Europe

Thursday was the first day of former Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn's highly publicised Gaza Tribunal, which aims to hold Britain accountable for its role in enabling Israel’s ongoing war crimes in Gaza.

The independent MP, now a key figure in the establishment of a new left-wing party, put forward a bill earlier this year for a public Chilcot-style inquiry into Britain's military cooperation with Israel.

But the Labour government blocked the bill. This unofficial two-day inquest is taking place instead.

There was nothing trivial about the tribunal. Eyewitnesses, UN rapporteurs, journalists, medics and academics all gave evidence on Thursday.

cross-posted from: https://scribe.disroot.org/post/4385794

Since Russian tanks rolled into Ukraine in 2022, European countries that share borders with Russia have ramped up security on their eastern borders.

Finland recently completed the first stretch of a wall along its 1,340-kilometre frontier with Russia and has been closely monitoring an increase in Russian troop movements on the other side.

This summer, Poland added protective minefields to a 20-kilometre stretch bordering both Russia and Belarus, as part of its sprawling “East Shield” development programme for defence infrastructure.

Now, the NATO-members are looking to the natural world to further fortify their defences – by revitalising peat bogs.

Wetlands that accumulate peat are made up of spongy, waterlogged ground that is impenetrable for tanks. They are typically found in cooler northern climates and are dotted throughout the northern and eastern European nations that share land borders with Russia and Belarus.

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cross-posted from: https://scribe.disroot.org/post/4385351

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The incidents took place amid this week’s large-scale Russian drone and missile attacks on Ukraine, Poland’s eastern neighbour. They also came two weeks after another drone – later confirmed to be Russian – exploded in eastern Poland.

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However, [Polish defence minister Władysław Kosiniak-Kamysz] added that the drones had been constantly tracked over Polish territory by “both national and…allied resources” and later left Poland’s airspace without causing any damage, reports broadcaster TVN.

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[It was not revealed] what types of drones had been detected, their origin, nor where the incidents had taken place [as] one reason for not providing more details was that “the recipient of this type of information is Russia [and] we don’t want to make their work easier”.

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cross-posted from: https://scribe.disroot.org/post/4384896

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A Russian rocket attack on Thursday on northern Ukraine killed two people from the Danish Refugee Council who were clearing mines in an area previously occupied by Moscow’s forces, the local Ukrainian governor said.

Experts say Ukraine is the most heavily mined country in the world, with teams of deminers across the north, south, and east, where Ukraine retook land captured by Russia at the start of its 2022 invasion.

“The Russians deliberately targeted workers from the Danish Refugee Council’s humanitarian demining mission… two people are known to have been killed,” Chernihiv regional governor Vyacheslav Chaus posted on social media.

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The strike hit near the outskirts of the regional capital of Chernihiv, 125 kilometres (80 miles) north of Kyiv.

“First, the Russians littered the area with explosives and mines. Now they are killing people, civilians who are risking their lives to clear our land,” Chaus added.

Three more people were wounded in the attack, he said.

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cross-posted from: https://scribe.disroot.org/post/4370342

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The operation, carried out across southern Moldova, revealed a sophisticated Kremlin-backed network that laundered money through Promsvyazbank (PSB)—a Russian bank under sanctions for funding Moscow’s war machine—and deployed Telegram bots to both transfer cash and flood Moldovan social media with pro-Russian propaganda. Police recovered large sums of cash in multiple currencies, Russian bank cards, laptops, and even a luxury Tesla vehicle, tying the scheme to Moscow’s hybrid warfare playbook.

More than 60 raids targeted political party financing schemes and vote-buying operations, a move that follows President Maia Sandu’s July warning of an unprecedented Russian campaign to destabilize Moldova. Sandu has accused Moscow of pouring an estimated €100 million in illicit crypto funding into the elections, backing fake candidates and criminal proxies to undermine the country’s pro-European path.

Evidence seized in this week’s operation shows cross-border financial activity reminiscent of the “Russian Laundromat” scandal, which funneled billions out of Russia through Moldovan and Latvian banks between 2010 and 2014. The arrests underscore how Kremlin-backed operatives continue to exploit Moldova’s southern regions, including Gagauzia and Russian-controlled Transnistria, as staging grounds for political sabotage.

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Russia’s goal is clear: destabilize Moldova, stall its European future, and entrench its influence in Eastern Europe. But this week’s raids show that the Kremlin’s operatives are being hunted down and exposed, and that Moldova is no longer standing alone against Moscow’s aggression.

cross-posted from: https://scribe.disroot.org/post/4370265

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"Europe, and Germany in particular, has outstanding scientists, institutions and innovation systems. The support for research in Germany is enviable, and the path from lab to market is historically strong," says Mona Nemer, Canada's chief science advisor.

"But advice to government is fragmented; during the pandemic, countries without a science advisor were absent from critical international coordination calls. A national science advisor integrates advice from diverse stakeholders into coherent, impartial recommendations for the government, not on behalf of a single institution, but for the benefit of the country."

