India Sees Opportunities as Trump Jettisons the Western Order

C. Raja Mohan

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“Multialignment” has been Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s lodestar as he moved India and its foreign policy out of the dead end of nonalignment over the last decade. In Washington to meet with U.S. President Donald Trump last week, Modi got to see—firsthand and in real time—how Trump was developing a multialignment of his own. Trump’s efforts to loosen U.S. commitments to Europe, reach out to Russian President Vladimir Putin, and publicly woo Chinese President Xi Jinping mark an epochal break with the idea of a rules-based international order backed by U.S. power and a collective West. With his vision of America First, Trump is now looking for bilateral deals with other powers to secure U.S. interests. If Trump succeeds in this, multialignment could well become the norm among the major powers of the international system.

In nudging India closer to the United States than ever before, Modi abandoned one of the important but unstated principles of India’s longtime nonalignment policy: keeping a political distance from the United States on global and regional issues. At the same time, Modi chose to maintain India’s old partnership with Russia while sustaining a difficult dialogue with China amid persistent border tensions and a mounting trade deficit. Under Modi, New Delhi also ended its prolonged indifference to Europe by stepping up engagement with key powers, including France, Germany, and Italy, as well as the European Union in Brussels.

India’s Industrial Policies: Rejecting the Old Status Quo and Creating the New

Sarthak Pradhan

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Introduction

Of India’s 1.4 billion people, approximately 565 million are part of the workforce, the majority in agriculture.[1] The country’s working-age population is expected to increase significantly, and if it is to create sufficient jobs for its youth, facilitate economic growth, and increase exports, it will need a robust, growing manufacturing sector.[2] India has long prioritized targeted industrial policy measures to boost manufacturing. While those measures occasionally obstruct foreign firms operating in India, violate World Trade Organization (WTO) rules, and lead to trade disputes, they are also in keeping with the emerging global trade norms championed by the United States, the European Union, and China. However, some of India’s measures are even more stringent than those of other countries, and those industrial policy measures have not significantly boosted India’s manufacturing sector, which has remained stagnant.

Industrial Policies in India

The Indian government has increasingly relied on three types of industrial policy measures to boost manufacturing: production-linked incentives (PLIs), tariffs, and domestic content requirements (DCRs).

What Lies Beneath the Surface of the F-35’s Allure for India?

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In an unexpected move, US President Donald Trump has offered F-35 stealth fighter jets to India as part of efforts to strengthen bilateral defence ties and build a closer strategic partnership with New Delhi. He is looking to expand military deals and enhance cooperation between the two nations. This offer comes as the Indian Air Force (IAF) is exploring different options for new fighter jets, with several aircraft models already being considered for purchase.

Earlier, the F-35 was not seen as a likely choice for India due to its highly sensitive technology and the fact that India already uses a large number of advanced Russian defence systems.

During Prime Minister Narendra Modi's recent visit to Washington, DC, Trump offered India the F-35 fighter jets. This happened around the same time as the Aero India, 2025, air show was held at the Yelahanka Air Force Station in Bengaluru, where the F-35 was also showcased.

Trump announced that, this year onwards, the US would increase military sales to India by millions of dollars. He also stated that steps were being taken to eventually offer India the F-35 stealth fighter. At a joint White House press conference, Modi did not mention the F-35 in his speech after Trump. However, a joint media statement confirmed that the US was reviewing its policy of providing India with fifth-generation fighter jets and other advanced military systems.

Balochistan districts can go Bangladesh way, Pakistan MP tells parliament ‘UN will accept their liberation’

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Member of Parliamentarian Pakistani Maulana Fazl-ur-Rehman has said that five to seven districts of Balochistan province could announce liberation.

He referred to the 1971 Indo-Pakistan war that led to the liberation of Bangladesh and warned that a similar situation could occur again due to the mindset of the Pakistani ruling authorities.

He made these remarks in the country's Parliament, the Pakistan National Assembly (NA).

Rehman emphasised that the United Nations could accept the declaration of liberation from these parts of the province. “If districts in Balochistan announce liberation, the UN will accept their independence and Pakistan will fall," Fazl-ur-Rehman said.

