries, but the virus is spreading further north, authorities say.

“Recent detections in people and animals in Belgium and the Netherlands show that the virus is now circulating further north, a trend that is expected to continue in the coming years,” the ECDC said.

The Netherlands has reported 59 human cases so far this year, while Belgium has reported 15.

The West Nile virus is asymptomatic in 80% of humans — but can lead to fever and, in severe cases, cause neurological diseases and become deadly.

Preventive measures against mosquito bites are recommended to reduce West Nile virus risks.

“Anyone living in or visiting areas where WNV is circulating can reduce their risk by using mosquito repellent, wearing loose-fitting long clothing in the evening and at night, and using window screens, mosquito nets, or air conditioning where appropriate,” the ECDC said.

TIRANA — The College of Europe’s Tirana office was among the latest casualties of escalating student protests gripping the Albanian capital.

The office for the school, which serves as a training ground for future EU civil servants, was broken into, looted and set on fire on Wednesday evening.

“Until yesterday, this was the office of the College of Europe,” Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama said in an Instagram video delivered from the burned-out shell of the office. Rama’s own workplace is a stone’s throw from the Pyramid complex housing the College of Europe.

Rama said he did not believe the damage was down to the students. “Students are the future, they are the ones who look ahead, who want to go further and faster,” he said.

Instead, he accused his political opponents of being behind the destruction, claiming that they were attempting to undermine Albania’s progress. The opposition parties deny any wrongdoing.

The College of Europe in Tirana refused to comment.

Protests in Albania have been ongoing since late May against the proposed development of a luxury resort linked to U.S. President Donald Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner, and alleged government corruption. But the situation escalated on Tuesday and Wednesday as students from around the country clashed with police, set fire to government buildings and businesses linked to powerful businessmen, and damaged traffic lights, bus stops, and the city’s roads.

The Delegation of the European Union to Albania released a statement Thursday morning, condemning the destruction of private and public property and asking protesters to exercise restraint. “Violence has no place in democracies,” they wrote.`

Large swathes of the city were damaged during over 14 hours of protests Wednesday. The Ministry of Justice, Ministry of Education and Ministry of Finance, as well as a number of government institutions, banks, and private businesses, were broken into and set on fire. In centrally located Skanderbeg Square, protesters torched a large under-construction tower block, with flames reaching several floors.

With the destruction came many reports of police brutality, including against regular citizens and journalists. Several media workers were prevented from filming or had their equipment confiscated. On Tuesday, a young man required emergency surgery for a severely broken leg following an altercation with police.

At least 89 people required hospital treatment, including about 51 police officers, while many more protesters have reported minor injuries.

On Thursday, protests began again at 8 a.m., as students across Tirana boycotted lessons and marched toward the Ministry of Education. Police immediately dispersed demonstrators with tear gas and water cannons, while the unrest continued to spread to other parts of the capital, particularly near government institutions and the headquarters of Rama’s Socialist Party.

A parliamentary session for Thursday was canceled after students said they would not allow any deputies to access the assembly.

Protests also spread to other parts of Albania. Masked protesters clashed with police in multiple cities, with damage, fires, and violence reported across the country.

Many businesses throughout the capital were shuttered for the day, with owners putting up signs saying “we are with you, please don’t burn our businesses.”

The students and the so-called “Flamingo Revolution” protestors are demanding the resignation of Rama and the entire government, and a new start for Albania — including economic, educational, government, electoral and legal reform.

Rama told Reuters on Thursday that he has no intention of resigning.

PARIS — Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy replied to French far-right presidential hopeful Marine Le Pen’s pledge to cut financial aid with a message: Europe is benefitting from Ukraine.

“Ukraine will give back security. It’s security and experience, the price is not so high as people’s lives, that’s why I think that Madame Le Pen is not deeply [acquainted] with some details,” he told the Financial Times. “We give back and this is very important.”

Le Pen has repeatedly said, including to POLITICO, that she would stop financial aid to Ukraine if she’s elected as French president next year — but suggested France could keep training Ukraine’s military and provide non-financial assistance. Le Pen, the National Rally candidate, is currently leading the polls.

