LONDON — Prime Minister Keir Starmer usually goes out of his way not to annoy Donald Trump. So he better hope the windmill-hating U.S. president doesn’t notice what the U.K. just did. In a fillip for the global offshore wind industry, Starmer’s government on Wednesday announced its biggest-ever down payment on the technology. It agreed to price guarantees, funded by billpayers to the tune of up to £1.8 billion (€2.08 billion) a year, for eight major projects in England, Scotland and Wales. The schemes have the capacity to generate 8.4 gigawatts of electricity, the U.K. energy department said — enough to power 12 million homes. It represented the biggest “wind auction in Europe to date,” said industry group WindEurope. It’s also an energy strategy that could have been tailor-made to rankle Trump. The U.S. president has repeatedly expressed a profound loathing for wind turbines and has tried to use his powers to halt construction on projects already underway in the U.S. — sending shockwaves across the global industry. Even when appearing alongside Starmer at press conferences, Trump has been unable to hide his disgust at the very sight of windmills. “You are paying in Scotland and in the U.K. … to have these ugly monsters all over the place,” he said, sitting next to Starmer during a visit to his Turnberry golf course last year. The spinning blades, Trump complained, would “kill all your birds.” At the time, the prime minister explained meekly that the U.K. was seeking a “mix” of energy sources. But this week’s investments speak far louder about his government’s priorities. The U.K.’s strategy — part of a plan to run the British power grid on 95 percent clean electricity by 2030 — is a clear signal that for all Starmer’s attempts to appease Trump, the U.K. will not heed Washington’s assertions that fossil fuels are the only way to deliver affordable bills and secure supply. “With these results, Britain is taking back control of our energy sovereignty,” said Starmer’s Energy Secretary Ed Miliband, a former leader of the Labour party. “With these results, Britain is taking back control of our energy sovereignty,” said Energy Secretary Ed Miliband. | Pool photo by Justin Tallis via Getty Images While not mentioning Trump or the U.S., he said the U.K. wanted to “stand on our two feet” and not depend on “markets controlled by petrostates and dictators.” WIND VS. GAS The goal of the U.K.’s offshore wind drive is to reduce reliance on gas for electricity generation. One of the most gas-dependent countries in Europe, the U.K. was hit hard in 2022 by the regional gas price spike that followed Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. The government ended up spending tens of billions of pounds to pay a portion of every household energy bill in the country to fend off widespread hardship. It’s a scenario that Miliband and Starmer want to avoid in future by focusing on producing electricity from domestic sources like offshore wind that are not subject to the ups and downs of global fossil fuel markets. Trump, by contrast, wants to keep Europe hooked on gas — specifically, American gas. The U.S. National Security Strategy, updated late last year, states Trump’s desire to use American fossil fuel exports to “project power.” Trump has already strong-armed the European Union into committing to buy $750 billion worth of American liquefied natural gas (LNG) as a quid pro quo for tariff relief. No one in Starmer’s government explicitly named Trump or the U.S. on Wednesday. But Chris Stark, a senior official in Miliband’s energy department tasked with delivering the 2030 goal, noted that “every megawatt of offshore wind that we’re bringing on is a few more metric tons of LNG that we don’t need to import.” The U.K.’s investment in offshore wind also provides welcome relief to a global industry that has been seriously shaken both by soaring inflation and interest rates — and more recently by a Trump-inspired backlash against net zero and clean energy. “It’s a relief for the offshore sector … It’s a relief generally, that the U.K. government is able to lean into very large positive investment stories in U.K. infrastructure,” said Tom Glover, U.K. country chair of the German energy firm RWE, which was the biggest winner in the latest offshore wind investment, securing contracts for 6.9 gigawatts of capacity. A second energy industry figure, granted anonymity because they were not authorized to speak on the record, said the U.K.’s plans were a “great signal for the global offshore wind sector” after a difficult few years — “not least the stuff in the U.S.” The other big winner was British firm SSE, which has plans to build one of the world’s largest-ever offshore wind projects, Berwick Bank — off the coast of Donald Trump’s beloved Scotland.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said that Kyiv is moving to step up pressure on Moscow with new operations targeting Russia, following a week of Russian attacks that knocked out power to Ukrainian cities as freezing temperatures set in. “Some of the operations have already been felt by the Russians. Some are still underway,” Zelenskyy said in his nightly address Saturday. “ I also approved new ones.” Zelenskyy said Ukraine’s actions include deep strikes and special measures aimed at weakening Russia’s capacity to continue the war. “We are actively defending ourselves, and every Russian loss brings the end of the war closer,” he said. He declined to provide details, saying it was “too early” to speak publicly about certain operations, but stressed that Ukraine’s security services and special forces are operating effectively. As part of Kyiv’s efforts to reduce Russia’s offensive capabilities, Ukrainian forces attacked the Zhutovskaya oil depot in Russia’s Volgograd region overnight Saturday, the General Staff said in a post on social media. Zelenskyy’s comments come after a week of escalating Russian strikes on Ukraine’s energy infrastructure, which left the regions of Zaporizhzhia and Dnipropetrovsk without electricity and heating as temperatures plunged well below zero. In the capital, renewed attacks killed at least four people and injured 25 others. The city’s mayor urged residents who could leave to do so, as roughly half of Kyiv’s apartment buildings were left without power or heat. Russia also launched a nuclear-capable Oreshnik ballistic missile at Ukraine’s Lviv region on Thursday, striking near the EU and NATO border as part of a massive barrage.

