Iran is sending more crude through Hormuz NOW than it was before the war — “showing it is in control of a strategic waterway that it has closed off to the rest of the region’s oil producers.”
@wsj.com
www.wsj.com/world/middle...
Again I'm reminded of Juncker's prediction about the unworkability of the EU's 2-president system created in 2009.
One president says the EU is giving up on the rules-based international order. The next day, the other one says the EU will defend and uphold it.
Strategic cacophony.
Love how direct the Finnish Security and Intelligence Service is in its annual National Security Overview, just published
supo.fi/en/overview
Not just a one-off - Merz (EPP), Meloni (ECR) and De Wever (ECR) are organising another pre-European Council meeting of selected leaders on competitiveness, which for them holds a big focus on simplification/deregulation:
⏰ 22h55 sur france·tv
Avec :
📌 Karim AMELLAL, ambassadeur de France pour la Méditerranée (2020-2025)
📌 Alice RUFO, Ministre déléguée auprès de la ministre des Armées
📌 Farid VAHID, Politologue à la Fondation Jean-Jaurès, franco-iranien
📌 Béligh NABLI, Professeur de droit public
Can US maintain European & East Asian buy-in for an extended Iran War?
The pain will multiply:energy, food,commodities,refugees, chips, AI..
Coalition mgmt during wartime is very hard because countries face unequal burdens & have their own domestic politics
www.phenomenalworld.org/analysis/con...
Polls have closed in the first of this year's five German state elections, in prosperous Baden-Württemberg. It's looking like a remarkable win-from-behind by the Greens under @oezdemir.de. Full results over the course of the evening.
The first of five German state elections this year takes place tomorrow in Baden-Württemberg (home of Daimler, Porsche, Bosch, SAP). Looks set to be photo finish between CDU and Greens - remarkable achievement by Greens' @oezdemir.de, whose party was 10+ points behind in autumn.
Super! Tu me le prêtes?
"Energy prices going to the moon are a problem, and we need to decarbonize while some fossil fuel extraction continues. The dilemma is how to navigate these tensions while transitioning a system that was already lacking in information in its previous state."
-> @alexbhturnbull.bsky.social in 2023
Fascinating to watch 🇫🇷, then 🇬🇧, then 🇮🇹, now 🇩🇪 start to acknowledge what 🇪🇸's government recognised from the very start: the Trump-Netanyahu war on Iran is a reckless intervention conducted without regard for rules of war and without a strategy for what comes next.
www.bloomberg.com/news/article...
Dans le Magazine du Monde cette semaine, Félicité Herzog raconte pourquoi elle quitte Vivendi et la famille Bolloré. À la tête de la librairie l’Ecume des pages jusqu’à mi-février, elle dénonce des ingérences idéologiques
www.lemonde.fr/m-le-mag/art...
The global political order is in a moment of profound change--how might it be reshaping the EU? Looking forward to discussing my recent JEI article (link in comments below) on the EU's security turn at the LSE on Tuesday, March 10 at 12:15. RSVP (in person or Zoom): www.lse.ac.uk/european-ins... 1/
New piece on Chinese tech investment in Europe — fittingly out the day the Commission publishes the Industrial Accelerator Act, kicking off months of legislative wrangling.
A look at the data and recent cases shows Europe has learned to block Chinese takeovers of tech & semiconductor assets.
1/
Le CEPII au @printempsdeleco.bsky.social
"Quel avenir pour l’Europe dans un monde de rapports de force ?"
📍17/03 11h05-12h00 @lecese.fr
🎙️I.Bensidoun, @thomas-grjebine.bsky.social, @mathildedupre.bsky.social, @shahinvallee.bsky.social
👉Inscriptions & livestream www.printempsdeleco.fr/14e-edition-...
Macron speech transcript 🇬🇧 version now available
www.elysee.fr/en/emmanuel-...
G7 plans to diversify CRM supplies may be easier said than done
• Not all critical minerals are that critical, meaning prioritisation efforts will be key
• Beyond mining, China controls bulk of global refining capacity - making it hard to escape Chinese leverage
www.economist.com/briefing/202...
Good debate between Nils and Shahin!
FT comments section this morning - saying what everyone else is thinking, right?
Finally, it’s not really in the scope but critical to assess the overall framework. what will happen to EV tariffs and to the negotiations on price undertakings for Chinese made EV?
Also, no clear guidance on subsidy schemes from the EU when one could have mandated EV only (not Hybrids) and life cycle emissions rather than only on road emissions.
The FDI / joint venture provisions are better but they only apply when the partner controls 40% of the world market. Why such a high threshold rather than discretionary choices where we want to force fair JV and technology transfers?
The EU rules of origins include all EU free trading partners unless one can document the existence of local content rules from which the EU is excluded as advocated by BMWE and Bruegel. We should have done the exact reverse.
The proposal confuses energy intensive and strategic sectors and ends up with a very narrow and entirely arbitrary scope of covered sectors (cement in and quantum computing chips out?)
A good thread by @nilsredeker.bsky.social but I disagree with his optimistic assessment of the @ec.europa.eu IAA. A quick thread :
"NATO is a platform for the United States to project power on the world stage," NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte tells the American right-wing news channel Newsmax.
He just said the quiet part out loud.
Can’t make this up
After months of wrangling and an epic list of delays, the Commission has finally released its Industrial Accelerator Act.
This could turn into one of the EU’s most consequential industrial policy files in years - and the proposal is honestly not a bad place to start.
Some quick thoughts:
