PM seeks to tighten economic co-up with Belgrade
As part of a two-day visit to Serbia, Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis on Monday expressed his desire to strengthen economic cooperation between Athens and Belgrade on all sectors.
https://www.ekathimerini.com/news/1231469/pm-seeks-to-tighten-economic-co-up-with-belgrade/
PM Mitsotakis to meet with farmers’ representatives on Tuesday
Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis will meet separately with two representative groups of farmers at the Maximos Mansion on Tuesday.
https://www.amna.gr/en/article/796597/PM-Mitsotakis-to-meet-with-farmers-representatives-on-Tuesday
Four dead in shooting incident in Glyfada, among them the owners of shipping company
The ultimatum of the shipowning family to the 75-year-old foreman to leave the house he had been given to live in and his dismissal from the company a few days prior was, it seems, what led him to the triple murder – the owner of the shipping company Maria Karnesi, managing director Antonis Vlassakis and ship captain Ilias Koukoularis – at the firm’s offices in Glyfada, southern Athens on Monday, before killing himself.
https://www.ekathimerini.com/news/1231556/disgruntled-former-employee-kills-three/
Nearly 3/4 mln households to be economically supported
A total of 730,000 households will be supported for two months as part of the targeted financial aid announced by Environment and Energy Minister Thodoros Skylakakis, government spokesperson Pavlos Marinakis said on Monday during a press briefing.
https://www.ekathimerini.com/economy/1231493/nearly-3-4-mln-households-to-be-economically-supported/
ATHEX: Stock market drops a gear on Monday
A rather subdued session at the Greek stock market on Monday saw most stocks yield ground for a second day in a row on the lowest daily trading of the last 11 sessions. Early gains gave way to some profit-taking by traders who believe the market has been overbought over the last few weeks, when the benchmark had climbed to its highest point since 2011.
https://www.ekathimerini.com/economy/1231514/athex-stock-market-drops-a-gear-on-monday/
KATHIMERINI: Remote university exams sabotaged
TA NEA: Government and Center-Left: two meetings will be the judge of developments
EFIMERIDA TON SYNTAKTON: The PM’s office will decide how to handle farmers’ blockades
AVGI: Farmers: the solutions and the impasse
RIZOSPASTIS: Greece’s involvement in the war games in Ukraine and the Middle East escalates, endangering the people
KONTRA NEWS: The PM’s office is enraged with the games of former PM Samaras
DIMOKRATIA: Ludicrous ministers
NAFTEMPORIKI: Statute of limitations for debts owed to social security fund EFKA remains inactive
SANCTIONING PUTIN’S HELPERS
LIMITLESS FRIENDSHIP, HERE ARE YOUR LIMITS: Brussels is for the first time planning to sanction companies in China and several other countries, including Turkey, India and Serbia, for helping Russia circumvent EU sanctions to buy dual-use goods, several diplomats told Playbook.
With a little help from my friend: Since Chinese President Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin declared the “no-limits friendship” between their dictatorships, reports (including this investigation from POLITICO) have piled up about how Beijing is helping Russia’s illegal invasion of Ukraine.
Highly sensitive: Brussels is now preparing to sanction four Chinese entities which it believes are helping the Kremlin buy European dual-use goods —adding them to annex IV of Regulation 833/2014, according to a draft. Two senior diplomats confirmed the plans to Playbook.
What it means: If EU countries agree to include the four names in the EU’s dual-use sanctions list, European businesses will be banned from dealing with those companies. Playbook first reported last year on the EU’s plans to sanction Chinese firms that it believed were aiding Russia’s war machine.
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Who else is on the list: One entity in Kazakhstan, one in Thailand, one in Turkey, one in Sri Lanka, one in India and one in Serbia, as well as 11 more entities in Russia itself, for a total of 21 new listings.
Background: In an effort to stop Moscow’s war economy from making drones, tanks and guided missiles, the EU and G7 allies have banned their own companies from exporting dual-use goods, such as microelectronics or even ball bearings, to Russia. But middle-men and companies in other countries such as the Emirates, Kazakhstan and China quickly popped up and started to buy suspiciously large amounts of those European products — to sell them on to Russia.
Whack-a-mole: In an interview with Playbook last year, the EU’s sanction envoy David O’Sullivan said the task now was to start plugging these holes to at least make it more expensive for Russia to buy that dual-use tech.
