WARSAW — Ukraine has more leverage than a year ago — and European leaders are warning Donald Trump not to squander it by pressuring Kyiv to ease up on Russia.
“In less than two years we went from the stage of no cards to the stage of don’t play your cards,” Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha told an audience at the Warsaw Security Conference. “That’s a true achievement.”
Last year, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy was ambushed in the Oval Office by Trump, who ridiculed him for having “no cards” to play against Russia.
Trump’s recent demand that Zelenskyy “better damn well stop” Ukraine’s refinery attacks, and his call for Ukraine to install a new leader, amount to a recognition that Kyiv does indeed have significant leverage in the fight.
Kyiv’s refinery campaign is helping create a growing fuel shortage across Russia and is also harming the Kremlin’s ability to finance the war. But European leaders fear that Trump’s desperation to lower fuel prices ahead of next month’s U.S. midterm elections by pressuring Kyiv to stop its attacks could weaken Ukraine’s hand without persuading Russia to end the war.
Sybiha’s comments drew loud applause at the Warsaw conference and underscored growing tensions among Kyiv, Washington and Ukraine’s European allies after Trump said the U.S. had agreed with Vladimir Putin to buy Russian diesel.
The dispute between Washington and Kyiv overshadowed a Warsaw event that is normally strongly pro-American, given Poland’s status as a key U.S. ally.
“Ministers and heads of state won’t say so outright what they think about the Americans, but they certainly think a lot of things — the negotiations with Putin are yet another stab in the back for the Ukrainians,” said a French lawmaker, speaking on condition of being granted anonymity.
“You end the war by persuading the aggressor to limit his level of ambition, not by asking the victim to capitulate,” said Polish Foreign Minister Radosław Sikorski.
His German counterpart Johann Wadephul underlined that Berlin is pushing the Trump administration to fully impose energy sanctions approved by the U.S. Congress.
On Sep. 18, Trump signed the Lindsey O. Graham Russia and Iran Sanctions Act of 2026, codifying existing US sanctions against Russia and expanding the scope for applying secondary sanctions, tariffs and restrictions, including against the energy sector.
“This is not the time to lower the sanctions regime, but to strengthen it,” Wadephul said.
U.K. Foreign Secretary Ed Miliband echoed that call, saying Trump should exert pressure on Russia to agree to an energy ceasefire under which both warring nations would stop hitting each other’s oil, gas, electricity and other assets.
Russia has so far refused to take such a step.
“Let us take seriously this issue of the energy ceasefire that President Trump has talked about, not simply a refinery ceasefire but a broad energy ceasefire, because in the last week alone we’ve seen 200 Russian attacks on Ukrainian energy infrastructure,” Miliband said.
The U.S. president said on Monday that Putin is keener to end the fighting than Zelenskyy — despite the Kremlin not agreeing to any ceasefire.
“I think actually Putin wants to make a deal more than Zelenskyy,” Trump said.
Since Trump announced an energy ceasefire — blindsiding both Kyiv and Moscow — Ukraine has paused bombing Russian refineries even as Russian attacks continue.
While Trump wants the attacks to stop, Ukraine’s European allies are keen to cripple Russia’s war effort.
“Ukraine is attacking refineries, which is having an effect, and data centers, which is also having an effect,” Sikorski said. He also called on Poland’s MAGA-aligned President Karol Nawrocki to use his influence with Trump “to explain to him that Putin is the aggressor and Zelenskyy is the victim of aggression.”
Wadephul added that he had talked to Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov during the U.N. General Assembly in New York last month, and saw no interest from him in ending the war.
“A lot of people in Europe and especially in Germany were asking us and me, ‘Why don’t you talk to the Russians?’ So now I had that conversation, and you saw the result,” he said. “It’s a very dire result. And it shows that Russia right now is not ready for ceasefire.”
During the same Warsaw event, Sybiha was forced to deny rumors that Washington may have stopped sharing intelligence with Kyiv in retaliation for its campaign of deep strikes against Russian oil refineries.
“You are asking me if we are getting intelligence data from the American side. Yes, we continue this cooperation,” he said.
Concerns about a potential cut-off in U.S. intelligence grew on Tuesday after Ukraine’s threat detection system failed to detect ballistic missiles that battered Kyiv overnight. Sybiha said the failure was due to a “special type of weaponry which was used by the Russian side.”
Zelenskyy also underlined the need for continued intelligence sharing. “There was also a rather treacherous ballistic missile strike on Kyiv — five missiles that hit civilian infrastructure. Unfortunately, there was no warning from our partners regarding this strike. Intelligence on Russian ballistic missile launches helps save lives.”
Sybiha stressed that Kyiv needs to continue strengthening its ability to fend off Russia’s constant air attacks while Ukraine’s troops push back against Russian forces on the front lines.
“The future of Europe and the global security architecture is now being decided in Ukraine,” he said.
Chris Lunday and Laura Kayali contributed to this report.
Governments should not go back and forth on energy policy and decarbonization targets if they want to attract investors, said Catherine MacGregor, the CEO of French energy giant Engie.
“Without trust, we cannot invest,” MacGregor said at POLITICO’s competitiveness summit in Paris on Tuesday.
In the French government’s 2027 budget proposal, French Prime Minister Sébastien Lecornu proposed backtracking on a number of renewable energy contracts, arguing that subsidies for green energy projects, particularly solar panels, were a major financial burden for the state.
MacGregor said such a move could imperil future investments in France.
“A contract is a contract,” she insisted, adding that “trust is very important” for investors to be able to spend money on energy projects in the long term.
France’s deteriorating public finances have become a central political issue ahead of the country’s presidential election next year. President Emmanuel Macron’s embattled minority government has been looking for ways to cut costs in a bid to bring down a stubbornly high budget deficit projected to come in at 5.4% of gross domestic product.
At the European Union level, Ursula von der Leyen’s second term at the helm of the European Commission has been marked by political pushback against the bloc’s core green policies, including Brussels’ landmark ban on combustion engines by 2035 and its emissions trading scheme.
But the bloc’s commitment to decarbonization gives investors the framework they need to plan ahead, MacGregor argued.
“Europe has one advantage: It moves slowly and that offers a certain level of stability which is very interesting for investors,” she said.
MacGregor defended the competitiveness of renewable energy projects as a means to produce energy locally and quickly, especially with gas prices so high.
