A protester holds a portrait of Mahsa Amini during a demonstration in support of Amini, a young Iranian woman who died after being arrested in Tehran by the Islamic Republic’s morality police, on Istiklal avenue in Istanbul on September 20, 2022.
Ozan Kose | AFP | Getty Images
Iran’s judiciary spokesperson reportedly said Tuesday that 40 foreign nationals have been detained for participating in recent anti-regime protests.
The individuals whose nationalities have not been revealed were arrested in accordance with Iranian laws, Iran’s judiciary spokesman Masoud Setayeshi said in a regular news briefing, state media Mehr News reported.
As Iran enters its ninth week of public unrest following the death of 22-year-old Mahsa Amini, the country’s Revolutionary Court has in the past week issued its first slew of death sentences for their roles in one of the largest sustained challenges to Iran’s regime since the 1979 Islamic Revolution.
In late September, nine Europeans from France, Sweden, Italy, Germany among other countries were arrested by the Iranian government for their involvement in the protests.
Two weeks ago, Iran’s judiciary announced that 1,024 indictments had been issued in relation to the protests in Tehran alone, according to human rights organization Amnesty International. Out of this number, 21 detainees were charged with security-related offenses punishable by death.
Uprisings against the regime erupted two months ago when 22-year-old Amini, who was arrested by the country’s “morality police” for breaking Iran’s strict rules on wearing the hijab, died while in custody reportedly from suffering multiple blows to the head. Iranian authorities claimed she died of a heart attack, but her family and masses of Iranians accuse the government of a cover-up.
Iran currently holds second place for the highest number of recorded executions, behind China.
At least 378 people have been killed in the nationwide protests, according to Norway-based nongovernmental organization Iran Human Rights.
HELSINKI — Investigators found traces of explosives at the Baltic Sea site where two natural pipelines were damaged in an act of “gross sabotage,” the prosecutor leading Sweden’s preliminary investigation said Friday.
Mats Ljungqvist of the Swedish Prosecution Authority said the investigators carefully documented the area where the Nord Stream 1 and 2 pipelines ruptured in September, causing significant methane leaks. The parallel undersea pipelines run from Russia to Germany.
“Analysis carried out shows traces of explosives on several of the foreign objects that were found” at the site, Ljungqvist said in a statement.
The prosecution authority said the preliminary investigation was “very complex and comprehensive” and further scrutiny would show whether anyone could be charged “with suspicion of crime.”
Investigators in Sweden, Denmark and Germany are looking into what happened. Danish officials confirmed in October that there was extensive damage to the pipelines caused by “powerful explosions.”
The leaks, which stopped after several days, occurred in international waters but within the exclusive economic zones of Denmark and Sweden. Investigators have not given indications of whom they think might be responsible but reported earlier that the blasts were likely to have involved several hundred pounds of explosives.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Friday it was “very important to find those who are behind the explosion.”
Sweden’s findings of “a sabotage act or a terrorist act — you can call it whatever you like” confirm “the information that the Russian side has had,” Peskov said. Moscow needs to wait for a full damage assessment to decide whether to repair the pipelines, he said.
Nord Stream 1 carried Russian gas to Germany until Moscow cut off supplies at the end of August. Nord Stream 2 never entered service as Germany suspended its certification process shortly before Russia invaded Ukraine in February.
The governments of Denmark, Germany and Sweden have refrained from speculating over who may be behind the sabotage, saying only that there’s no sufficient proof yet to identify the perpetrator.
But some Nordic and other European media outlets have pointed a finger of blame on Moscow, hosting military experts suggesting that Russia has all the resources to carry out such a precise attack requiring careful advance planning.
Fatih Birol, head of the International Energy Agency, said late September it was “very obvious” who was responsible of the pipeline sabotage, suggesting Russia’s involvement.
Russian President Vladimir Putin has accused the West of blowing up the pipelines and singled out the United States as profiting from attacks on Europe’s energy infrastructure.
Earlier this week, Germany marked the completion of port facilities for the first of five planned liquefied natural gas terminals it is scrambling to get running as it replaces the Russian pipeline gas that once accounted for more than half its supplies.
SHARM EL-SHEIKH, Egypt (AP) — She has pedaled thousands of miles from Sweden to Egypt’s Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheikh to deliver a simple message: Stop climate change.
The trip took 72-year-old activist Dorothee Hildebrandt and her pink e-bike — which she fondly calls Miss Piggy, after the temperamental character from The Muppet Show — more than four months. She crisscrossed Europe and the Middle East until she arrived in Sharm el-Sheikh, at the southern tip of the Sinai Peninsula.
Her mission is to raise awareness and urge world leaders gathered at the annual U.N. climate conference known as COP27 to take concrete steps to stop climate change, she said. Greenhouse gas emissions continue to rise and scientists say the amount of heat-trapping gases needs to be almost halved by 2030, to meet temperature-limiting goals of the Paris climate accord of 2015.
Since her arrival a week ago, Hildebrandt and her e-bike have become a fixture at the summit. From a friend’s place where she is staying, some 15 kilometers (9 miles) from the conference center, she bikes to the COP27 venue every day, meeting other activists and attending events. Many are keen to take photos with her around the conference venue.
“They really have to stop climate change,” Hildebrandt says of the world leaders. “Even if it is uncomfortable.”
“It was uncomfortable for me … this long ride,” she told The Associated Press. But she wanted to show that if there’s a will, “you can do it,” she said.
Past climate talks have traditionally seen very large protests at the end of the first week of the two-week summit, often drawing thousands. This year has been mostly muted, with sporadic and small demonstrations during the first week. Activists have blamed the high cost of travel, accommodation and restrictions in the isolated Egyptian city for limiting the numbers of demonstrators.
The largest demonstration so far was on Saturday, a day after U.S. President Joe Biden made his stop at the summit. Hundreds of protesters chanted, sang, and danced in an area not far from where the negotiations were taking place amid tight security.
Born in the town of Kassel in central Germany, Hildebrandt says she got her first bicycle at the age of 10 and never stopped pedaling. In 1978 she moved to Sweden to marry her ex-husband.
She retired in 2015. Her activism and biking, which she documents on social media, is for the children and further generations of the world, she says. A sign on her bike reads, “Biking for Future and Peace.”
In her hometown of Katrineholm, 150 kilometers (93 miles) southwest of Stockholm, the Swedish capital, she founded “GrandmasForFuture – Katrineholm” in the town. The group focuses on raising awareness on climate change among other things.
Hildebrandt says she also wants Western industrialized nations to pay for the destruction they have caused so far — an issue called loss and damage, about reparations from big polluters to the global south that have been hurt the most.
Unhappy with results from the previous climate conference, COP26 in Glasgow, Scotland, she saw her chance in Sharm el-Sheikh.
Starting out on July 1, Hildebrandt cycled through 17 countries, covering 8,228 kilometers (5,112 miles), averaging about 80 kilometers (49 miles) a day. Her Facebook posts got thousands of views and she says she received positive feedback both from followers and people she met along the way.
In the Turkish coastal city of Antalya, her bike broke down. A cyclist, who works in tourism in the city, took Hildebrandt and her bike to a mechanic for repairs, and she was able to continue on.
And in Lebanon, she took taxies from the port city of Tripoli to Beirut for her safety. She then had a mandatory guide with a vehicle and a driver to travel to the Jordanian border through Syria.
“I could have used my bike throughout Syria, but the costs would have been too high for me,” she said.
Even in Sinai, local authorities barred her from cycling from the port of Nuweiba to Sharm el-Sheikh, apparently for her safety, she said.
Still, she is confident she has gotten her message across.
On Thursday, she was invited to cycle with Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi, an avid cyclist. She asked the president about the lack of large protests, compared to previous summits. She said el-Sissi said protests are not barred in Egypt.
“Everyone is allowed to demonstrate everywhere in Cairo and Sharm el-Sheikh” he told her, Hildebrandt says.