Walking a tightrope with Beijing: But the EU has so far shied away from directly singling out China. EU countries such as Germany had also urged Brussels to scrap plans to sanction third countries that help Russia.
The latest: Diplomats from the 27 EU governments discussed the plan on Monday in the so-called Relex meeting. Permanent representatives will seek to agree on the list on Wednesday.
PREPARING FOR TRUMP
METSOLA: EU MUST STEP UP TO LEAD FREE WORLD IF TRUMP RETURNS. “Europe must be ready to step up, irrespective of what happens in the United States,” including by setting up a new EU defense budget, European Parliament President Roberta Metsola told Playbook Monday night, commenting on former President Donald Trump’s latest threat inviting Russia to attack Europeans.
Stand strong: “It must be ready to shoulder the responsibility if necessary and be ready for any eventuality,” Metsola said, adding: “Europe cannot waver, when we see what could happen across the Atlantic … Europe needs to stand strong.”
Asked what that meant in practice, Metsola said: “We need a defense union and we need to spend more on defense.”
Europe’s wake-up call: Metsola is joining a growing chorus of leaders who warn that the EU can no longer afford to stick its head in the sand. Metsola’s EPP colleague Manfred Weber previously told Playbook that the EU needed to now seriously arm up and accept France’s offer to discuss sharing its nuclear deterrent.
Be ready to act if Washington doesn’t: While Metsola said a European defense union should be “complementing, not competing with NATO,” she also stressed that Europe needed to “strengthen our defense industry and get practical about our strategic autonomy,” to be able to act if Washington doesn’t.
New EU defense budget: Asked what Parliament could do about it, Metsola said MEPs have already called for and would continue pushing for “joint procurement” and “development” of weapons to be “financed by the Union through a dedicated budget under parliamentary co-decision and scrutiny.”
New leader of the free world: “Europe must become the new shining city upon a hill,” Metsola said in Estonia’s parliament on Monday — a reference to Ronald Reagan’s mantra that the U.S. should be that shining beacon of freedom for the world.
Everyone’s channeling their inner Reagan: Last week, Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk warned America that “Reagan, who helped millions of us to win back our freedom and independence, must be turning in his grave today,” after Republicans blocked a U.S. aid package for Ukraine.
TODAY — VDL MEETS MACRON: Amid the latest escalation in Trump’s rhetoric and Washington’s continued inability to agree on aid for Ukraine, Commission President Ursula von der Leyen will today speak with French President Emmanuel Macron in Paris.
EU defense bonds: Macron last month called for EU defense bonds — a proposal that is now picking up pace — with the two leaders likely to discuss it today.
SCHOLZ FIRES BACK AT TRUMP — BUT OFFERS NO PLAN TO DEFEND EUROPE: “Nobody is allowed to play or ‘make deals’ with Europe’s security,” German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said in Berlin on Monday, following Trump’s comments over the weekend.
That’s really gonna convince Trump: “Any relativization of NATO’s guarantee of assistance is irresponsible and dangerous, and is solely in the interests of Russia,” Scholz added, as my colleague James Angelos reports here.
Hope is his strategy: Scholz still hasn’t taken up France’s offer to discuss a nuclear defense for the EU — nor explained how Europe should finance its defense if Trump wins November’s U.S. election and further undermines NATO.
Cold shower: The chancellor was speaking at a presser with Poland’s Tusk, who remarked that Trump’s words “should act like a cold shower for all of us, especially for those who have not noticed this real threat we are dealing with.”
Return of the Weimar Triangle: Hours earlier, Tusk was in Paris visiting Macron to send a clear message: Poland — which now has one of the biggest militaries in Europe — is ready to play a leading role together with France and Germany in an alliance also known as the Weimar Triangle. More on Tusk’s comments here, from Clea Caulcutt.
Speaking of which: The foreign ministers of the three countries — Annalena Baerbock, Stéphane Séjourné and Radosław Sikorski — on Monday marked the return of the Triangle with a meeting in the ornate Château de La Celle Saint-Cloud, just under an hour outside Paris.
Their message: “Every minute counts to prepare us to absorb the shock of a Trump election,” said Séjourné. More on the meetings of leaders and foreign ministers here from Hans von der Burchard and Clea, who were with Baerbock and Séjourné in Paris, and James Angelos in Berlin.