Zelenskyy stressed that European armed forces and defense industries, including France’s, were benefiting from Ukraine’s battlefield experience. “It’s win-win,” he said. `

He argued that Le Pen should keep supporting Ukraine because it’s helping the Franco-Italian air defense system SAMP/T, which is currently deployed in the war-torn country, be more efficient. “We made a lot of different changes together with French guys, because they saw how it worked and how it works now.”

“The French industry only wins with these technologies, cooperation, co-production,” he added. “I will not vote for her … because I’m Ukrainian,” he also joked.

Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) has detained a Swedish citizen in the Pskov region near the Estonian border on Thursday.

The man is accused of crossing the border illegally, according to a press release published by the FSB. The accused also faces allegations of “organizing activities of a terrorist organization” and “mercenarism”.

The FSB also published videos of the Swedish citizen, in which he confirms his identity and says he is 35 years old. He also states that he signed a contract with the Armed Forces of Ukraine’s Aidar Battalion in order to carry out acts of sabotage in Russia.

The Aidar Battalion and the Ukrainian army have so far not commented on the allegations, but his relatives confirmed to Swedish television that he had visited Ukraine sporadically and fought there.

“The Ministry for Foreign Affairs and the Embassy in Moscow are investigating these reports,” the Swedish Foreign Ministry said in comments.

The Armed Forces of Ukraine did not respond to a request for comment by the time of publication.

In the meantime, the Swedish embassy in Moscow advised its citizens against visiting Russia as “a sharp deterioration in the security situation may limit the Embassy’s ability to provide consular support.”

Earlier this week, the FSB detained a correspondent for Japan’s Hokkaido Shimbun in Sakhalin on suspicion of espionage, accusing him of gathering information about Russia’s defense capabilities.

Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi rejected Russia’s allegations. “There is no such fact,” she told reporters.

BRUSSELS — NATO allies will hold a crisis meeting to discuss how to respond to a series of drone strikes on cargo shipping in the Black Sea, Romania’s President Nicușor Dan said.

Two chemical tankers were hit by air drones in the past 24 hours in or near Romania’s territorial waters, but it is “too early” to say for sure whether Russia was behind the attacks, Dan added.

Dan was speaking on the sidelines of the European Council summit in Brussels, where he spoke to Bulgarian Prime Minister Rumen Radev and NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte about the latest incidents.

“The secretary general expressed the solidarity of the alliance and there will be a NAC [North Atlantic Council] meeting at which the whole situation with the Black Sea will be discussed,” Dan told POLITICO. “Of course the conclusion is that all the hybrid attacks are trying to decrease our support for Ukraine. We will continue to support,” he said.

Dan said invoking NATO’s collective defense clause, Article 5, was “not now” being discussed as an option for responding to the attacks. Nor has Romania asked for Article 4 — the emergency clause that sets consultations in motion over military matters when a member’s security has been threatened — to be triggered, he said.

Rescuers are searching for seven missing crew members after two chemical tankers were hit by aerial drones in or near Romanian territorial waters. Over the past 10 days, drones have hit at least five more cargo ships close to Romania and Bulgaria — both NATO members — killing at least 23 sailors.

Investigation teams from Romania’s army and intelligence services are trying to establish what led to the most recent drones strikes on the ships, Dan said.

Romania asked NATO for equipment including specialized radars and requested the delivery to be accelerated after a Russian drone crashed into an apartment building near the border with Ukraine in May.

Dan suggested Romania was likely to seek further assistance with equipment from allies this time. “On the operational level, we are in the same situation where we have been … on the Danube border with Ukraine,” Dan said. “What we did at that moment, we came here to NATO and some of our allies — United States, France, Spain, Italy, Slovakia, Portugal — gave us some equipment. And now we are in the same situation, but on the other border, with the Black Sea.”

After the meeting with Dan and Radev, NATO’s Rutte said the alliance had already increased “counter-drone capabilities” along its eastern flank. “NATO will continue to work closely with our allies in the Black Sea, adjusting our deterrence and defence posture as needed,” he posted on X.

This story has been updated. Victor Jack contributed to the report.

NEWRY, Northern Ireland — The former leader of Northern Ireland’s main pro-British party, Jeffrey Donaldson, received a 15-year prison sentence Thursday for sexually abusing two schoolgirls and continuing for decades into their adulthood.

Donaldson, 63, kept his hands clasped together but offered no visible reaction as Judge Paul Ramsey said the former Democratic Unionist Party leader must serve an 11-year sentence for raping one girl and a further 4-year term for sexually abusing another.

