A clash between Poland’s right-wing president and its centrist ruling coalition over the European Union’s flagship social media law is putting the country further at risk of multimillion euro fines from Brussels. President Karol Nawrocki is holding up a bill that would implement the EU’s Digital Services Act, a tech law that allows regulators to police how social media firms moderate content. Nawrocki, an ally of U.S. President Donald Trump, said in a statement that the law would “give control of content on the internet to officials subordinate to the government, not to independent courts.” The government coalition led by Prime Minister Donald Tusk, Nawrocki’s rival, warned this further exposed them to the risk of EU fines as high as €9.5 million. Deputy Digital Minister Dariusz Standerski said in a TV interview that, “since the president decided to veto this law, I’m assuming he is also willing to have these costs [of a potential fine] charged to the budget of the President’s Office.” Nawrocki’s refusal to sign the bill brings back bad memories of Warsaw’s years-long clash with Brussels over the rule of law, a conflict that began when Nawrocki’s Law and Justice party rose to power in 2015 and started reforming the country’s courts and regulators. The EU imposed €320 million in penalties on Poland from 2021-2023. Warsaw was already in a fight with the Commission over its slow implementation of the tech rulebook since 2024, when the EU executive put Poland on notice for delaying the law’s implementation and for not designating a responsible authority. In May last year Brussels took Warsaw to court over the issue. If the EU imposes new fines over the rollout of digital rules, it would “reignite debates reminiscent of the rule-of-law mechanism and frozen funds disputes,” said Jakub Szymik, founder of Warsaw-based non-profit watchdog group CEE Digital Democracy Watch. Failure to implement the tech law could in the long run even lead to fines and penalties accruing over time, as happened when Warsaw refused to reform its courts during the earlier rule of law crisis. The European Commission said in a statement that it “will not comment on national legislative procedures.” It added that “implementing the [Digital Services Act] into national law is essential to allow users in Poland to benefit from the same DSA rights.” “This is why we have an ongoing infringement procedure against Poland” for its “failure to designate and empower” a responsible authority, the statement said. Under the tech platforms law, countries were supposed to designate a national authority to oversee the rules by February 2024. Poland is the only EU country that hasn’t moved to at least formally agree on which regulator that should be. The European Commission is the chief regulator for a group of very large online platforms, including Elon Musk’s X, Meta’s Facebook and Instagram, Google’s YouTube, Chinese-owned TikTok and Shein and others. But national governments have the power to enforce the law on smaller platforms and certify third parties for dispute resolution, among other things. National laws allow users to exercise their rights to appeal to online platforms and challenge decisions. When blocking the bill last Friday, Nawrocki said a new version could be ready within two months. But that was “very unlikely … given that work on the current version has been ongoing for nearly two years and no concrete alternative has been presented” by the president, said Szymik, the NGO official. The Digital Services Act has become a flashpoint in the political fight between Brussels and Washington over how to police online platforms. The EU imposed its first-ever fine under the law on X in December, prompting the U.S. administration to sanction former EU Commissioner Thierry Breton and four other Europeans. Nawrocki last week likened the law to “the construction of the Ministry of Truth from George Orwell’s novel 1984,” a criticism that echoed claims by Trump and his top MAGA officials that the law censored conservatives and right-wingers. Bartosz Brzeziński contributed reporting.

