Latest Articles about Western Europe
Moscow, Kyiv Differ Over Goals in Relaunching Normandy Process (Part One)
On January 26, in Paris, senior political advisors to the Russian, Ukrainian, German and French heads of state and government convened to “reanimate” (such is the term in circulation) the quadrilateral “Normandy” process of consultations. The meeting, lasting eight and a half hours (almost twice... MORE
Briefs
Al-Qaeda’s Sahelian Affiliates Increases Attack Tempo in Mali, Burkina Faso and Benin Jacob Zenn The Sahelian al-Qaeda affiliate, Group for Supporters of Islam and Muslims (JNIM), has not been attracting as many headlines as other historically al-Qaeda-aligned groups, such as the Taliban, in recent months.... MORE
Ukraine in Play After Biden-Putin Discussion
Presidents Joseph Biden of the United States and Vladimir Putin of Russia have agreed, in their December 7 video-dialogue (see EDM, December 8), to create working groups that would address Russia’s concerns regarding Ukraine’s place in the European security order. Those concerns directly relate to... MORE
End of the Golden Era: Sino-British Relations Enter Difficult Period
Introduction In May, the United Kingdom’s (UK) Carrier Strike Group (CSG) led by the HMS Queen Elizabeth set off for the Indo-Pacific region on a seven-month deployment, which is the first of its kind (UK Ministry of Defence, May 22). The CSG has so far... MORE
Europe Is Talking to Minsk
On November 15 and 17, Angela Merkel, the outgoing chancellor of Germany, telephoned Belarusian President Alyaksandr Lukashenka (RBC, November 17). While, on November 14 and 16, Belarus’s Foreign Minister Vladimir Makei had two phone conversations with Josep Borrell, the European Union’s High Representative for Foreign... MORE
Lavrov’s Leaks: Moscow Embarrasses Berlin and Paris in Negotiations Over Ukraine (Part Two)
*To read Part One, please click here. While Kyiv, Berlin and Paris pursue (with varying degrees of intensity, frantically in Kyiv’s case) a high-level “Normandy” meeting as a goal for its own sake, without conditions or a clear agenda, Moscow is setting maximalist conditions for... MORE
Lavrov’s Leaks: Moscow Embarrasses Berlin and Paris in Negotiations Over Ukraine (Part One)
Russian diplomacy is testing its rogue-state practices on its Western diplomatic counterparts, and finds them malleable. On November 17, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov unilaterally publicized the confidential messages recently exchanged between himself and his German and French counterparts, Heiko Maas and Jean-Yves Le Drian,... MORE
Ukraine’s Troubles, Putin’s ‘Red Lines’ and Biden’s Warnings
Crisis is brewing yet again in the intrinsically antagonistic relations between Russia and Ukraine, and President Vladimir Putin seeks to harvest richer political dividends from it than he did half a year ago. The apparent buildup of Russian forces near the Ukrainian border follows much... MORE
Pakistan’s Deal with Tehreek-i-Labbaik Pakistan: Statesmanship or Surrender?
On November 1, supporters of Tehreek-i-Labbaik Pakistan (TLP) abandoned their two-week long protests and marched to the Pakistani capital Islamabad after the group signed a deal with the government, whose details were initially kept secret. The deal was facilitated by several religious scholars and leaders of... MORE
Emerging Chemical, Biological, Radiological and Nuclear Threats from Europe’s ‘Garage Extremists’
In September 2021, a 26-year-old French national, influenced by far-right ideology, was arrested for having successfully manufactured four improvised explosive devices (IEDs) containing uranium in his home (TRIPwire, September 9). Four months earlier, a 16-year-old boy of Syrian origin, who had been radicalized by the... MORE