“Renewable projects, when we do them well, in an organized manner and at scale … we are able to be competitive,” she added.
PARIS — French center-right presidential candidate Edouard Philippe accused his far-right rival Marine Le Pen of trying to force a Frexit in disguise with her euroskeptic campaign promises.
“There is something in Marine Le Pen’s proposals that has the potential to blow Europe up, or let’s say to crack it open,” Philippe said at POLITICO’s Paris Competitiveness Summit on Tuesday.
The former prime minister — who is currently the best-placed centrist candidate to challenge the front-running Le Pen, according to recent polls — said Le Pen’s plan to unilaterally demand a drastic cut to France’s contribution to the EU budget was akin to “saying you want out of Europe” without openly advocating for leaving the bloc. Le Pen had previously called for a referendum in France on leaving the EU but dropped the proposal after her crushing defeat to Emmanuel Macron in the 2017 presidential election. Her party, the National Rally, now says it wants to change the EU from within.
Philippe, a fiscal conservative who has been pitching himself as the voice of reason in a campaign dominated by populist rivals, also slammed budget plans Le Pen unveiled last week as “grotesque,” accusing her of pitching “fantasy” savings.
Le Pen’s fiscal plans have faced serious scrutiny since being presented, with many observers saying they either lack key details or overestimate savings on major proposals like immigration. Progressive think tank Terra Nova wrote in a note out Tuesday that Le Pen’s budget presentation was “riddled with errors and contradictions” as well as “botched estimates.”
“She isn’t even able to estimate the cost of the pension reform she is proposing,” Philippe said.
Le Pen said in August that her plan to bring France’s legal retirement age back down to 62 for most workers would cost €9 billion a year, and last week she said she would lay out at a later stage how she intends to fund her flagship pledge. However, the Institut Montaigne, a fiscally conservative think tank, estimated the proposal would cost €34.7 billion a year.
Philippe is hoping to convince voters that his fiscally conservative agenda is the right path in a country burdened by a ballooning public debt and a budget deficit still above 5% of gross domestic product, in breach of EU rules.
Philippe said France needed to get its finances back on track to regain credibility on the European stage after a “loss of influence” over the past few years.
Though he currently leads a crowded field of centrist candidates, Philippe’s campaign has struggled in recent weeks to gain momentum — and far-left candidate Jean-Luc Mélenchon is now challenging the former PM for second place in the polls. France’s presidential election goes to a runoff if no candidate receives more than 50% of the vote, and Le Pen’s strong poll numbers all but guarantee her a spot in the second round.
The former prime minister pitched a pragmatic European agenda with less regulatory burden, more focus on investment and a tougher approach to China.
Philippe had some harsh criticism for an already embattled flagship measure of the EU’s green deal, saying the 2035 combustion engine ban has been “disastrous.”
There was “a great naiveté toward China,” which ultimately benefited from Europe’s push on electric vehicles, Philippe said.
“We need to much better protect our market,” he added. “If one wants access to the European market, one has to manufacture in Europe. If a carmaker doesn’t manufacture here, then we have to slap high tariffs.”
The EU is in the process of drawing up new “Made in Europe” rules that would favor European producers over those outside the bloc, in response to trade practices by competitors like China and the United States.
Shortly before Philippe took the stage, European Commissioner for Industry Stéphane Séjourné said at the POLITICO event that a Franco-German deal trading stronger protections on the definition of Made in Europe in exchange for a loosening of combustion engine rules should be finalized “in the next few hours or in the next few days.”
On artificial intelligence, Philippe aligned himself with Macron, advocating for European sovereignty in the field and the need to regulate what he described as “an instrument of power.”
“What I see is an AI world making money for the U.S. with European savings and European data, and that bugs me,” he said.
WARSAW — European leaders are preparing to demand tougher sanctions on Russia at a summit on Thursday, putting them at odds with Donald Trump just days after the U.S. president struck a deal with Vladimir Putin to ease restrictions on Russian diesel exports.
The leaders plan to call for further sanctions and measures targeting Moscow’s oil revenues at the European Council, according to a recent draft joint statement obtained by POLITICO, as EU governments reject Trump’s claim to have secured an energy ceasefire between Russia and Ukraine.
The disagreement exposes a widening divide over how to bring Moscow to the negotiating table. While Trump is seeking to bring down U.S. fuel prices by allowing more Russian diesel onto global markets, European leaders argue that restricting the Kremlin’s energy revenues remains essential to forcing Putin to end the war.
“Russia is not interested in deescalation, ceasing fire or peace,” Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk told a security conference in Warsaw on Monday. “That is why I will go to Brussels to ask my partners to consider seriously increasing sanctions against Russia.”
German Chancellor Friedrich Merz also called for further restrictions, pointing to Moscow’s continued attacks on Ukraine’s energy infrastructure despite Trump’s announcement of a ceasefire.
“Russia will only negotiate in good faith under pressure,” Merz said Monday. “Following Moscow’s reckless attacks on Ukraine’s civilian energy supply, we must even tighten [sanctions] further.”
The push comes after EU foreign ministers on Monday approved the bloc’s largest-ever addition to its Russia sanctions list, targeting more than 1,600 individuals and entities. The European Commission is also preparing a 23rd package of sectoral sanctions, which Kyiv expects to be circulated to EU governments by the end of the year, according to a senior Ukrainian official who was, like others in this article, granted anonymity to speak frankly on the sensitive negotiations.
Other European countries are taking a similar position. Britain and Norway have also pledged to increase pressure on Moscow.
“It’s important to sanction Russia not to finance the war,” Norwegian Defense Minister Tore O. Sandvik told POLITICO, calling for loopholes in existing restrictions to be closed.
Behind closed doors, many European diplomats see Trump’s abrupt shift toward easing restrictions on Russian energy as driven primarily by domestic political concerns ahead of next month’s U.S. midterm elections.
That is the “broadly held view” among EU officials, according to one senior official.
The president is under mounting pressure over fuel prices, which have surged since the outbreak of the U.S.-Israeli war with Iran. Having promised during his 2024 campaign to bring gasoline prices below $2 a gallon, Trump now faces an electorate paying more than twice that amount, with Republicans at risk of losing control of Congress.
His agreement with Putin is intended to release an additional 4.8 million tons of Russian diesel onto global markets over the coming months, easing pressure on fuel supplies and prices.
