Europe

The survey found that 32% of eligible voters believe Germany has worsened since Merz took office in May, while just 22% say the country has improved. A further 37% perceive no change at all.

Archived version

The Russian treasury has been hit by the reduction of oil and gas revenues and the deterioration of the economy.

The Russian authorities need to look for additional revenues for the treasury, which has been hit by the reduction of oil and gas revenues and the worsening situation in the economy. The head of the Federation Council Committee on Budget and Financial Markets Anatoly Artamonov said this on Wednesday, The Moscow Times reports (link to article in Russian).

The senator said measures need to be taken "urgently" as "assessments of economic indicators" have become "more pessimistic" and commodity revenues are declining.

"We need to use all available resources to increase the revenue base," Artamonov urged. In particular, he said, it is necessary to consider the abolition of some tax benefits, the amount of which has now reached one third of the federal budget.

In addition, Artamonov continued, the level of shadow employment in Russia remains high, when individuals avoid paying income tax and contributions to social funds. We are talking, in particular, about salaries "in envelopes", the volume of which was previously estimated by the authorities at 10 trillion rubles a year.

Also, "our persistent reluctance to deal with privatization issues is perplexing," the senator said, adding that all the measures he listed are "reserves to replenish the budget" (quoted by Interfax).

Money is increasingly needed by the federal treasury, which spends every third ruble on the war - a record share since the Soviet Union. According to the Ministry of Finance, oil and gas revenues fell by 17% in the first half of this year, while total revenues grew by only 3%, meaning that in real terms (adjusted for inflation) they began to shrink. At the same time, expenditures jumped by 20%. As a result, in six months the budget has a "hole" of 3.7 trillion rubles - 6 times more than in the same period a year ago.

Reserves for patching budget "holes" are nearing exhaustion: the liquid assets of the National Welfare Fund, which before the war reached $120 billion, by July 1, 2025 reduced to $52.6 billion, that is, almost 2.5 times. If oil prices remain low, this reserve will be completely used up as early as next year, economists at the Russian Academy of National Economy and Public Administration warned.

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The Ukrainian branch of the American right-wing extremist organization the Base has claimed responsibility for the assassination of Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) Colonel Ivan Voronych in Kyiv.

A joint international operation, known as Eastwood and coordinated by Europol and Eurojust, targeted the cybercrime network NoName057(16). Law enforcement and judicial authorities from Czechia, France, Finland, Germany, Italy, Lithuania, Poland, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, the Netherlands and the United States took simultaneous actions against offenders and infrastructure belonging to the pro-Russian cybercrime network. The investigation was also supported by ENISA, as well as Belgium, Canada, Estonia, Denmark, Latvia, Romania and Ukraine. The private parties ShadowServer and abuse.ch also assisted in the technical part of the operation.

[...]

The actions led to the disruption of an attack-infrastructure consisting of over one hundred computer systems worldwide, while a major part of the group's central server infrastructure was taken offline. Germany issued six warrants for the arrest of offenders living in the Russian Federation. Two of these persons are accused of being the main instigators responsible for the activities of "NoName057(16)". In total, national authorities have issued seven arrest warrants, which are directed, inter alia, against six Russian nationals for their involvement in the NoName057(16) criminal activities. All of the suspects are listed as internationally wanted, and in some cases, their identities are published in media. Five profiles were also published on the EU Most Wanted website.

[...]

• 2 arrests (1 preliminary arrest in France and 1 in Spain)
• 7 arrest warrants issued (6 by Germany, and 1 by Spain)
• 24 house searches (2 in Czechia, 1 in France, 3 in Germany, 5 in Italy, 12 in Spain, 1 in Poland)
• 13 individuals questioned (2 in Germany, 1 in France 4 in Italy, 1 in Poland, 5 in Spain)
• Over 1 000 supporters, 15 of which administrators, notified for their legal liability via a messaging app
• Over 100 servers disrupted worldwide
• Major part of NoName057(16) main infrastructure taken offline

[...]

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/38711310

Oxford University Press (OUP) will no longer publish a controversial academic journal sponsored by China’s Ministry of Justice after years of concerns that several papers in the publication did not meet ethical standards about DNA collection.

A statement published on the website of Forensic Sciences Research (FSR) states that OUP will stop publishing the quarterly journal after this year.