LONDON — Choosing your Brexit camp was once the preserve of Britain’s Tories. Now Labour is joining in the fun.  Six years after Britain left the EU, a host of loose — and mostly overlapping — groupings in the U.K.’s ruling party are thinking about precisely how close to try to get to the bloc. They range from customs union enthusiasts to outright skeptics — with plenty of shades of grey in between. There’s a political urgency to all of this too: with Prime Minister Keir Starmer tanking in the polls, the Europhile streak among many Labour MPs and members means Brexit could become a key issue for anyone who would seek to replace him. “The more the screws and pressure have been on Keir around leadership, the more we’ve seen that play to the base,” said one Labour MP, granted anonymity like others quoted in this piece to speak frankly. Indeed, Starmer started the new year explicitly talking up closer alignment with the European Union’s single market. At face value, nothing has changed: Starmer’s comments reflect his existing policy of a “reset” with Brussels. His manifesto red lines on not rejoining the customs union or single market remain. Most of his MPs care more about aligning than how to get there. In short, this is not like the Tory wars of the late 2010s. Well, not yet. POLITICO sketches out Labour’s nascent Brexit tribes. THE CUSTOMS UNIONISTS  It all started with a Christmas walk. Health Secretary Wes Streeting told an interviewer he desires a “deeper trading relationship” with the EU — widely interpreted as hinting at joining a customs union. This had been a whispered topic in Labour circles for a while, discussed privately by figures including Starmer’s economic adviser Minouche Shafik. Deputy Prime Minister David Lammy said last month that rejoining a customs union is not “currently” government policy — which some took as a hint that the position could shift. But Streeting’s leadership ambitions (he denies plotting for the top job) and his willingness to describe Brexit as a problem gave his comments an elevated status among Labour Europhiles.  “This has really come from Wes’s leadership camp,” said one person who talks regularly to No. 10 Downing Street. Naomi Smith, CEO of the pro-EU pressure group Best for Britain, added any Labour leadership contest will be dominated by the Brexit question. MPs and members who would vote in a race “are even further ahead than the public average on all of those issues relating to Europe,” she argued. Joining a customs union would in theory allow smoother trade without returning to free movement of people. But Labour critics of a customs union policy — including Starmer himself — argue it is a non-starter because it would mean tearing up post-Brexit agreements with other countries such as India and the U.S. “It’s just absolutely nonsense,” said a second Labour MP.    Keir Starmer has argued that the customs union route would mean hard conversations with workers in the car industry after Britain secured a U.K.-U.S. tariff deal last summer. | Colin McPherson/Getty Images And since Streeting denies plotting and did not even mention a customs union by name, the identities of the players pushing for one are understandably murky beyond the 13 Labour MPs who backed a Liberal Democrat bill last month requiring the government to begin negotiations on joining a bespoke customs union with the EU. One senior Labour official said “hardly any” MPs back it, while a minister said there was no organized group, only a vague idea. “There are people who don’t really know what it is, but realize Brexit has been painful and the economy needs a stimulus,” they said. “And there are people who do know what this means and they effectively want to rejoin. For people who know about trade, this is an absolute non-starter.” Anand Menon, director of the UK in a Changing Europe think tank, said a full rejoining of the EU customs union would mean negotiating round a suite of “add-ons” — and no nations have secured this without also being in the EU single market. (Turkey has a customs union with the EU, but does not benefit from the EU’s wider trade agreements.) “I’m not convinced the customs union works without the single market,” Menon added.  Starmer has argued that the customs union route would mean hard conversations with workers in the car industry after Britain secured a U.K.-U.S. tariff deal last summer, a person with knowledge of his thinking said. “When you read anything from any economically literate commentator, the customs union is not their go-to,” added the senior Labour official quoted above. “Keir is really strong on it. He fully believes it isn’t a viable route in the national interest or economic interest.” THE SINGLE MARKETEERS (A.K.A. THE GOVERNMENT) Starmer and his allies, then, want to park the customs union and get closer to the single market.  Paymaster General Nick Thomas-Symonds has long led negotiations along these lines through Labour’s existing EU “reset.” He and Starmer recently discussed post-Brexit policy on a walk through the grounds of the PM’s country retreat, Chequers. Working on the detail with Thomas-Symonds is Michael Ellam, the former director of communications for ex-PM Gordon Brown, now a senior civil servant in the Cabinet Office. Ellam is “a really highly regarded, serious guy” and attends regular meetings with Brussels officials, said a second person who speaks regularly to No. 10.   A bill is due to be introduced to the U.K. parliament by summer which will allow “dynamic” alignment with new EU laws in areas of agreement. Two people with knowledge of his role said the bill will be steered through parliament by Cabinet Office Minister Chris Ward, Starmer’s former aide and close ally, who was by his side when Starmer was shadow Brexit secretary during the “Brexit wars” of the late 2010s. Starmer himself talked up this approach in a rare long-form interview this week with BBC host Laura Kuenssberg, saying: “We are better looking to the single market rather than the customs union for our further alignment.” While the PM’s allies insist he simply answered a question, some of his MPs spy a need to seize back the pro-EU narrative. The second person who talks regularly to No. 10 argued a “relatively small … factional leadership challenge group around Wes” is pushing ideas around a customs union, while Starmer wants to “not match that but bypass it, and say actually, we’re doing something more practical and potentially bigger.”  A third Labour MP was blunter about No. 10’s messaging: “They’re terrified and they’re worrying about an internal leadership challenge.” Starmer’s allies argue that their approach is pragmatic and recognizes what the EU will actually be willing to accept. Christabel Cooper, director of research at the pro-Labour think tank Labour Together — which plans polling and focus groups in the coming months to test public opinion on the issue — said: “We’ve talked to a few trade experts and economists, and actually the customs union is not all that helpful. To get a bigger bang for your buck, you do need to go down more of a single market alignment route.”  Stella Creasy argued that promising a Swiss-style deal in Labour’s next election manifesto (likely in 2029) would benefit the economy — far more than the “reset” currently on the table. | Nicola Tree/Getty Images Nick Harvey, CEO of the pro-EU pressure group European Movement UK, concurred: “The fact that they’re now talking about a fuller alignment towards the single market is very good news, and shows that to make progress economically and to make progress politically, they simply have to do this.”  But critics point out there are still big questions about what alignment will look like — or more importantly, what the EU will go for.  The bill will include areas such as food standards, animal welfare, pesticide use, the EU’s electricity market and carbon emissions trading, but talks on all of these remain ongoing. Negotiations to join the EU’s defense framework, SAFE, stalled over the costs to Britain. Menon said: “I just don’t see what [Starmer] is spelling out being practically possible. Even at the highest levels there has been, under the Labour Party, quite a degree of ignorance, I think, about how the EU works and what the EU wants.   “I’ve heard Labour MPs say, well, they’ve got a veterinary deal with New Zealand, so how hard can it be? And you want to say, I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but New Zealand doesn’t have a land border with the EU.”  THE SWISS BANKERS Then there are Europhile MPs, peers and campaigners who back aligning with the single market — but going much further than Starmer.  For some this takes the form of a “Swiss-style” deal, which would allow single market access for some sectors without rejoining the customs union.   This would plough through Starmer’s red lines by reintroducing EU freedom of movement, along with substantial payments to Brussels.  But Stella Creasy, chair of the Labour Movement for Europe (LME), argued that promising a Swiss-style deal in Labour’s next election manifesto (likely in 2029) would benefit the economy — far more than the “reset” currently on the table. She said: “If you could get a Swiss-style deal and put it in the manifesto … that would be enough for businesses to invest.”  Creasy said LME has around 150 MPs as members and holds regular briefings for them. While few Labour MPs back a Swiss deal — and various colleagues see Creasy as an outlier — she said MPs and peers, including herself, plan to put forward amendments to the dynamic alignment bill when it goes through parliament.  Tom Baldwin, Starmer’s biographer and the former communications director of the People’s Vote campaign (which called for a second referendum on Brexit), also suggests Labour could go further in 2029. “Keir Starmer’s comments at the weekend about aligning with — and gaining access to — the single market open up a whole range of possibilities,” he said. “At the low end, this is a pragmatic choice by a PM who doesn’t want to be forced to choose between Europe and America.   “At the upper end, it suggests Labour may seek a second term mandate at the next election by which the U.K. would get very close to rejoining the single market. That would be worth a lot more in terms of economic growth and national prosperity than the customs union deal favoured by the Lib Dems.”  A third person who speaks regularly to No. 10 called it a “boil the frog strategy.” They added: “You get closer and closer and then maybe … you go into the election saying ‘we’ll try to negotiate something more single markety or customs uniony.’”  THE REJOINERS? Labour’s political enemies (and some of its supporters) argue this could all lead even further — to rejoining the EU one day. “Genuinely, I am not advocating rejoin now in any sense because it’s a 10-year process,” said Creasy, who is about as Europhile as they come in Labour. “Our European counterparts would say ‘hang on a minute, could you actually win a referendum, given [Reform UK Leader and Brexiteer Nigel] Farage is doing so well?’”  With Prime Minister Keir Starmer tanking in the polls, the Europhile streak among many Labour MPs and members means Brexit could become a key issue for anyone who would seek to replace him. | Tom Nicholson/Getty Images Simon Opher, an MP and member of the Mainstream Labour group closely aligned with Burnham, said rejoining was “probably for a future generation” as “the difficulty is, would they want us back?” But look into the soul of many Labour politicians, and they would love to still be in the bloc — even if they insist rejoining is not on the table now. Andy Burnham — the Greater Manchester mayor who has flirted with the leadership — remarked last year that he would like to rejoin the EU in his lifetime (he’s 56). London Mayor Sadiq Khan said “in the medium to long term, yes, of course, I would like to see us rejoining.” In the meantime Khan backs membership of the single market and customs union, which would still go far beyond No. 10’s red lines.  THE ISSUES-LED MPS Then there are the disparate — yet overlapping — groups of MPs whose views on Europe are guided by their politics, their constituencies or their professional interests. To Starmer’s left, backbench rebels including Richard Burgon and Dawn Butler backed the push toward a customs union by the opposition Lib Dems. The members of the left-wing Socialist Campaign Group frame their argument around fears Labour will lose voters to other progressive parties, namely the Lib Dems, Greens and SNP, if they fail to show adequate bonds with Europe. Some other, more centrist MPs fear similar. Labour MPs with a military background or in military-heavy seats also want the U.K. and EU to cooperate further. London MP Calvin Bailey, who spent more than two decades in the Royal Air Force, endorsed closer security relations between Britain and France through greater intelligence sharing and possibly permanent infrastructure. Alex Baker, whose Aldershot constituency is known as the home of the British Army, backed British involvement in a global Defense, Security and Resilience Bank, arguing it could be key to a U.K.-EU Defence and Security Pact. The government opted against joining such a scheme.   Parliamentarians keen for young people to bag more traveling rights were buoyed by a breakthrough on Erasmus+ membership for British students at the end of last year. More than 60 Labour MPs earlier signed a letter calling for a youth mobility scheme allowing 18 to 30-year-olds expanded travel opportunities on time limited visas. It was organized by Andrew Lewin, the Welywn Hatfield MP, and signatories included future Home Office Minister Mike Tapp (then a backbencher).  Labour also has an influential group of rural MPs, most elected in 2024, who are keen to boost cooperation and cut red tape for farmers. Rural MP Steve Witherden, on the party’s left, said: “Three quarters of Welsh food and drink exports go straight to the EU … regulatory alignment is a top priority for rural Labour MPs. Success here could point the way towards closer ties with Europe in other sectors.”  THE NOT-SO-SECRET EUROPHILES (A.K.A. ALL OF THE ABOVE) Many Labour figures argue that all of the above are actually just one mega-group — Labour MPs who want to be closer to Brussels, regardless of the mechanism. Menon agreed Labour camps are not formalized because most Labour MPs agree on working closely with Brussels. “I think it’s a mishmash,” he said. But he added: “I think these tribes will emerge or develop because there’s an intra-party fight looming, and Brexit is one of the issues people use to signal where they stand.” A fourth Labour MP agreed: “I didn’t think there was much of a distinction between the camps of people who want to get closer to the EU. The first I heard of that was over the weekend.”  