COP27 has turned a spotlight on a yearslong crackdown on dissent in Egypt, where most public protests are effectively banned by authorities.
After the summit ends Nov. 18, Hildebrandt will bike to Cairo, then on to the Mediterranean city of Alexandria before going to Israel’s port of Haifa and from there, on to Greece.
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Delegates landing in Egypt’s Red Sea resort of Sharm El-Sheikh for U.N. climate talks this week are a global elite bent on tearing down national borders, stripping away individual freedoms and condemning working people to a life of poverty.
That dark view is held by a range of far-right or populist parties — among them Donald Trump’s Republicans, who are seeking to retake control in Tuesday’s U.S. midterm elections. Some of these radicals are rampaging through elections in Europe while others, such as Brazil’s President Jair Bolsonaro last week, have been defeated only narrowly.
Republican and Trump acolyte Lauren Boebert derides the environmentalist agenda as “America last;” Britain’s Brexit-backing Home Secretary Suella Braverman says the country is in thrall to a “tofu-eating wokerati;” and in Spain, senior figures in the far-right Vox party dismiss the U.N.’s climate agenda as “cultural Marxism.”
Right-wingers of various strains around the world have co-opted climate change into their culture war. The fact this is happening in countries that produce a large share of global greenhouse gas emissions has alarmed some green advocates.
“Reactionary populism is now the biggest obstacle to tackling climate change,” wrote three climate leaders, including Brazil’s former Environment Minister Izabella Teixeira, in a recent commentary.
In the U.S., Republicans are eyeing a return to power in one or both houses of Congress in Tuesday’s midterm elections. Many at the COP27 talks will be reliving the first week of the U.N. climate conference in Morocco six years ago when Trump’s election struck the climate movement like a hurricane.
A Republican surge would gnaw at the fragile confidence that has built around global climate efforts since President Joe Biden’s election, raising the specter of a second Trump term and perhaps the withdrawal — again — of the U.S. from the landmark 2015 Paris climate deal.
“I don’t want to think about that,” said Teixeira’s co-author Laurence Tubiana, a former French diplomat who led the design of the Paris Agreement and who now leads the European Climate Foundation.
Some on the American right are pushing a more conciliatory message than others. “Republicans have solutions to reduce world emissions while providing affordable, reliable, and clean energy to our allies across the globe,” said Utah Congressman John Curtis, who will lead a delegation from his party to COP27.
Tubiana and others in the environmental movement are trying to put on a brave face. They argue Republicans won’t want to tamper too much with Biden’s behemoth Inflation Reduction Act, which contains measures to promote clean energy.
“You might see railing against it, and I’m sure there’ll be lots of political talk and rhetoric, but I don’t expect that would be a focus for the Republicans,” said Nat Keohane, president of the Center for Climate and Energy Solutions, a green NGO based in Arlington, Virginia. Nevertheless, if Republicans take both houses, “we certainly won’t make any progress,” Keohane said.
Trump’s first term and the presidency of Brazil’s Bolsonaro — which ended in a narrow defeat in last month’s election — now look like the opening skirmishes in a struggle in which the planet’s stability is at stake.
In parts of Europe, the right present their policies as sympathetic to the risks of climate change while dismissing internationally sanctioned action as sinister elitism that threatens their voters’ prosperity.
“The Sweden Democrats are not climate deniers, whatever that means,” Swedish far-right leader Jimmie Åkesson told a crowd days before a September election that saw his party win big. But Sweden’s current climate plans, Åkesson said, were “100 percent symbolic” rather than meaningful. “All that leads to is that we get poorer, that our lives get worse.”
This is the gibbet on which the far right are hanging environmentalism: depicting them as the witting or unwitting cavalry of global elites.
“We consider it to be a globalist movement that intends to end all borders, intends to end our freedom, intends to end our freedom for our identities,” Javier Cortés, president of the Seville chapter of Spain’s far-right Vox party, said in an interview with POLITICO. “We are not in favor of CO2 emissions. On the contrary, we want to respect the environment. All we are saying is that the European Union has to clarify that it wants to sell us a climate religion in which we cannot emit CO2, while we make our industries disappear from Europe and we need to buy from China.”
To describe this as climate denial — a common but often inaccurate charge — would be to miss the point that this is now just another front in the culture wars.
Online disinformation about the last U.N. climate talks was largely focused on the hypocrisy and elitism of those attending, according to research from the Institute for Strategic Dialogue (ISD). The main spreaders weren’t websites and figures traditionally associated with climate denial, but culture war celebrities such as psychologist Jordan Peterson, Rebel Media’s Ezra Levant and Dilbert cartoonist Scott Adams.
Populist attacks on globalism “rely on a well-funded transnational network,” said Tubiana. “It warrants serious scrutiny.”
But while economic interests may be powering parts of the movement, there is also a sense of political opportunism at work. Huge changes to the economy will be needed to lower emissions at the speed dictated by U.N.-brokered global climate goals. There will be winners and losers — and the losers may gravitate toward populists pledging to take up their cause.
“Far-right organizations are recognizing this as a potentially lucrative topic that they can win votes or support on,” said Balsa Lubarda, head of the ideology research unit at the Centre for Analysis of the Radical Right.
Loving the losers
The far right’s focus on the losers has been “turbo charged” by the energy crisis, said Jennie King, head of civic action and education at ISD, which populists have wrongly argued is the fault of green policy. The European Parliament’s coalition of far-right parties has grown and capitalized on the energy crisis by joining with center-right parties to vote down environmental legislation.
Sweden’s Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson — newly elected with Åkesson’s support — aims to dilute the country’s ambitions for cutting some greenhouse gas emissions, a move center-right Liberal Environment Minister Romina Pourmokhtari justified in familiar terms: “That is a reaction to the reality people are facing.” And in Britain, Brexit leader Nigel Farage retooled his campaign to become an anti-net zero mouthpiece.
Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni says she wants to reclaim environmentalism for the right | Vincenzo Pinto/AFP via Getty Images
Strains of right-wing ecology may also mean that not all groups are actively hostile to the climate agenda, said Lubarda. Italy’s new Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni is a huge fan of the books of J.R.R. Tolkien, which center on the Shire, an idealized bucolic homeland. Meloni says she wants to reclaim environmentalism for the right, but the protection of national economic interests still comes first.
“There is no more convinced ecologist than a conservative, but what distinguishes us from a certain ideological environmentalism is that we want to defend nature with man inside,” she said in her inaugural speech to parliament last month.
While Meloni has announced that she will attend COP27, she has also renamed the Ministry for the Ecological Transition the Ministry for Environment and Energy Security. The governing program of her Brothers of Italy party includes a section on climate change, but it strongly emphasizes the need to protect industry.
It’s this broad sense of demotion and delay that alarms those who are watching these ideas grow in stature among populists on the right. They say that while it may not sound like climate denial, the result is effectively the same.
“You can say that you are climate friends,” said Belgian Socialist MEP Marie Arena. “But in the act, you are not at all. You are business friends first.”
Jacopo Barragazzi, Charlie Duxbury and Zack Colman contributed to this report.
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PRAGUE — U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai traveled more than 4,000 miles to prevent a transatlantic trade war over electric vehicles, but her EU counterparts signaled on Monday that they would be a tough crowd to win round.
The growing spat hinges on U.S. legislation that encourages consumers via tax credits to “Buy American” when it comes to choosing an electric car.
At a time when the U.S. and Europe want to present a united front against Russia, this protectionist measure has triggered outrage in many EU countries, including France and Germany, two leading European carmaking nations. Beyond the EU, China, Japan and South Korea have also voiced concern.
After speaking with Tai at a meeting of EU ministers in Prague, the bloc’s trade chief Valdis Dombrovskis predicted it would be difficult to resolve the dispute.
“It will not be easy to fix it — but fix it we must,” he said.
