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It could have been a Mitchell and Webb sketch – a man with a very German accent and a distinguished Nazi grandfather complaining: “These foreigners, coming over here, importing their antisemitism.” Only this was not a comedy. The man was Germany’s chancellor, Friedrich Merz, and he was making his complaint last month in an interview … Read more

In the years after the Brexit referendum, the deterioration of Anglo-French relations became one measure of the sorry disconnect between a radicalised, reckless Conservative party and any sane notion of the national interest. In 2021, a bellicose Boris Johnson sent Royal Navy frigates to patrol off the coast of Jersey in response to a dispute with … Read more

Shahin Vallée Joseph de Weck European governments are once again haunted by a tough choice between financing the military or spending on social programmes. That, at any rate, is the narrative that has taken hold since Donald Trump’s retreat from the postwar global security order and the urgent pressure to rearm Europe. But to frame … Read more

“The housing crisis is now as big a threat to the EU as Russia,” Jaume Collboni, the mayor of Barcelona, recently declared. “We’re running the risk of having the working and middle classes conclude that their democracies are incapable of solving their biggest problem.” It is not hard to see where Collboni is coming from. … Read more

A trembling ceasefire has brought a pause to what had become the familiar sounds of explosions over Tehran. I was born in 1988, a year before the Iran-Iraq war came to an end. For my generation, war was something that belonged to the past – an impossible event, until this summer. For 12 days, we … Read more

Only half of young people in France and Spain believe that democracy is the best form of government, with support even lower among their Polish counterparts, a study has found. A majority from Europe’s generation Z – 57% – prefer democracy to any other form of government. Rates of support varied significantly, however, reaching just … Read more

Exposed as divided and marginalised during the Iran crisis, European nations are scrambling to retrieve a place at the Middle East negotiating table, fearing an impulsive Donald Trump has diminishing interest in stabilising Iran or the wider region now that he believes he has achieved his key objective of wiping out Tehran’s nuclear programme. On … Read more

When I left my family home to study at university in 2007 and moved to downtown Budapest, housing costs were hardly a topic of conversation among my friends. I rented rooms in centrally located flats for £80-£100 per month. Fast forward to 2025 and a similar room in a shared flat would set you back … Read more

Even your own language can have the capacity to surprise you. I recently joined a panel at a journalism conference with a reporter and a lawyer, both from Colombia. I found myself captivated by some of the words they used that aren’t – or rather weren’t – so common in Spain. The investigative journalist Diana … Read more