Wait, has Trump done Europe a favor? In one fell swoop over the weekend, Trump freed Europe from the confines of the American security bubble. The Continent might finally get real about defending itself, Matthew Karnitschnig writes here.
ISRAEL-HAMAS
BORRELL CALLS ON WEST TO STOP SENDING WEAPONS TO ISRAEL: “Everybody goes to Tel Aviv begging ‘please protect civilians, don’t kill so many,’” but Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu “doesn’t listen to anyone,” the EU’s top diplomat Josep Borrell said Monday.
He added: “President Biden said this is too much … well if you believe that too many people are being killed, maybe you should provide less arms.”
Background: Israel looks set to launch a ground offensive on Rafah in the south of Gaza — where about 1.3 million people who fled the war are now trapped in a very small area. Netanyahu last week ordered civilians to “evacuate” the area.
Borrell continued: “They are going to evacuate — where, to the moon? Where are they going to evacuate these people?” My colleague Paula Andrés has more.
Following that logic: A court in the Netherlands on Monday ordered the Dutch government to halt shipments of components to Israel for F-35 fighter jets, to ensure the Netherlands complies with the U.N. court ruling ordering Israel to prevent a possible genocide in Gaza.
Spotlight on Berlin: Germany massively ramped up weapons shipments to Israel following Hamas’ October 7 terrorist attack, with exports increasing nearly tenfold.
But even Berlin is now warning Bibi: “If the Israeli army were to launch an attack on Rafah, it would be a premeditated humanitarian disaster,” Foreign Minister Baerbock said on Monday. Baerbock is receiving her Palestinian counterpart Riad Malki in Berlin today.
Eyes wide open: And it’s not just Baerbock’s ministry. Senior government officials told my Berlin Playbook colleague Gordon Repinski they were worried about a possible attack in Rafah. “That could no longer be justified,” one said.
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ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE
BIG TECH PROMISES TO CRUSH AI FAKES: Big Tech will pledge to crack down on deceptive artificial intelligence-generated content aimed at influencing elections.
New agreement: A draft seen by POLITICO, and expected to be unveiled at the Munich Security Conference that kicks off on Friday, shows that signatory companies will promise to track and stamp out deceptive content spreading on social media and inform and educate the public about the emerging threat — in a year when hundreds of millions of people will vote in India, the EU and the U.S., among others.
Who’s in the alliance? Microsoft, Google, Meta (which owns Instagram and Facebook), TikTok, OpenAI and Adobe are expected to sign, according to four people briefed on the discussions. Meta confirmed to POLITICO it was part of the agreement, and said Adobe, Google, LinkedIn, Microsoft, OpenAI and TikTok would also join.
Notably absent from that list: X marks the spot. POLITICO Pro subscribers can get the whole story from Océane Herrero, Gian Volpicelli and Antoaneta Roussi and here.
MEET THE VATICAN’S AI BOSS: Friar Paolo Benanti has the ear of Pope Francis as well as Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni in calling for “human-centric” AI that shouldn’t be allowed to run rampant.Gian spoke to him about his influence on AI policy.
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IN OTHER NEWS
EU MOVES ON RUSSIA’S FROZEN ASSETS: The Council of the EU on Monday adopted a decision and a regulation that pave the way toward using the profits generated by confiscated Russian assets to finance Ukraine’s reconstruction. Details here by Joe Stanley-Smith.
GENTILONI WANTS A STRONGER PARLIAMENT: Economy Commissioner Paolo Gentiloni has called for a stronger European Parliament — something he said the Commission is “not always enthusiastic about.” Speaking at an event in Rome on Monday, the Italian said: “If we want to make a change, we need a stronger European Parliament.” Ahead of the EU election in June, Gentiloni added: “At a time when democracies are under attack, we are more convinced than ever that in a democracy we are better off.” H/t Tom Nicholson.
FRANCE UNEARTHS RUSSIAN DISINFO NETWORK: French authorities say they have discovered (another) Russian-based disinformation network targeting Western Europe. Viginum, the French disinformation watchdog, said it had identified plans for a propaganda campaign in France, Germany, Poland and other European countries ahead of the EU election. More from The Economist.
THE FLEMISH SHAKE-DOWN: The Belgian region of Flanders is planning to force Instagram, TikTok and YouTube to contribute financially to the production of Flemish films and TV series, on the grounds that Flemish-made content is available on those platforms and helps the companies make money. Mathieu Pollet and Pieter Haeck have the details.