Among the 27 EU countries, anxiety about the U.S. measure is growing. Sweden’s new trade minister, Johan Forssell, whose country takes over the presidency of the Council of the EU in January, told POLITICO on Sunday that aspects of the U.S. legislation were “worrying” and “not in accordance with [World Trade Organization] rules.”
Another senior official stressed: “It’s not only one or two member states, which are concerned … It’s also the small ones; they will have no access at all” to the U.S. market.
French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz agreed over lunch last week that the EU should retaliate if Washington pushed ahead with the controversial bill. Macron floated the idea of a “Buy European Act” to strike back.
The new tax credits for electric vehicles are part of a huge U.S. tax, climate and health care package, known as the Inflation Reduction Act, which passed the U.S. Congress in August.
The idea is that a U.S. consumer can claim back $7,500 of the value of an electric car from their tax bill. To qualify for that credit, however, the car needs to be assembled in North America and contain a battery with a certain percentage of the metals mined or recycled in the U.S., Canada or Mexico.
Czech Trade Minister Jozef Síkela, whose country currently holds the presidency of the Council of the EU, said that European carmakers wanted to qualify for the scheme, just as the North Americans do.
In its current form, the bill is “unacceptable,” and “is extremely protective against exports from Europe,” said Síkela as he walked into Monday’s meeting. “We simply expect that we will get the same status as Canada and Mexico.”
U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai and European Commission Executive Vice President Valdis Dombrovskis | Jim Watson/AFP via Getty Images
“But we need to be realistic,” Síkela told reporters later. “This is our starting point in the negotiations and we’ll see what we’ll manage to negotiate at the end.”
In a bid to soothe tensions, a joint task force was set up last week by the European Commission and the U.S. The task force is supposed to meet at the end of this week, although the exact date isn’t yet fixed, according to thesenior official.
Asked whether Brussels would retaliate should no agreement be struck with Washington, Dombrovskis took a cautious approach: “Setting up this task force is already … a response of us, raising those concerns … At this stage, we are focusing on a negotiated solution before considering what other options there may be.”
The midterm elections in the U.S., where President Joe Biden’s Democrats look likely to lose ground, compound the difficulties.
It doesn’t seem like the tensions will be eased by the next Trade and Technology Council, which takes place between U.S. and European negotiators in early December.
Dismay over the U.S. subsidies has overshadowed the preparatory work for the next TTC meeting, for which the EU and businesses on both sides of the Atlantic want to see rapid concrete results to avoid the perception that the format is simply a talking shop.
Tai herself had no immediate comment in Prague, but later released a statement on her meeting with Síkela that gave no hint of a breakthrough.
“Ambassador Tai and Minister Síkela discussed the ongoing work of the Trade and Technology Council, and the importance of achieving meaningful results for the December TTC Ministerial and beyond. They also discussed the newly-created U.S.-EU Task Force on the Inflation Reduction Act,” the statement said.
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It was the second time that a European country hosted two consecutive editions of the tournament, upsetting the south American nations again.
Host: Sweden Teams: 16 Format: Group stage, knockouts Matches: 35 Goals: 126 Winners: Brazil Runners-up: Sweden Golden boot: Just Fontaine (France)
Background
The qualification process for the 1958 World Cup gave the opportunity to a wider pool of nations.
It saw the qualification of all four British nations, the return of Argentina and the debut of the erstwhile Soviet Union. Former two-time champions Uruguay and Italy failed to qualify.
Three Muslim nations, Indonesia, Sudan and Turkey, refused to play Israel and lost out on any chances of qualifying for the main round. Israel, meanwhile, lost their knock-out game against Wales.
It was the second time that a European country hosted two consecutive editions of the tournament, upsetting the South American nations again.
FIFA decided to move the tournament to a different continent thereon.
This was also the tournament that gave Brazil their first World Cup title and the world the first glimpse of the legend that is Pele.
Although Pele, who was 17 at that time, did not play the first two games, he made up for it by scoring six goals in the remaining four.
Pele scored the winner against Wales in the quarter-final. It was not until his hat-trick against France in the semi-final that the world took notice of him.
In the final against Sweden, the youngster followed it up with two goals helping his side land a first global title in front of 50,000 fans at the Rasunda Stadium in Stockholm.
Highs
France’s Just Fontaine scored 13 goals in the tournament, a record for a player in a single World Cup that still stands.
Pele and Brazil launched their glorious journey at the World Cup by winning their first title. Pele became the youngest scorer at a World Cup when he scored against Wales at the age of 17 years and 239 days.
Seven goals were scored in a final, a record that still stands.
Lows
Argentina’s return to the World Cup was disastrous as they lost two matches and conceded 10 goals, finishing bottom of their group. The team was met with the wrath of angry fans when it returned home.
The average attendance for the matches was low compared with the previous few editions.
COPENHAGEN, Denmark — A venomous king cobra which escaped from its home in a Swedish zoo six days ago has been located inside the building where its terrarium is located but has not yet been recaptured, the park said Friday.
The deadly snake escaped on Saturday via a light fixture in the ceiling of its glass enclosure at the Skansen Aquarium, part of the zoo on Stockholm’s Djurgarden island. Park guests who were inside the building where the snakes are located were evacuated. The zoo later assessed that there was no general risk for employees or guests and and the rest of the zoo remained open.
The park said it had located the reptile overnight in a confined space near its terrarium and staff were now working to retrieve it.
If the snake had gotten out of the building, it would not have survived the cold climate, the park said.
The snake’s official name is Sir Vass (Sir Hiss), but since its escape has been nicknamed Houdini, after the escape artist who thwarted every attempt to cage him. The reptile had just moved into the terrarium.
King cobras can be up to 5.5 meters (18 feet) long and mainly live in India, southeast Asia, in Indonesia and the Philippines.
The zoo is home to about 200 exotic species including fish, corals, crocodiles, turtles, lizards, snakes, naked mole-rats, marmosets, golden lion tamarins, baboons, lemurs, spiders and parrots.
NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg has a message for U.S. Republicans making election promises to slash Ukraine’s support: That will only empower China.
Stoltenberg pushed his point in an expansive interview with POLITICO this week, in which the military alliance’s chief made the case for a long-term American presence in Europe and a widespread boost in defense spending.
“The presence of the United States — but also Canada — in Europe, is essential for the strength and the credibility of that transatlantic bond,” Stoltenberg said.
Yet anxiety is coursing through policy circles that a more reticent U.S. may be on the horizon. The upcoming U.S. midterm elections could tip control of Congress toward the Republicans, empowering an ascendant, MAGA-friendly Republican cohort that has been pressing to cut back U.S. President Joe Biden’s world-leading military aid to Ukraine.
Stoltenberg warned that Kyiv’s recent battlefield gains would not have been possible without NATO allies’ support. And he appealed to the more strident anti-China sentiment that runs through both major U.S. political parties.
A victorious Russia, he said, would “be bad for all of us in Europe and North America, in the whole of NATO, because that will send a message to authoritarian leaders — not only Putin but also China — that by the use of brutal military force they can achieve their goals.”
Stoltenberg, however, expressed optimism that the U.S. would not soon vanish from Europe — or from Ukraine. Indeed, a contingent of more establishment Republicans has supported Biden’s repeated requests to send money and arms to Ukraine.
“I’m confident,” the NATO chief said, “that also after midterms, there will still be a clear majority in the Congress — in the House and in the Senate — for continued significant support to Ukraine.”
Difficult decisions ahead
The charged debate is the product of a troubling reality: Russia’s war in Ukraine appears likely to drag on for months as budgets tighten and economies wane.
In Washington, that discussion is intensifying ahead of elections slated for November 8. And a chorus of conservatives is increasingly reluctant to spend vast sums on aid to Ukraine. Since the war began, the U.S. has pledged to give Ukraine more than $17 billion in security assistance, well above what Europe has collectively committed.
Stoltenberg said that he is confident Washington will continue aiding Ukraine “partly because if [Russian President Vladimir] Putin wins in Ukraine, that will be a catastrophe for the Ukrainians.”