But European and Ukrainian officials question whether the additional supply will make a meaningful difference, saying that the total volume promised amounts to only around 10 days of U.S. demand. They feel the deal risks undermining efforts to deprive Moscow of the revenues funding its invasion.
“The reality” is that the additional fuel will have a “minimal” impact on U.S. prices, the senior EU official said.
“This is about the midterms,” a second EU official said. “He said he would bring down prices, but then he decided to go to war with Iran.”
The officials also question whether Putin intends to honor Trump’s purported energy ceasefire. Russia has continued striking Ukrainian energy infrastructure since the announcement, while Kyiv says it was not consulted on the arrangement.
For now, most European officials are reluctant to criticize Trump publicly, despite any doubts about the agreement. The EU and Ukraine should maintain their position over the coming weeks, when the administration’s longer-term intentions toward Kyiv may become clearer, one diplomat said, adding that Trump might even change course again if Putin fails to deliver the promised diesel.
The dispute has also revived European calls for Washington to enforce its own sanctions against Moscow.
Tusk urged Europe and the United States to act together to show Russia they were prepared to impose tougher measures, while EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas called on Washington to align its approach with Brussels.
Kallas pointed to sweeping Russia sanctions legislation championed by the late Republican Senator Lindsey Graham, which Trump signed into law last month but has yet to fully implement.
The legislation gives Washington additional tools to target Russia’s energy trade and those helping sustain its war effort. European officials want the administration to use them rather than loosen restrictions on Russian exports.
Some Republicans are also calling for tougher action.
“I think we need to be implementing the Russia sanctions bill,” Republican Representative Dan Crenshaw told the Warsaw conference.
The disagreement is raising wider questions in Europe about its dependence on Washington, particularly amid reports that U.S. officials have threatened to restrict Ukraine’s access to American weapons unless Kyiv stops attacking Russian oil refineries.
There is currently “no sign” Washington is following through on those threats, a NATO official told POLITICO, arguing that restricting sales would also hurt American weapons manufacturers.
“PURL is a good deal for the Americans,” the official said, referring to the NATO initiative under which European allies finance purchases of U.S. weapons for Ukraine.
European Defense Commissioner Andrius Kubilius, without directly addressing the reports, said Europe needed to take “primary responsibility” for its own defense more urgently as Washington reduces its military presence on the Continent.
The immediate test, however, comes on Thursday, when EU leaders will seek to maintain pressure on Moscow even as their most powerful ally moves in the opposite direction.
Victor Jack and Sebastian Starcevic contributed reporting from Brussels, James Angelos contributed reporting from Berlin, Esther Webber contributed reporting from London.
European governments rebuked U.S. President Donald Trump’s plan to import hundreds of thousands of tons of Russian diesel, and vowed to keep isolating Moscow and supporting Ukraine as it heads into a brutal wartime winter.
Trump said over the weekend he would import 300,000 tons of Russian diesel, weeks ahead of U.S. midterm elections in which the Republicans are polling badly and in which energy prices and cost-of-living concerns are expected to play a major role.
But his announcement — which included a claim that Russia and Ukraine had agreed an “energy ceasefire” and a call for Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to step down — drew skepticism and scorn from European capitals and the EU.
“This deal doesn’t help neither the price of oil products nor the unity of the transatlantic community,” Lithuanian Foreign Minister Kęstutis Budrys said at a gathering of the bloc’s foreign ministers on Monday morning, adding “it is not the European way.”
Irish Foreign Minister Helen McEntee called Trump’s announcement of a deal with Moscow “concerning,” while German Minister of State for Europe Gunther Krichbaum said every dollar spent on Russian energy funded the purchase of weapons used against Kyiv.
The EU’s top diplomat, Kaja Kallas, reminded Washington that “Russia has started this war. We should not forget this.”
On Monday, Zelenskyy suggested that Washington had other motives for pursuing an energy agreement with Moscow, arguing that the Russian fuel involved would make little difference to global supplies.
Speaking at the Warsaw Security Forum, Zelenskyy said proposed Russian diesel deliveries were insignificant compared with global monthly consumption of roughly 120 million tons.
“I don’t think that this will have a tangible impact,” Zelenskyy said. “I believe that there are different rationales behind this decision.”
Zelenskyy also suggested Washington should consider an alternative arrangement with Kyiv. “Why doesn’t America then conclude a diesel deal with Ukraine?” he asked. “Let’s propose a diesel deal with Ukraine.”
He also revealed that Kyiv had not been informed beforehand of Trump’s announcement that he had secured an energy ceasefire. “No, we did not know about that,” Zelenskyy said. “We’ve learned that from the media as well.”
On their way into their meeting, the EU’s foreign ministers remained united in their insistence that increasing pressure on Moscow was the only way forward.
“Obviously our position has not changed — pressure on Russia, sanctions, support to Ukraine, Russia’s isolation is the way to peace,” Latvian Foreign Minister Baiba Braže said.
The British Foreign Office’s minister of state Stephen Doughty said London was “not planning to follow suit with” purchasing Russian energy and would ratchet up “economic pressure” on Moscow.
“Pressure, pressure, pressure on Russia,” Lithuania’s Budrys said.
Trump’s claim that Ukraine and Russia had agreed to an “energy ceasefire” drew confusion from Kyiv and its allies over the weekend, with Zelenskyy saying the truce and its terms were “news” to him but that he would support it nonetheless — provided Moscow followed suit.
Just hours after Trump’s announcement, however, Russian bombs fell on Ukrainian power plants, causing widespread blackouts.
Kyiv is bracing for its fifth winter since Russia launched its full-scale invasion in February 2022, which Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk said last month could prove “tragically critical” for Ukraine due to Russia’s near-constant strikes on infrastructure.
At the opening session of the Warsaw Security Forum on Monday, Tusk slammed “anyone who is trying to introduce any symmetries, who suggests it is Ukraine responsible for the war,” saying doing so “gives a valuable present, gift, to the aggressor, to Putin.”
Kallas said any ceasefire shouldn’t “only apply to the refineries, where Ukraine has one and Russia has plenty,” adding that would “definitely [be] in the benefit of the Russians.”
She also called on Washington to join Brussels and London in imposing harsh sanctions on Russia. “Of course the U.S. is our biggest ally,” she said, “but our message is clear: If we want to end this war, the only way we can do this is putting more pressure on Russia.”
Ukraine’s financial needs are set to come up at a meeting of European heads of state and government on Thursday in Brussels. The IMF estimated that Kyiv will face a financing gap of $30 billion to $35 billion next year.
