Latest Updates

Zelenskiy creates new role with expanded powers for ex-Defence Minister Fedorov

After a week of chaos, scandal and protest, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy acknowledged the effectiveness of sacked ex-Defence Minister Fedorov and announced his appointment to an expanded national security role with real powers.

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AI boom gives Poland and Hungary new export opportunities

Central European economies are emerging as unexpected beneficiaries of the global artificial intelligence boom, with Poland and Hungary seeing growth in exports linked to AI infrastructure.

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Graham's "hellish" Russian sanctions bill moving forward

A US sanctions bill originally promoted by the late Senator Lindsey Graham and Democrat Richard Blumenthal has moved close to passage after being stalled in Congress for more than a year.

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War enters brutal tit-for-tat phase as Ukraine strikes civilian targets destroying Wildberries warehouse

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BEYOND THE BOSPORUS: Erdogan’s son-in-law offers new revelations on 10th anniversary of failed coup

After narrowly escaping assassins, president unknowingly boarded a plane co-piloted by a member of the anti-government Gulenists, recounts Berat Albayrak.

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Arrests close in on the Russian stoligarch Rotenberg brothers’ business empire

A widening series of arrests surrounding the notorious businessmen Arkady and Boris Rotenberg has raised questions over whether two of President Vladimir Putin’s oldest and most influential allies are headed for a fall from grace.

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Xi positions China to challenge US grip on global AI rules

President Xi Jinping used the opening of China's flagship AI summit on July 17 to portray Beijing as an alternative rule-setter for artificial intelligence, unveiling a new intergovernmental body and a package of aid for developing nations.

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Ukrainian parliament frustrates Zelenskiy’s defence ministry reshuffle

Ukraine’s parliament has frustrated President Volodymyr Zelenskiy’s attempt to install a new defence leadership, exposing strains within his ruling coalition and intensifying a political crisis over the removal of Mykhailo Fedorov.

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Suspected water contamination leaves over 1,000 ill in North Macedonia's Gostivar

Magyar's constitutional overhaul tests Hungary's path from Orbán era

Turkey bans jailed Erdogan challenger Imamoglu’s latest YouTube and X accounts

Suspected water contamination leaves over 1,000 ill in North Macedonia's Gostivar

A suspected contamination of the drinking water supply has triggered a major public health scare in the western North Macedonia town of Gostivar.

Magyar's constitutional overhaul tests Hungary's path from Orbán era

OSW analysts say PM Péter Magyar's sweeping constitutional changes aimed at restoring the rule of law relied "on tools similar to those for which Fidesz was criticised for years".

Latest Updates

News

Some 2,700 Russian tourism companies were liquidated in the first half of 2026, up 52.3% year on year, as domestic demand fell and the Middle East war closed outbound routes, squeezing the small agencies that dominate the market.

Ukrainian drones killed seven workers at a Wildberries logistics centre in Russia's Tambov region and injured dozens more near Moscow, where an oil depot burned, in one of the deadliest strikes on a commercial site inside Russia.

Iran struck US military targets in four countries, hitting a fuel pier in Kuwait and an air base in Bahrain, as a seventh night of American strikes on Iran's Gulf coast cut water supplies and destroyed bridges.

Iran claims two tankers exploded in a mined corridor south of the Strait of Hormuz, a claim the US military denies, as attacks on shipping push Brent above $84 and traffic through the chokepoint collapses.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy is set to appoint former interior minister Ihor Klymenko as secretary of the National Security and Defence Council, completing another stage of a contentious wartime government reshuffle.

Tech

Iraq has licensed Starlink to operate satellite internet services, signed in Washington as part of a summit package of 48 agreements with US firms and institutions worth more than $60bn.

Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif has directed officials to ensure that all remittance inflows are processed through digital channels, saying the move would improve transparency, efficiency and economic activity.

Baku aims to diversify its hydrocarbon-dependent economy by building a domestic technology and startup sector, following earlier moves to create technology parks and free economic zones.

The Spanish subsidiary of Romanian telecom group Digi Communications has attracted nearly €1.3bn of demand from investment funds and family offices.

Trinidad and Tobago is pursuing AI-driven investment through major US-backed data centre projects, but concerns over water scarcity, electricity demand and environmental sustainability are emerging alongside promises of jobs and diversification.