LONDON — If there’s one thing Keir Starmer has mastered in office, it’s changing his mind. The PM has been pushed by his backbenchers toward a flurry of about-turns since entering Downing Street just 18 months ago.  Starmer’s vast parliamentary majority hasn’t stopped him feeling the pressure — and has meant mischievous MPs are less worried their antics will topple the government.  POLITICO recaps 7 occasions MPs mounted objections to the government’s agenda — and forced the PM into a spin. Expect this list to get a few more updates… PUB BUSINESS RATES  Getting on the wrong side of your local watering hole is never a good idea. Many Labour MPs realized that the hard way. Chancellor Rachel Reeves used her budget last year to slash a pandemic-era discount on business rates — taxes levied on firms — from 75 percent to 40 percent. Cue uproar from publicans. Labour MPs were barred from numerous boozers in protest at a sharp bill increase afflicting an already struggling hospitality sector. A £300 million lifeline for pubs, watering down some of the changes, is now being prepped. At least Treasury officials should now have a few more places to drown their sorrows. Time to U-turn: 43 days (Nov. 26, 2025 — Jan. 8, 2026). FARMERS’ INHERITANCE TAX  Part of Labour’s electoral success came from winning dozens of rural constituencies. But Britain’s farmers soon fell out of love with the government.  Reeves’ first budget slapped inheritance tax on farming estates worth more than £1 million from April 2026. Farmers drive tractors near Westminster ahead of a protest against inheritance tax rules on Nov. 19, 2024. | Ben Stansall/AFP via Getty Images Aimed at closing loopholes wealthy individuals use to avoid coughing up to the exchequer, the decision generated uproar from opposition parties (calling the measure the “family farm tax”) and farmers themselves, who drove tractors around Westminster playing “Baby Shark.”  Campaigners including TV presenter and newfound farmer Jeremy Clarkson joined the fight by highlighting that many farmers are asset rich but cash poor — so can’t fund increased inheritance taxes without flogging off their estates altogether. A mounting rebellion by rural Labour MPs (including Cumbria’s Markus Campbell-Savours, who lost the whip for voting against the budget resolution on inheritance tax) saw the government sneak out a threshold hike to £2.5 million just two days before Christmas, lowering the number of affected estates from 375 to 185. Why ever could that have been?  Time to U-turn: 419 days (Oct. 30, 2024 — Dec. 23, 2025). WINTER FUEL PAYMENTS  Labour’s election honeymoon ended abruptly just three and a half weeks into power after Reeves made an economic move no chancellor before her dared to take.  Reeves significantly tightened eligibility for winter fuel payments, a previously universal benefit helping the older generation with heating costs in the colder months.  Given pensioners are the cohort most likely to vote, the policy was seen as a big electoral gamble. It wasn’t previewed in Labour’s manifesto and made many newly elected MPs angsty.  After a battering in the subsequent local elections, the government swiftly confirmed all pensioners earning up to £35,000 would now be eligible for the cash. That’s one way of trying to bag the grey vote. Time until U-turn: 315 days (July 29, 2024 — June 9, 2025).  WELFARE REFORM Labour wanted to rein in Britain’s spiraling welfare bill, which never fully recovered from the Covid-19 pandemic.  The government vowed to save around £5 billion by tightening eligibility for Personal Independence Payment (PIP), a benefit helping people in and out of work with long term health issues. It also said other health related benefits would be cut. However, Labour MPs worried about the impact on the most vulnerable (and nervously eyeing their inboxes) weren’t impressed. More than 100 signed an amendment that would have torpedoed the proposed reforms.  The government vowed to save around £5 billion by tightening eligibility for Personal Independence Payment. | Vuk Valcic via SOPA Images/LightRocket/Getty Images In an initial concession, the government said existing PIP claimants wouldn’t be affected by any eligibility cuts. It wasn’t enough: Welfare Minister Stephen Timms was forced to confirm in the House of Commons during an actual, ongoing welfare debate that eligibility changes for future claimants would be delayed until a review was completed.  What started as £5 billion of savings didn’t reduce welfare costs whatsoever.  Time to U-turn: 101 days (Mar. 18, 2025 — June 27, 2025).  GROOMING GANGS INQUIRY  The widescale abuse of girls across Britain over decades reentered the political spotlight in early 2025 after numerous tweets from X owner Elon Musk. It led to calls for a specific national inquiry into the scandal. Starmer initially rejected this request, pointing to recommendations left unimplemented from a previous inquiry into child sexual abuse and arguing for a local approach. Starmer accused those critical of his stance (aka Musk) of spreading “lies and misinformation” and “amplifying what the far-right is saying.” Yet less than six months later, a rapid review from crossbench peer Louise Casey called for … a national inquiry. Starmer soon confirmed one would happen. Time to U-turn: 159 days (Jan. 6, 2025 — June 14, 2025).  ‘ISLAND OF STRANGERS’ Immigration is a hot-button issue in the U.K. — especially with Reform UK Leader Nigel Farage breathing down Starmer’s neck. The PM tried reflecting this in a speech last May, warning that Britain risked becoming an “island of strangers” without government action to curb migration. That triggered some of Starmer’s own MPs, who drew parallels with the notorious 1968 “rivers of blood” speech by politician Enoch Powell. The PM conceded he’d put a foot wrong month later, giving an Observer interview where he claimed to not be aware of the Powell connection. “I deeply regret using” the term, he said. Time to U-turn: 46 days (May 12, 2025 — June 27, 2025).  Immigration is a hot-button issue in the U.K. — especially with Reform UK Leader Nigel Farage breathing down Starmer’s neck. | Tolga Akmen/EPA TWO-CHILD BENEFIT CAP  Here’s the U-turn that took the longest to arrive — but left Labour MPs the happiest. Introduced by the previous Conservative government, a two-child welfare cap meant parents could only claim social security payments such as Universal Credit or tax credits for their first two children. Many Labour MPs saw it as a relic of the Tory austerity era. Yet just weeks into government, seven Labour MPs lost the whip for backing an amendment calling for it to be scrapped, highlighting Reeves’ preference for fiscal caution over easy wins.  A year and a half later, that disappeared out the window. Reeves embracing its removal in her budget last fall as a child poverty-busty measure got plenty of cheers from Labour MPs — though the cap’s continued popularity with some voters may open up a fresh vulnerability. Time until U-turn: 491 days (July 23, 2024 — Nov. 26, 2025).