Donaldson has been behind bars since June, when a jury found him guilty of 18 counts of sexually abusing the two women — identified in court only as Victim A and Victim B — when they were children. The listed offenses ran from 1985 to 2008.

Ramsey, addressing a packed Newry Crown Court, read from the two victims’ statements, which described abuse that began when they were 7 or 8 years old. One of the victims described recurring nightmares: “I wonder what it is like not to be afraid at night.”

The judge noted how Donaldson, who is appealing the conviction, had “doubled down on his denials” over what he called the veteran politician’s “catastrophic descent into disgrace.”

Donaldson’s former party, which denounced him immediately after his 2024 arrest and scrubbed him from the DUP website, said in a statement Thursday that Donaldson “deserves every day of the lengthy prison sentence he has to serve” for what it described as “vile and disgusting crimes.”

“Our first thoughts are again with the innocent victims who, having suffered such evil, were retraumatized through giving evidence at the trial. They deserve our compassion, support and respect,” the DUP statement said.

Donaldson was an MP representing Lagan Valley from 1997 to 2024, first for the moderate Ulster Unionist Party and then — after belatedly breaking with the party over its support for the Good Friday peace accord of 1998 — as a member of the hard-line DUP.

Donaldson became DUP leader in 2021, when he oversaw the collapse of Northern Ireland’s power-sharing government in a bitter dispute over the region’s peculiar post-Brexit trade rules. Just weeks before his arrest, he again played a key role in reviving the coalition, the cornerstone of the Good Friday peace deal he had once rejected.

In March 2024, Donaldson was arrested in his secluded County Down home and charged alongside his wife, Eleanor. She was subsequently deemed by the Newry judge not mentally fit to stand trial on charges of aiding and abetting his crimes.

The U.K. government in July removed Donaldson from membership in the Privy Council, a body of parliamentary advisers to King Charles III. The king also stripped him of his knighthood.

Donaldson has been placed in an isolated hospital wing at Northern Ireland’s Maghaberry Prison, alongside other convicted sex offenders, to protect him from potential assaults from other prisoners. He reportedly is spending much of his days behind bars doing puzzles and reading the Bible.

Seven crew members are missing after a tanker caught fire close to Romanian territorial waters in the Black Sea Thursday morning, Romanian authorities said.

The San Marino-flagged chemical tanker sent a distress call at 7 a.m. local time about 13 nautical miles from Sulina, a port on Romania’s eastern coast, close to the Ukrainian border. Romanian border police, along with aviation units, arrived to assist the crew, the Romanian Naval Authority said.

Five people have been rescued so far, the naval authority told local media. Another tanker was affected by a fire late on Wednesday close to Sulina, with authorities confirming the crew were safe.

Romanian authorities have not given a reason for either incident. The fires broke out hours after the country’s defense ministry announced an air alert around Snake Island — a Ukrainian territory located about 40 kilometers from the spot where the San Marino tanker sent its distress signal. A drone was also spotted near Sulina overnight `”after which it disappeared from the radar,” the ministry wrote.

At least five commercial vessels have been hit by suspected drone strikes in the Black Sea over the past two weeks. The deadly attacks are affecting a key route that carries 95% of Ukraine’s grain exports.

On Oct. 6, drones struck two ships in Bulgaria’s Black Sea economic zone. One sank, and its 10 crew members went missing. On Tuesday two more ships were struck near Bulgaria, leaving 11 crew members missing.

Romanian President Nicusor Dan will meet Bulgarian Prime Minister Rumen Radev and NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte for talks on the sidelines of the European Council summit in Brussels at 1:30 p.m. today.

An Israeli surveillance technology firm has run a large-scale operation to infect mobile phones with spyware using online advertisements to hack the devices, researchers said on Thursday.

An investigation by the University of Toronto’s Citizen Lab and cybersecurity firm Confiant Threat Intelligence laid bare an ad-based infection technique developed by an Israeli company that researchers named “AdFection.” The hacks weaponized legitimate online ad systems for espionage purposes, allowing spyware manufacturers to connect to millions of devices and identify, track and target victims.

