DUBLIN — The Irish capital, which doubles as Europe’s de facto tech capital, hosted two very different AI summits in the past week. Most eyes were on the International AI Summit, the signature tech event of Ireland’s six-month presidency of the Council of the EU, where top brass from the world’s biggest tech firms discussed ways to harness artificial intelligence and minimize safety risks. But the weekend before, a very different conversation was taking place at the Workers’ AI Counter Summit, as Ireland’s tech workers demanded a say in how the burgeoning technology reshapes the workplace and society. Ireland’s lucrative tech sector has been rattled by waves of AI-driven layoffs — and the country’s fledgling tech union has seen an exponential spike in sign-ups from workers who are worried about their future.   There’s an “awakening” happening right now among workers in Ireland’s tech sector, and a growing “awareness that they’re not bulletproof,” said Sinéad Gibney, a social democrat lawmaker who previously worked for Google.   “I do think what we will see is that parts of roles will be automated, which means that people will be competing more heavily for the same roles,” she said. “They won’t have the same labor power and therefore we’re going to see a drop in quality of work, we’re going to see more zero-hour contracts, in more places than we already see it.” The labor movement brewing in Ireland, where many of the world’s tech giants have their EU bases, is part of a wider trend among tech workers globally, who have seen their work disrupted by rapidly evolving AI. RISE IN LAYOFFS Ireland’s dedicated union for tech workers, the Digital and Techworker Alliance (DATA), has seen a five-fold increase in membership since it was first founded in 2023.   In its first year and a half of existence, membership hovered around 270 people. In the past year-and-a-half, it’s jumped to more than 1,350 members, DATA organizer John Bohan told POLITICO.  He added that this number tends to spike around layoffs and other actions. “The tech industry was founded on the idea that it would never have a union, because they’re making people rich, and treat them really well,” Bohan said.  “But post-Covid, workforce adjustments happened again and again, with layoffs and declining conditions in the sector. We started to see more people wanting to get organized around redundancies.”   The spike in sign-ups coincides with a wave of layoffs in Ireland’s tech bubble (and the tech sector globally), as companies corrected pandemic-era overhiring, and diverted investment to AI.   Ireland hosts the EU headquarters of most of the world’s largest tech companies, and more than 170,000 people are employed in the tech sector, according to the country’s statistics institute. Social media giant Meta has roughly halved its workforce in Ireland since the pandemic, axing well over 1,000 roles to offset AI investment and boost efficiency. Separately, Meta subcontractor Covalen also announced massive layoffs earlier this year, cutting more than 700 people.   Video-sharing platform TikTok announced this year it would shed around 300 Irish jobs, mostly from its trust and safety team, shifting the work to other countries, outsourced vendors or automated AI solutions.   A report by the IMF earlier this year warned that Ireland’s labor market is “relatively more exposed” to AI than many advanced economies, partly due to its concentration of tech workers.   The AI race is also creating new jobs on the Irish market – as AI firms like Anthropic and OpenAI are setting up Irish bases and trying to lure Big Tech workers with even bigger salaries.   Amid the uncertainty and volatility of the AI boom, tech workers are turning to unions for the first time as a safety net. One tech worker who used to work in trust and safety at a big tech firm told POLITICO that there used to be a feeling that as a “pampered” tech worker you “can’t ask for your rights, because you already have it so much better.”  But as layoffs continue and teams get leaner, workers in fields like trust and safety “now have to deal with these issues with fewer and fewer resources”, and face a “constant threat of being chopped,” the worker said.   