Violence in Kurram region

His comments come amid escalating violence in Pakistan's Kurram region. The area has seen Sunni-Shiite clashes for decades. Since November, around 150 people have been killed in renewed fighting.

Tribes have been fighting with machine guns and heavy weapons, leaving the remote, mountainous region near Afghanistan largely cut off.

Firsthand Insights Into Sri Lanka’s Rehabilition Of Ex-LTTE Combatants: A Sri Lankan Experience For Global Application – Analysis

Air Commodore Vajira Senadheera\

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Introduction

The end of Sri Lanka’s civil conflict in 2009 marked a transformative moment in the country’s history, presenting both challenges and opportunities for post-conflict recovery. Among the most significant challenges was the reintegration of former combatants, particularly members of the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE). (1) This reintegration was a critical element in Sri Lanka’s pursuit of lasting peace and stability. This article offers a firsthand perspective on the country’s rehabilitation program for ex-combatants, drawing from my experience as a leader at the Protective Accommodation and Rehabilitation Centre (PARC) (2) in Trikonamadu, Eastern Sri Lanka.

Researcher Yulia Antonovskaya (3) noted in 2015 that Sri Lanka presents a unique context for Disarmament, Demobilization, and Reintegration (DDR) (4) programs. Unlike many post-conflict scenarios where the United Nations and international organizations lead DDR efforts, Sri Lanka’s case was distinct. The government-maintained control throughout the conflict, achieving a decisive victory, and subsequently launching its DDR program during the final phase of the war. As a result, the program primarily emphasized reintegration, with disarmament and demobilization playing a lesser role.

While academic discussions on post-conflict rehabilitation often focus on theoretical models, firsthand experience offers valuable practical insights. My tenure at PARC provided direct exposure to the complexities of rehabilitation initiatives, highlighting key strategies, successes, and challenges. This article explores those aspects and offers lessons that could inform similar programs worldwide.

How China can really pivot to the Global South

Xiaochen Su

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The latest actions from the Trump administration have reaffirmed the imperative for Chinese firms to reduce their dependence on the American market.

Trump’s 10% additional tariffs on all Chinese imports have predictably invited Chinese countermeasures. And markets remain fearful that Trump will continue threatening the 60% tariffs on all Chinese goods he promised to impose while on the campaign trail.

The risk of destabilization in Sino-American trade was further evidenced by Trump’s decision to scrap the $800 de minimis loophole on packages shipped into the US. If he did not hold implementation at the last minute, the US business of Chinese cross-border e-commerce firms like Temu and Shein, making up 60% of all de minimis packages, would have been wiped out overnight.

As Trump systematically restricts Chinese imports, European leaders may follow suit to stem a deluge of manufactured goods redirected from America. The European Union’s October 2024 decision to impose tariffs on “unfairly subsidized” Chinese electric vehicles may be a harbinger of an increasingly restrictive trade relationship with China, especially as Europe seeks to develop its strategic autonomy in high-value, future-oriented industries supporting its technological and green-energy ambitions.

Is China’s military really built for war? New report questions Beijing’s arms buildup

Brad Lendon

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China is not ready for war, according to a contentious report from a US think tank, which claims the main motivation for the ruling Communist Party’s expansive push for military modernization is to retain its grip on power – not fight an overseas foe.

Beijing has pursued a head-turning military buildup under Chinese leader Xi Jinping, during which the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) – previously not even one of the strongest in Asia – has started to rival, or in some categories surpass, the US military in analysts’ estimations.

Simulations by US defense experts have repeatedly shown the US – widely regarded as the world’s strongest military – having a tough time matching the PLA in a fight close to China’s shores, especially over the democratic island of Taiwan, which is claimed by Beijing.

But a report released last month by the Washington-based RAND Corp. said that despite the impressive buildup, political considerations – importantly the Communist Party’s desire for control over both military personnel and Chinese society – could hamper the PLA in battle, especially against a peer adversary such as the US.