BRUSSELS — Donald Trump blew up global efforts to cut emissions from shipping, and now the EU is terrified the U.S. president will do the same to any plans to tax carbon emissions from long-haul flights. The European Commission is studying whether to expand its existing carbon pricing scheme that forces airlines to pay for emissions from short- and medium-haul flights within Europe into a more ambitious effort covering all flights departing the bloc. If that happens, all international airlines flying out of Europe — including U.S. ones — would face higher costs, something that’s likely to stick in the craw of the Trump administration. “God only knows what the Trump administration will do” if Brussels expands its own Emissions Trading System to include transatlantic flights, a senior EU official told POLITICO. A big issue is how to ensure that the new system doesn’t end up charging only European airlines, which often complain about the higher regulatory burden they face compared with their non-EU rivals. The EU official said Commission experts are now “scratching their heads how you can, on the one hand, talk about extending the ETS worldwide … [but] also make sure that you have a bit of a level playing field,” meaning a system that doesn’t only penalize European carriers. Any new costs will hit airlines by 2027, following a Commission assessment that will be completed by July 1. Brussels has reason to be worried.  “Trump has made it very clear that he does not want any policies that harm business … So he does not want any environmental regulation,” said Marina Efthymiou, aviation management professor at Dublin City University. “We do have an administration with a bullying behavior threatening countries and even entities like the European Commission.” The new U.S. National Security Strategy, released last week, closely hews to Trump’s thinking and is scathing on climate efforts. “We reject the disastrous ‘climate change’ and ‘Net Zero’ ideologies that have so greatly harmed Europe, threaten the United States, and subsidize our adversaries,” it says. In October, the U.S. led efforts to prevent the International Maritime Organization from setting up a global tax to encourage commercial fleets to go green. The no-holds-barred push was personally led by Trump and even threatened negotiators with personal consequences if they went along with the measure. In October, the U.S. led efforts to prevent the International Maritime Organization from setting up a global tax aimed at encouraging commercial fleets to go green. | Nicolas Tucat/AFP via Getty Images This “will be a parameter to consider seriously from the European Commission” when it thinks about aviation, Efthymiou said. The airline industry hopes the prospect of a furious Trump will scare off the Commission. “The EU is not going to extend ETS to transatlantic flights because that will lead to a war,” said Willie Walsh, director general of the International Air Transport Association, the global airline lobby, at a November conference in Brussels. “And that is not a war that the EU will win.” EUROPEAN ETS VS. GLOBAL CORSIA In 2012, the EU began taxing aviation emissions through its cap-and-trade ETS, which covers all outgoing flights from the European Economic Area — meaning EU countries plus Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway. Switzerland and the U.K. later introduced similar schemes. In parallel, the U.N.’s International Civil Aviation Organization was working on its own carbon reduction plan, the Carbon Offsetting and Reduction Scheme for International Aviation. Given that fact, Brussels delayed imposing the ETS on flights to non-European destinations. The EU will now be examining the ICAO’s CORSIA to see if it meets the mark. “CORSIA lets airlines pay pennies for pollution — about €2.50 per passenger on a Paris-New York flight,” said Marte van der Graaf, aviation policy officer at green NGO Transport & Environment. Applying the ETS on the same route would cost “€92.40 per passenger based on 2024 traffic.” There are two reasons for such a big difference: the fourfold higher price for ETS credits compared with CORSIA credits, and the fact that “under CORSIA, airlines don’t pay for total emissions, but only for the increase above a fixed 2019 baseline,” Van der Graaf explained. “Thus, for a Paris-New York flight that emits an average of 131 tons of CO2, only 14 percent of emissions are offset under CORSIA. This means that, instead of covering the full 131 tons, the airline only has to purchase credits for approximately 18 tons.” Efthymiou, the professor, warned the price difference is projected to increase due to the progressive withdrawal of free ETS allowances granted to aviation. The U.N. scheme will become mandatory for all U.N. member countries in 2027 but will not cover domestic flights, including those in large countries such as the U.S., Russia and China. KEY DECISIONS By July 1, the Commission must release a report assessing the geographical coverage and environmental integrity of CORSIA. Based on this evaluation, the EU executive will propose either extending the ETS to all departing flights from the EU starting in 2027 or maintaining it for intra-EU flights only. Opposition to the ETS in the U.S. dates back to the Barack Obama administration. | Pete Souza/White House via Getty Images According to T&E, CORSIA doesn’t meet the EU’s climate goals. “Extending the scope of the EU ETS to all departing flights from 2027 could raise an extra €147 billion by 2040,” said Van der Graaf, noting that this