“Ukraine will be front and center at this week’s European Council,” European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said in a statement Sunday night after a phone call with Zelenskyy, adding the war was entering a “new, grimmer phase.”
Zoya Sheftalovich contributed reporting from Brussels. Nick Vinocur contributed reporting from Warsaw.
BRUSSELS — Europe will lose out because of €159 billion in cuts to the bloc’s next long-term budget, the European Commission has warned days before EU leaders gather in Brussels for talks on the bloc’s future spending plans.
In an unusual attack, the Commission told governments that scrapping billions from several rainy-day funds will leave Europe less equipped to deal with crises during the next seven-year budget cycle, said four EU diplomats briefed on the talks, granted anonymity to speak freely about confidential discussions.
The Commission’s top budget official, Stéphanie Riso, delivered the warning to the EU’s 27 ambassadors during a closed-door meeting on Sunday, a day after the Irish presidency of the Council of the EU, which is steering the talks, proposed cutting around 8% from the bloc’s total budget from 2028 to 2034.
The Commission is “very concerned about cuts to flexibility,” said one of the EU diplomats.
As a result of the changes, “we will have no ways left to help farmers and regions when crises hit, because of climate change or geopolitical tensions,” they added.
EU ambassadors gathered to discuss the Irish plan, which envisages cuts of €159 billion in current prices from the Commission’s nearly €2 trillion proposal. Of that amount, €38 billion was cut from foreign aid, €75 billion was axed from competitiveness, and at least €22 billion was slashed from rainy-day funds.
But even those reductions were criticized as insufficient by a German-led group of states pushing for cuts of several hundred billion. During the closed-door meeting, a rival bloc of 17 countries, known as the Friends of Cohesion, welcomed the fact that the Irish presidency had spared agriculture and regional payments from cuts.
EU governments are racing to finalize a deal on the budget among themselves by the end of the year — before elections in France, Italy and Poland that threaten to disrupt the negotiations.
A leaders’ summit on Thursday and Friday will give early signals as to whether the end-of-year deadline is achievable — or whether leaders should start preparing contingency plans.
One EU diplomat said the pressure is now on those leaders: “What could make a difference is if Friedrich Merz and Emmanuel Macron show up, hand-in-hand, and say we live in a new world.”
The Commission warned that cuts such as those put forward by Ireland will shrink the next budget — excluding repayments to post-Covid debt — below the current one.
The cuts overwhelmingly affect EU-wide priorities such as competitiveness, defense and foreign aid while leaving traditional policies untouched such as agriculture and regional payouts, which make up almost half the budget.
The changes undermine the Commission’s proposal, which envisaged more flexibility and steered hundreds of billions of euros toward new priorities.
In a further setback for the Commission, Ireland also downsized — or even scrapped — several financial cushions to shelter EU countries from unforeseen events such as natural disasters or public health emergencies.
The EU executive argues these changes will make spending in the next budget more rigid than in the current one — and potentially warrant a midterm review of the budget further down the line.
However, Ireland’s Europe Minister Thomas Byrne disputed this claim in a press conference on Saturday, saying the budget proposal “offers increased flexibility … in response to the clear call from member states for a simplified and more flexible, modern [budget].”
Another source of tension in the next budget came from Ireland’s watering down the link between EU payouts and economic reforms.
The Commission has repeatedly defended using regular budget payments as a carrot to nudge governments to undertake reforms that will make them more competitive.
However, Ireland’s ambassador to the EU, Aingeal O’Donoghue, said during the meeting that the new text will not link EU cash disbursements and “fiscal reforms,” according to one of the diplomats.
BRUSSELS — Three of the European Parliament’s biggest political groups say they will fight an EU proposal to relax carbon pricing rules, opening a rift that could push conservative lawmakers to side with the far right to weaken the bloc’s climate ambition.
The center-left Socialists and Democrats, the centrist Renew Europe and the Greens all said in recent days that they would try to preserve an ambitious path to net zero under the Emissions Trading System, forcing heavy industry to cut planet-warming emissions faster than Brussels proposes.
That puts them at odds with the center-right European People’s Party, Parliament’s biggest group, which broadly supports the European Commission’s proposal.
For years, those four groups have worked together in Parliament to pass legislation that strikes a political middle ground, shunning collaboration with the far right. The sometimes uneasy alliance has ensured consistent, bipartisan support for the ETS, Europe’s most powerful tool for reducing greenhouse gas emissions.
But now, a reform of the landmark cap-and-trade scheme, unveiled by the EU executive in July, looks set to become a bellwether in an era when, increasingly, the center no longer holds.
The EPP is steering Parliament’s work on the proposed ETS revision through veteran German lawmaker Peter Liese, who wants to find a deal that satisfies everyone.
“I don’t want the Venezuelan majority. It’s against my convictions, but it is also not possible because nobody would see [Marine] Le Pen, the Austrian far-right FPÖ or the German extreme-far-right AfD voting for any ETS proposal,” he told POLITICO in September, using the informal term for a controversial alliance of center-right and far-right groups.
Instead, Liese, who maintains close ties with Dutch S&D lawmaker Mohammed Chahim, said he wanted “the broadest possible coalition,” including the right-wing European Conservatives and Reformists as well as “the Greens, The Left, if they want.”
But new amendments filed last week by the S&D, the second-largest group in Parliament, as well as the Greens and Renew, point to major schisms over key aspects of the ETS reform. The biggest divide concerns the so-called linear reduction factor, the mechanism that determines how quickly the supply of pollution permits shrinks each year.
Under the current trajectory, the total cap on carbon emissions for all sectors covered by the ETS falls slightly each year, and would reach zero around 2039 or 2040. At that point, ETS sectors — which include power generators, steelmakers and chemical manufacturers — would no longer be able to emit any carbon dioxide at all.
Liese’s proposal would push that date into the 2040s, in line with the Commission’s original pitch in the summer. But the three other centrist or left-leaning groups oppose the plan and have tabled nearly identical amendments that would keep the rates high until the end of next decade and bring about quicker industrial decarbonization across Europe.
Though the percentages between the warring groups appear tiny, they translate into millions of additional tons of CO₂ emissions and expose a growing political gulf. S&D, the Greens and Renew are fighting to preserve Europe’s climate ambitions, while the EPP is increasingly sympathetic to the concerns of the chemicals and metals industries, both of which have been vocally critical of the ETS.