Opinion

Ukrainian strikes on Russian energy infrastructure are reshaping fuel markets without significantly reducing Moscow's oil export revenues, analyst argues.

From prison cell, launches blistering attack on collapse of judiciary that will silence political dissent ahead of all elections.

The rising costs of the Ukraine war have forced the Russian government to increase spending, causing the federal budget deficit to expand further. High spending growth is making it hard for the CBR to cut rates and revive the economy.

Iran’s central bank is squeezing liquidity to defend the rial, meeting under a fifth of banks’ funding demand as inflation hits 57.7% and money supply growth tops 53% after the war with the US and Israel.

Trump has broken with the paradigm of the rules based international order and is causing chaos with his “America first” approach. But actually he has four approaches to reforming international bodies: retreat, rebel, replace and reform.

Data

Russia’s international reserves edged up to $722.4bn in the week ending 10 July, according to the Central Bank of Russia, extending a recovery after a sharp fall in late June.

Russia's central bank has warned that the recent surge in inflation is spreading beyond a temporary fuel price shock, while economists have sharply raised their forecasts for inflation and interest rates, complicating Kremlin hopes for rate cuts,

Israel's annual inflation rate fell to 1.6% in the 12 months to June, its lowest in five years, down from 1.9% in May. Monthly CPI came in flat against forecasts of a 0.1%-0.2% decline, leaving inflation inside the Bank of Israel's 1%-3% target band

Accelerating inflation pushed real wages down by 6.9% y/y in May, the sharpest annual decline in purchasing power in the past decade.

Azerbaijan exported oil, gas and related products worth a combined $10.8bn in the first half of 2026, according to State Customs Committee data.

Features

Russia’s deepening fuel crisis is spreading beyond filling-station queues into freight, agriculture, retail and public services, threatening to deliver a fresh inflationary shock as the country enters its peak harvest season.

President Volodymyr Zelenskiy's nomination of Interior Minister Ihor Klymenko to replace the popular and effective Mykhailo Fedorov has come as a great disappointment to Ukraine’s allies and the new minister faces formidable challenges.

Beirut is engaging Damascus and Israel directly under a "zero problems" policy, signing a framework agreement with Israel and agreeing a joint committee with Syria. The Israeli track stays fragile.

China has effectively priced Russia's flagship Power of Siberia-2 gas pipeline out of existence, demanding a price for gas that analysts say would make the project uneconomic.

The Kremlin is pushing the Far East as a major investment opportunity thanks to a sanctions-driven surge in trade with China and a broader wave of investment from across the continent and the Global South.

Blogs

What is in store for Ukraine? There are two starkly different possibilities. It can become Finland — a country that lost a war, lost a tenth of its territory, swallowed neutrality, and then got rich. Or it can become Afghanistan.

Ukraine just got a new Prime Minister, Serhii Koretskyi, an oil and gas man that cut his teeth as an oil trader in the private sector before going to run Ukraine’s two biggest energy companies: Ukrnafta and Naftogaz.

Tehran's cafés and traffic jams are back weeks into renewed war, but residents interviewed say inflation and the cost of rebuilding now dominate conversation, with little appetite for another round of fighting.

The European Union's renewed drive to expand eastwards could face its biggest political obstacle yet if French far-right leader Marine Le Pen wins the 2027 presidential election.

Ukraine is likely to get a new Prime Minister today and a much more pragmatic government as a result of the surprise reshuffle that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy triggered by asking the current Prime Minister Yuliia Svyrydenko to quit.

bneGREEN

Poland has assembled a 10-country coalition to press Brussels to slow the tightening of the bloc’s emissions trading system and reconsider a carbon market for buildings and road transport.

Cambodia approved more than $1bn worth of renewable energy projects in the first half of 2026, strengthening its clean energy capacity and supporting broader investment growth.

Latin American economies face renewed inflationary pressure and possible delays to interest rate cuts if a strong El Niño weather pattern disrupts food production, electricity generation and infrastructure this year, Swiss bank UBS said in a note.

Polish scientists have urged lawmakers to hold an urgent parliamentary debate on the climate crisis and accelerate both emissions reductions and adaptation measures.

The planet’s seas are on their way to being as warm as bath water as the predicted super El Niño arrives. It is already clear that this year’s oceanic heating event will be the most powerful on record.

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