“Plugging into the online ads ecosystem provides the mercenary spyware industry a stealthy delivery system,” said Bill Marczak, senior researcher at The Citizen Lab. He said the findings were “surely just the tip of the iceberg” of how online ads are abused for espionage.

Researchers discovered critical details of the hacking tools by analyzing devices belonging to journalists and staff at the Al Jazeera media network, finding that 45 devices of journalists and staff were targeted and some infected with Israeli-made spyware known as Candiru.

At the heart of the hacking campaign is the Israeli company Discover-Tech that describes itself as an advertising business. Citizen Lab researchers said the company facilitated surveillance for commercial spyware operators. Its platform, called Controlium, allegedly allowed spyware makers like Candiru — which in 2025 was acquired by Integrity Labs — to identify, track and target devices by loading advertisements on websites and apps.

Discover-Tech and Integrity Labs did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

The scale is striking: An analysis of four billion advertising records found that Discover-Tech’s ads appeared across nearly 200,000 websites and mobile apps in dozens of countries over four months. Among the websites that featured the ads were institutional sites of NATO, the United Nations, the European Parliament, European Commission and Council of the EU.

The technique exploits real-time bidding — the automated system used by platforms such as Google to sell advertising space and target users. Rather than persuading victims to click a malicious link, attackers can exploit advertisements to identify and potentially infect devices without any interaction from the user — a technique known as “zero-click” infections.

Discover-Tech’s advertisements directed millions of devices to servers associated with Candiru, potentially enabling large-scale surveillance and reconnaissance, researchers said. That does not mean all those devices were infected.

Citizen Lab, based in Toronto, is a globally recognized research group that previously uncovered spyware scandals targeting Catalan political figures, a member of the European Parliament and the inner circle of murdered Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi.

The findings triggered calls for further investigation on Thursday. “The possibility that EU institutions have been exposed should set off alarm bells across Brussels,” said Hannah Neumann, a German European Parliament lawmaker of the Greens group. Neumann herself was the victim of a cyber-espionage operation by an Iranian hacking group.

“Europe cannot claim to defend democracy while leaving its own democratic institutions vulnerable to spyware,” Neumann said.

BRUSSELS — Montenegro as the EU’s 28th member by 2028? Not so fast, says Croatia, the bloc’s most recent member.

Ahead of a debate on enlargement among EU leaders at Thursday’s summit, Croatia — which joined the bloc in 2013 — is among the countries raising concerns about Montenegro’s accession bid.

Speaking to POLITICO at a pre-summit meeting of the European People’s Party, Croatian Prime Minister Andrej Plenković said Zagreb had been “extremely constructive” but pointed to unresolved issues under negotiating Chapter 23 (Judiciary and Fundamental Rights) and Chapter 31 (Foreign, Security and Defence Policy), some of which date back decades.

“Some have been on the agenda for the last two years [with] no progress whatsoever,” he said, urging Montenegro to make headway. “We will ask our colleagues to help them to make progress, if there’s an objective to conclude the negotiations.”

Croatia’s concerns are laid out in an orientation paper, obtained by POLITICO, in which Zagreb insists it supports Montenegro’s EU membership ambitions while identifying several outstanding disputes that need to be resolved.

“Croatia seeks to facilitate Montenegro’s accession, not obstruct it,” the paper reads. Several of the unresolved issues stem from Montenegro’s involvement in the military aggression against Croatia in the 1990s, including attacks on Dubrovnik and the occupation of parts of Croatian territory, according to the document.

Among Zagreb’s demands is compensation for Croatian nationals detained at the Morinj camp, where more than 300 Croatians were held between October 1991 and August 1992, following the occupation of part of the Dubrovnik region by Serbian and Montenegrin forces.

Croatia is also calling for the preservation and permanent display of a memorial plaque at the former detention camp, as well as the renaming of a municipal swimming pool in Kotor dedicated to Zoran Gopčević, a former international water polo player who, according to the document, served as a guard at Morinj in 1991 and 1992.

Other outstanding demands include the prosecution of war crimes committed during Croatia’s War of Independence and further talks on the delimitation of the border between the two countries.

Despite those disputes, Croatia has so far consented to Montenegro’s progress in accession negotiations. The country has provisionally closed 21 of its 33 negotiating chapters, making it the frontrunner in the EU’s enlargement process.

Is Reform facing another growing crisis over alleged racist, sexist and violent language within its ranks?

Sam Coates and Anne McElvoy assess what the latest claims within an ITV News undercover investigation mean for Nigel Farage and whether more damaging revelations are still to come.

Reform says there is “no room for racism” within the party.

Elsewhere, Volodymyr Zelenskyy says Donald Trump is putting lives at risk by cutting Ukraine’s access to Starlink, a vital satellite technology. If the US can switch off critical military technology, how safe is Britain’s growing reliance on Elon Musk’s satellite networks?

Plus, is the cabinet office heading for a historic rebrand, and who will hold the power at the heart of government?

EU leaders meet today for their first chance to beef about the budget face to face.

On the show, Zoya Sheftalovich and Sarah Wheaton dive deeper into why leaders look increasingly unlikely to reach an agreement on the EU’s next money pot by December. Plus, Zoya obtained a document revealing deepening relations between Russia and Slovakia. Will that be a cause for concern around the Council table?

Next up, Zoya spoke with Defense Commissioner Andrius Kubilius on stage yesterday. His main message? Europe should boost its defense capabilities and stop relying so heavily on U.S. military support.

And finally, ECB President Christine Lagarde plugged her upcoming memoir at a press conference … is she allowed to do that? 

If you have a question or comment, don’t hesitate! message us on our WhatsApp here or at +32 491 05 06 29.

Articles mentioned in this episode:

• “How to watch the EU leaders’ summit like a pro.”
• “Slovakia deepening ties with Russia, document shows.”
• “Lagarde’s book plug raises questions about ECB ethics standards.”
• “Weakened Macron and Merz sink hopes of a quick EU budget deal.”

Die Berliner Landespolitik manövriert sich erst in eine Sackgasse und will nun doch daraus rausfinden. Wegen des Streits um antisemitische Strömungen in der Linkspartei stehen die Sondierungsgespräche mit SPD und Grünen auf der Kippe, werden aber heute fortgesetzt. Wie sich das rot-grün-rote Bündnis gegen den Widerstand von SPD und Grünen im Bund retten will, zeigt Maximilian Stascheit auf.

Auch die Bundes-SPD kämpft mit schlechten Umfragewerten und internem Frust vor dem anstehenden Parteitag im Dezember. Im 200-Sekunden-Interview erklärt der nordrhein-westfälische SPD-Fraktionschef Jochen Ott, warum seine Partei eine neue Vision braucht und wie der Weg aus der Krise aussehen soll.

Beim EU-Gipfel in Brüssel steht Europa derweil vor einem massiven Realitätscheck in der Ukraine-Politik. Die US-Unterstützung bröckelt spürbar. POLITICO-Experte Hans von der Burchard ordnet ein, welche Forderungen Wolodymyr Selenskyj morgen mitbringt und warum der Streit um den EU-Haushalt weitere Hilfen zu blockieren droht.

Das Berlin Playbook als Podcast gibt es jeden Morgen ab 5 Uhr. Rixa Fürsen, Maximilian Stascheit und das POLITICO-Team liefern Politik zum Hören – kompakt, international, hintergründig.

Für alle Hauptstadt-Profis: Der Berlin Playbook-Newsletter bietet jeden Morgen die wichtigsten Themen und Einordnungen. Jetzt kostenlos abonnieren.

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LONDON — The watchdog meant to police transparency in the U.K.’s polling industry is struggling to punish rogue firms, its own officers warned in a private meeting leaked to POLITICO.

Officers of the British Polling Council (BPC) raised concerns at a meeting last week that they lack the power to effectively hold members to account — with one comparing the way the body is currently organized to a “bowling club.”

The downbeat comments come amid fresh scrutiny of the booming U.K. polling industry. A Channel 4 News investigation in September accused JL Partners, a prominent pollster founded by former Conservative Party adviser James Johnson, of securing newspaper coverage of two polls in the run-up to elections — without disclosing their links to Nigel Farage’s Reform UK.

The polls had in fact been paid for by two undercover reporters posing as a wealthy American benefactor and his son. The pair had offered their support to Reform via Farage’s advisers Dan Jukes and James Orr.

At the time, the BPC said in a statement it was “clear there have been breaches” of the body’s rules and that it would seek further information from JL Partners. The BPC’s own rulebook states that polling companies must disclose who has commissioned their research and that those who fail to do so can be kicked out.

