During the Russian invasion of Ukraine, several senior Russian politicians, including President Vladimir Putin, Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, and former president and prime minister Dmitry Medvedev, have made several statements widely seen as threatening to use nuclear weapons.
What a difference a few weeks can make. Until recently, this was a standard description of New Caledonia: A French territory comprising dozens of islands in the South Pacific, known for its palm-lined beaches, marine-life-rich lagoon, and a barrier reef that surrounds the main island, Grand Terre, a major scuba-diving destination.
A few months ago we described Qatar as a “cunning state”. Cunning means the quality or skill of being clever at planning something to reach your goals, even by tricking others. Lately, it has emerged that Azerbaijan has also resorted to cunning strategies to punch above its weight.
French police reinforcements have started arriving in New Caledonia as part of a massive operation to regain control of the capital Noumea, the top French official in the Pacific island territory said on Friday (17 May).
Political murders often happen in authoritarian countries, and even more often in dictatorships, but when an elected politician gets shot in a democratic country, it opens wounds in the nation’s society that are very hard to heal.
Regards from Sofia, where the author of this Brief has witnessed the first days of the European election campaign and concluded the following: The number one election punching bag is the European Green Deal, and it's no different in many other EU countries.
China’s President Xi Jinping has been received in Serbia and Hungary as the messiah. Only during communism Belgrade and Budapest were so decorated with flags and posters and so many people were bussed to greet the high visitor.
Vladimir Putin was sworn on Tuesday (7 May) for a fifth presidential mandate that will run until 2030, pledging that Russia “will win” in the conflict he personally started by invading Ukraine, and promising to those loyal to him to take the highest positions in the country.
One month before the EU elections, it is useful to look back and see how the nine previous votes have exemplified historical developments and the changing balance of power in our union.
The European Commission has warned three Chinese electric vehicle makers that they have not supplied sufficient information for its anti-subsidy investigation, according to two people familiar with the case.
Twenty years ago, on a sunny Saturday on 1 May 2004, three former Soviet Republics, three former Soviet satellite countries (one of them having split in two), one former Yugoslav republic, and two former British colonies joined the EU.
In the US and France, 1968 was a year of iconic student protests. In light of this historic legacy, what is the 2024 wave of student protests, from Columbia University to Sciences Po, telling us?
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz's recent visit to China is an example of a “do-it-alone” foreign policy approach which can only benefit the Middle Kingdom.
Is it possible that a single piece of legislation could sway Georgia - an official candidate for EU membership since December - away from its EU path? And if so, does it mean that Vladimir Putin is winning back this former Soviet republic, the birthplace of Stalin?
France has invited Russia to the 80th anniversary of the Normandy landings, an event that changed the course of World War Two. “Given the circumstances,” the organisers said, President Vladimir Putin is not invited but another figure, to be announced later, will represent Russia on 6 June.
It’s the same drones and almost the same missiles. But Israel’s outstanding air defences and the decisive help it got from a mighty coalition of allies, including the US, wildly surpass anything Ukraine can hope for.
Iliana Ivanova, European Commissioner for Innovation, Research, Culture, Education and Youth shared with Euractiv in an interview her views on how to fill the gap in financing of science and innovation in the member states which stands at €100 billion per year.
China is backing Russia's war effort in Ukraine by helping Moscow in its biggest military buildup since the Soviet era, providing drone and missile technology, satellite imagery and machine tools, senior US officials said on Friday (12 April).
The US Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency said Russian government-backed hackers have used their access to Microsoft's email system to steal correspondence between officials and the tech giant, an emergency directive by the US watchdog released on Thursday (11 April) showed.
It often happens that news flying below the radar ends up being quite significant. Case in point: The announcement that two dozen German soldiers arrived in Vilnius on Monday, with a further 150 due to join them later this year, barely made headlines outside Lithuania.
Six years ago, the Brief imagined the ethical challenge that killer robots, possessing, artificial intelligence and presumably looking like Terminator, would pose.
The President of Kazakhstan Kassym-Jomart Tokayev highlighted Asia’s leading role in new development paradigms at the Boao Forum for Asia (BFA) in the Chinese island of Hainan on Thursday (28 March).
On the top of the cabinet crisis following the failure of the rotation of prime ministers, a constitutional crisis is looming as appointing a caretaker premier appears as “mission impossible”.
Editorialists can sometimes feel bad if they read columns they wrote a couple of years ago or even a couple of months ago. I start today's Brief with this disclaimer.