The senior Labour official quoted above added: “I don’t think it cuts across tribes in such a clear way … a broader group of people just want us to move faster in terms of closeness into the EU, in terms of a whole load of things. I don’t think it fits neatly.” For years MPs were bound by a strategy of talking little about Brexit because it was so divisive with Labour’s voter base. That shifted over 2025. Labour advisers were buoyed by polls showing a rise in “Bregret” among some who voted for Brexit in 2016, as well as changing demographics (bluntly, young voters come of age while older voters die).  No. 10 aides also noted last summer that Farage, the leader of the right-wing populist party Reform UK, was making Brexit less central to his campaigning. Some aides (though others dispute this) credit individual advisers such as Tim Allan, No. 10’s director of communications, as helping a more openly EU-friendly media strategy into being. For all the talk of tribes and camps, Labour doesn’t have warring Brexit factions in the same way that the Tories did at the height of the EU divorce in the 2010s. | Jakub Porzycki/Getty Images THE BLUE LABOUR HOLDOUTS  Not everyone in Labour wants to hug Brussels tight.  A small but significant rump of Labour MPs, largely from the socially conservative Blue Labour tribe, is anxious that pursuing closer ties could be seen as a rejection of the Brexit referendum — and a betrayal of voters in Leave-backing seats who are looking to Reform. One of them, Liverpool MP Dan Carden, said the failure of both London and Brussels to strike a recent deal on defense funding, even amid threats from Russia, showed Brussels is not serious.   “Any Labour MP who thinks that the U.K. can get closer to the single market or the customs union without giving up freedoms and taking instruction from an EU that we’re not a part of is living in cloud cuckoo land,” he said. A similar skepticism of the EU’s authority is echoed by the Tony Blair Institute (TBI), led by one of the most pro-European prime ministers in Britain’s history. The TBI has been meeting politicians in Brussels and published a paper translated into French, German and Italian in a bid to shape the EU’s future from within.   Ryan Wain, the TBI’s senior director for policy and politics, argued: “We live in a G2 world where there are two superpowers, China and the U.S. By the middle of this century there will likely be three, with India. To me, it’s just abysmal that Europe isn’t mentioned in that at all. It has massive potential to adapt and reclaim its influence, but that opportunity needs to be unlocked.”  Such holdouts enjoy a strange alliance with left-wing Euroskeptics (“Lexiteers”), who believe the EU does not have the interests of workers at its heart. But few of these were ever in Labour and few remain; former Leader Jeremy Corbyn has long since been cast out. At the same time many Labour MPs in Leave-voting areas, who opposed efforts to stop Brexit in the late 2010s, now support closer alignment with Brussels to help their local car and chemical industries. As such, there are now 20 or fewer MPs holding their noses on closer alignment. Just three Labour MPs, including fellow Blue Labour supporter Jonathan Brash, voted against a bill supporting a customs union proposed by the centrist, pro-Europe Lib Dems last month.  WHERE WILL IT ALL END?  For all the talk of tribes and camps, Labour doesn’t have warring Brexit factions in the same way that the Tories did at the height of the EU divorce in the 2010s. Most MPs agree on closer alignment with the EU; the question is how they get there.  Even so, Menon has a warning from the last Brexit wars. Back in the late 2010s, Conservative MPs would jostle to set out their positions — workable or otherwise. The crowded field just made negotiations with Brussels harder. “We end up with absolutely batshit stupid positions when viewed from the EU,” said Menon, “because they’re being derived as a function of the need to position yourself in a British political party.” But few of these were ever in Labour and few remain; former Leader Jeremy Corbyn has long since been cast out. | Seiya Tanase/Getty Images The saving grace could be that most Labour MPs are united by a deeper gut feeling about the EU — one that, Baldwin argues, is reflected in Starmer himself. The PM’s biographer said: “At heart, Keir Starmer is an outward-looking internationalist whose pro-European beliefs are derived from what he calls the ‘blood-bond’ of 1945 and shared values, rather than the more transactional trade benefits of 1973,” when Britain joined the European Economic Community.  All that remains is to turn a “blood-bond” into hard policy. Simple, right?