But just as the chances for a centrist compromise dim, Liese has another possible route.
Memories of fascism in the early twentieth century once discouraged mainstream political groups from working with the far right. That firewall appeared to erode when talks with centrist allies collapsed in 2025 over the first omnibus package governing certain environmental reporting rules. The EPP turned to the right-wing ECR and the far-right Patriots for Europe and Europe of Sovereign Nations to secure a deal, paving the way for similar alliances in the future.
On the ETS, there is a growing risk that it could happen all over again.
Czech lawmaker Alexandr Vondra of the ECR recently floated the possibility of working with Liese to secure a deal backed by his right-wing group during a parliamentary debate on the ETS.
“I would address here specifically EPP because it holds the key to the success of the reform of the ETS system,” he said, before laying out a list of industry-friendly demands that included a much looser trajectory to zero emissions. “If so, count me and my group in.”
Amendments tabled by Vondra this week and seen by POLITICO reflected a similar willingness to work with the EPP and limited regard for emissions reductions. If Liese does decide to shift his compromise to the right and cashes in on ECR votes, it could also quell problems within his own party.
The Polish, Spanish and Italian branches of the EPP are all unhappy with what they see as Liese’s overly climate-friendly proposal, according to three parliamentary insiders. Recent votes in Parliament on the Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism, the bloc’s carbon levy on imports that works in tandem with the ETS, exposed fractures within the group, with portions of the EPP supporting right-wing groups or abstaining on a key provision of the legislation.
But how willing far-right groups will be to play ball with the EPP remains to be seen.
The Europe of Sovereign Nations group — whose members include Germany’s far-right Alternative für Deutschland — is hostile to the ETS and wants it totally abolished. But the Patriots — whose members include France’s National Rally — might provide Liese with an opening: the group generally calls for the policy to be slowed to a halt, especially the upcoming ETS2, as it does all Green Deal legislation. French far-right lawmaker and rising political star Jordan Bardella said as much in a speech to Parliament in May.
“ETS: three letters, an acronym that reeks of detached bureaucracy, with one question that keeps coming up: who’s going to pay?” he said.
The Trump administration moved Friday to temporarily lift sanctions on Russian diesel as President Donald Trump said Moscow had agreed to release large quantities of the fuel and suggested the U.S. could be a buyer.
The surprise move comes as the Trump administration has struggled to bring the record diesel prices — caused by the ongoing war against Iran as well as Ukrainian attacks against Russian refineries — under control ahead of the midterm elections.
In a post on Truth Social, Trump said he had just “concluded a highly successful discussion” with Russian President Vladimir Putin, in which Putin agreed to supply hundreds of thousands of tons of diesel fuel “to the American and Global Marketplace.”
“Between our TOTAL CONTROL of the Strait of Hormuz, and this great announcement on Russian Energy, Diesel Prices for Americans and, indeed, the World, will be COMING DOWN, IN RECORD NUMBERS, AND FAST!” Trump wrote on Truth Social.
The Treasury Department said in a post on X that it was “immediately issuing a temporary general license to allow the supply of Russian diesel to the global market.”
Moscow has restricted diesel exports in recent months as Ukraine has accelerated its attacks on Russian refineries, contributing to the global shortage of the fuel. It is unclear how Russia will supply the large quantities of the fuel promised by Trump with a large chunk of its refineries out of commission.
This story appeared in Today, Explained, a daily newsletter that helps you understand the most compelling news and stories of the day. Subscribe here.
The first hurricane of the fall season is expected to strike the Gulf Coast overnight, marking the latest onset of hurricane season in living memory. As of early Friday afternoon, Hurricane Isaias had grown to a Category 3 storm, with sustained winds of 120 miles per hour. It will strike along the shores of the Florida Panhandle, Alabama, and Mississippi, posing a threat to life and property for millions of Americans. Weather forecasters anticipate between 8 and 12 inches of rain in the areas near where the storm makes landfall.
Isaias’s imminent arrival signals the end of a period of unusual good luck when it comes to hurricanes striking the United States. Last year, no hurricanes reached the US mainland at all. And this year, Isaias is breaking a more than 100-year-old record: October 9 is the latest date since 1905 for the first Atlantic hurricane of the season to take shape. August and September have historically been the busiest periods of hurricane season.
Not lately, though. It’s a strange recent phenomenon, and it’s been even more fortuitous than it would ordinarily be. That’s because the Trump administration has slashed weather forecasting and emergency relief funding over the past two years, leaving us less prepared for a disaster.
And now our luck seems to be running out — with even more rough weather on the way.
Here’s the secret ingredient that’s pushed off hurricanes even as warming planetary temperatures raise concerns about more extreme weather events: El Niño. This notorious shift in global wind patterns, which occurs every two to seven years, moves warm water around the oceans, disrupting traditional weather patterns and leading to intense rain and sometimes disastrous flooding, as well as droughts. If there is an upside, however, it’s that this temporary change in ocean conditions prevents hurricanes from forming as frequently as they otherwise would.
The downside is, well, El Niño is still on its way. Forecasters expect this year’s version to be historically bad — using words like “super” or “Godzilla” to describe it. The worst of the bad weather is projected to arrive in December: The southern half of the continental US is expected to see unusually rainy and stormy weather, while areas of the Great Lakes and Pacific Northwest could see extreme dry spells.
It will also serve as a crucial test of our reduced capacity for predicting and responding to disasters. Trump’s “big beautiful bill” cut funding for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s weather forecasting and public alert programs by $200 million, and 17 percent of FEMA’s workforce left the agency in 2025 amid the administration’s DOGE purge.
For now, if you’re in the danger zone for Isaias, please pay attention to local and national weather alerts this weekend. If you’re not, count yourself lucky — but there are storm clouds on the horizon.
➨ These days, it feels like we’re all swimming in a sea of AI hype and hysteria — all the ways this technology will make our lives better, all the ways it could kill every single one of us. But what if the two are more related than we think? Eric Levitz’s new piece asks whether the AI companies themselves warning us about the apocalypse is part of their own marketing strategy. It’s a useful guide for how to think about all of these existential conversations.
The European Union and China reached an agreement on Friday that will curb China’s booming hybrid car exports, delivering a breakthrough in negotiations aimed at rebalancing their trade relationship.