A Ukraine soldier fires a US-made MK-19 automatic grenade launcher towards Russian positions at a front line near Toretsk in the Donetsk region of Ukraine | Dave Clark / AFP via Getty Images
But he also stressed the China connection at a moment when Beijing is top of mind for many American policymakers — including some of the same conservatives raising questions about the volume of assistance to Ukraine.
The Biden administration recently described China as “America’s most consequential geopolitical challenge” in its national security strategy.
And the document explicitly ranks China above Russia in the longer term: “Russia poses an immediate and ongoing threat to the regional security order in Europe and it is a source of disruption and instability globally but it lacks the across the spectrum capabilities of” China.
Still, the collision of Russia’s long war in Ukraine, domestic U.S. political pressures and the growing focus on Beijing are reinvigorating a long-standing burden-sharing debate within NATO.
In 2014, NATO allies agreed to “aim to move towards” spending 2 percent of their economic output on defense by 2024. With that deadline looming — and the recognition that military threats only seem to be rising — leaders are grappling with what comes next. Will they raise the target number? Will they word the spending goals differently?
“I expect that NATO allies will at the summit in Vilnius next year make a clear commitment to invest more in defense,” Stoltenberg said while noting that “it’s a bit too early to say” what precise language NATO allies will agree to.
NATO allies themselves have taken varying approaches to China, with some still adopting a much softer line than Washington.
Stoltenberg acknowledged these divergences. But he argued the alliance had made progress on confronting Beijing, emphasizing NATO’s decision earlier this summer to explicitly label China a challenge in its long-term strategy document.
It is “important for NATO allies to stand together and to address the consequences of the rise of China — and that we agree on, and that’s exactly what we are doing,” he said.
Yet while allies have agreed to “address” China’s rise, they haven’t figured out who should foot the bill for those efforts. Some U.S. lawmakers, academics and experts are advocating for Europe to take the lead in managing local security challenges so the U.S. can focus more on the Indo-Pacific.
Daniel Hamilton, a U.S. State Department official during the 1990s NATO enlargement wave, dubs it “greater European strategic responsibility.” This approach, added Hamilton, now a senior fellow at Johns Hopkins University, would involve European allies providing, within 10 years, “half of the forces and capabilities” needed “for deterrence and collective defense against Russia.”
European allies, some experts argue, are simply too comfortable in their reliance on Washington.
“European members of NATO have over-promised and under-delivered for decades,” said Harvard University professor Stephen Walt, a leading international affairs scholar. Europeans, he said, “will not make a sustained effort to rebuild their own defense capabilities if they can count on the United States to rush to their aid at the first sign of trouble.”
Over the next decade, Walt added, “Europe should take primary responsibility for its own defense, while the United States focuses on Asia and shifts from being Europe’s ‘first responder’ to being its ‘ally of last resort.’”
Stoltenberg pushed back against such a strict division of labor.
Decoupling North America from Europe “is not a good model, because that will reduce the strength, the credibility of the bond between North America and Europe.”
He did, however, lean on NATO’s European allies — which will include most of the Continent west of Russia once Finland and Sweden’s memberships are approved — to keep upping their defense spending.
“I strongly believe that European allies should do more,” he said, adding that he has been “pushing hard” on the topic. “The good news,” he noted, “is that all allies and also European allies have increased and are now investing more.”
Still, simple math shows that Europe is not close to being self-sustaining on defense.
“The reality is that 80 percent of NATO’s defense expenditures come from non-EU allies,” Stoltenberg said. The alliance’s ocean-spanning, multi-continent layout also “makes it clear that you need a transatlantic bond and you need non-EU allies to protect Europe.”
“But most of all,” Stoltenberg stressed, “this is about politics — I don’t believe in Europe alone, I don’t believe in North America alone.”
Hungary’s government supports the NATO membership of Sweden and Finland and has submitted the ratification documents to the National Assembly, Minister Gergely Gulyás told reporters at a briefing on Saturday.
Gulyás, chief of staff to Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, said the expansion of NATO to include the two Nordic countries would be ratified by mid-December at the latest, according to media reports.
Asked by a reporter if NATO would be getting stronger with Finland and Sweden joining, Gulyás replied that he hoped so. He added that it could be debated whether the expansion is in Hungary’s national security interest, but said that this is irrelevant now, according to the reports.
Hungary and Turkey are the only NATO countries that have yet to ratify the accession of Sweden and Finland to the alliance — a process that started shortly after Russia invaded Ukraine in February.
Finnish Prime Minister Sanna Marin told POLITICO on Thursday that she doesn’t expect Hungary and Turkey to block NATO expansion, but warned of the risks of delaying accession.
The representation of women on boards of companies in India during the last decade rose to 18 per cent in 2022 but the country is far behind France, Sweden, the US and the UK, according to a report. During 2013 till 2022, India made significant and rapid progress in increasing women representation on boards from 6 per cent in 2013 to 18 per cent in 2022, leading consultancy EY’s report titled ‘Diversity in the Boardroom: progress and the way forward’ said.
France topped the chart with 44.5 per cent women representation on companies’ boards followed by Sweden (40 per cent), Norway (36.4 per cent), Canada (35.4 per cent), the UK (35.3 per cent), Australia (33.5 per cent), US (28.1 per cent), Singapore (20.1 per cent), as per the report.
The findings for India are based on an analysis of Nifty 500 companies consisting of 4,500 directors and public source data.
The report noted that the current 18 per cent women representation on Indian boards is essentially a result of the corporate law mandate in the country.
Nearly 95 per cent of the Nifty 500 companies now have a woman on their boards of directors. However, less than 5 per cent of companies have women chairpersons, it noted.
While organisations have shown serious intent towards increasing board diversity, the pace of progress is certainly not up to the mark, the report said, adding that regulatory interventions have been the cornerstone of increased women participation globally and also on the Indian boards.
Historically, the report said that the only positions available to women on the Indian boards were leadership in the grievance and Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) committees.
However, this is starting to change, and gender diversity on boards is increasing in Indian businesses, it added.
“Women’s participation in the boardroom is a necessary but often overlooked step in achieving gender parity. Increasing women’s representation on boards can improve company performance and also helps to promote greater inclusion and diversity within the workforce,” EY India India Region Diversity and Inclusiveness Business Sponsor Aashish Kasad said.
As per the report, at 24 per cent, the life sciences sector leads with the highest percentage of women on boards followed by media and entertainment 23 per cent.
However, the report found that the increase is not uniform across companies in the media and entertainment sector as the rise is mainly due to a few organisations exceeding the mandated quota and hiring more women directors.
Closely followed by the media and entertainment sector is the consumer products and retail sector with 20 per cent women on the boards.
The technology (IT and ITeS) industry, which has one of the highest representation of women in the workforce at 34 per cent, has 20 per cent women representation on their boards, the report said.
It also said that presently, women account for only 6 per cent of executive positions on banking and capital markets boards.
Women’s representation on the boards of energy and utilities sector (oil and gas and power and utilities) companies is also stagnant at 15 per cent in 2017 and 2022, it said.
According to the report, women’s participation in the Indian energy sector is a mere 8 per cent, with only 600 women in managerial and executive roles.
STOCKHOLM — The Swedish parliament on Monday elected Ulf Kristersson — the conservative Moderate Party leader — as prime minister at the head of a minority coalition that is being supported by a once-radical far-right party.
Kristersson, 59, was elected by a vote of 176 to 173 and will present his government on Tuesday. His three-party coalition does not have a majority, but in Sweden, prime ministers can govern as long as there is no parliamentary majority against them.
After a month of talks with the anti-immigration populist Sweden Democrats, Kristersson presented an agreement that gave them an unprecedented position of influence in Swedish politics. They took over 20% of the vote at the Sept. 11 election.