That’s causing an “undoing of a certain perspective that we have of ourselves as tech sector workers,” they said, “because of undeniable experiences that now put us in situations where we clearly see our rights being violated, even if we may have it so much or somewhat better than most people.”  A different tech worker who currently works for Covalen told POLITICO that there is a sense that “if they believe they can replace you with AI, they will do that.”   “All these Big Tech firms only care about profit, and what I have realized is the Irish government protects that Big Tech capital [rather than workers],” the Covalen worker said. “But the question is, what’s the government going to do when the tech bros change their mind and move elsewhere?”   WORKERS AT THE CENTER The speaker list at this week’s AI summit was a flex of the country’s strength as a tech hub, as top names from the world’s biggest companies like Google and Microsoft took to the stage. Fionnuala Ní Bhrógáin, head of organizing and campaigning at Ireland’s Communications Workers’ Union (DATA’s parent union), was the only union voice on the line-up. “The fact that 36 executives and industry bosses featured on the program, compared with just one trade union speaker — invited at the last minute after attention was drawn to the absence of workers’ voices — says a lot about the value the Irish government places on AI’s impact on workers,” she told POLITICO. “The reality is that a meaningful conversation about AI’s future can only happen through genuine engagement with workers and collective bargaining,” Ní Bhrógáin added. “Without that voice, we risk deepening mistrust and resistance rather than creating the conditions for workers to shape these changes collectively.” DATA organized its counter-AI summit the previous weekend, to put “workers at the center of the debate about power, AI, technology and the future of work.”  The event cut through the “hype and futurism of politicians and industry figures to focus on the real present harms faced by ordinary workers and communities,” DATA’s Bohan said.   The union is pushing for stronger legal protections for tech workers caught up in AI-driven layoffs in Ireland, including making it mandatory for employers to recognize unions during collective bargaining. It is also calling for a ban on cooling-off clauses that prevent laid-off workers from moving between Big Tech subcontractors.   A spokesperson for Ireland’s department for enterprise told POLITICO in a written statement that the government is “committed to strengthening collective bargaining and industrial relations” and has published an action plan to do so between now and 2030.   They said that employers already have to comply with obligations under Irish employment law, including consultation and notification procedures for collective redundancies, and workers who feel those rules have been broken can complain to the Workplace Relations Commission.  Firefighting to future-proofing  Naoise Ó Cearúil, a center-right Fianna Fáil lawmaker who chairs the AI committee, pointed out that while there have been high-profile job cuts in Ireland’s tech sector, “the actual net is that there has been an increase [in jobs], particularly over the past year and even five years.”  According to Ireland’s central statistics office, total employment in tech and related sectors surpassed 177,000 in the second quarter of this year, up from around 144,000 at the same time in 2021.   Ó Cearúil pointed out that many job losses were in trust and safety jobs like content moderation that are “very difficult mentally,” and now tech firms are able to “utilize AI and software to be able to do a lot of detection, rather than using humans.”   He has called for a national program to be established, to support workers whose jobs are at risk due to AI and automation.   A spokesperson for Ireland’s department of enterprise acknowledged that the country’s tech sector has “experienced significant adjustment in recent years,” but said the changes were generally part of wider global restructuring “rather than reflecting any Ireland-specific weakness.”  They said the Irish government is currently focused on “ensuring workers and businesses are equipped to adapt to technological change through investment in education, training, lifelong learning and digital skills.”  