KYIV — The Russian army attacked Ukraine with more than 90 killer drones in the early hours of Thursday morning, causing complete blackouts in the key industrial regions of Dnipro and Zaporizhzhia, Kyiv’s energy ministry reported. “While energy workers managed to restore power in the Zaporizhzhia region in the morning, some 800,000 households in the nearby Dnipro region were still without electricity and heating on Thursday morning,” Artem Nekrasov, acting energy minister of Ukraine, said during a morning briefing. In Dnipro, eight coal mines stopped working because of a power outage. All the miners were safely evacuated to the surface, Nekrasov added. Power outages were also reported in Chernihiv, Kyiv, Ivano-Frankivsk, Poltava and other regions. Freezing weather is coming to Ukraine over the next three days, with temperatures forecast to drop to minus 20° C during the night, when Russia often launches massive missile and drone attacks. Precipitation and cold could cause additional electricity supply disruptions due to snow accumulating on power lines, Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Svyrydenko said Wednesday evening. “Ukraine’s energy system is under enemy attack every day, and energy workers work in extremely difficult conditions to provide people with light and heat. Deteriorating weather conditions create additional stress on critical infrastructure. We are working to minimize the consequences of bad weather,” Svyrydenko added. Local governors in the eastern regions of Zaporizhzhia and Dnipro reported that hospitals and other critical infrastructure had to turn to emergency power supplies because of the latest Russian attack. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy thanked Ukrainian energy workers for the speedy power restoration in Zaporizhzhia, and used the opportunity to remind Kyiv’s partners around the world they need to respond “to this deliberate torment of the Ukrainian people by Russia.” “There is absolutely no military rationale in such strikes on the energy sector and infrastructure that leave people without electricity and heating in wintertime. This is Russia’s war specifically against our people, against life in Ukraine — an attempt to break Ukraine,” Zelenskyy added.

LONDON — The government is preparing a bill that will give overarching powers to allow the U.K. to align with the EU over a wide suite of areas to give legal shape to their “reset” deal with the bloc. One U.K. official said a bill is due to be introduced to parliament this spring or summer, establishing a legal framework for U.K.-EU alignment. These potential areas include food standards, animal welfare, pesticide use, the EU’s electricity market and carbon emissions trading, according to the official, who was granted anonymity to speak freely about the plans. The bill would create a new framework for the U.K. government and devolved administrations to adopt new EU laws when they are passed in Brussels. It raises the prospect that new EU laws in agreed areas will effectively transfer to the U.K. statute book automatically, with Britain retaining the power to veto them in specific cases. U.K. officials stress that the exact form the powers will take has not yet been decided. The U.K. is currently negotiating a Brexit “reset” agreement with the bloc, including an agrifood deal, plans to link its emissions trading system with the EU’s and reintegrating electricity markets. Britain is still seeking carve-outs as part of these deals, the official said, making it too early to say exactly where alignment will happen and what it will look like. News of the scope of the bill comes after EU Relations Minister Nick Thomas-Symonds said in August last year that parliament would “rightly have a say” on alignment with new EU rules in a speech delivered to The Spectator. He has insisted that the U.K. will still “have decision-shaping rights when new EU policies are made.” The U.K. government has been approached for comment.