China Doesn’t Want to Lead an Axis

Sergey Radchenko

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China and Russia’s 2022 proclamation of a “no limits” partnership with “no ‘forbidden’ areas” has had a far-reaching effect. The agreement implied that Beijing and Moscow were about to resurrect their long-defunct alliance that, when it briefly bound the two powers in the 1950s, projected a formidable threat that the United States could not afford to leave unchallenged.

Regardless of their various disagreements, Chinese President Xi Jinping has called Russian President Vladimir Putin his “dear friend” and was overheard in March 2023 telling him that the two of them were together “driving changes unseen in a century.” Their frequent meetings have

The Coming Golden Age of Crime

Robert Muggah and Misha Glenny

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On a gray afternoon in November 2021, Metropolitan Police officers pulled over a vehicle on a highway north of London, acting on a tip about a suspected drug deal. In the car, they found 250,000 pounds in cash, according to the investigators involved. A sweep of the driver’s home turned up a dollar-counting machine and another 24,500 pounds.

This was a significant coup for law enforcement, but the story turned out to be much bigger. Further investigation revealed a thread that led British investigators to a building in the heart of Moscow. The money, the machine, and the man driving the car all traced back to a Russian intelligence operation.

Europe Fails to Seize the Moment on Ukraine

Matthew Savill

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European leaders still appear to be scrambling to create a consensus on both their priorities and support for Ukraine after a week of blunt US statements and jumbled diplomacy. Going in to a meeting of European leaders in Paris on 17 February, called by French President Emmanuel Macron during an uncomfortable Munich Security Conference, UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer appeared to break with caution by stating his readiness to deploy UK ground forces to Ukraine as part of providing security guarantees. There is already a small UK military presence in Ukraine in the form of a defence section in the embassy and a medical training team, but this proposal appeared to suggest a more substantial force of some description. It has been nearly a year since Macron first used a classic ‘refusal to rule out’ approach on sending French troops, but Starmer’s suggestion was the firmest sign yet of any other major European military appearing to be ready to follow suit.

The problems are multiple: there is no agreement on the purpose or size of any such force; some countries appear reluctant to even discuss the issue; and without US support, there is serious doubt as to the credibility of any such force acting as a deterrent to future Russian aggression. The proposal rests upon the significant assumption that any ceasefire agreement will include the deployment of Western forces; initial indications suggest that the Russians will strenuously resist such a provision. While repeated statements about European willingness to step up are welcome, and European defence spending overall has been on an upward trend since the NATO Wales Summit in 2014, only a serious, coordinated European effort can make a substantial contribution to Ukrainian security if we assume that the US will be significantly reducing its involvement. It might not be a good sign that countries like the Baltic states, which have a clear interest in how Russia is tackled, were not involved in the Paris discussions.

Trump’s Phone Call With Putin Is Causing a Stir in Taiwan

Karishma Vaswani

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One phone call does not a treaty make, but President Donald Trump’s conversation with Russia’s Vladimir Putin on ending the war in Ukraine is worrying Taiwan. China will watch developments for any hint on whether a resolution spells a similar future for the self-ruled island Beijing claims as its own.

Taiwan’s President Lai Ching-te’s government should consider what it can offer Trump to avoid becoming a pawn in the US-China rivalry. It’s a delicate balance: Appeasing the US leader doesn’t only mean figuring out what he wants, but interpreting how American policy toward the island might be changing.

The New Globalism

Atossa Araxia Abrahamian

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When Donald Trump looks at the globe, what does he see? We know that in the president’s eyes, other nations may be abject “shithole countries,” shiny real-estate opportunities, or potential candidates for the 51st state. There’s no question that people, goods, and ideas from other lands are less welcome in the United States than they once were. But for all his purported anti-globalism, Trump is no isolationist: Foreign states are still useful things. In his first few weeks in office, Trump has shown us how, in spite of its fixation on borders, the MAGA movement is embracing its own version of globalization.

Trump’s is not a politics of international cooperation and mutual support, as the cuts to USAID and digs against NATO make clear. Nor does he defer to corporate hegemony: He has no problem banning foreign businesses and threatening multinationals with tariffs. He seems to approach the world, rather, as a wily oligarch does—juggling offshore trusts, fictitious addresses, and numbered accounts to avoid taxes, litigation, and the rules and responsibilities that come with living in a society.