money could support the production of greener aviation fuels to replace fossil kerosene. But according to Efthymiou, the Commission might decide to continue the current exemption “considering the very fragile political environment we currently have with a lunatic being in power,” she said, referring to Trump. “CORSIA has received a lot of criticism for sure … but the importance of CORSIA is that for the first time ever we have an agreement,” she added. “Even though that agreement might not be very ambitious, ICAO is the only entity with power to put an international regulation [into effect].” Regardless of what is decided in Brussels, Washington is prepared to fight. Opposition to the ETS in the U.S. dates back to the Barack Obama administration, when then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton sent a letter to the Commission opposing its application to American airlines. During the same term, the U.S. passed the EU ETS Prohibition Act, which gives Washington the power to prohibit American carriers from paying for European carbon pricing. John Thune, the Republican politician who proposed the bill, is now the majority leader of the U.S. Senate.

BRUSSELS — European leaders like Romania’s Nicușor Dan spent most of 2025 trying to work out how to live with Donald Trump. Or — even worse — without him. Since the great disruptor of international norms returned to the White House in January, he has made clear just how little he really cares for Europe — some of his key lieutenants are plainly hostile.  The U.S. president slashed financial and military aid to Ukraine, hit the European Union with tariffs, and attacked its leaders as “weak.” His administration is now on a mission to intervene in Europe’s democracy to back “patriotic” parties and shift politics toward MAGA’s anti-migrant goals.  For leaders such as Romania’s moderate president, the dilemma is always how far to accept Trump’s priorities — because Europe still needs America — and how strongly to resist his hostility to centrist European values. Does a true alliance even still exist across the Atlantic? “The world [has] changed,” Dan said in an interview from his top-floor Brussels hotel suite. “We shifted from a — in some sense — moral way of doing things to a very pragmatic and economical way of doing things.” EU leaders understand this, he said, and now focus their attention on developing practical strategies for handling the new reality of Trump’s world. Centrists will need to factor in a concerted drive from Americans to back their populist opponents on the right as the United States seeks to change Europe’s direction. Administration officials such as Vice President JD Vance condemned last year’s canceled election in Romania and the new White House National Security Strategy suggests the U.S. will seek to bend European politics to its anti-migrant MAGA agenda. For Dan, it is “OK” for U.S. politicians to express their opinions. But it would be a “problem” if the U.S. tried to “influence” politics “undemocratically” — for example, by paying media inside European countries “like the Russians are doing.” WEAK EUROPEANS Relations with America are critical for a country like Romania, which, unusually, remained open to the West during four decades of communist rule. On the EU’s eastern edge, bordering Ukraine, Romania is home to a major NATO base — soon to be Europe’s biggest — as well as an American ballistic missile defense site. But the Trump administration has announced the withdrawal of 800 American troops from Romania, triggering concern in Bucharest. As winter sun streamed in through the window, Dan argued that Europe and the U.S. are natural allies because they share more values than other regions of the world. He thought “a proper partnership” will be possible — “in the medium [term] future.” But for now, “we are in some sense of a transition period in which we have to understand better each other.” Dan’s frank assessment reveals the extent of the damage that has been done to the transatlantic alliance this year. Trump has injected jeopardy into all aspects of the Western alliance — even restoring relations with Russian ruler Vladimir Putin.  At times, Europeans have been at a loss over how to respond.  Does Dan believe Trump had a point when he told POLITICO this month that European leaders were “weak”?  “Yes,” Dan said, there is “some” truth in Trump’s assessment. Europe can be too slow to make decisions. For example, it took months of argument and a fraught summit in Brussels last week that ended at 3 a.m. to agree on a way to fund Ukraine. But — crucially — even a fractious EU did eventually take “the important decision,” he said. That decision to borrow €90 billion in joint EU debt for a loan for cash-strapped Kyiv will keep Ukraine in the fight against Putin for the next two years.  WAITING FOR PEACE According to EU leaders who support the plan (Hungary, Slovakia and Czechia won’t take part), it makes a peace deal more likely because it sends a signal to Putin that Ukraine won’t just collapse if he waits long enough. But Dan believes the end of the war remains some way off, despite Trump’s push for a ceasefire.  “I am more pessimistic than optimistic on short term,” he said. Putin’s side does not appear to want peace: “They think a peace in two, three months from now will be better for them than peace now. So they will fight more — because they have some small progress on the field.”  Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said at last week’s European Council summit that he wanted Trump to put more pressure on Putin to agree to a ceasefire. Does Dan agree? “Of course. We are supporting Ukraine.” But Trump’s “extremely powerful” recent sanctions on Russian oil firms Rosneft and Lukoil are already helping, Dan said. He also welcomed Trump’s commitment to peace, and America’s new openness to providing security guarantees to bolster a final deal.  Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said at last week’s European Council summit that he wanted Trump to put more pressure on Putin to agree to a ceasefire. Does Dan agree? “Of course. We are supporting Ukraine.” | Olivier Hoslet/EPA It is clear that Dan hopes Putin doesn’t get the whole of Donbas in eastern Ukraine, but he doesn’t want to tie Zelenskyy’s hands. “Any kind of peace in which the aggressor is rewarded in some sense is not good for Europe and for the future security of the world,” Dan said. “But the decision for the peace is just on the Ukrainian shoulders. They suffer so much, so we cannot blame them for any decision they will do.” Romania plays a critical role as an operational hub for transferring supplies to neighboring Ukraine. With its Black Sea port of Constanța, the country will be vital to future peacekeeping operations. Ukrainian soldiers are training in Romania and it is already working with Bulgaria and Turkey to demine the Black Sea, Dan said.  Meanwhile, Russian drones have breached Romanian airspace more than a dozen times since the start of the full-scale war, and a village on the border with Ukraine had to be evacuated recently when drones set fire to a tanker ship containing gas. Dan played down the threat.  “We had some drones. We are sure they have not intentionally [been] sent on our territory,” he said. “We try to say to our people that they are not at all in danger.” Still, Romania is boosting its military spending to deter Russia all the same. CORRUPTION AND A CRISIS OF FAITH Dan, 56, won the presidency in May this year at a tense moment for the country of 19 million people. The moderate former mayor of Bucharest defeated his populist, Ukraine-skeptic opponent against the odds. The vote was a rerun, after the first attempt to hold a presidential election was canceled last December over allegations of massive Russian interference and unlawful activity in support of the far-right front-runner Călin Georgescu. Legal cases are underway, including charges against Georgescu and others over an alleged coup plot. But for many Romanians, the cancelation of the 2024 election merely reinforced their cynicism toward the entire democratic system in their country. They wanted change and almost half the electorate backed the far right to deliver it.  Corruption today remains a major problem in Romania and Dan made it his mission to restore voters’ faith. In his first six months, however, he prioritized painful and unpopular public-sector spending cuts to bring the budget deficit — which was the EU’s biggest — under control. “On the big problems of society, starting with corruption, we didn’t do much,” Dan confessed. That, he said, will change. A recent TV documentary about alleged corruption in the judiciary provoked street demonstrations and a protest letter signed by hundreds of judges. Dan is due to meet them this week and will then work on legislative reforms focused on making sure the best magistrates are promoted on merit rather than because of who they know. “People at the top are working for small networks of interests, instead of the public good,” Dan said. But for many Romanians, the cancellation of the 2024 election merely reinforced their cynicism toward the entire democratic system in their country. | Robert Ghement/EPA He was also clear that the state has not yet done enough to explain to voters why the election last year was canceled. More detail will come in a report expected in the next two months, he said. RUSSIAN MEDDLING One thing that is now obvious is that Russia’s attack on Romanian democracy, including through a vast TikTok influence campaign, was not isolated. Dan said his country has been a target for Moscow for a decade, and other European leaders tell him they now suffer the same disinformation campaigns, as well as sabotage. Nobody has an answer to the torrent of fake news online, he said. “I just have talks with leaders for countries that are more advanced than us and I think nobody has a complete answer,” he said. “If you have that kind of information and that information arrived to half a million people, even if you’re coming the next day saying that it was false, you have lost already.” The far-right populist Alliance for the Union of Romanians party is ahead in the polls on about 40 percent, mirroring the pattern elsewhere in Europe. Dan, who beat AUR leader George Simion in May, believes his own team must get closer to the people to defeat populism. And he wishes that national politicians around Europe would stop blaming all their unpopular policies on Brussels because that merely fuels populist causes. Dan said he has learned that EU politics is in fact a democratic process, in which different member countries bring their own ideas forward. “With my six months’ experience, I can say that it’s quite a debate,” he said. “There is not a bureaucratic master that’s arranging things. It’s a democracy. It’s a pity that the people do not feel that directly.” But what about those marathon EU summits that keep everyone working well beyond midnight? “The topics are well chosen,” Dan said. “But I think the debates are a little bit too long.”