BERLIN — An extreme left-wing group has claimed responsibility for an arson attack that caused a blackout affecting about 45,000 households and more than 2,000 businesses in Berlin over the weekend. “This isn’t just arson or sabotage. It’s terrorism,” Berlin’s Mayor Kai Wegner said Sunday of the attack, which burned through a cable connected to one of the city’s largest gas-fired power plants. Members of the so-called Vulkan Group, known for similar attacks on critical infrastructure in the past, claimed responsibility for the sabotage in a letter titled: “Cutting off power to those in power,” which was published online. “In the greed for energy, the earth is being depleted, sucked dry, burned, ravaged, burned down, raped, destroyed,” the group, which is listed by Berlin’s intelligence services as a left-wing extremist organization, said in the letter. “The aim of the action is to cause significant damage to the gas industry and the greed for energy,” its authors wrote. The group has used similar means to communicate in the past, and Berlin police believed the letter to be genuine. With temperatures below freezing in the German capital, schools and kindergartens in the southern districts affected by the power outage remained closed on Monday morning. Around 30,000 households and approximately 1,700 businesses were still without power on the third day of the power outage. Full restoration of supply is expected to take until Thursday. The city’s energy senator, Franziska Giffey told POLITICO’s Berlin Playbook Podcast on Monday that Berlin’s critical infrastructure needed better protection. “There is a great deal of public information about our critical infrastructure that we need to publish and make transparent. In the future, we will have to consider how we can handle this differently and how we can protect ourselves even better against these issues,” she said. In a separate interview with Berlin’s public broadcaster rbb, Giffey said prosecutors at the national level would need to assist with the investigation. “The question is, are these just left-wing activist groups acting on behalf of ideology, or is there more to it than that? That absolutely must be investigated,” said the politician from the center-left Social Democratic Party that governs Berlin in a coalition with Wegner’s conservatives. “This is not just an attack on our infrastructure, but also an attack on our free society.” Josh Groeneveld and Rixa Fürsen contributed to this report.

Poland scrambled fighter jets and placed its air defense systems on heightened alert overnight as Moscow launched one of its heaviest air assaults on Ukraine in recent weeks.  The Russian attack sent shockwaves across NATO’s eastern flank just a day before Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy is due to meet U.S. President Donald Trump to discuss a newly revised peace proposal. Poland’s Operational Command posted Saturday on X that military aviation operations were launched in Polish airspace “in connection with the activity of long-range aviation of the Russian Federation carrying out strikes on the territory of Ukraine.”  Fighter jets were scrambled and ground-based air defense and radar reconnaissance systems were put on readiness as a preventive measure to protect Polish airspace. The move came as Russia attacked Ukraine overnight with nearly 500 drones — many of them Iranian-designed Shaheds — and around 40 missiles, including Kinzhal hypersonic weapons, according to Ukrainian authorities. “Another Russian attack is still ongoing,” Zelenskyy wrote on X at mid-morning Saturday, saying the primary target was Kyiv, where energy facilities and civilian infrastructure were hit. He said residential buildings were damaged and rescue teams were searching for people trapped under rubble, while electricity and heating were cut in parts of the capital amid freezing temperatures. Ukrainian Interior Minister Ihor Klymenko said at least one person was killed and more than 20 others were injured in Kyiv, with multiple civilian sites damaged and search-and-rescue operations continuing. Zelenskyy said the barrage underscored Russian President Vladimir Putin’s lack of seriousness about ending the war. “Russian representatives engage in lengthy talks, but in reality, Kinzhals and Shaheds speak for them,” Zelenskyy wrote. The attack came one day before Zelenskyy is expected to meet Trump in Florida to present a revised 20-point peace plan, including proposals on security guarantees and territorial arrangements, talks Trump has publicly framed as contingent on his approval. Several hours later, Poland’s military said the air operation had ended and that no violation of Polish airspace had been detected.