The announcement came as Trade Commissioner Maroš Šefčovič wrapped up two days of talks in Beijing, the culmination of a push launched in June to narrow the bloc’s €1 billion-a-day trade deficit with China.
The deal marks a win for the EU executive, which has been under pressure to secure concessions from Beijing. Going into the talks, France and Germany strengthened Šefčovič’s hand by calling for the EU to take tough action on trade if China failed to curb a growing export glut.
Speaking in Beijing, the commissioner said the two sides had reached an agreement that would help to shield European automakers from low-price Chinese competition. He declined to enter into specifics before EU leaders officially mandate the EU executive to move forward.
“We have reached a shared understanding to moderate China’s export of hybrids and plug-in hybrids to the European Union. This opens the prospect of cutting China’s exports by more than a half,” Šefčovič told reporters.
The estimate was based on projections of how Chinese exports would grow over the next four years without the agreement. In practical terms, it would mean that “several millions of car exports from China to the European Union” would be prevented, he explained.
China’s Commerce Ministry highlighted the understanding on hybrids in a parallel 16-point statement, but offered no details on how exports would be restrained. It said the two sides “will continue to strengthen communication and cooperation under the trade monitoring mechanism and further leverage dialogue mechanisms to enhance mutual understanding.”
Šefčovič declined to elaborate when asked whether the deal would allow the EU to impose safeguards — a mixture of import quotas and tariffs — a step that Brussels has been considering. He said the arrangement would comply with the rules of the World Trade Organization.
Šefčovič said that Beijing had also agreed to lower duties on European goods worth €4 billion, ranging from olive oil to footwear, a move that would save exporters €225 million.
“It is a crucial first step,” he said. “But only a first step in the process of rebalancing.”
The Slovak commissioner said he would report back to European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, along with EU leaders, when they meet for a summit in Brussels next Thursday.
He had focused on cars as a key deliverable going into meetings in Beijing with Commerce Minister Wang Wentao and Vice Prime Minister He Lifeng.
Chinese auto exports to Europe have been booming, accounting in August for one in eight cars sold in the bloc — mainly driven by sales of hybrids. Europe’s own automotive industry is feeling the pressure, with Volkswagen and Mercedes-Benz recently announcing job cuts and plant closures.
Aside from the deal on hybrids, Beijing said in its statement that it was “willing to continue” fast-tracking licenses to export rare earth elements to the EU. Automakers had been forced to shut down assembly lines after China temporarily restricted exports in response to U.S. tariffs last year. China dominates the production and processing of rare earths.
“We have reached a shared understanding to further facilitate China’s export licensing for rare earths and permanent magnets,” Šefčovič said.
Brussels sees the agreement on hybrid electric vehicles as a blueprint that could be replicated to shield further EU sectors currently under strain, such as chemicals or machinery. The two sides plan to meet again in March 2027, and will hold a video call in January.
The agreement on one of the EU’s top negotiating targets significantly reduces the risk of an escalation in trade tensions that could have led to a tit-for-tat round of retaliation. It remains to be seen whether the EU will act swiftly on the Franco-German call to empower Brussels to shut out exports from countries that destabilize its single market.
“Public opinion and the leaders clearly expect very fast action from our side. I am glad to say that the Chinese partners appreciated this very strong political argument, and therefore, we can proceed through the negotiated solution,” said Šefčovič.
Other areas of agreement include exploring easier market access for European medical devices, as well as promises by Beijing to scale back sweeping disease-control measures that have restricted European meat and livestock exports.
While the deal will cool the most immediate tensions, a wider resolution to the economic imbalances that fueled the conflict remains distant. The EU’s trade deficit with China totaled nearly €360 billion in 2025, and is already up 12 percent so far this year.
China’s automotive exports to the EU, which totaled €15.1 billion last year, are only a fraction of that.
This article has been updated.
This story was originally published by The Guardian and is reproduced here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration.
The world’s largest penguin colony has declined by two-thirds since 2011, most likely because of the climate crisis, a study has revealed. Scientists said the rapid demise of chinstrap penguins on Zavodovski, the northernmost of the South Sandwich Islands in Antarctica, increased the risk of a wider ecosystem collapse.
“It is an enormous population crash, equivalent to half a million breeding individuals being lost from that island,” said the leader of the research, professor Norman Ratcliffe, a penguin ecologist at the British Antarctic Survey.
The Guardian reported in 2020 that chinstrap penguin populations were decreasing on Low in the South Shetland Islands, prompting concerns among scientists that “something is broken” in the world’s wildest ecosystem. The new study, published on Wednesday in the journal Current Biology, indicates that the speed of collapse may be accelerating so rapidly that the distinctive bird — which gets its name from a black line that runs below the beak from cheek to cheek — may need to be classified as an endangered species.
Zavodovski Island had by far the biggest penguin colony in the world, with about 600,000 chinstraps and 90,000 macaroni penguins when the population was measured in 2011. Given the decline between then and 2025, it is likely to have lost that title to Cape Adare in the Ross Sea.
Scientists believe the most likely cause is climate disruption. Human-driven heating has pushed up winter temperatures on and around the Antarctic Peninsula to 5 degrees Celsius above preindustrial levels, one of the fastest rises in the world. On 6 June, the Argentinian Esperanza base on the Trinity Peninsula registered a record winter high of 15.4°C, about 20°C above normal for the time of year — a margin that scientists described as “absolutely crazy.”
Chinstrap penguins are struggling to adapt because they have special diets and specific ocean temperature preferences. Tracking data shows they prefer to forage in cooler waters to the northwest of the island, where they would expect to find Antarctic krill, which make up the bulk of their diet. But as the waters warm, the krill have moved south into the Weddell Sea.
Macaroni penguins, by contrast, are less fussy eaters and their numbers rose 30 percent — though not nearly enough to make up for the loss of chinstraps. Ratcliffe said this was only small comfort because if current trends continued, all penguins would run out of space.
He said the loss of chinstrap penguins would have wider repercussions for food webs. “Each ecosystem could be regarded as like a giant Jenga set, and every component that you remove increases the risk of ecosystems collapsing completely.”
The scientists ruled out several other possible causes of decline. There was no sign that chinstrap and macaroni penguins were in competition for food. The nearest humans lived thousands of miles away.
Although the island is volcanic and had a major eruption in 2016, prompting a “Penguin Pompeii hypothesis” of a sudden population fall, this theory was not borne out either by the data, which showed a steady linear decline, or by observations that showed the chinstraps avoided the main “asphyxia plain” area where the ash and lava were deposited.
