Category: Politico News

35. Craig Saunders and Louise Berwick  A top civil service power couple. Louise Berwick manages communications on foreign affairs and defense in Downing Street. Her husband, Craig Saunders, is midway through moving from a top Home Office comms job to be head of news and media at the Treasury. 36. Luke Tryl and Dharmesh Nayee […]

But The POLITICO Poll also revealed limited willingness among the Western public to make sacrifices to pay for more military spending. While there is widespread support for increasing defense budgets in principle across the U.K., France, Germany and Canada, that support fell sharply when people learned it might mean taking on more government debt, cutting […]

That has rapidly changed, O’Brien said. Though unlike many networks of progressive institutions, the right has yet to set up a WhatsApp group for collaboration — “If there is, we’re not part of it,” said O’Brien — right-wing operatives and thinkers meet regularly at major events, like the CPAC and NatCon summit series.  They also […]

European leaders have spent the week talking about how to make the EU more competitive — first with industry heavyweights in Antwerp, then behind closed doors at a leaders’ retreat in Belgium. On this episode of EU Confidential, host Sarah Wheaton digs into what’s really behind the latest push to revive Europe’s economy. Are calls […]

He followed up with high-profile visits to India and China — seen by most in his team as successful. His allies have consistently defended this approach, stressing that representing Britain in the world is one of Starmer’s most important duties and that he has made a success of it. The prime minister has sought to project […]

With the bloc buffeted by multiple geopolitical crises, it’s starting to realize that it can’t come to grips with them if it only acts when all 27 member countries agree. From defense to energy to investment, the European Commission, which makes the rules, and national governments, which are supposed to implement them, are finding themselves […]

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez lodged a protest with Rome over the decision, according to newspaper El Mundo. Joking he was meeting journalists outside the castle “in splendid isolation” while others breakfasted, Irish Taoiseach Micheál Martin said “we weren’t invited” and “I don’t get the necessity” of a private club convening separately. Belgian Prime Minister […]

The Belgian capital had been without a regional government since an election in June 2024, with parties unable to agree on forming a coalition, causing chaos for the city’s finances. Brussels is currently grappling with a staggering €15 billion debt, raising concerns about a looming financial crisis.  The parties involved in this week’s talks were the Francophone […]

Leaders played down differences as they gathered at the Alden Biesen estate, with Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni saying her views on industrial strategy converged with those of German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, and brushing off suggestions the duo were trying to isolate French President Emmanuel Macron. “It is not something that we do against someone […]

That means a “NATO 3.0,” he said, where Europeans pay more for their own defense and slim NATO’s activities down to its core task of defending alliance territory. The term won immediate praise from some allies. NATO 3.0 is “a good way to explain his point, which we totally agree on,” Norwegian Defense Minister Tore […]