The news that Torbjörn Törnqvist, the long-standing principal shareholder of oil and gas company Gunvor, is selling 100% of his stake and stepping down from all positions is, in fact, yet another scheme to take the company into the shadows and an attempt to hide the real beneficiaries behind a...
Bulgaria’s crisis of power, budget and corruption. What next?
At the end of 2025, Bulgaria is experiencing one of the biggest political crises in recent years. Tens of thousands of people took to the streets of Sofia and other cities to protest against the draft state budget for 2026, which was drawn up in euros for the first time...
Accident at Baikonur and Russian space «prospects»
The night launch of the Soyuz-MS-28 carrier rocket from Baikonur on the night of November 28 ended with the successful arrival of three crew members at the ISS but turned into an unexpected crisis for the Russian space industry. During the launch, elements of the launch complex at pad 31/6...
The hidden cost of fiscal reform: what awaits Britain
At the end of November 2025, UK Chancellor of the Exchequer Rachel Reeves presented a budget that is positioned as an attempt to combine “restoring public finances” with “investing in social justice.” The budget is seen as one of the most ambitious and controversial documents of recent times, combining a...
Dangerous cargo from Moscow: the Lithuanian episode of the hidden war
The summer of 2024 turned out to be “eventful.” A series of fires and explosions in parcels at DHL and DPD freight hubs in Europe—the UK, Germany, and Poland—led to large-scale counterterrorism investigations and raised the question in the West of whether this was part of an organized campaign controlled...
Drug trafficking as geopolitics: Afghan heroin and Russian Interests
Afghanistan continues to be the world leader in opium and heroin production and is “adapting” drug trafficking routes to new geopolitical conditions. One of these, the so-called “Northern Corridor” through Central Asia and Russia, is increasingly becoming the focus of European and international reports. This is not just a matter...
Exposed infrastructure for laundering Russian money from London to the Kremlin
The UK's National Crime Agency (NCA) conducted a large-scale operation called “Destabilisation”, which exposed money laundering schemes and transnational infrastructures linking street crime in the UK to global cryptocurrency networks working for Russian interests. How can organized crime become a link between sanctioned Russian elites and British street crime? At...
How Swarovski Optik continues to get into Russia despite sanctions
Since the beginning of Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine, many observers expected European companies, especially those with strong reputations, to immediately cease all cooperation with the aggressor. However, as it turns out, a significant number of European companies, including some with global reputations, have continued their business ties with Russia....
The Western Balkans: a focus of instability on the way to the European Union
For a long time, the states of the Western Balkans – Serbia, Montenegro, Albania, North Macedonia, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Kosovo are considered potential members of the European Union, provided that the criteria appropriate for accession are met. Especially since such Balkan states as Greece, Bulgaria, Romania, Slovenia and Croatia...
Russian diplomacy as a tool of hybrid influence on Poland
In the confrontation between Russia and the West, diplomacy is increasingly seen not simply as a mechanism for official dialogue, but as a form of hybrid instrument combining espionage, sabotage, and disinformation. Poland is one of the clearest examples of Russian diplomacy being used as a cover for actions that...