Serbia will be absent when EU leaders meet their Western Balkan counterparts on Wednesday evening to discuss enlargement after President Aleksandar Vučić said late Tuesday that his country would not attend. “For the first time in the last 13 or 14 years, neither I nor anyone else will go to that intergovernmental conference. No one will represent the Republic of Serbia, so the Western Balkans will be without the Republic of Serbia,” Vučić told Serbian media. The Serbian president called it a personal decision, arguing that “by doing this, I believe I am protecting the Republic of Serbia and its interests, because we need to show what we have achieved.” Serbia has made little progress in its bid to join the EU, despite being granted candidate status in 2012. No major accession milestones have been reached since 2021. Vučić’s decision follows a dinner meeting in Brussels on Dec. 10 with European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and European Council President António Costa, where Vučić said he proposed that all six Western Balkan countries join the EU simultaneously rather than through the standard step-by-step accession process. Serbia has long maintained close ties with Russia, rooted in historical, cultural and religious connections as well as close economic cooperation; Serbia relies on Moscow for gas supplies. Since Moscow’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, Serbia has faced growing pressure to distance itself from Moscow but has resisted imposing sanctions, instead seeking to balance its ties with Russia and the European Union. Serbian Minister for European Integration Nemanja Starović issued a statement backing Vučić’s decision, accusing the EU of a “short-sighted lack of willingness” to recognize Serbia’s reforms and make progress in the accession process — a stance he said sends a negative message to Serbian citizens. “This message only fuels anti-European narratives and discourages those who are driving reform processes within society,” Starović said. Starović went on to say that Serbia’s absence defends ” the dignity of our people, but also the integrity of the accession process, as well as the credibility of the European idea in Serbia.” Opposition politicians in Serbia criticized the decision, calling it “an attempt at emotional blackmail, because Vučić is dissatisfied that Albania and Montenegro have made progress and are likely to become the next EU member states,” said Aleksandar Radovanović, member of the Free Citizens Movement. Pavle Grbović, a member of Serbia’s parliament also from Free Citizens Movement, said it was “a symptom of profound political cowardice and an attempt to evade uncomfortable questions and messages.” POLITICO contacted the European Council for comment but did not receive a reply.

A fair, fast and competitive transition begins with what already works and then rapidly scales it up.  Across the EU commercial road transport sector, the diversity of operations is met with a diversity of solutions. Urban taxis are switching to electric en masse. Many regional coaches run on advanced biofuels, with electrification emerging in smaller applications such as school services, as European e-coach technologies are still maturing and only now beginning to enter the market. Trucks electrify rapidly where operationally and financially possible, while others, including long-haul and other hard-to-electrify segments, operate at scale on HVO (hydrotreated vegetable oil) or biomethane, cutting emissions immediately and reliably. These are real choices made every day by operators facing different missions, distances, terrains and energy realities, showing that decarbonization is not a single pathway but a spectrum of viable ones.  Building on this diversity, many operators are already modernizing their fleets and cutting emissions through electrification. When they can control charging, routing and energy supply, electric vehicles often deliver a positive total cost of ownership (TCO), strong reliability and operational benefits. These early adopters prove that electrification works where the enabling conditions are in place, and that its potential can expand dramatically with the right support. > Decarbonization is not a single pathway but a spectrum of viable ones chosen > daily by operators facing real-world conditions. But scaling electrification faces structural bottlenecks. Grid capacity is constrained across the EU, and upgrades routinely take years. As most heavy-duty vehicle charging will occur at depots, operators cannot simply move around to look for grid opportunities. They are bound to the location of their facilities.  The recently published grid package tries, albeit timidly, to address some of these challenges, but it neither resolves the core capacity deficiencies nor fixes the fundamental conditions that determine a positive TCO: the predictability of electricity prices, the stability of delivered power, and the resulting charging time. A truck expected to recharge in one hour at a high-power station may wait far longer if available grid power drops. Without reliable timelines, predictable costs and sufficient depot capacity, most transport operators cannot make long-term investment decisions. And the grid is only part of the enabling conditions needed: depot charging infrastructure itself requires significant additional investment, on top of vehicles that already cost several hundreds of thousands of euros more than their diesel equivalents.  This is why the EU needs two things at once: strong enablers for electrification and hydrogen; and predictability on what the EU actually recognizes as clean. Operators using renewable fuels, from biomethane to advanced biofuels and HVO, delivering up to 90 percent CO2 reduction, are cutting emissions today. Yet current CO2 frameworks, for both light-duty vehicles and heavy-duty trucks, fail to recognize fleets running on these fuels as part of the EU’s decarbonization solution for road transport, even when they deliver immediate, measurable climate benefits. This lack of clarity limits investment and slows additional emission reductions that could happen today. > Policies that punish before enabling will not accelerate the transition; a > successful shift must empower operators, not constrain them. The revision of both CO2 standards, for cars and vans, and for heavy-duty vehicles, will therefore be pivotal. They must support electrification and hydrogen where they fit the mission, while also recognizing the contribution of renewable and low-carbon fuels across the fleet. Regulations that exclude proven clean options will not accelerate the transition. They will restrict it.  