FSR is a journal that comes from China’s Academy of Forensic Science, an agency that sits under the Ministry of Justice. The academy describes FSR as “the only English quarterly journal in the field of forensic science in China that focuses on forensic medicine”. It has been published by OUP since 2023.

Several papers published in FSR have attracted criticism because they study genetic data from Uyghurs and other heavily surveilled ethnic minorities in China. Critics say subjects in the studies may not have freely consented to their DNA samples being used in the research and that the studies could help to enhance the mass surveillance of those populations.

One study, published in 2020, analysed blood samples from 264 Uyghurs in Ürümqi, the capital of the Xinjiang region in north-west China. The paper states that the people giving the samples consented to the research and that their data was anonymised.

The lead author on the study is affiliated with China’s state security apparatus via the Xinjiang Police College, which provided a research grant.

[...]

Yves Moreau, a professor of engineering at the University of Leuven in Belgium who focuses on DNA analysis, first raised concerns about OUP’s relationship with FSR and about several studies. He said he was grateful for OUP’s decision but that the brief public statement on the matter “fails to address the important issues at stake”.

[...]

In recent years there has been increasing scrutiny about the ethical standards of genetic research papers from China. Last year, a genetics journal from a leading scientific publisher retracted 18 papers from China due to concerns about human rights.

The concerns centre on whether or not vulnerable populations in China can freely refuse to participate, especially when researchers come from organisations, such as the police, affiliated with state security. There are also concerns that this kind of forensic DNA sampling could produce research that enhances the mass surveillance of those populations.

Moreau said: “Forensic genetics is an area where specific caution is needed because this is the research that powers police DNA identification and databases. While DNA identification is a valuable technique to help solve crimes, it can raise privacy and ethical issues.” He added that the mass surveillance of minorities in Xinjiang and Tibet made China a particularly challenging country to enforce international norms about ethical research and human rights.

[...]

Archived

[...]

The Kremlin has removed at least 19,546 Ukrainian children from their families for re-education as Russians according to Kyiv, a war crime that has prompted the International Criminal Court to issue an arrest warrant for Putin. Of those taken, only 1,399 have been returned to Ukraine, through volunteers or relatives travelling vast distances, or in agreements brokered by third countries such as South Africa, Qatar or the Vatican.’

[...]

During the Istanbul peace talks between the two warring sides last month, the Ukrainian delegation gave their Kremlin counterparts a list of 339 Ukrainian children being held in Russia, Zarivna said. “It wasn’t a full list. It was a test… a small first step,” she said. “It was a way to see whether Russia is truly prepared to begin the process of returning Ukrainian children.”

In public, Russia denied that any of the 339 children had been abducted. But privately, the Russian side “suggested swapping [the children] like poker chips for Russian prisoners of war,” Zarivna said. The idea of trading children was as abhorrent for the Americans as the Ukrainians, she said, and slowly the Trump administration began to understand the nature of Putin’s regime.

[...]

Ireland's Data Protection Commission (DPC) has announced that it has opened an inquiry into TikTok Technology Limited’s (TikTok) transfers of EEA users’ personal data to servers located in China.

[...]

In April 2025, TikTok informed the DPC of an issue that it had discovered in February 2025, namely that limited EEA user data had in fact been stored on servers in China, contrary to TikTok’s evidence to the previous inquiry.

[...]

The DPC’s decision, which issued following the inquiry cooperation procedure with peer EU regulators under the GDPR One Stop Shop mechanism, expressed its deep concern that TikTok had submitted inaccurate information to that inquiry. In its press release issued at the time of the conclusion of that inquiry, the DPC stated that it was taking those developments “very seriously” and was “considering what further regulatory action may be warranted, in consultation with our peer EU Data Protection Authorities”. As a result of that consideration, the DPC has now decided to open this new inquiry into TikTok.

[...]

Since January 2025, six tankers have been struck by unexplained explosions shortly after entering Russian ports. Many questions remain about the circumstances surrounding the blasts but several industry analysts believe sabotage, carried out by a state actor, is most likely responsible.

Archived

Belgium’s Central Business Council (CCE-CRB) is calling on the federal government to restrict the influx of cheap parcels from Chinese webshops Shein, Temu and AliExpress, as they are unsafe and damaging to the economy, De Tijd reports. The appeal is backed by consumer association Testachats and the customs service.