Three people familiar with internal BPC discussions — granted anonymity to discuss a sensitive matter — said members had since urged the industry body to dismiss JL Partners, arguing the pollster, which declined to comment for this piece, had committed a cut-and-dried violation of the rules.

However, the firm has not been expelled more than a month later — prompting concern among some members that the BPC is ill-equipped to deal with any serious misconduct.

One of the people cited above, from a rival pollster to JL Partners, said: “If the BPC isn’t able to kick someone out who’s so brazenly ignoring the spirit of the rules, it does beg the question: what’s the point of it?”

Crisis meeting

Jane Green, the president of the organization, laid bare the scale of the challenge facing the industry body at the behind-closed-doors meeting last week, according to a transcript reviewed by POLITICO.

She told the session that the body was set up to deal with “small, little mistakes” that were quickly corrected, but that anything more contentious would be “a nightmare” to deal with, since the BPC is “essentially a club” in which members have “agreed to play nicely.”

Without naming JL Partners, she argued there is a risk a pollster could take legal action if the BPC attempts to sanction a member — in which case she and other officers would be personally liable and could face losing their homes.

“We’ve risked our own houses, my kids’ Lego budget, all the rest of it, right? This is not cool,” she said.

The Reform UK controversy erupted at a time the BPC had already been planning to set itself up as a company limited by guarantee, removing the risk of personal liability for its officers. It now faces a wider dilemma over whether to continue in its current form or strengthen its ability to hold members to account.

Martin Boon from the public opinion research firm DeltaPoll told the same meeting that the BPC “[doesn’t] have regulatory powers or regulatory budgets, and I think we have to be careful about going down that road,” according to the transcript.

Luke Tryl of pollster More in Common said that “strengthening the complaints bit of what we do” is “really important, because I think people are now looking to the industry [to show] that we are stepping up, we are addressing concerns.”

Several members were adamant during the meeting that the BPC should not broaden its remit, the transcript shows, saying that any regulation should be carried out by the separate Market Research Society, which does hold powers to sanction members and is currently conducting a separate review of JL Partners’ conduct.

However, BPC members also aired reservations at the meeting that the MRS can sometimes be obliged to follow up on “vexatious,” complaints and has “very little experience” of political research.

Green meanwhile told those present that the BPC could struggle to deliver planned training for journalists on Multilevel Regression and Post-stratification (MRP) polls — increasingly used across Westminster — due to a lack of resources.

She said she wanted to see “clear rules of disclosure” on such polls — but cautioned that reduced bandwidth meant the BPC could now find it difficult to lead that drive.

Green also discussed an artificial intelligence agent as a possible answer to the BPC’s lack of manpower, with the tool used to scrape news organizations for political polling to check they have complied with the rules.

‘The industry’s changed massively’

Uncertainty over the future of the BPC is especially vexed as the British polling industry grows and opinion surveys play an increasingly prominent role in elections.

Smaller parties have been gaining ground in the U.K. in recent years, challenging the long-held two-party system and complicating the polling landscape.

ORB International’s Johnny Heald told the meeting of pollsters: “As one of the founding [BPC] members, clearly we set out with very good intentions to be transparent, but the industry’s changed massively … The combined turnover of all companies in this room has got to be hundreds of millions, and our [BPC] income is £4,000.”

In an emailed statement to POLITICO, Green acknowledged that the Reform UK story had “increased the salience of some of the issues amongst members,” but stressed that the BPC had already been working on reforms to its legal structure to better protect officers from legal challenge.

“The BPC doesn’t have professional staff and is run by the three Officers, so we felt there was a need to widen the number of members to increase the resilience of the organisation in cases when officers are working, ill, overseas etc,” she said.

The BPC is, she said, keen to “facilitate a conversation about the nature of the BPC, given its foundations and narrow remit on transparency, and the tenor of the meeting was to retain the existing remit, but with some steps to strengthen, and I was delighted our committee has grown in size now, with a larger team.”

BRUSSELS — The EU border agency Frontex is suspending a support program for deported migrants after its budget for the year ran out earlier than anticipated, emails seen by POLITICO show. 