LONDON — Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s carefully built relationship with Donald Trump could be torpedoed by the disclosure of Peter Mandelson’s communications as ambassador, U.K. officials fear. Starmer will have to publish documents relating to the ex-Labour peer’s appointment as ambassador after demands from MPs across the political spectrum for greater transparency about the process. While it is not yet known exactly what will be published, the files may include messages from Mandelson to officials at No.10 Downing Street and the Foreign Commonwealth and Development Office.  Two senior Whitehall officials, granted anonymity because they were not authorized to speak on the record, told POLITICO they are concerned about what the former envoy — known for his ruthlessness and candor — may have said about Trump to his colleagues, and how they responded to him. One of the officials said there is “lots which could be damaging” and “he [Mandelson] used to download his thoughts in real time.” They point out that parliament’s Intelligence and Security Committee, which will sift through the documents before publication, will only be looking for matters that could jeopardize national security, rather than cause embarrassment or rifts. In a further sign of the shockwaves going through the diplomatic establishment, FCDO permanent secretary Oliver Robbins wrote to all departmental staff Wednesday night to reassure them over the “anxiety” caused by the whole affair. He asked civil servants approached about communications that may be disclosed to refer all requests to his office. In the message, obtained by POLITICO, Robbins said, referencing the PM’s earlier expression of regret for appointing Mandelson: “I am also sorry about this episode, which I know will have affected staff particularly in our U.S. team but also across the workforce. “I want to acknowledge that anxiety and reassure you that my recommendations as head of the diplomatic service to the foreign secretary for the many roles in our department carrying enormous trust and leadership responsibility are guided by my deep concern to preserve and enhance our service’s reputation for merit, professionalism and integrity.” NATIONAL SECURITY EXCEPTIONS The ISC has specified that papers which are national security related should be sent to them unredacted, and the government should provide an explanation as to exactly why pieces of information are prejudicial. “We believe the motion is clear that those papers which the government is required to provide to the ISC must be disclosed, unredacted, to the ISC,” the committee said in a letter to the PM and cabinet secretary. “The government may not decline to disclose any in scope material altogether” Kevan Jones, chair of the committee, told the BBC that the panel would put “as much as possible in the public domain.” One of Mandelson’s predecessors as ambassador, Kim Darroch, was forced to resign in 2019 over his criticism of Trump’s “dysfunctional” administration, made in confidential diplomatic cables that were made public.  But both senior officials cited above made it clear that Mandelson may not have always used cables for his musings on Trump, instead often using email and texts. Mandelson, one of the architects of New Labour who helped bring Tony Blair to power in 1997, returned to high office last year when he was named as the British ambassador to Washington despite his known links to the pedophile Jeffrey Epstein.  He was forced out of that role in September after it was reported he had continued a closer relationship with Epstein after the late financier’s conviction than was previously publicly known.  Mandelson did not immediately respond to a request for comment. He has not commented on the police investigation, but has previously said he was wrong to have continued his association with Epstein and apologized “unequivocally” to Epstein’s victims. The scandal was reopened Monday when emails released as part of the Epstein files appeared to show Mandelson leaking internal government discussions in the wake of the 2008 financial crash.  Police are now investigating allegations of misconduct in public office against him, which they have warned may limit some of the information which is made available.  

KYIV — Ukraine and Russia agreed to swap 314 prisoners of war during the latest round of talks in Abu Dhabi on Thursday, U.S. Special Envoy Steve Witkoff said. The trilateral discussions ended Thursday afternoon, with Ukrainian, American and Russian negotiating teams working together and in special subgroups for two days. In a post on X, Witkoff described the latest trilateral negotiating round as “detailed and productive.” “While significant work remains, steps like this demonstrate that sustained diplomatic engagement is delivering tangible results and advancing efforts to end the war in Ukraine,” Witkoff said, adding that discussions will continue in the coming weeks. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy confirmed that the PoW exchange, the first in five months, happened on Thursday. “We are bringing our people home — 157 Ukrainians. Warriors from the Armed Forces, National Guard, and the State Border Guard Service. Soldiers, sergeants, and officers. Along with our defenders, civilians are also returning. Most of them had been in captivity since 2022,” Zelenskyy said in a post on X. Russia also received the return of 157 of its PoWs. The last prisoner exchange between Russia and Ukraine was in October, when the sides swapped 185 soldiers and 20 civilians. Zelenskyy explained that Moscow had halted the swaps. “They are not particularly interested in exchanging people, because they do not feel that it gives them anything. They believe it benefits us. But I think they should also be thinking about their own people — their own soldiers,” Zelenskyy told reporters in Kyiv last week. Since Kyrylo Budanov, former head of Ukrainian military intelligence, joined the negotiating group, Russia began to take the negotiations more seriously, Zelenskyy said last week. “I believe it was a higher-level delegation than before, considering what the people who represented Russia this time are responsible for. We saw this as a more serious opportunity for discussion,” Zelenskyy said. “Because one thing is when you come only to receive information and deliver some fantastical historical briefing from a playbook that everyone has heard many times before. And another thing is when you move closer to real steps to end the war,” Zelenskyy added. Territorial issues remain the most difficult issue in the negotiations. Russia demands that Ukraine withdraw from the remaining 30 percent of Donbas, Kyiv’s most secure stronghold in the region. Kyiv insists everyone should stand where they are, calling it enough of a compromise. “The American side understands this and says that there is a compromise solution, proposing a free economic zone. However, the issue of control over any territory — including a free economic zone — must also be fair. Specifically, it must involve Ukraine maintaining control over the territories that we currently control,” Zelenskyy said last week.