I’ve spent much of my career as a journalist reporting on the shadowy offshore world and its protagonists: the people who built it, the countries complicit in the system, the firms and oligarchs that profit from it, and the groups and individuals who get caught in the cracks. I recognize in Trump’s recent incursions a line of reasoning that I’ve encountered time and time again: that if you’re incredibly rich, cruel, or clever, the world can be your loophole.

America's 'Oil Weapon' Hits Russia Hard | Opinion

Gordon G. Chang

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"The oil weapon alone will not win the war in Ukraine, but it might just have brought Vladimir Putin to the bargaining table," Rebecca Grant of the Arlington, Va.-based Lexington Institute told Newsweek last week, referring to sanctions announced by the Treasury Department on Jan. 10.

The oil weapon seems, at least for the moment, to be working. Putin, who had been resistant to negotiations to end the war, agreed to begin discussions, as President Donald Trump announced last Wednesday in a Truth Social posting.

On Jan. 10, Treasury imposed a broad range of measures targeting Russia's oil sales, especially the vessels of its "shadow" or "dark" fleet, the ships that lift sanctioned oil from Russia.

Treasury hit 183 vessels, 143 of them tankers. The measures cover ships carrying an estimated 42 percent of Russia's seaborne oil exports, according to data and analytics platform Kpler. Lloyd's List reports the number could be as high as 50 percent. The U.S. sanctions come after the United Kingdom and the European Union in December listed 90 ships.

Ukraine War: Europe, we can do this - Opinion

Bill Emmott

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Is Donald Trump proposing a capitulation to Russia or isn’t he? The messages concerning the war in Ukraine have been as mixed and confusing as ever, whether the source is President Trump himself in Washington or his Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth and Vice President J.D. Vance traveling in Europe and following the novel alliance-management technique of insulting your friends at every opportunity.

Whatever the reality, two things are clear:

• Nothing can or will be settled until negotiations actually begin between the victim, Ukraine, and the invader, Russia – so pre-emptive panic, outrage or despair are pointless.
• If Europe wants to protect its own security in the long term it will have to be a bold, ambitious and strong partner for Ukraine both immediately and in the future.

This is not a new revelation. European leaders must work out how best to protect their nations’ interests in a world in which their post-war partnership with the United States is at best in suspension, at worst destroyed.

This means that flattering Donald Trump or offering concessions to him is not just a waste of time but counter-productive. Europe needs to show strength, not sycophancy, to both of the dictatorial bullies it is faced with: Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin.

Of course, Europe is divided. But it always is, which is why the European Union is necessary, and why even the EU often must work through coalitions of the willing rather than a full consensus.

The real reason Trump is waging a global trade war

Melissa Lawford

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Trump certainly is using tariffs as a negotiating tactic to bring world leaders to their knees. But optimists are overlooking a second truth: the US president is also desperate for cash.

America’s public finances are shot. The deficit is the highest since at least 1975 outside of a crisis period. Debt is on track to grow at double the rate of the economy in the decades ahead.

And against this backdrop, Trump has promised tax cuts that would cost in the region of $10 trillion (£7.9 trillion) over the next 10 years.

Experts warn that for Trump, tariffs are not only a means of geopolitical leverage but a key source of funds for his tax-cutting agenda. This means they will be here for the long run.

“He views them as a revenue-raiser and his team will use them to justify tax cuts,” says Michael Martins, founder of Overton Advisory and former US embassy political specialist.

“Instead of taxing our citizens to enrich other countries, we will tariff and tax foreign countries to enrich our citizens,” Trump said in his inauguration speech.

“It will be massive amounts of money pouring into our Treasury, coming from foreign sources.”

As Israel uses US-made AI models in war, concerns arise about tech’s role in who lives and who dies

MICHAEL BIESECKER, SAM MEDNICK and GARANCE BURKE 

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U.S. tech giants have quietly empowered Israel to track and kill many more alleged militants more quickly in Gaza and Lebanon through a sharp spike in artificial intelligence and computing services. But the number of civilians killed has also soared, fueling fears that these tools are contributing to the deaths of innocent people.

