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Today’s Brief

Hormuz, tariffs and hotter Spain

Trump escalates Gulf war as tariffs strain Canada and heat tests Europe

The day’s serious news moved along two familiar tracks: war raised prices, and politics added more of them. Courts, cabinets and weather services then reminded everyone that domestic systems can strain just as quickly as foreign policy.

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In the spotlight

All threads

World · Updated 30m ago

The US under Trump: second term

NATO members agreed to a 5% GDP defense spending target, a significant shift in burden-sharing, while the US also announced new tariffs on EU and Canadian goods and declared its intent to control the Strait of Hormuz.

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Stories unfolding over time

Track the most important long-running topics: current state, chronicle of events, history of framing.

Recently updated

The US under Trump: second term

US foreign policy under the Trump administration is shifting decisively from multilateralism toward a doctrine of transactional bilateral bargaining, placing pressure on established alliances, trade relationships, and global institutions.

Updated 30m ago·Update

The war in Ukraine and its limits

The war in Ukraine has entered a new phase defined by a rapid technological competition and a more mature Ukrainian strike doctrine, challenging the positional stalemate even as Russia continues its attritional campaign in the east.

Updated 41m ago

Culture, media and the new divides

The European information ecosystem faces increasing pressure from collapsing traditional media business models, algorithmic-driven polarization, and the unchecked rise of AI-generated content, while regulators and courts establish new boundaries for speech and accountability.

Updated 55m ago·Update

China and the West: decoupling

The strategic de-risking of Western economies from China has escalated into a reciprocal regulatory conflict, where China's new legal countermeasures directly target corporate compliance with Western policies, forcing a more complex and adversarial reassessment of economic dependencies.

Updated 3h ago

The Middle East after Gaza

The Gaza war has accelerated a fundamental realignment of Middle Eastern power, shifting influence from traditional centers like Egypt and Syria towards the Gulf states, while simultaneously forcing regional and European powers to negotiate a new, post-conflict security architecture for critical chokepoints and alliances.

Updated 5h ago

The Green Deal under revision

The EU's climate agenda has formally pivoted from legislative expansion to a phase of implementation, simplification, and competitiveness-driven recalibration, marking a strategic retreat from new regulatory ambition.

Updated 5h ago

European Union

The European Union faces internal pressures from resurgent populist forces in France and Hungary, while the European Central Bank navigates inflation risks amid a recalibrated Green Deal and ongoing debates on economic competitiveness.

Brussels vs capitals: EU integration

Sovereignty within the European Union is not static; it is continuously contested and renegotiated through legal rulings, treaty interpretations, and political crises, with competences shifting between Brussels and national capitals.

Updated 2d ago·Update

The Green Deal under revision

The EU's climate agenda has formally pivoted from legislative expansion to a phase of implementation, simplification, and competitiveness-driven recalibration, marking a strategic retreat from new regulatory ambition.

Updated 5h ago

The ageing Union's economy

Europe's economic competitiveness is under pressure from low productivity, weak investment, demographic decline, and the cost of the green transition, with the Draghi and Letta reports framing the debate on whether the EU can keep pace with the US and China.

Updated 16h ago

European democracies and populism

Populist and anti-liberal political forces are gaining institutional ground within the European Union, testing and at times reshaping the boundaries of liberal democracy through electoral victories, legal challenges, and conflicts with EU frameworks.

Updated 11h ago

World

The US military maintains its naval blockade and airstrikes on Iranian ports, while Iran's Revolutionary Guard declares the Strait of Hormuz unsafe for oil transit, impacting global energy flows and driving Western economic de-risking from…

China and the West: decoupling

The strategic de-risking of Western economies from China has escalated into a reciprocal regulatory conflict, where China's new legal countermeasures directly target corporate compliance with Western policies, forcing a more complex and adversarial reassessment of economic dependencies.

Updated 3h ago

The war in Ukraine and its limits

The war in Ukraine has entered a new phase defined by a rapid technological competition and a more mature Ukrainian strike doctrine, challenging the positional stalemate even as Russia continues its attritional campaign in the east.

Updated 41m ago

The Middle East after Gaza

The Gaza war has accelerated a fundamental realignment of Middle Eastern power, shifting influence from traditional centers like Egypt and Syria towards the Gulf states, while simultaneously forcing regional and European powers to negotiate a new, post-conflict security architecture for critical chokepoints and alliances.

Updated 5h ago

The US under Trump: second term

US foreign policy under the Trump administration is shifting decisively from multilateralism toward a doctrine of transactional bilateral bargaining, placing pressure on established alliances, trade relationships, and global institutions.

Updated 30m ago·Update

Other

The EU AI Office investigates systemic risks, while national governments implement the Migration Pact, the Climate Resilience Act faces immediate challenges, and the European Commission escalates Digital Services Act probes against Meta…

Demography and migration

An ageing Europe faces a structural need for labour immigration to sustain its economy and welfare systems, yet political sentiment across member states remains deeply sceptical, creating a persistent and widening policy gap.

Updated 2d ago

AI: capabilities, regulation, labour

Models are learning faster than the institutions behind them can adapt, with this thread tracking frontier-model capability jumps, the AI Act and its enforcement, labour-market impact, and infrastructure (chips, energy, water).

Updated 22h ago

Climate: from mitigation to adaptation

The world has crossed the 1.5°C warming threshold, forcing a pivotal narrative shift from solely preventing climate change to urgently adapting to its irreversible impacts, with the EU now advancing a binding legal framework amid escalating, continent-wide crises.

Updated 2d ago

Culture, media and the new divides

The European information ecosystem faces increasing pressure from collapsing traditional media business models, algorithmic-driven polarization, and the unchecked rise of AI-generated content, while regulators and courts establish new boundaries for speech and accountability.

Updated 55m ago·Update