BRUSSELS — The European Commission announced a new list of 46 projects Friday in a bid to diversify away from China’s grip on raw materials and establish its own mineral sovereignty.
The projects span extraction, processing, recycling, and substitution for raw materials to supply the EU’s defense, automotive, clean tech and technology industries.
Many of the projects are designed to support electrification and the battery value chain. Lithium, nickel, cobalt, manganese and graphite — the five key battery metals used in electric vehicles and grid-scale batteries — dominate the list. Copper and aluminum, conductors that are used in anything involving electricity, also figure prominently.
Through these projects, Brussels wants to meet its targets under the Critical Raw Materials Act, which, by 2030, the bloc aims to mine at least 10%, process 40% and recycle 25% of its own needs, while sourcing no more than 65% of any one material at any processing stage from a single non-EU country.
The list covers 15 of the 17 “strategic minerals” under the act, which the bloc needs to deliver these targets on each one.
Friday’s announcement is the second batch of strategic projects listed under the act, after the EU rolled out its first list in March 2025, featuring 47 projects and 13 non-EU country projects. The majority of those projects are behind schedule however, highlighting the complexity of getting critical mineral projects up and running.
“With the projects selected in 2025 and 2026, we could now fully meet our European extraction target for lithium, nickel, rare earths, magnesium and tungsten,” said the bloc’s industry chief, Stéphane Séjourné. “We could also meet our processing target for lithium and rare earths. And our recycling target for lithium, cobalt and rare earths.”
With over 170 applications received, the 46 projects span 16 EU member countries: Belgium, Bulgaria, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, Lithuania, the Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Slovakia, Spain, Romania and Sweden.
“Exactly one year ago, we experienced firsthand why this matters. On Oct. 9, 2025, China announced new export restrictions on rare earths,” said Séjourné. Those export controls are due to expire in January.
The “strategic project” label is meant to provide faster permitting and help secure public and private finance, with permitting deadlines of 27 months for mines and 15 months for processing and recycling projects.
The Commission will also announce strategic projects in non-EU countries later this year.
BRUSSELS — The EU is facing a winter gas shortage that could leave it scrambling to replace lost energy supplies equivalent to the power used by 12 million homes, according to new reports shared with POLITICO.
The shortfall raises the prospect of a winter of soaring power bills and forced energy saving measures if the bloc fails to find adequate supplies elsewhere.
As the war in Iran continues to disrupt global energy supplies, the EU faces an overall shortfall this winter of up to 14 billion cubic meters of natural gas — around 7% of the bloc’s demand and enough to power between 10 and 12 million European households, according to a report by the Institution for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis, a U.S.-based energy think tank.
Those conclusions are echoed in a key report by a top European body of gas network operators that was presented to national energy officials on Thursday.
Natural gas is used widely to heat Europe’s buildings, power its industry and generate its electricity. But the EU’s gas reserves have fallen to their lowest level for the time of year since records began in 2011, at just above 70%, after high prices made it more attractive for traders to sell gas in the summer rather than store it for later use in the winter.
With gas prices at near-four-year highs and supply constrained due to the U.S.-Israeli war in the Middle East, Europe has limited supply options if the coming winter proves as cold as the last, IEEFA found.
While that doesn’t necessarily mean the bloc will run out of gas, it does mean there could be 7 billion fewer cubic meters of stored gas to draw upon. That could force countries to buy gas at high prices on increasingly volatile global markets, or even require consumers to cut demand if fresh supplies are unavailable.
The EU’s record-low reserves leave the bloc “with less of a buffer” against global supply disruptions, leaving it “vulnerable to price spikes,” Ana Jaller-Makarewicz, IEEFA’s lead European energy analyst, said in a statement. If countries are forced to exhaust stocks this year, that would also leave them with more to refill next year, continuing the feedback loop of low reserves and higher prices, she added.
The same risks were outlined in a 2026-2027 winter supply outlook published Thursday by the European Network of Transmission System Operators for Gas (ENTSO-G), an association of gas operators. The report warns that if imports of liquefied natural gas are limited or even “optimal” in the context of a cold winter, storage levels could fall as low as 11%, a baseline needed for strategic reserves that can’t be easily tapped into.
If countries hope to restore their reserves to 30% by the end of winter — or else face increased exposure to future cold spells — volumes equivalent to 7% of the demand will either have to be curtailed or simply withheld from consumers, ENTSO-G warns.
Part of that pressure comes from a looming EU-wide ban on long-term supply contracts for Russian LNG, due to take effect in January, which will reduce European gas imports by an additional 7 billion cubic meters, according to the IEEFA report. Russian gas has been historically used to offset “swings in demand” over the winter, it said. “Now Europe depends on storage to get through winter.”
To make matters worse, the IEEFA report argues, gas demand over winter has crept up in the past two years, while imports to the bloc have flatlined. That’s left the EU leaning harder on its reserves over the winter period, with net drawdowns rising to 22.6 billion cubic meters in January this year, up from 18.8 billion cubic meters in January 2025 and 17.8 billion cubic meters in January 2024.
The alternative would be to import fresh LNG, a seaborne fuel that the EU increasingly sources from the U.S. But at current prices, importing the lost volumes would cost Europeans an additional €3 billion, a 12% rise over what the same volume would have cost last year, on top of already sky-high prices, according to the report. U.S. LNG production is also near full capacity, meaning those additional imports would further squeeze supply, Jaller-Makarewicz told POLITICO.
To some, a rise in prices is more likely. While ENTSO-G’s tight market scenario assumes a “global deficit” that sees available LNG imports into Europe reduced by 20%, Laurent Ruseckas, a senior gas market analyst at S&P Global Energy, argues that reserves can only ever fall so low, “since a rapid drawdown early in winter will drive up prices,” drawing cargoes to Europe from Asia.
“There is not much demand to destroy in Europe,” he added, pointing out that the war in Ukraine already destroyed 20% of the bloc’s industrial demand. “And it didn’t come back.”
BRUSSELS — It was meant to be Europe’s escape from the web of Chinese critical mineral supremacy.
But two years after it took effect, the EU’s Critical Raw Materials Act is not on schedule. Just one in four critical mineral projects granted special status under the law is on track to be ready on time, according to new analysis shared with POLITICO.
