Tenex, Rosatom’s export arm, pumps roughly a quarter of America’s reactor fuel across the Atlantic while the U.S. targets Russian oil. When Washington slapped sanctions on Lukoil yesterday, Bulgaria’s only refinery didn’ just feel the squeeze – it saw the spectre of shutdown. A single U.S. decision in a Maryland...
Bulgaria stalls multi-billion Rheinmetall gunpowder and shell plant deal
Institutional hurdles and a prosecutor’s probe delay the signing of a landmark joint venture with the German defence giant. Bulgarian institutions are delaying the implementation of a key multi-billion-euro defence investment to build two factories for gunpowder and artillery shell production in partnership with the German defence corporation Rheinmetall. The...
Trump-Putin Budapest summit in limbo
European nations are working with Ukraine on a new proposal for a ceasefire in Russia's war along current battle lines. A planned Budapest summit between U.S. President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin was put on hold on Tuesday (21 October), as Moscow’s rejection of an immediate ceasefire in...
New sanctions on Russian energy sector
Oil prices surged following the United States’ announcement of new sanctions targeting Russian oil giants Rosneft and Lukoil, the first such measures since Donald Trump resumed the presidency. This action aims to stifle essential revenue streams to Moscow amidst renewed Western efforts to compel Russia to reconsider its ongoing invasion...
The mirage of sndependence: Europe’s clean energy built on dirty imports
On 20 October two refineries linked to Russian oil - Hungary’s MOL Danube facility and Romania’s Petrotel-Lukoil plant- went up in flames, almost simultaneously. Budapest called its refinery blaze a “technical failure” and Bucharest said “no scenario can be ruled out,” outside analysts raised their weary eyebrows. At 1 a.m....
EU faces geopolitical challenges as Von der Leyen urges action
Amid shifting global dynamics, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen emphasized the urgency for Europe to assert its place in a world increasingly characterized by ambivalence and hostility from major powers. This statement came during her address to the European Parliament on Tuesday, where she highlighted recent developments such...
How Albania became a hub of the global fraud industry
Organised crime networks are using call centres in Albania to defraud people across Europe, conning them with promises of big profits from scam investments and employing sophisticated social-engineering techniques. It began in June 2019 with a Google search for ‘investment opportunities’. The results took Carina Christine Bruenig and her husband,...
Germany’s Merz under pressure from CDU to abandon ‘firewall’ against AfD
As Germany readies itself for five separate state elections early next year, chancellor Friedrich Merz's centre-right Christian Democrats faces a dilemma over how to handle the surging influence and popularity of the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD). In the run-up to the CDU party convention last weekend, voices within the...
EU battles to phase out Russian fossil-fuels by either 2027 or 2028
“Russia weaponised energy like it weaponises information, like it weaponises all the possibilities that it has to influence the decisionmaking process in the EU but not only in EU – this is something we have to keep in mind to avoid aggression of Russia in the future,” the Ukrainian ambassador...
Germany’s former Chancellor Schroeder as a symbol of political corruption
Former German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder defended the construction of the Russian gas pipeline Nord Stream 2 during a parliamentary committee session in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern on October 17, 2025. Schroeder emphasized that Russia could supply inexpensive natural gas through the pipeline, arguing that the initiative was economically beneficial. He and his allies rejected...