WASHINGTON — Close the cover on the CIA World Factbook: The spy agency announced Wednesday that after more than 60 years, it is shuttering the popular reference manual. The announcement posted to the CIA’s website offered no reason for the decision to end the Factbook, but it follows a vow from Director John Ratcliffe to end programs that don’t advance the agency’s core missions. First launched in 1962 as a printed, classified reference manual for intelligence officers, the Factbook offered a detailed, by-the-numbers picture of foreign nations, their economies, militaries, resources and societies. The Factbook proved so useful that other federal agencies began using it, and within a decade, an unclassified version was released to the public. After going online in 1997, the Factbook quickly became a popular reference site for journalists, trivia aficionados and the writers of college essays, racking up millions of visits per year. The White House has moved to cut staffing at the CIA and the National Security Agency early in President Donald Trump’s second term, forcing the agency to do more with less. The CIA did not return a message seeking comment Wednesday about the decision to cease publication of the Factbook.

5 TIMES THE WINTER OLYMPICS GOT SUPER POLITICAL Invasions, nuclear crises and Nazi propaganda: The Games have seen it all. By SEBASTIAN STARCEVIC Illustration by Natália Delgado /POLITICO The Winter Olympics return to Europe this week, with Milan and Cortina d’Ampezzo set to host the world’s greatest athletes against the snowy backdrop of the Italian Alps. But beyond the ice rinks and ski runs, the Games have long doubled as a stage for global alliances, heated political rivalries and diplomatic crises.  “An event like the Olympics is inherently political because it is effectively a competition between nations,” said Madrid’s IE Assistant Professor Andrew Bertoli, who studies the intersection of sport and politics. “So the Games can effectively become an arena where nations compete for prestige, respect and soft power.” If history is any guide, this time won’t be any different. From invasions to the Nazis to nuclear crises, here are five times politics and the Winter Olympics collided. 1980: AMERICA’S “MIRACLE ON ICE” One of the most iconic moments in Olympic history came about amid a resurgence in Cold War tensions between the U.S. and the Soviet Union. The USSR had invaded Afghanistan only months earlier, and Washington’s rhetoric toward Moscow had hardened, with Ronald Reagan storming to the presidency a month prior on an aggressive anti-Soviet platform. At the 1980 Winter Games in Lake Placid, New York, that superpower rivalry was on full display on the ice. The U.S. men’s ice hockey team — made up largely of college players and amateurs — faced off against the Soviet squad, a battle-hardened, gold medal-winning machine. The Americans weren’t supposed to stand a chance. Then the impossible happened. In a stunning upset, the U.S. team skated to a 4-3 victory, a win that helped them clinch the gold medal. As the final seconds ticked away, ABC broadcaster Al Michaels famously cried, “Do you believe in miracles? Yes!” The impact echoed far beyond the rink. For many Americans, the victory was a morale boost in a period marked by geopolitical anxiety and division. Reagan later said it was proof “nice guys in a tough world can finish first.” The miracle’s legacy has endured well into the 21st century, with U.S. President Donald Trump awarding members of the hockey team the Congressional Gold Medal in December last year. 2014: RUSSIA INVADES CRIMEA AFTER SOCHI Four days. That’s how long Moscow waited after hosting the Winter Olympics in the Russian resort city of Sochi before sending troops into Crimea, occupying and annexing the Ukrainian peninsula. Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych had fled to Moscow days earlier, ousted by protesters demanding democracy and closer integration with the EU. As demonstrators filled Kyiv’s Independence Square, their clashes with government forces played on television screens around the world alongside highlights from the Games, in which Russia dominated the medal tally. Vladimir Putin poses with Russian athletes while visiting the Coastal Cluster Olympic Village ahead of the Sochi 2014 Winter Olympics. | Pascal Le Segretain/Getty Images No sooner was the Olympic flame extinguished in Sochi on Feb. 23 than on Feb. 27 trucks and tanks rolled into Crimea. Soldiers in unmarked uniforms set up roadblocks, stormed Crimean government buildings and raised the Russian flag high above them. Later that year, Moscow would face allegations of a state-sponsored doping program and many of its athletes were ultimately stripped of their gold medals. 