Kristersson’s center-right coalition government is made up of his party, the Liberals and the Christian Democrats, but he has said it will remain in “close collaboration” with the Sweden Democrats. He depends on the support of the Sweden Democrats to secure a majority in Parliament, enabling them to influence government policy from the sidelines.
The Sweden Democrats were founded in the 1980s by far-right extremists. They toned down their rhetoric and expelled openly racist members under Jimmie Akesson, who took over the party in 2005.
Akesson, who doesn’t consider his party far-right, said he would have preferred Cabinet seats for the Sweden Democrats, but he supported the deal that would give his party influence over government policy, including on immigration and criminal justice.
Since the election, the populist party has landed the chairmanships of four parliamentary committees, giving it the ability to wield more influence in mainstream Swedish politics.
Kristersson will be replacing Magdalena Andersson, who heads Sweden’s largest party, the Social Democrats, which now are in opposition. He backs Sweden’s historic bid to join NATO following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February.
“It feels great, I am grateful,” Kristersson told a press conference. “ I am happy about the trust that I have received from the Riksdag. I am also humbled by the tasks that lie ahead of us.”
The center-left opposition heavily criticized the new governing coalition, with Lena Hallgren of the Social Democrats, calling it “a strange construction.”
Many said it represented a paradigm shift in Sweden and would damage its image in the world as an egalitarian and tolerant nation. Nooshi Dadgostar, the leader of the former communist Left Party, said her parents who fled from Iran could never have imagined that Sweden would embark on an authoritarian path.
“What is happening now in Sweden is frightening,” she told Parliament.
The winner, or winners, of the Nobel Prize in chemistry will be announced Wednesday at the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences in Stockholm
STOCKHOLM — The winner, or winners, of the Nobel Prize in chemistry will be announced Wednesday at the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences in Stockholm.
Last year the prize was awarded to scientists Benjamin List and David W.C. MacMillan for finding an ingenious and environmentally cleaner way to build molecules that the Nobel panel said is “already benefiting humankind greatly.”
A week of Nobel Prize announcements kicked off Monday with Swedish scientist Svante Paabo receiving the award in medicine for unlocking secrets of Neanderthal DNA that provided key insights into our immune system.
Three scientists jointly won the prize in physics Tuesday. Frenchman Alain Aspect, American John F. Clauser and Austrian Anton Zeilinger had shown that tiny particles can retain a connection with each other even when separated, a phenomenon known as quantum entanglement, that can be used for specialized computing and to encrypt information.
The awards continue with literature on Thursday. The 2022 Nobel Peace Prize will be announced on Friday and the economics award on Monday.
The prizes carry a cash award of 10 million Swedish kronor (nearly $900,000) and will be handed out on Dec. 10. The money comes from a bequest left by the prize’s creator, Swedish inventor Alfred Nobel, in 1895.
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STOCKHOLM — This year’s Nobel Prize in physics has been awarded to Alain Aspect, John F. Clauser and Anton Zeilinger for their work on quantum information science.
Hans Ellegren, Secretary General, Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, announced the winner Tuesday at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm.
A week of Nobel Prize announcements kicked off Monday with Swedish scientist Svante Paabo receiving the award in medicine Monday for unlocking secrets of Neanderthal DNA that provided key insights into our immune system.
They continue with chemistry on Wednesday and literature on Thursday. The 2022 Nobel Peace Prize will be announced on Friday and the economics award on Oct. 10.
THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. AP’s earlier story follows below.
STOCKHOLM (AP) — The winner, or winners, of the Nobel Prize in physics will be announced Tuesday at the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences in Stockholm.
While physicists often tackle problems that appear at first glance to be far removed from everyday concerns — tiny particles and the vast mysteries of space and time — their research provides the foundations for many practical applications of science.
Last year the prize was awarded to three scientists — Syukuro Manabe, Klaus Hasselmann and Giorgio Parisi — whose work has helped to explain and predict complex forces of nature, thereby expanding our understanding of climate change.
A week of Nobel Prize announcements kicked off Monday with Swedish scientist Svante Paabo receiving the award in medicine Monday for unlocking secrets of Neanderthal DNA that provided key insights into our immune system.
They continue with chemistry on Wednesday and literature on Thursday. The 2022 Nobel Peace Prize will be announced on Friday and the economics award on Oct. 10.
The prizes carry a cash award of 10 million Swedish kronor (nearly $900,000) and will be handed out on Dec. 10. The money comes from a bequest left by the prize’s creator, Swedish inventor Alfred Nobel, who died in 1895.
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STOCKHOLM — Swedish scientist Svante Paabo won the Nobel Prize in medicine Monday for his discoveries on human evolution that provided key insights into our immune system and what makes us unique compared with our extinct cousins, the award’s panel said.
Paabo spearheaded the development of new techniques that allowed researchers to compare the genome of modern humans and that of other hominins — the Neanderthals and Denisovans.
While Neanderthal bones were first discovered in the mid-19th century, only by unlocking their DNA — often referred to as the code of life — have scientists been able to fully understand the links between species.
This included the time when modern humans and Neanderthals diverged as a species, determined to be around 800,000 years ago, said Anna Wedell, chair of the Nobel Committee.
“Paabo and his team also surprisingly found that gene flow had occurred from Neanderthals to Homo sapiens, demonstrating that they had children together during periods of co-existence,” she said.
This transfer of genes between hominin species affects how the immune system of modern humans reacts to infections, such as the coronavirus. People outside Africa have 1-2% of Neanderthal genes.
Paabo and his team also managed to extract DNA from a tiny finger bone found in a cave in Siberia, leading to the recognition of a new species of ancient humans they called Denisovans.
Wedell described this as “a sensational discovery” that subsequently showed Neanderthals and Denisovan to be sister groups which split from each other around 600,000 years ago. Denisovan genes have been found in up to 6% of modern humans in Asia and Southeast Asia, indicating that interbreeding occurred there too.
“By mixing with them after migrating out of Africa, homo sapiens picked up sequences that improved their chances to survive in their new environments,” said Wedell. For example, Tibetans share a gene with Denisovans that helps them adapt to the high altitude.
“Svante Pääbo has discovered the genetic make up of our closest relatives, the Neanderthals and the Denison hominins,” Nils-Göran Larsson, a Nobel Assembly member, told the Associated Press after the announcement.
“And the small differences between these extinct human forms and us as humans today will provide important insight into our body functions and how our brain has developed.”
Paabo said he was surprised to learn of his win on Monday.
“So I was just gulping down the last cup of tea to go and pick up my daughter at her nanny where she has had an overnight stay, and then I got this call from Sweden and I of course thought it had something to do with our little summer house in Sweden. I thought, ‘Oh the lawn mower’s broken down or something,’” he said in an interview posted on the official home page of the Nobel Prizes.
He mused about what would have happened if Neanderthals had survived another 40,000 years. “Would we see even worse racism against Neanderthals, because they were really in some sense different from us? Or would we actually see our place in the living world quite in a different way when we would have other forms of humans there that are very like us but still different,” he said.
Paabo, 67, performed his prizewinning studies in Germany at the University of Munich and at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig. He is the son of Sune Bergstrom, who won the Nobel prize in medicine in 1982. According to the Nobel Foundation, it’s the eighth time that the son or daughter of a Nobel laureate also won a Nobel Prize.
Scientists in the field lauded the Nobel Committee’s choice this year.
David Reich, a geneticist at Harvard Medical School, said he was thrilled the group honored the field of ancient DNA, which he worried might “fall between the cracks.”
By recognizing that DNA can be preserved for tens of thousands of years — and developing ways to extract it — Paabo and his team created a completely new way to answer questions about our past, Reich said. That work was the basis for an “explosive growth” of ancient DNA studies in recent decades.
“It’s totally reconfigured our understanding of human variation and human history,” Reich said.
Dr. Eric Green, director of the National Human Genome Research Institute, called it “a great day for genomics,” a relatively young field first named in 1987.