Militaries have for years hired private companies to build custom autonomous weapons. However, Israel's recent wars mark a leading instance in which commercial AI models made in the United States have been used in active warfare, despite concerns that they were not originally developed to help decide who lives and who dies.

The Israeli military uses AI to sift through vast troves of intelligence, intercepted communications and surveillance to find suspicious speech or behavior and learn the movements of its enemies. After a deadly surprise attack by Hamas militants on Oct. 7, 2023, its use of Microsoft and OpenAI technology skyrocketed, an Associated Press investigation found. The investigation also revealed new details of how AI systems select targets and ways they can go wrong, including faulty data or flawed algorithms. It was based on internal documents, data and exclusive interviews with current and former Israeli officials and company employees.

Political lessons for Australia from the war in Ukraine

Mick Ryan

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Three years ago, Russian forces moved across the Ukrainian northern, eastern and southern frontiers, as well as in a coordinated series of missile and air assault actions, in the hope of a short, ten-day lightning war. The ultimate objective was that the Ukrainian government would fall, to be replaced by a Russian puppet government that would keep NATO out and Russia in.

In On War, Carl von Clausewitz describes how “the political object, as the original motive of the War, will be the standard for determining both the aim of the military force and also the amount of effort to be made”. Ukraine, facing an existential crisis, has leveraged all its national resources to achieve the supreme political goal of retaining Ukrainian sovereignty. Russia, which has invented this crisis and constructed a make-believe tale about NATO encroachment and Nazi leadership in Ukraine, faced no existential challenge. And yet, Putin has manufactured a political environment where there is no Russian national life, in the economy, in schools or in the media, without total commitment to winning the war.

Writing in the early days of the war, I described how no responsible military or political institution will be able to ignore the lessons that will emerge from Ukraine. Very few people anticipated the profound impacts this war would have on European and global political and security affairs. The insights from this conflict about the changing character of war extend from the technological to the industrial, the tactical to the political. With this as context, what might be the key insights that the past three years have provided for Australian politicians?

It’s Time for Europe to Do the Unthinkable

Kishore Mahbubani

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Desperate times call for desperate measures. And as my geopolitical gurus taught me, one must always think the unthinkable, as Europe must do now.

It’s too early to tell who the real winners and losers from the second Trump administration will be. Things could change. Yet, there’s no doubt that Europe’s geopolitical standing has diminished considerably. U.S. President Donald Trump’s decision to not even consult with or forewarn European leaders before speaking to Russian President Vladimir Putin shows how irrelevant Europe has become, even when its geopolitical interests are at stake. The only way to restore Europe’s geopolitical standing is to consider three unthinkable options.

Low Global Unemployment Won’t Last

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In 2024, conflicts in Ukraine and the Middle East and tight monetary policies contributed to a slowing global economy. Yet, global unemployment remained stable at 5 percent, its lowest level in decades. In Europe and East Asia, jobless rates fell as economies continued recovering from the pandemic and adjusted to trade restrictions and sanctions on Russia. This decline offset a sharp rise in U.S. unemployment, driven by the Federal Reserve’s high base rate, weak demand and slower hiring.

The International Labor Organization does not expect unemployment to stay this low. An upward trend has already emerged in both low- and high-income countries. Meanwhile, despite job growth, real wages have declined in many nations due to persistently high inflation. The ILO sees no immediate factors that could mitigate future labor market risks.