2022: RUSSIA INVADES UKRAINE … AGAIN There’s a theme here. Russian President Vladimir Putin made an appearance at the opening ceremony of Beijing’s Winter Games in 2022, meeting on the sidelines with Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping and declaring a “no limits” partnership. Four days after the end of the Games, on Feb. 24, Putin announced a “special military operation,” declaring war on Ukraine. Within minutes, Russian troops flooded into Ukraine, and missiles rained down on Kyiv, Kharkiv and other cities across the country. According to U.S. intelligence, The New York Times reported, Chinese officials asked the Kremlin to delay launching its attack until after the Games had wrapped up. Beijing denied it had advance knowledge of the invasion. 2018: KOREAN UNITY ON DISPLAY As South Korea prepared to host the Winter Games in its mountainous Pyeongchang region, just a few hundred kilometers over the border, the North Koreans were conducting nuclear missile tests, sparking global alarm and leading U.S. President Donald Trump to threaten to strike the country. The IOC said it was “closely monitoring” the situation amid concerns about whether the Games could be held safely on the peninsula. South Korean Vice Unification Minister Chun Hae-Sung, shakes hands with the head of North Korean delegation Jon Jong-Su after their meeting on January 17, 2018 in Panmunjom, South Korea. | South Korean Unification Ministry via Getty Images But then in his New Year’s address, North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un signaled openness to participating in the Winter Olympics. In the end, North Korean athletes not only participated in the Games, but at the opening ceremony they marched with their South Korean counterparts under a single flag, that of a unified Korea. Pyongyang and Seoul also joined forces in women’s ice hockey, sending a single team to compete — another rare show of unity that helped restart diplomatic talks between the capitals, though tensions ultimately resumed after the Games and continue to this day. 1936: HITLER INVADES THE RHINELAND Much has been said about the 1936 Summer Olympics in Berlin, in which the Nazi regime barred Jewish athletes from participating and used the Games to spread propaganda. But a few months earlier Germany also hosted the Winter Olympics in the town of Garmisch-Partenkirchen, allowing the Nazis to project an image of a peaceful, prosperous Germany and restore its global standing nearly two decades after World War I. A famous photograph from the event even shows Adolf Hitler and Joseph Goebbels signing autographs for the Canadian figure skating team. Weeks after the Games ended, Hitler sent troops into the Rhineland, a major violation of the Treaty of Versailles that was met with little pushback from France and Britain, and which some historians argue emboldened the Nazis to eventually invade Poland, triggering World War II.

BRUSSELS — The EU and U.K. must overcome historic gripes and “reset” their relationship to be able to work together in an increasingly uncertain world, the bloc’s top parliamentarian said. European Parliament President Roberta Metsola used an address to the Spanish senate on Tuesday to call for closer ties with the U.K. as London steps up efforts to secure smoother access to European markets and funding projects, after the country voted to leave the bloc in 2016. “Ten years on from Brexit … and in a world that has changed so profoundly, Europe and the U.K. need a new way of working together on trade, customs, research, mobility and on security and defense,” Metsola said. “Today it is time to exorcize the ghosts of the past.” Metsola called for a “reset” in the partnership between Britain and the EU as part of a policy of “realistic pragmatism anchored in values that will see all of us move forward together.” Her speech comes after British Prime Minister Keir Starmer said he intended to try and ensure his country’s defense industries can benefit from the EU’s flagship SAFE scheme — a €150 billion funding program designed to boost procurement of military hardware. That push has been far from smooth, with a meeting of EU governments on Monday night failing to sign off U.K. access to SAFE, despite France — which has consistently opposed non-EU countries taking part — supporting the British inclusion. Starmer has also signaled in recent days that he is seeking closer integration with the EU’s single market. Brussels has so far been reluctant to reopen the terms of the U.K.’s relations with the bloc just six years after it exited. While those decisions lie with the remaining 27 EU member countries, rather than the Parliament, Metsola’s intervention marks a shift in tone that could bolster the British case for closer relations. In the context of increasingly tense relations with the U.S., capitals are depending on cooperation with British intelligence and military capabilities and in key industries. Europe must take “the next steps towards a stronger European defense, boosting our capabilities and cooperation, and working closely with our NATO allies so that Europe can better protect its people,” Metsola said.

Millions of people are forming emotional bonds with artificial intelligence chatbots — a problem that politicians need to take seriously, according to top scientists. The warning of a rise in AI bots designed to develop a relationship with users comes in an assessment released Tuesday on the progress and risks of artificial intelligence. “AI companions have grown rapidly in popularity, with some applications reaching tens of millions of users,” according to the assessment from dozens of experts, mostly academics — completed for the second time under a global effort launched by world leaders in 2023. Specialized companion services such as Replika and Character.ai have user numbers in the tens of millions — with users citing a variety of reasons including fun and curiosity, as well as to alleviate loneliness, the report says. But people can also seek companionship from general-purpose tools such as OpenAI’s ChatGPT, Google’s Gemini or Anthropic’s Claude. “Even the ordinary chatbots can become companions,” said Yoshua Bengio, a professor at the University of Montreal and lead author of the International AI Safety report. Bengio is considered one of the world’s leading voices on AI. “In the right context and with enough interactions between the user and the AI, a relationship can develop,” he said. While the assessment acknowledges that evidence regarding the psychological effects of companions is mixed, “some studies report patterns such as increased loneliness and reduced social interaction among frequent users,” the report says. The warning lands two weeks after dozens of European Parliament lawmakers pressed the European Commission to look into the possibility of restricting companion services under the EU’s AI law amid concerns over their impact on mental health. “I can see in political circles that the effect of these AI companions on children, especially adolescents, is something that is raising a lot of eyebrows and attention,” said Bengio. The worries are fueled by the sycophantic nature of chatbots, which aim to be helpful for their users and please them as much as possible. “The AI is trying to make us, in the immediate moment, feel good, but that isn’t always in our interest,” Bengio said. In that sense, the technology has similar pitfalls to social media platforms, he argued. Bengio said to expect that new regulations will be introduced to address the phenomenon. He pushed back, however, against the idea of introducing specific rules for AI companions and argued that the risk should be addressed through horizontal legislation which addresses several risks simultaneously. The International AI Safety report lands ahead of a global summit starting Feb. 16, an annual gathering for countries to discuss governance of the technology that this year is held in India. Tuesday’s report lists the full series of risks that policymakers will have to address, including AI-fueled cyberattacks, AI-generated sexually explicit deepfakes and AI systems that provide information on how to design bioweapons. Bengio urged governments and the European Commission to enhance their internal AI expertise to address the long list of potential risks. World leaders first gave a mandate for the annual assessment at the 2023 AI Safety Summit in the United Kingdom. Some of the advisers are well-known figures in the Brussels tech policy world, including former European Parliament lawmaker Marietje Schaake.

BERLIN — Germany’s far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) is heading back to the Munich Security Conference (MSC) — reclaiming a seat at one of the world’s most prestigious security forums after being banished for three straight years. The decision to invite AfD lawmakers to the mid-February gathering marks a significant reversal for the conference and a symbolic win for a party eager to shed its pariah status by rubbing shoulders with global leaders. The AfD mounted an aggressive campaign beginning late last year to regain access to the MSC, including legal action against conference organizers and attempts to capitalize on relationships with Trump administration officials. That effort appears to have paid off, at least in part. MSC organizers have invited three AfD parliamentarians to attend this year’s conference, though the party has pushed for more prominent figures — including national co-chair Alice Weidel — to be included. “The invitations were issued because we made an impression with our contacts to the Americans,” Heinrich Koch, one of three AfD parliamentarians who received an invite, told POLITICO. Koch, by his own account and that of one of the AfD’s legal representatives, was deployed by the party to gain access to the MSC. Wolfgang Ischinger, the prominent German diplomat acting as MSC chair this year, denied that conference organizers invited the AfD due to a pressure campaign, framing the decision rather as one that acknowledges a simple political reality: that the AfD is the largest opposition force in Germany. “It is a decision that we took on our own conscience, if you wish, trying to do the right thing in order to make sure that we would be able to reflect the current reality,” he told POLITICO. “It would be very difficult for the Munich Security Conference — which brings together so many opposing views, adversaries, people who accuse each other [of being] murderers or genocidal people — for us to justify categorically excluding the largest German opposition party.” LEGACY OF NAZI RESISTANCE This year won’t be the first time AfD politicians have attended the MSC. During Ischinger’s previous tenure as head of the conference, which lasted from 2008 to 2022, AfD politicians with a focus on defense were invited to the conference. But since that time, the AfD has come under the increasing scrutiny of national and state domestic intelligence agencies tasked with monitoring groups deemed anti-constitutional, culminating last year in the party’s federal classification as a right-wing extremist organization. Ischinger’s successor, career diplomat Christoph Heusgen, refused to invite AfD leaders for the past three conferences, arguing that a party deemed at that point to have been at least partly right-wing extremist by intelligence authorities had no place at the event. After all, he argued, the conference was founded after World War II by Ewald von Kleist, one of the aristocratic Wehrmacht officers now revered in Germany for having partaken in the failed 1944 plot to assassinate Adolf Hitler. “I can well imagine that Ewald von Kleist would have supported my decision against the AfD,” Heusgen told German newspaper Tagesspiegel. Wolfgang Ischinger speaking at the 2023 Munich Security Conference in Munich. He denied that conference organizers invited the AfD this year due to a pressure campaign. | Johannes Simon/EPA Heusgen stepped aside after last year’s conference, and this year Ischinger is back at the helm. But it was in response to Heusgen’s rejection of the party that the AfD sued late last year to get into the conference this February. The AfD said it was a victim of “targeted exclusion,” according to documents from the Munich regional court seen by POLITICO.  “The plaintiff wishes to be involved in foreign policy and security policy issues in order to have a say as an opposition faction,” the court said. But the court ultimately rejected the AfD’s argument, ruling last December that the MSC, as a private organization, is free to choose whom to invite. Koch, who was in court on behalf of the AfD parliamentary group, says he pressured the MSC side during the proceeding to invite party members by threatening to come to the conference anyway as guests of the American delegation. Soon after, his party received three invitations, he said.  The MSC denied in emailed comments to POLITICO that such threats had led to the invites. EMPTY THREATS? The AfD’s threats appear to have consisted mostly of bluster. Koch said he reached out to the office of U.S. Senator Lindsey Graham, who is set to attend the conference, but never heard back from the Republican lawmaker. Graham did not respond to three requests for comment. The threat nevertheless illustrates how the AfD has sought to utilize past support from the Trump administration to pressure the MSC and, more broadly, to end its domestic political ostracization. The AfD’s effort to get into the MSC can be seen as part of a larger push to knock down the so-called firewall mainstream forces have erected around the far right, precluding close cooperation with the party despite its rising popularity. In that effort, the AfD has received support from the highest rungs of the Trump administration. At last year’s MSC, U.S. Vice President JD Vance sharply criticized European centrists for excluding the far right, declaring “there’s no room for firewalls.” Following his speech, JD Vance met with AfD national co-leader Alice Weidel in a Munich hotel.  Koch said the AfD would attempt to organize a similar high-level meeting this year, though it’s not clear Vance will attend the February conference. Koch said he has also sought an invitation for Weidel, but the MSC had denied it. The MSC’s Ischinger said he and his team would not issue any further invitations to AfD politicians. Weidel’s spokesperson, Daniel Tapp, denied that the AfD had used the prospect of another meeting with a high-level Trump administration official to press for invites to the MSC, but said a “certain pressure” had led to three of its lawmakers being invited. Weidel’s plans for the conference remain unclear. “We will wait and see over the next few days whether anything else develops in this matter,” said Tapp late last month. As of Friday, no meeting involving Weidel and U.S. officials during the MSC had been planned, according to Tapp. Ischinger said any AfD events occurring outside the confines of the MSC are irrelevant to the conference. “They can organize a huge conference, you know, if you ask me,” he said. “And it’s not my business to stop them or discuss this with them. It’s their business, but it has nothing to do with the Munich Security Conference.” POLITICO is an official media partner of this year’s Munich Security Conference.