The Human Genome project, which ran from 1990-2003, “got us the first sequence of the human genome, and we’ve improved that sequence ever since,” Green said. Since then, scientists developed new cheaper, extremely sensitive methods for sequencing DNA.
When you sequence DNA from a fossil millions of years old, you only have “vanishingly small amounts” of DNA, Green said. Among Paabo’s innovations was figuring out the laboratory methods for extracting and preserving these tiny amounts of DNA. He was then able to lay pieces of the Neanderthal genome sequence against the human sequencing coming out of the Human Genome Project.
Paabo’s team published the first draft of a Neanderthal genome in 2009. The team sequenced more than 60% of the full genome from a small sample of bone, after contending with decay and contamination from bacteria.
“We should always be proud of the fact that we sequenced our genome. But the idea that we can go back in time and sequence the genome that doesn’t live anymore and something that’s a direct relative of humans is truly remarkable,” Green said.
Katerina Harvati-Papatheodorou, professor of paleoanthropology at the University of Tübingen in Germany, said the award also underscores the importance of understanding humanity’s evolutionary heritage to gain insights about human health today.
“The most recent example is the finding that genes inherited from our Neanderthal relatives … can have implications for one’s susceptibility to COVID infections,” she said in an email to the AP.
The medicine prize kicked off a week of Nobel Prize announcements. It continues Tuesday with the physics prize, with chemistry on Wednesday and literature on Thursday. The 2022 Nobel Peace Prize will be announced on Friday and the economics award on Oct. 10.
Last year’s medicine recipients were David Julius and Ardem Patapoutian for their discoveries into how the human body perceives temperature and touch.
The prizes carry a cash award of 10 million Swedish kronor (nearly $900,000) and will be handed out on Dec. 10. The money comes from a bequest left by the prize’s creator, Swedish inventor Alfred Nobel, who died in 1895.
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Jordans reported from Berlin. Ungar reported from Louisville, Kentucky. Maddie Burakoff contributed from New York.
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European far-right politicians just stormed to victory in Italy, after achieving historic results in France and Sweden.
“Everywhere in Europe, people aspire to take their destiny back into their own hands!” said Marine Le Pen, the leader of France’s far-right National Rally Party.
But if you think there is a new wave of right-wing radicalism sweeping Europe, you’d be wrong. Something else is going on.
Analysis by POLITICO’s Poll of Polls suggests far-right parties in the region on average did not increase their support by even one percentage point between the start of Russia’s invasion in Ukraine in February and today.
POLITICO looked at the median and average increase of all parties organized in right-wing European Parliament groups of Identity and Democracy, the European Conservatives and Reformists or unaffiliated parties with political far-right positions.
Overall, the results indicate that if an increase in support occurred for far-right parties, it happened several years ago.
The Sweden Democrats’ first surge happened after the 2014 election, when the party grew from around 10 percent to 20 percent, the same one-fifth share of the vote they received in this year’s election. The far-right Alternative for Germany AfD in Germany grew fast in 2015 and 2016 reaching 14 percent in POLITICO’s polling tracker. In Italy, the Northern League overtook Forza Italia for the first time in early 2015, and peaked in 2019 at 37 percent before starting a downward trend ending on 9 percent in last month’s election. In the Italian election, voters mostly switched between rival right-wing camps.
The far-right has moved from the fringes of politics into the mainstream, not only influencing the political center but also entering the arena of power.
“There is a normalization of far-right parties as an integral part of the political landscape,” said Cathrine Thorleifsson, who researches extremism at the University of Oslo. “They have been accepted by the electorate and also by other, conventional parties.”
Cooperation between the center-right and the extreme-right has become less taboo.
“The rise of far-right parties is only part of the story. The facilitating and mainstreaming of far-right parties as well as the adoption of far-right frames and positions by other parties is at least as important,” tweeted Cas Mudde, a leading scholar on the issue.
This may risk destabilizing Europe even more than winning a couple of percentage points in the polls.
Italy’s far-right firebrand Giorgia Meloni is a clear-cut example. While her party draws its origin from groups founded by former fascists, she’ll now lead the EU’s third-largest economy.
Leader of Italian far-right party “Fratelli d’Italia” (Brothers of Italy), Giorgia Meloni | Pitro Cruciatti/AFP via Getty Images
In Sweden, the center-right party has started coalition talks for a minority government which would have to draw on opposition support, most likely from the far-right Swedish Democrats. Far-right parties have also entered governments in Austria, Finland, Estonia and Italy. Other countries are likely to follow.
George Simion, the leader of Romania’s far-right party, Alliance for the Union of Romanians (AUR), celebrated Meloni’s win in Italy, saying his party is likely to follow in their footsteps.
Spain heads to the ballot box next year and socialist Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez may have a tough time winning re-election. The conservative People’s Party is between five and seven points ahead of the Spanish socialists in all the published polls, but it is unlikely to garner enough votes to secure a governing majority outright.
That means it may have to come to an agreement with far-right party Vox, whose leader, Santiago Abascal, is an ally of Meloni’s. While the People’s Party previously refused to govern with Vox, last spring its newly elected leader, Alberto Núnez-Feijóo, greenlit a coalition agreement with the ultranationalist group in Spain’s central Castilla y León region.
Tom Van Grieken, the right-wing Belgian politician, also pointed to Spain as the next likely example, especially because of the possible cooperation with the PP. “All over Europe, we see conservative parties who are considering breaking the cordon sanitaire,” he said, referring to the refusal of other parties to work with the far-right. “They are tired of compromising with their ideological counterparts, the parties at the left end of the spectrum.”
Chairman of Vlaams Belang party Tom Van Grieken | Stephanie Le Coqc/EFE via EPA
This didn’t happen overnight. The far-right worked hard to shrug off their extremist, neo-Nazi image.
“In some of the reporting on the Swedish Democrats, you’d think they’ll deport people on trains as soon as they’re in power. Come on, these parties have changed,” said one EU official with right-wing affiliations.
The far-right invested in “image adjustment and trying to tread carefully with some issues, while unashamedly catering to others,” said Nina Wiesehomeier, a political scientist at the IE University of Madrid. “This is particularly obvious in Italy right now, with Meloni sticking to the slogan of ‘God, homeland, family,’ as a continuation, while having tried to purge the party from more radical elements.”
In Belgium’s northern region of Flanders, the right-wing Vlaams Belang (Flemish Interest) explicitly dismisses the label “extreme-right.” Just like his counterparts in Italy, Sweden and France, Van Grieken, the party’s president, denounced the more extremist positions of his group’s founding fathers and moderated his political message to make voting for the far-right socially acceptable.
Overt racism is taboo. Instead, the rhetoric changes to criticizing an open-door migration policy. By carefully catering to centrist voters, the far-right aims for a bigger slice of the cake, while still riding on the anti-establishment discontent.
“There is a clear fault line between the winners of globalization and the nationalists,” Van Grieken told POLITICO. “This comes on top on the concerns about mass migration, whether it’s in Malmö, Rome or other European cities.”
Perfect storm
Now, the time is right to capitalize on that transformation.
As Europe is battling record inflation and Europeans fear exorbitant heating bills, governments warn about the political implications of a “winter of discontent.”
“It’s a massive drainage of European prosperity,” Belgian Prime Minister Alexander De Croo told POLITICO recently. “In the current situation, it’s hard to believe in progress, it’s very hard to make progress. So there’s a very pessimistic feeling.”
The current war in Ukraine is the latest in a succession of crises — in global finance, migration and the pandemic. Experts argue that this is key to understanding the rising support for the far-right.
“Such existential crises have a destabilizing effect and lead to fear,” said Carl Devos, a professor in political science at Ghent University. “Fear is the breeding ground for the far-right. People tend to translate that fear and outrage into radical voting behaviour.”
Migration and identity politics are less prominent in the media because of the Ukraine war and rising energy prices, but they’re still key issues in right-wing debate.