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cross-posted from: https://scribe.disroot.org/post/4370059

• 68% of EU citizens want the EU to play a greater role in protecting citizens against international crises and security risks
• Nine out of ten Europeans citizens call on Member States to tackle current global challenges together (90%) and most believe the EU needs greater means (77%) to prevail in a rapidly changing geopolitical landscape
• Defence and security (37%) as well as competitiveness, economy and industry (32%) should be the EU’s focus, to reinforce its position in the world
• To invest in what matters, 78% of EU citizens believe that more projects should be funded by the EU as a whole and 91% say the European Parliament should be properly informed and equipped to control EU spending

[Edit typo.]

cross-posted from: https://scribe.disroot.org/post/4369022

• New sanctions target those supporting Putin’s attempts to forcibly deport and indoctrinate Ukraine’s children and erase their Ukrainian cultural heritage
• Package of 11 designations includes leading Russian officials and state-linked youth organisations
• Defence intelligence demonstrates that Russia is pursuing a long-standing Russification policy in illegally temporarily occupied territories of Ukraine, seeking to eradicate Ukrainian culture, identity and statehood

COSMETICS retail giant Lush has closed all of its UK stores in protest at Israel’s actions in Palestine.

Lush, which operates more than 100 stores across the UK, has also closed down its factories and website for the day. Visitors are instead greeted with a page in the colours of the Palestinian flag which reads: “Stop starving Gaza. We are closed in solidarity.”

Lush said it hopes to push the UK Government into greater action by depriving it of a day's worth of tax revenue from its business.

As the EU’s legislative process kicks off, MEPs will begin debating the EU-US tariff deal on Wednesday. A heated exchange with the European Commission is expected.

Italian dockworkers have threatened to “shut down all of Europe” and block all shipments to Israel if communication with the latest aid flotilla bound for Gaza is lost. The threat marks a significant escalation in dockworkers’ long history of industrial action in solidarity with Palestine.

Speaking at a procession in the port of Genoa – one of Italy’s two largest commercial ports – on behalf of the Unione Sindacale di Base (USB), a syndicate of various grassroots unions in Italy and thought to be the largest of its kind, the dockworker said: “If we lose contact with our boats, with our comrades – even for just 20 minutes – we will shut down all of Europe.”

“Our young women and men must come back without a scratch, and all this cargo, which belongs to the people and is going to the people, must reach its destination, down to the very last box.”

“13,000-14,000 containers leave this region every year for Israel. Not a single nail will leave anymore,” he continued.

Portugal, Netherlands, Denmark, Germany, Switzerland, Lichtenstein, Andorra, Monaco, Italy, Austria, Croatia, Kosovo, North Macedonia, Greece, Moldova, Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia and Finland must recognize Palestine!

Please folks pressure those governments officials to act now. Women and children are facing high amounts of violence from the IDF not only that but they’re also dealing with starvation. The civilians must be protected by the world and that Israel must be disarmed

Free Palestine from oppression!

cross-posted from: https://scribe.disroot.org/post/4352275

The Commission is collecting input on 2 key initiatives: the EU Electrification Action Plan and the EU Heating and Cooling Strategy.

Interested parties and citizens are invited to contribute to the call for evidence and open public consultation on the EU Electrification Action Plan and to the call for evidence and open public consultation on the EU Heating and Cooling Strategy, via the links provided.

The calls for evidence and the public consultations will continue until 20 November 2025. The feedback received will feed into the Commission’s work on these initiatives, planned for publication in the first quarter of 2026.

Both initiatives were announced in the Clean Industrial Deal and the Action Plan for Affordable Energy to further support the EU's energy affordability and competitiveness, reinforcing energy security, while advancing towards the achievement of our energy and climate targets. The initiatives are closely interlinked and seek to ensure progress towards a decarbonised energy system based on electrification and energy efficiency, driven by a substantial increase in homegrown clean energy.

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cross-posted from: https://scribe.disroot.org/post/4352168

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On September 1, nearly 20 Russian regions, along with Russian-occupied areas of Ukraine’s Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia, and Luhansk regions, officially launched a preschool version of the state-sponsored “patriotic” lesson series Important Conversations. According to the independent outlet Agentstvo, kindergartens have already received teaching manuals for the extracurricular program.

Agentstvo reviewed reports from the first sessions held in kindergartens in the Ivanovo and Chelyabinsk regions. Photos from the lessons showed a textbook titled “Important Conversations for Preschoolers.”

According to Agentstvo, the book was published in 2025 with a print run of 3,000 copies as part of a series for elementary schools called “My History.” The cover features a label indicating that the textbook “complies with the federal educational program for preschool education.” The subtitle reads, “The World We Live In,” and the cover lists topics such as “Family Day,” and “What Can the Kremlin Tell Us?” The book covers 30 “important topics” in total.

The volume was co-authored by Natalia Vinogardova, a member of the Russian Academy of Sciences and Doctor of Pedagogical Sciences, and Irina Khomyakova, a Pedagogical Sciences PhD candidate. Both work at the Center for Primary General Education within the Russian Education Academy’s Institute for Education Development Strategy. The institute is also responsible for designing materials used in the Important Conversations curriculum for older students, Agentstvo notes.

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