The Netherlands’ incoming government wants to push Europe toward a tighter intelligence-sharing club — including what it calls a potential “European equivalent” of the Five Eyes alliance — as part of a broader overhaul of its security services. The new coalition argues, in its governing plans published Friday, that rising threats require faster and more proactive intelligence agencies while preserving the country’s tradition of operating under strict rule-of-law safeguards. The proposals include boosting funding and digital infrastructure for the civilian intelligence agency (AIVD) and military intelligence service (MIVD), and strengthening the role of the national counterterrorism coordinator. At the European level, The Hague says it wants to intensify cooperation with a core group of like-minded countries, explicitly floating a continent-wide version of the “Five Eyes” intelligence partnership (which is made up of Australia, Canada, New Zealand, the U.K., and the U.S.). In October, the heads of the two Dutch agencies announced they would stop sharing certain information with their U.S. counterparts, citing political interference and human rights concerns. Instead they would look at increasing cooperation with other European services, like the U.K., Poland, France, Germany and the Nordic countries. Domestically, the government plans to fast-track a revamped Intelligence and Security Services Act, rewriting the law to focus on threats rather than specific investigative tools and making it “technology-neutral” so agencies are not outpaced by innovation. Supervisory bodies would be merged to provide streamlined, but legally robust, oversight. The agenda also calls for expanding the operational research capacity of Dutch intelligence services to help build Europe’s “strategic autonomy,” while deepening ties with tech firms and recruiting top technical talent.

BEIJING — U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer’s reengagement with China is “very dangerous,” Donald Trump said Friday. The U.S. president made the remarks after the British prime minister met Chinese President Xi Jinping in Beijing Thursday, where Starmer called for a “more sophisticated” relationship between the two countries and secured visa-free travel for British citizens to China for up to 30 days and a cut in Chinese tariffs on Scotch whisky. Starmer has been at pains to stress that he will not choose between trade with the U.S. and China. Downing Street has pointed out that Trump himself plans to visit China in April, and that the American president has called Xi his friend. Starmer also contrasted his approach with that of Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney, whose visit to China this month — and subsequent speech in Davos declaring the old world order “ruptured” — prompted Trump to threaten a new wave of tariffs on Ottawa. Trump was asked about the U.K.’s pursuit of closer ties with Beijing as he attended the premiere of the film “Melania” in Washington. The U.S. president saved his harshest criticism for Carney but also warned Britain about its business dealings with China. “It’s very dangerous for them to do that,” Trump said. “And it’s even more dangerous, I think, for Canada to get into business with China. “Canada is not doing well. They’re doing very poorly, and you can’t look at China as the answer. “I know China very well. I know President Xi is a friend of mine. I know him very well. But that’s a big hurdle to go over.” On the plane to Beijing on Tuesday night, Starmer rebuffed questions about whether his trip would irk Trump. “The relationship we have with the U.S. is one of the closest relationships we hold, on defense, security, intelligence and also on trade and lots of areas,” he said. “We had a very successful state visit from President Trump last year which led to hundreds of billions of pounds being invested in each other’s economies so it’s a very important relationship. “It doesn’t make sense to stick our head in the ground and bury in the sand when it comes to China,” Starmer added. “It’s in our interests to engage and not compromise on national security, and that’s why we have been able to set out a consistent, comprehensive approach.”