With this in mind, the question is: why would the EU consider imposing purchasing mandates on operators or excessively high emission-reduction targets on member states that would, in practice, force quotas on buyers? Such measures would punish before enabling, removing choice from those who know their operations best. A successful transition must empower operators, not constrain them.  The EU’s transport sector is committed and already delivering. With the right enablers, a technology-neutral framework, and clarity on what counts as clean, the EU can turn today’s early successes into a scalable, fair and competitive decarbonization pathway.  We now look with great interest to the upcoming Automotive Package, hoping to see pragmatic solutions to these pressing questions, solutions that EU transport operators, as the buyers and daily users of all these technologies, are keenly expecting. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Disclaimer POLITICAL ADVERTISEMENT * The sponsor is IRU – International Road Transport Union  * The ultimate controlling entity is IRU – International Road Transport Union  More information here.

BRUSSELS — Cheap packages entering the EU will be charged a tax of €3 per item from next July, the bloc’s 27 finance ministers agreed on Friday. The deal effectively ends the tax-free status for packages worth less than €150. The flat tax will apply for each different type of item in a package. If one package contains 10 plushy toys, the duty is applied once. But if the shipment also contains a charging cable, another €3 is added. The flood of untaxed and often unsafe goods prompted the European Commission to propose a temporary solution for the packages under €150 a month ago. This “de minimis” rule allows exporters like Shein and Temu to send products directly to consumers, often bypassing scrutiny. The EU has already received more packages in the first nine months of 2025 than in the entire previous year, when the counter hit 4.6 billion. French Finance Minister Roland Lescure called it “a literal invasion of parcels in Europe last year,” which would have hit “7, 8, 9 billion in the coming years if nothing was done.” An EU official told POLITICO earlier this month that at some airports, up to 80 percent of such packages arriving don’t comply with EU safety rules. This creates a huge workload for customs officials, a growing pile of garbage, and health risks from unsafe toys and kitchen items. EU countries have already agreed to formally abolish the de-minimis loophole, but taxing all items based on their actual value and product type will require more data exchange. That will only be possible once an ambitious reform of the bloc’s Customs Union, currently under negotiation, is completed by 2028. The €3 flat tax is the temporary solution to cover the period until then. The rising popularity of web shops like Shein and Temu, which both operate out of China is fueling this flood. France suspended access to Shein’s online platform this month. This €3 EU-wide tax will be distinct from the so-called handling fee that France has proposed as a part of its national budget to relieve the costs on customs for dealing with the same flood of packages. Klara Durand and Camille Gijs contributed to this report.

BRUSSELS — Russian state assets in Europe could remain permanently frozen under a legal mechanism approved by EU capitals on Thursday. The EU’s ambassadors handed emergency powers to the European Commission to keep €210 billion in Russian state assets blocked until the Kremlin pays post-war reparations to Ukraine, the Danish Council presidency announced on Thursday. It said that ambassadors had “agreed on a revised version of the Art. 122-proposal and approved the launch of a written procedure for formal Council decision by tomorrow around 5 pm.” The decision was taken by a “very clear majority.” The legal mechanism deals a major blow to the Kremlin’s hopes of unfreezing its money as part of a post-war peace settlement — an idea that has been championed by U.S. President Donald Trump but remains unpopular in Europe. The EU’s new emergency powers will remain in place until “Russia ceases its war of aggression against Ukraine, and provides reparations to Ukraine,” according to a legal text, seen by POLITICO, that was backed by the EU’s 27 ambassadors on Thursday afternoon. In a major boost to Ukraine, the legal workaround significantly reduces the chance that pro-Kremlin countries in Europe, such as Hungary and Slovakia, will hand back the frozen funds to Russia. The emergency clause effectively overhauls the current rules, which compel EU countries to unanimously reauthorize the sanctions every six months.  Kremlin-friendly countries are thereby set to lose their power to release the sanctioned money simply by voting “no” on sanctions renewal. Were that to happen after the EU provided an assets-backed loan to Kyiv, the EU’s 27 capitals would be on the hook to repay the loan to Russia. The EU justified the seismic legal change on the grounds that handing back the assets to Russia would wreak havoc on the EU economy — and potentially fuel hybrid attacks by the Kremlin across the bloc. Keeping the assets frozen “is a measure that is appropriate in order to avoid further repercussions of unprecedented magnitude on the economic situation of the Union caused by Russia’s actions,” the Commission wrote in the legal text. The EU executive initially proposed the legal mechanism to strengthen a separate plan to mobilize €210 billion in frozen Russian assets for Ukraine — most of which are held by the Belgian-based Euroclear.  Belgium, however, is opposed to the plan over fears that it will be on the hook to repay the loan if Russia claws back the money. In order to allay Belgium’s concerns, the Commission stripped references to the loan from the legal proposal that was approved Thursday. Giovanna Faggionato contributed to this report.