The border agency paused new applications for reintegration support under its program on Oct. 2 after estimating that costs had “reached a level that does no longer ensure full financial coverage,” according to an email sent by Executive Director Hans Leijtens to staff on that date.

The program, which has operated since 2022, offers financial assistance, healthcare, vocational training and counseling to people who are returned to their home countries after being refused the right to stay in the EU. Reintegration support forms part of the EU’s plan to boost returns of unsuccessful asylum-seekers.

The suspension comes as the EU seeks to step up deportations from the bloc — a leading pillar of EU migration policy, and the object of new legislation adopted earlier this month — and weeks before the European Commission is expected to propose expanding the mandate of the border agency, including its role in returns and reintegration.

Frontex cannot resume the program without additional cash. The agency asked the Commission for more funds, but is waiting for clarity on the EU budget for 2027, and the next seven-year budget starting in 2028, the emails said.

“There is no point in talking about a more ambitious European return policy without also talking about the resources needed to deliver it,” Frontex spokesperson Chris Borowski told POLITICO. “Ambition and funding have to go hand in hand.”

Borowski confirmed that the agency had suspended new cases, but stressed that individuals already been accepted into the program wouldn’t be affected and that Frontex would also continue to offer EU countries “other forms of assistance” on returns, such as operational and technical support.

“Returns do not end when a plane lands. Helping people rebuild their lives after returning to their home countries is an important part of making migration management work. It takes planning, people and money,” he said.

With 2,368 new cases per month on average, the agency took on significantly more migrants seeking reintegration support than it expected. Cases in September were 63% higher than Frontex’s target, according to Leijtens’ email to staff. In the first half of this year, the agency took on around 75% more cases than it did in the same period last year.

In previous years, Frontex was able to assign additional funds from other parts of its budget, the email says — signaling the agency has had to search to find the cash to keep the program running in the past.

“Frontex does not have the necessary appropriations to cover the needs further as MFF allocations did not consider that Frontex would be expected to take over EURP funding at the scale we have seen today,” Leijtens wrote, referring to Multiannual Financial Framework, the EU’s seven-year budget.

The agency has raised the issue with the Commission but “no further commitments could be made onwards,” according to the email.

The program’s suspension raises questions about the future of the bloc’s migration approach. Reintegration is “the key ingredient” to making the EU’s returns strategy work, Lukas Gehrke, the director of the U.N.’s migration organization’s global office in Brussels, told POLITICO.

Forced returns are expensive and come with a higher risk of human rights infringements, whereas reintegration support boosts voluntary returns, reduces people’s propensity to attempt to reach the EU again, and tends to ease cooperation with the country to which they return, he argued.

“That means every euro spent on return with reintegration is a euro spent in a more sustainable way,” Gehrke said.

‘Do not argue or defend the EU policy’

In emailed guidance on how to communicate the suspension to migrants who applied for support, seen by POLITICO, staff were told to “acknowledge the institutional problem” with reintegration program funding “so the returnee does not feel personally targeted or punished.”

Counselors should be transparent, validate migrants’ disappointment, wait for their emotions to pass and shift the conversation to what they could still do upon their return, the guidance read, advising: “Do not argue or defend the EU policy.”

Potential returnees “may feel deceived, leading to anger, despondency, or complete withdrawal from the return process,” it also warned.

Expanding the agency’s Frontex mandate featured in the Commission’s five-point plan to address sudden mass movements of people, in the aftermath of migration crisis in the Spanish exclave of Ceuta. Besides stepping up the agency’s role in returns and reintegration, the plan also noted an intention to charge Frontex with monitoring the bloc’s external borders and add capacity to quickly deploy forces in the event of an emergency.

“The Commission will propose that Frontex becomes a genuinely European capability with the scale, tools and agility to support Member States wherever and whenever needed,” Commission President Ursula von der Leyen wrote in a letter to EU leaders ahead of a summit on Thursday and Friday, where migration is likely to be a flashpoint.

The plans have already raised concerns that the border agency’s mandate is being expanded more quickly than its resources.

Strengthening the border agency’s emergency response capacities, for example, comes with a tradeoff as staff that can be deployed on a moment’s notice cannot be deployed elsewhere, Leijtens, Frontex’s executive director, said at an event earlier this month.  “If they’re in Narva in Estonia, you can’t use them in Italy right now.”

Zoya Sheftalovich contributed to this report.