In Austria, the coalition parties fought over whether or not asylum seekers should receive climate bonuses. In the Netherlands, the death of a baby at the asylum center Ter Apel led to a renewed debate over the overcrowded migration centers.
The combination of those issues is likely to feed into more right-wing wins across the continent. “The far-right offers nationalist, protectionist solutions to the globalized crises, said Thorleifsson. “We see how the migration issue was momentarily off the agenda during the pandemic, but now it’s back.”
Aitor Hernández-Morales, Camille Gijs and Ana Fota contributed reporting.
The presidents of nine NATO countries in central and eastern Europe declared on Sunday that they would never recognize the annexation by Russia of several Ukrainian regions. Hungary and Bulgaria were conspicuously absent from the signatories.
In a joint statement, the leaders also supported a path to NATO membership for Ukraine.
The nine leaders demanded that “Russia immediately withdraw from all occupied territories” and encouraged “all allies to substantially increase their military aid to Ukraine,” according to the statement.
“We reiterate our support for the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine,” they wrote.
The statement comes two days after Russian President Vladimir Putin declared he was annexing four Ukrainian regions, a move the West has described as an illegal land-grab. It was signed by the presidents of Poland, Romania, Slovakia, Czech Republic, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Montenegro and North Macedonia.
The signatories also wrote that they “firmly stand behind” a NATO decision in 2008 over Ukraine’s future membership to the alliance. At the time, NATO allies pledged that Ukraine would eventually become a member. But as that process stalled over the years, it seemed increasingly unlikely that Ukraine’s bid would become a reality.
In the wake of the annexations, Ukraine formally applied for a fast-track accession to NATO, with hopes to jump-start its membership bid.
On Sunday, an adviser to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy tweeted that 10 NATO countries supported Ukraine’s membership to the alliance — including many countries that used to belong to the former Soviet bloc.
NATO countries however have hesitated at including a new member that is at war — and by treaty they would be forced to defend. In recent months, NATO has also welcomed the application of two new countries in Europe – Finland and Sweden, spurred by security concerns after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Climate scientists described the shocking images of gas spewing to the surface of the Baltic Sea as a “reckless release” of greenhouse gas emissions that, if deliberate, “amounts to an environmental crime.”
Anadolu Agency | Anadolu Agency | Getty Images
Unexplained gas leaks along two underwater pipelines connecting Russia to Germany have sent huge volumes of methane, a potent greenhouse gas, into the atmosphere.
Seismologists on Monday reported explosions in the vicinity of the unusual Nord Stream gas leaks, which are situated in international waters but inside Denmark’s and Sweden’s exclusive economic zones.
Denmark’s armed forces said video footage showed the largest gas leak created a surface disturbance of roughly 1 kilometer (0.62 miles) in diameter, while the smallest leak caused a circle of approximately 200 meters.
Climate scientists acknowledge that it is hard to accurately quantify the exact size of the emissions and say the leaks are a “wee bubble in the ocean” compared to the massive amounts of methane emitted around the world every day.
Nonetheless, environmental campaigners argue that the incident shows the risk of sabotage or an accident makes fossil infrastructure a “ticking time bomb.”
Researchers at the German Environment Agency (UBA) estimate the climate impact of the leaks to be equivalent to roughly 7.5 million metric tons of carbon.
The agency said a total of 300,000 tons of methane are expected to be released into the atmosphere from the leaks. Methane is significantly more harmful to the climate than carbon, UBA researchers said, noting that over a 100-year period one ton of methane causes as much warming to the atmosphere as 25 tons of carbon.
BORNHOLM, DENMARK – SEPTEMBER 27: Danish Defense shows the gas leaking at Nord Stream 2 seen from the Danish F-16 interceptor on Bornholm, Denmark on September 27, 2022.
Danish Defence/ | Anadolu Agency | Getty Images
For context, the International Energy Agency estimates that annual global methane emissions are around 570 million tons.
This means the estimated emissions from the Nord Stream gas leaks are just a fraction of the global total each year, even while campaigners argue the incident serves as another reminder of the risks associated with fossil fuel infrastructure.
Paul Balcombe, honorary lecturer in chemical engineering at Imperial College London, said that even if only one of the two leaking Nord Stream pipes were to release all its contents, it would likely be twice as much methane as the 2015 Aliso Canyon leak in California, the largest known release of methane in U.S. history.
The massive roiling water due to the leak as we have seen in imagery is symbolic of the enormous amount of fossil fuel that the world is combusting.
Jeffrey Kargel
Senior scientist at Planetary Research Institute
The cause of the Nord Stream gas leaks is not yet known. Many in Europe suspect sabotage, particularly as the incident comes amid a bitter energy standoff between Brussels and Moscow. Russia has dismissed claims that it was behind the suspected attack as “stupid.”
Denmark’s Energy Agency said Wednesday that emissions from the gas leaks correspond to approximately one-third of the country’s annual greenhouse gas emissions.
Based on the Danish government’s initial estimates, the worst-case scenario would see 778 million standard cubic meters of gas or 14.6 million metric tons of carbon equivalent emissions. Comparatively, Danish emissions in 2020 were roughly 45 million tons of carbon equivalent.
Grant Allen, professor of atmospheric physics at the University of Manchester, said it has been estimated that there may be up to 177 million cubic meters of gas still residual in the Nord Stream 2 pipeline alone.
Allen said this amount is equivalent to the gas used by 124,000 U.K. homes in a year. “This is not a small amount of gas, and represents a reckless emission of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere,” he added.
Jeffrey Kargel, senior scientist at Planetary Research Institute in Tucson, Arizona, described the gas leaks at the Nord Stream pipelines as a “real travesty” and “an environmental crime if it was deliberate.”
“The massive roiling water due to the leak as we have seen in imagery is symbolic of the enormous amount of fossil fuel that the world is combusting,” Kargel said.
“The global climate is changing drastically, with huge impacts on extreme climate mounting every year, decade after decade. It is such an extreme climate change that just about every adult age person on Earth knows it from first-hand experience,” he added. “We can literally feel it on our skin.”
Neither pipeline was pumping gas at the time of the leaks but both lines were still pressurized: Nord Stream 1 stopped pumping gas to Europe “indefinitely” earlier this month, with Moscow’s operator saying international sanctions on Russia prevented it from carrying out vital maintenance work.
The Nord Stream 2 pipeline, meanwhile, never officially opened as Germany refused to certify it for commercial operations due to Russia’s unprovoked invasion of Ukraine.
Dave Reay, executive director of the Edinburgh Climate Change Institute, said “the most direct effect of these gas leaks on climate is the extra dollop of the powerful greenhouse gas methane – the main component of natural gas – they are adding to the atmosphere.”
“That said, this is a wee bubble in the ocean compared to the huge amounts of so-called ‘fugitive methane’ that are emitted every day around the world due to things like fracking, coal mining and oil extraction,” he added.
Environmental campaigners argue the risk of sabotage or an accident makes fossil infrastructure a “ticking time bomb.”
Lisi Niesner | Reuters
“Risks of sabotage or accident make fossil fuel infrastructure a ticking time bomb, but even on a good day oil and gas pipes and storage leak methane constantly,” Silvia Pastorelli, EU climate and energy campaigner at environmental group Greenpeace, told CNBC via email.
“Behind all these numbers of cubic metres and megatonnes are real dangers for real people, this potent greenhouse gas is accelerating the climate crisis leading to worse heatwaves like Europe had this summer or more devastating like storms the one battering Florida now,” Pastorelli said.
“Gas pipes from Norway or Algeria won’t get us out of this mess, Europe must instead go full tilt for renewable energy and real energy savings that protect vulnerable people.”
This satellite photo from Planet Labs PBC shows a large disturbance in the sea can be observed off the coast of the Danish island of Bornholm, Monday Sept. 26, 2022 following a series of unusual leaks on two natural gas pipelines running from Russia under the Baltic Sea to Germany have triggered concerns about possible sabotage. Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen says she “cannot rule out” sabotage after three leaks were detected on Nord Stream 1 and 2. (Planet Labs PBC via AP)
The EU is seeking to reset its often testy relationship with Israel next week, convening a summit on Monday of senior political figures for the first time in a decade.