KYIV — Russia attacked Ukraine with dozens of cruise missiles and kamikaze drones in the early hours of Tuesday morning, with strikes reported in Kyiv and in 13 other regions, after the U.S. mediators hosted what they called “constructive” peace talks in Florida last weekend. Moscow launched more than 650 drones and more than 30 missiles at Ukraine, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in a morning statement. “This Russian strike sends a clear signal about Russian priorities. A strike before Christmas, when people want to be with their families, at home, safe. A strike in the midst of negotiations to end this war. Putin can’t accept that the killing has to stop. And that means the world isn’t putting enough pressure on Russia,” Zelenskyy added. After Russia last week brushed off German Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s call for a Christmas сeasefire, Zelenskyy warned that Moscow is planning massive attacks over the holiday period. “The military must pay attention directly, protect as best they can — it’s not easy, because there is a shortage of air defense [equipment], unfortunately. And people need to pay attention — a lot of attention these days, because these ‘comrades’ can strike: nothing is sacred,” Zelenskyy said in an evening post on Telegram on Monday. The strikes on Tuesday morning injured five people in the capital Kyiv, reported Tymur Tkachenko, the head of the local military administration.  In the Kyiv region, one person was killed and three were wounded, the State Emergency Service of Ukraine said in a statement. Another person was killed in the western region of Khmelnytskyi. In the nearby Chernihiv region, first responders were fighting fires caused by drone attacks that lasted all night. The Odesa region, where Russian attacks on Dec. 13 knocked out power for thousands of residents, was attacked again on Tuesday morning. The Russian strikes damaged more than 120 buildings, as well as energy and port infrastructure, including a civilian vessel, the State Emergency Service said. In the western region of Zhytomyr, Russian drones injured six people, Governor Vitaly Bunechko said in a Telegram post. Later, the authorities reported that a child had died in the attack.

LONDON — British students will once again be able to take part in the EU’s Erasmus+ exchange scheme from January 2027 — following a six-year hiatus due to Brexit. U.K. ministers say they have secured a 30 percent discount on payments to re-enter the program that strikes “a fair balance between our contribution and the benefits” it offers. The move is one of the first tangible changes out of Keir Starmer’s EU “reset,” which is designed to smooth the harder edges off Boris Johnson’s Brexit settlement while staying outside the bloc’s orbit. In an announcement on Wednesday Brussels and London also confirmed they were formally beginning negotiations on U.K. re-entry into the EU’s internal market for electricity. Both sides hope the move, which was called for by industry in both sides of the Channel, will cut energy bills while also making it easier to invest in North Sea green energy projects — which have been plagued by Brexit complications. They also pledged to finish ongoing talks on linking the U.K. and EU carbon trading systems, as well as a new food and drink (SPS) deal, by the time they meet for an EU-U.K. summit in 2026. The planned meeting, which will take place in Brussels, does not yet have a date but is expected around the same time as this year’s May gathering in London. The announcements give more forward momentum to the “reset,” which faltered earlier this month after failing to reach an agreement on British membership of an EU defense industry financing program, SAFE. The two sides could not agree on the appropriate level of U.K. financial contribution. The pledge to finalize carbon trading (ETS) linkage next year is significant because it will help British businesses avoid a new EU carbon border tax — CBAM — which starts from Jan. 1 2026. While the tax, which charges firms for the greenhouse gas emissions in their products, begins on Jan. 1, payments are not due until 2027, by which time the U.K. is expected to be exempt. But it is not yet clear whether British firms will have to make back payments on previous imports once the deal is secured, and there is no sign of any deal to bridge the gap. WIDENING HORIZONS EU Relations Minister Nick Thomas-Symonds, who negotiated the agreement, said the move was “a huge win for our young people” and would break down barriers and widen horizons so that “everyone, from every background, has the opportunity to study and train abroad.” European Parliament President Roberta Metsola welcomes British Minister for the Constitution and European Union Relations Nick Thomas-Symonds. | Ronald Wittek/EPA “This is about more than just travel: it’s about future skills, academic success, and giving the next generation access to the best possible opportunities,” he said. “Today’s agreements prove that our new partnership with the EU is working. We have focused on the public’s priorities and secured a deal that puts opportunity first.” The expected cost of the U.K.’s membership of the Erasmus+ program in 2027 will be £570 million. Skills Minister Jacqui Smith said Erasmus+ membership is “about breaking down barriers to opportunity, giving learners the chance to build skills, confidence and international experience that employers value.” Liberal Democrat Universities Spokesperson Ian Sollom also welcomed U.K. re-entry into the exchange scheme but said it should be a “first step” in a closer relationship with the EU. “This is a moment of real opportunity and a clear step towards repairing the disastrous Conservative Brexit deal,” he said. “However while this is a welcome breakthrough, it must be viewed as a crucial first step on a clear roadmap to a closer relationship with Europe. Starting with negotiating a bespoke UK-EU customs union, and committing to a youth mobility scheme for benefit of the next generation.”