BRUSSELS — The EU will begin to ban all Russian gas imports to the bloc early next year after lawmakers, officials and diplomatic negotiators struck a last-minute deal over a key piece of legislation set to reshape Europe’s energy sector. Put forward over the summer, the bill is designed to kill off the EU’s lingering Russian energy dependency at a critical juncture in the Ukraine war, with Russia advancing steadily and Kyiv fast running out of cash. While Europe’s imports of Russian gas have fallen sharply since 2022, the country still accounts for around 19 percent of its total intake. The EU is already set to sanction Russian gas imports, but those measures are temporary and subject to renewal every six months. The new legislation is designed to make that rupture permanent and put member countries that still operate contracts with Russia on a surer footing in the event of legal action. “We were paying to Russia €12 billion per month at the beginning of the war for fossil fuels. Now we’re down to €1.5 billion per month … We aim to bring it down to zero,” European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen told reporters on Wednesday. “This is a good day for Europe and for our independence from Russian fossil fuels — this is how we make Europe resilient.” “We wanted to show that Europe will never go back to Russian fossil fuels again — and the only ones who lost today are Russia and Mr Putin,” Green MEP Ville Niinistö, one of the Parliament’s two lead negotiators on the file, told POLITICO. The law will enter into force on Jan. 1 next year and then apply to different kinds of gas in phases. Spot market purchases of gas will be banned almost immediately, while existing short- and long-term contracts will be banned in 2026 and 2027. A prohibition on pipeline gas will come into effect in September 2027, owing to concerns from landlocked countries reliant on Russian gas, such as Slovakia and Hungary. Finalized in barely six months, the law was the subject of fierce disagreements in recent weeks as the European Parliament’s more ambitious stance irked member countries concerned about the legal risks and technical difficulties of the ban. But despite fears that talks would be prolonged and even spill over into the new year, negotiators reached a compromise on key aspects of the law at the last minute. Now both sides can claim victory. Lawmakers, for instance, repeatedly pushed for an earlier timeline and ultimately ensured that none of the bans would enter into force later than 2027. The Parliament also secured commitments from national capitals to impose one of three penalties on companies that breach the rule: a lump sum penalty of €40 million, 3.5 percent of a company’s annual turnover, or 300 percent of the value of the offending transaction. Where the Council included its demands, the Parliament was able to water them down. For instance, lawmakers convinced member countries to tighten a controversial clause allowing countries facing energy crises to lift the ban — suspensions will only last four weeks at a time and will need to be reviewed by Parliament and the Commission. The Parliament also backed down from a push for a parallel ban on Russian crude imports in the same file after the Commission promised a separate bill early next year, as first reported by POLITICO. The Council did push through its controversial list of “safe” countries from which the EU can still import gas without rigorous vetting. Lawmakers complained that the list includes Qatar, Algeria and Nigeria, but have now accepted it, so long as countries can be excised from the list if they offend. MEPs gushed that they got far more than they expected and weren’t trampled by seasoned diplomats, as some had feared. “We have strengthened the European Commission’s initial proposal by introducing a pathway towards a ban on oil and its products, ending long-term contracts sooner than originally proposed, and secured harmonized EU penalties for non-compliance,” European People’s Party MEP Inese Vaidere, who also led the file, told POLITICO. “We achieved more than my realistic landing scenario — earlier phase-outs, tougher penalties, and closing the loopholes that let Russian gas sneak in,” said Niinistö. “This was about proving European unity — Parliament, Council and Commission on the same side — and showing citizens that we can cut Russia’s revenues faster and more decisively than ever proposed before.”