On Friday, EU industry chief Stéphane Séjourné will unveil a new list of critical mineral projects that will receive privileged access to funding, accelerated permitting and help from Brussels to find buyers.
The idea is to make Europe a major producer of materials essential to clean energy, tech, and defense manufacturing. It’s currently a heavy importer.
But progress on the first round of 47 projects, announced early last year, offers little hope for the bloc’s ambitions.
“At least one in three mining and processing strategic projects is either late, stalled, at risk, or no longer exists, and only about a quarter are clearly on track,” said Diego Marin, policy officer for raw materials at the European Environmental Bureau, citing publicly available sources. The findings will be published in a report later this month.
Financial, regulatory, and political hurdles are blocking European mining projects, the industry says, despite the Critical Raw Materials Act’s aim to speed up the time it takes to get the shovels in the ground.
The EEB’s findings were echoed in an industry call in August, where 23 projects named in the first round claimed some were facing “immediate jeopardy,” in a letter sent to the Commission and obtained by POLITICO.
Those same companies also believe that announcing more strategic projects will create more problems. However, a Commission official dismissed that claim, saying that some of those projects had received direct funding from the Commission, and claiming the companies believe new projects would “dilute their status.”
The EU unveiled 47 projects in March 2025, covering 14 of the bloc’s 17 designated strategic raw materials—from lithium, nickel, cobalt and graphite for electric vehicle batteries and rare earths for magnets used in wind turbines, to tungsten for military equipment and gallium for semiconductors. It also includes 13 projects from outside the bloc.
These were designed to deliver the EU’s raw materials targets: by 2030, the bloc aims to mine at least 10 percent, process 40 percent and recycle 25 percent of its own needs, while sourcing no more than 65 percent of any one material at any processing stage from a single non-EU country.
Breaking Europe’s dependence on China for key metals is at the heart of the policy, a goal European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen highlighted in her State of the Union speech last month. “We are more than 80% dependent on China for many critical raw materials [and] 90% for some rare earths,” she lamented.
A Commission official said that if all goes to plan, the EU will meet its 2030 goals for lithium, cobalt and rare earths, but results for other materials are mixed, with shortfalls in nickel processing and recycling and across the manganese supply chain. They did not give hard figures, though.
“Unless something happens that is absolutely not foreseen today, we will be far, far away from reaching the targets, even if they are quite low,” said Jan Moström, former CEO of Swedish mining giant LKAB and outgoing president of Euromines. He said better access to financing and faster permitting was key.
The EU is under additional time pressure as a pause on China’s export controls on rare earth minerals is due to expire in January.
Global think tank ODI found in June that “out of 60 projects, 14 are unlikely to contribute by 2030 because their estimated start of production falls between 2029 and 2031,” and that “three out of four are either behind their expected schedule or impossible to verify using up-to-date public evidence” — backing up the EEB’s numbers.
A European Court of Auditors report this year also revealed that “many projects will struggle to secure supply for the EU by 2030” and that there was “no proper tracking of results.”
The European Commission questioned the current validity of the ECA’s findings, saying it “audited a period of policy that does not cover everything we’ve done since this mandate. So the Court of Auditors had very relevant points that we took into account in our policy, but should absolutely not be seen as a fair assessment of the work we’ve done with the von der Leyen Commission number two,” said a Commission official.
Since adopting the Critical Raw Materials Act in 2024, Brussels has rolled out a flurry of initiatives to get projects moving. They include a proposed critical raw materials center, for which Parliament is seeking €2 billion; the “RESourceEU” plan that’s mobilized more than €2 billion; a mechanism to identify suppliers; and plans to revise water rules and speed up environmental impact assessments.
But industry leaders say the EU is moving too slowly.
“I’m still to be convinced that it makes any difference,” Michael Staffas, CEO of Swedish miner Boliden, told POLITICO when asked about the benefits of being designated as a strategic project. Boliden’s subsidiary Somincor was granted strategic status for a copper and zinc mine in Portugal.
The “strategic project” label promised faster permitting and help securing public and private finance, with permitting deadlines of 27 months for mines and 15 months for processing and recycling projects.
“In Sweden you have different authorities that can basically object to a permit process and that in itself creates way longer time than 27 months, just the legislation,” said LKAB CEO Johan Menckel, whose company currently has three strategic projects.
One is the Per Geijer deposit, home to Europe’s largest rare-earth deposits, which the local indigenous Sámi community opposes, arguing it would harm their reindeer-herding tradition.
The local administration recently recommended that the State Mining Authority grant the concession on the condition that the Swedish company “minimize the impact on the reindeer industry,” but that will be subject to appeal from the Sámi.
Karin K Niia, a Sámi reindeer herder, said in comments that the EU will be complicit in cultural genocide if the project goes ahead.
Europe’s biggest bet to escape China’s foothold in battery metal supply chains is the Barroso lithium mine in Portugal, run by UK-based mining company Savannah Resources. The company says the mine could supply enough lithium for around half a million electric-vehicle batteries a year.
“I don’t think the strategic project stamp and the [Critical Raw Materials Act] have been absolutely essential, but it wasn’t also supposed to be. It was supposed to, in my understanding, be important to set a framework under which Europe can do the right thing faster, better, and for the better benefit of the next generation of Europe,” Savannah’s CEO Emanuel Proença said, calling it just another piece of a very big puzzle.
Europe’s lithium-refining ambitions are also faltering: France’s Viridian Lithium went bankrupt after failing to secure funding, while Portugal’s José de Mello Group was unable to finance its planned €492 million refinery — despite both projects winning strategic status in the EU’s first round.
Viridian Lithium spokesperson Luc Pez said the strategic project label was a ‘curse.’
Rio Tinto’s Jadar project in Serbia, one of the non-EU projects to gain strategic-project status, was meant to provide double Barroso’s lithium capacity and cater to up to 25 percent of Europe’s demand. That, however, was suspended because of permitting issues and became a widely protested project amid allegations of corruption and environmental concerns.
That reflected the simple fact that people don’t like mines in their backyard — an obstacle for mining projects worldwide, but especially in Europe, which is densely populated and has strong civil society.
“These projects had strategic status, EU money and fast-track permits, and it still wasn’t enough,” said EEB’s Marin. “If the supply push can’t deliver even under those conditions, the EU has to take demand reduction and sufficiency seriously. We can’t permit our way out of a market problem.”
Frida Preuß contributed to this report.
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