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An average of 1,600 parcels were declared each day via Belgium’s customs service in 2017, a number that rose to 1 million in 2023 and 3 million last year. These are parcels with a declared value of less than 150 euros, the limit below which no import duty has to be paid.

“Almost all of them are parcels from China,” Kristian Vanderwaeren, director general of Belgian customs [said].

...

Of the Chinese parcels that are checked, 40 per cent are in breach of regulations, such as the contents not matching the description on the label. The value assigned to a parcel by the sender is often much lower than the actual value, allowing them to avoid import duties.

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Of the Chinese parcels that are checked, 40 per cent are in breach of regulations, such as the contents not matching the description on the label. The value assigned to a parcel by the sender is often much lower than the actual value, allowing them to avoid import duties.

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“I am preparing strict measures: more controls, better cooperation between the authorities and the quick withdrawal of non-compliant products from the market,” [Belgium's] Federal Economy minister David Clarinval .... said.

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[UK] counter-terror police have warned the activity of hostile states on British soil is posing a growing threat and urged families to watch for signs their children are being manipulated.

Teenagers, along with petty criminals and disillusioned people, may be more vulnerable to recruitment by Russia, Iran and China, they warned.

Hostile states are increasingly using proxies to carry out acts of sabotage and targeted violence in the UK, counter-terror police said, adding that investigating such activity now accounts for about 20% of their workload.

Parents and teachers should "be inquisitive" and "seek help" if they think a child is at risk, police advised.

Since the Salisbury poisonings in 2018 – which targeted Russian double agent Sergei Skripal – there has been a five-fold increase in police work to tackle hostile activity, commanders said.

"The breadth, complexity and volume of these operations has continued to grow at a rate that I'm not sure that us, or our partners internationally, or any intelligence community predicted," Dominic Murphy, head of the Metropolitan Police's Counter-Terrorism Command, told reporters.

"We are increasingly seeing these three states, but not just these three states, undertaking threat to life operations in the United Kingdom."

[...]

The Metropolitan Police is now putting additional resources into tackling hostile state activity, with training for officers in "foreign interference" and hundreds taking part in recent exercises in how to respond.

"We're working with local force chiefs up and down the country to raise awareness and ensure that there really is an increased understanding about this threat," Ms Evans said.

[...]

Archived (archive.org)

Alternative source: "UK lifts ban on Pakistani airlines, removes country from Air Safety List" (Dawn)

This will enable Ukrainians to call, text and use their mobile data from Ukrainian phone numbers in the 27 EU countries at no extra cost, and extend the same benefits to end users from the EU who may be in Ukraine.

cross-posted from: https://feddit.org/post/15750762

NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte warned on Wednesday that countries such as Brazil, China and India could be hit very hard by secondary sanctions if they continued to do business with Russia.

Archived

[...] France

Anatoly Kuzichev, co-host of the talk show Vremya Pokazhet (lit. “Time Will Tell”) on Kremlin-controlled Perviy Kanal (lit. “Channel One”), has made frequent visits to Paris in recent years. Travel records suggest that he also enjoys Amsterdam, Barcelona, Venice, and even the United States.

Kuzichev is not alone in his fondness for France. Other Kremlin propagandists who frequent the country include:

• Marina Danielyan, chief of staff to the CEO of Channel One
• Larisa Krymova, head of public relations and internet broadcasting at Channel One
• Alexander Fayfman, first deputy CEO of Channel One
• Marina Kataya, deputy executive producer at NTV
• Sergey Burygin, deputy CEO of REN TV
• Yulia Bystritskaya, CEO of TV Center
• Oleg Volnov, deputy CEO of Channel One for political programming
• Gennady Gokhshtein, deputy CEO of VGTRK
• Aleksey Yefimov, CEO of Channel One’s international division
• Vadim Takmenyov, deputy executive producer at NTV
• Anatoly Tupitsyn, executive producer at LLC AKCEPT (the legal name of REN TV)
• Igor Ugolnikov, CEO of the VoenFilm Studio
• Darya Khubova, executive producer at Vremya (Channel One's main evening newscast)
• Pyotr Shepin, commercial director at Channel One
• Alexander Yakovenko, deputy director of news at NTV
• Nailya Asker-Zade, television host and media personality

[...]

[The article lists dozens of other Russian propagandists who frequently visit European countries like Spain, Italy, Croatia, Estonia, Belgium, Norway, Switzerland, Germany, Greece, Cyprus, Austria, Finland.]