The meeting format, known as the EU-Israel Association Council, has essentially been dormant since 2013, when Israel canceled a gathering in protest over the EU’s stance on Israeli settlements in the West Bank. Since then, the two sides have continued to clash over similar issues.
But the 2021 exit of hardline Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu opened the door for current rapprochement. His replacement, Yair Lapid, who also holds the foreign minister role, has embraced a two-state solution with Palestine — a position more in line with many EU countries’ approach, even if several countries are still expected to express disapproval of Israel’s Palestinian policies on Monday. Brussels is also eager to shore up energy supplies from Israel amid Russia’s war in Ukraine.
Lapid is expected to attend Monday’s council meeting.
“There’s a big hope that the upcoming association council between the EU and Israel will bring … a new wind into our relationship,” Czech Foreign Minister Jan Lipavský told POLITICO last week at the United Nations General Assembly, expressing optimism that the development will be one of the key achievements of the Czechs’ six-month rotating EU presidency.
Still, getting EU consensus on one of the world’s most notoriously contentious conflicts is not going to be easy.
Countries like Ireland and Sweden have traditionally taken a more pro-Palestinian stance — Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas stopped off in Dublin for a meeting with the Irish prime minister earlier this month en route to the U.N. annual gathering. On the other end of the spectrum, Israel has strong supporters within the EU. Hungary, for example, is a staunch ally with economic and ideological bonds forged over the years between Prime Minister Viktor Orbán and Netanyahu.
Before the EU-Israel council went dark, it had served for more than a decade as a forum for officials to regularly meet and discuss these issues. Now, with the council set to be revived, member states are tinkering with an official communique that needs to satisfy the spectrum of views regarding EU-Israeli relations.
Finding common language can mean weeks of fighting over a single word while backroom deals are cut to appease the myriad interests at play. Palestinian officials are also watching closely, demanding not to be left out of a similar diplomatic engagement with Brussels.
The EU’s complicated role in the Israel-Palestine conflict has played out in numerous controversies this year alone.
This spring, the European Commission was forced to delay funding for the Palestinian Authority over the content of textbooks, which critics say included anti-Israeli incitements to violence.
The decision to block the funds was led by Hungarian EU Enlargement Commissioner Olivér Várhelyi. As POLITICO first reported, 15 countries sent a letter to the Commission in April blasting the move. Commission President Ursula von der Leyen finally announced the money would be disbursed during a visit to the Palestinian city Ramallah in July.
EU commissioner for neighbourhood and enlargement Olivér Várhelyi | Kenzo Tribouillard/AFP via Getty Images
Further tensions with Tel Aviv emerged following an Israeli raid in July on the offices of Palestinian NGOs.
Israel had accused the groups — some of which received funds from EU countries — of being terrorist organizations. But numerous EU countries weren’t convinced.
In a joint statement at the time, Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Ireland, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain and Sweden all blasted Israel, saying it had not supplied “substantial information” to justify the raids. The bloc reiterated those “deep concerns” in August after further Israeli raids on civil society groups.
Another dynamic affecting the EU’s relationship with Israel is the Continent’s energy woes. As Europe scrambles to find alternative sources of Russian gas, furthering energy ties with Israel is one possible answer.
In a June visit to Israel, von der Leyen signed a memorandum of understanding with Israel and Egypt to boost gas exports. The EU is also Israel’s largest trade market and accounts for about a third of Israel’s total trade.
But while economic imperatives explain part of the new push for engagement with Israel, long-term observers say the outreach also reflects a new willingness to engage with Tel Aviv after Lapid came to power this summer. Lapid entered office as part of a power-sharing arrangement with Naftali Bennett, who held the job for a year prior to him.
“I think it is a genuine shift,” said Maya Sion-Tzidkiyahu, who helms the Israel-Europe Program at Mitvim Institute, an Israeli think tank. “The change of tone was made by Lapid, who shares much of the EU’s normative stance on the liberal democratic world order. It’s now much more positive than during Netanyahu’s government, even if Bennett and now Lapid government is not advancing the peace process.”
Sion-Tzidkiyahu said mutually beneficial scenarios are helping to replace “megaphone diplomacy” with closer dialogue.
“Disagreements on contentious issues such as the Palestinian or Iranian one will not disappear, but perhaps there are now better understanding for the concerns of each side,” she said.
Lipavský, the Czech foreign minister, is aware of the concerns some EU countries have about the Israeli’s government actions in the West Bank and towards Palestinians.
“We need to discuss [these concerns] openly, but I don’t think that one issue should block the debate about the others,” he said.
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen poses for pictures with Israel’s Yair Lapid | Pool photo by Maya Alleruzzo/AFP via Getty Images
Officially, the EU supports the two-state solution that sees a Palestinian state living side-by-side in peace and security with Israel — a vision also shared by the United States. But making that prospect a reality seems as far away as ever.
Sven Koopmans, the EU special representative for the Middle East peace process, wrote earlier this month that all parties needed to help identify ways to solve the man-made conflict.
“The current situation is increasingly seen as a structural human rights problem, in which Israel has the upper hand,” he wrote in the Israeli outlet Haaretz. “That negatively affects how the world perceives Israel, and holds risks for the long-term. It should not be that way.”
When it comes to resuming the peace process, Sion-Tzidkiyahu is not confident.
“Under the current political circumstances in the Palestinian Authority and Israel, such development is not foreseen,” she said. “At most, the EU can push for more practical steps by Israel to improve Palestinian’s condition.”
TEWKSBURY, England, January 17, 2018 (Newswire.com)
– Engcon, the world’s leading manufacturer of tiltrotators – the hydraulic wrist accessory that improves the efficiency, profitability and safety for 1 to 33 metric tonne excavators – has expanded its production facilities in Poland to meet demand.
Engcon had barely finished celebrating the opening of its new factory in Strömsund, Sweden, before announcing its next investment to extend its factory in Poland. One of the reasons for the investment is to meet the growing demand for tiltrotators in Europe, especially in France, Holland and the U.K.
Europe has discovered the tiltrotator. It all started with explosive growth in sales back in the early 2000s. That meant that we had to seriously step up our rate of production.
Stig Engström, Founder and Owner
“I am pleased and proud of the growth we have been experiencing since starting up in Poland,” Stig Engström, founder and owner of Engcon says. “We built the factory in Niepruszewo in 2012 to meet growing demand for buckets, ground compactors, grabbers and welded components. Due to our continued sales growth, we have just had the factory extended.”
The extension has added 1,000 square meters (10,764 square feet) to the factory, which will host a new assembly hall, testing facilities and an expanded space for processing, sheet metal cutting and burring. The office section has also been extended and Engcon has invested a total of more than £1.5 million in building the extension and procuring new equipment.
“Europe has discovered the tiltrotator,” confirms Stig. “It all started with explosive growth in sales back in the early 2000s. That meant that we had to seriously step up our rate of production.”
In 2003, Engcon decided to establish a strategic presence in Poland and to start up manufacturing operations in the country. The company leased a factory building and began production.
“Starting up production in Poland gave us a real boost,” continues Stig. “Eventually, we began reaching such large volumes that we needed to invest again. We bought a larger industrial site and built a new, modern factory which opened its doors in 2012. The factory was built entirely in line with our Swedish requirements.”
As the factory now expands its capacity, it looks to the factory in Strömsund, which recently implemented a completely automatic testing facility. This concept is currently being replicated in Poland for the products manufactured there.
“It is important for us to have the same conditions in Poland as we do in our other facilities so that we can reach our common quality objectives,” adds Dan Ekholm, production manager for the Engcon Group. “This expansion of our operations in Poland creates five new jobs directly and it looks like there will be many more on the way.”