The Army and the New Paradigm of Ground Combat: Lessons from Ukraine’s Failed 2023 Counteroffensive

Bryan J. Bonnema and Moises Jimenez

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The current battlefield is riddled with multiple forms of contact. The combination of indirect fires, efficient and increasingly shortened kill chains, electromagnetic interference, the proliferation of unmanned aircraft systems (UAS)—including, one-way attack UAS, thermal optics, mines, and antitank guided missile favor the defender and impose considerable risk to offensive operations. In May 2023, it is estimated that the Ukrainian Army expended around ten thousand UAS a month to conduct reconnaissance, counter-reconnaissance, and shaping operations. The US Army is working to adapt to these operational realities with, for instance, expanding its transformation in contact initiative to include new organizations and move into transformation in contact 2.0. But much of what that the Army envisions under that initiative—including its emphasis on short-, medium-, and long-range reconnaissance UAS—falls well short of what current battlefield conditions demand. Even if it could muster a more robust magazine of UAS platforms, the Army has not refined its offensive framework to account for the changing paradigm of ground combat. This paradigm favors the defender; it punishes decisive battle and humbles tactical leaders who believe they can simply suppress, breach, and seize their way to victory. The previous paradigm of maneuver-centric activity massed combat power, massed fires and effects, and required extensive rehearsals and synchronization. The current paradigm requires a framework that accounts for layered, multidomain threats, finite resources, tactical innovation and expedited decision making.

Europe’s Self-Inflicted Irrelevance

Andrew Latham

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Today, the great and the good of Europe are gathering in Paris for yet another emergency summit, this time to discuss Ukraine and “security in Europe.” The spectacle will be grand, the rhetoric will be lofty, and the statements will be full of self-importance. But make no mistake – this meeting is little more than a diplomatic mirage. Europe has been sidelined from serious strategic decision-making because it has long refused to be a serious player in defense and security. The real discussions about Ukraine’s future aren’t happening in Paris; they will take place in Saudi Arabia, where the United States and Russia will engage in actual negotiations that determine the trajectory of the war. Europe has been reduced to bystander, offering commentary while others make the real moves. This is the logical outcome of decades of strategic neglect and delusions of moral leadership without the hard power to back it up.

For years, European leaders have clung to the fantasy that they could shape global affairs through soft power, economic leverage, and moral posturing. Meanwhile, they have gutted their militaries, outsourced their security to the United States, and hoped that history had somehow moved beyond the need for deterrence. The result? When war returned to the continent, they found themselves utterly unprepared. NATO’s European members have scrambled to rearm since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, but their efforts remain lackluster. Germany, despite its grand proclamations of a “Zeitenwende” (historical turning point), is still struggling to meet even its own modest defense targets. France, despite having one of the most capable European militaries, lacks the resources to lead continent-wide efforts. The United Kingdom, under successive governments, has allowed its military capabilities to erode, leaving it struggling to project power beyond token gestures.

Is Trump 'Considering' Leaving NATO? Unverified, Unevidenced Claims Spread

Tom Norton

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President Donald Trump's administration left European leaders reeling last week, prompting unattributed rumors that he was "considering" withdrawing the United States from the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), the militaristic pact that has bound the U.S. and Europe since 1949.

Confirmed talks in Saudi Arabia between Russian and U.S. officials, alongside comments made by Vice President JD Vance to the Munich Security Conference, have stirred worries that the U.S. relationship with Europe may weaken as Washington pursues a more nationalist agenda.

Newsweek reached out to the White House via email for comment.

The Saudi talks, which U.S. officials have confirmed Europe will not be a part of, have worried Euro leaders. Before being elected to a second term as president in 2024, Trump indicated a potentially frostier future with European powers, driven by a disparity across the alliance on military spending.

During his first term, Trump attacked allied NATO leaders for failing to meet their defense spending targets; allies agreed in 2014 to a guideline spending figure of 2 percent of their GDPs on militaries by 2024.

Ukraine Must Be Involved in Peace Talks

Mark Temnycky

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Last week, various news outlets reported that senior officials from the Trump-Vance administration would be meeting with their Russian counterparts to discuss an end to the Russian invasion of Ukraine. The negotiations are expected to take place this week in Saudi Arabia, where President Trump’s officials will attempt to broker an end to the war.

U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio, National Security Advisor Mike Waltz, and Middle East Special Envoy Steve Witkoff will all be present in Saudi Arabia to speak with their Russian counterparts. However, Special Envoy to Ukraine Keith Kellogg will noticeably be absent from the peace talks. Instead, he will be traveling to Ukraine to speak with Ukrainian officials on ways to end the war.

For nearly three years, the Russians have waged their full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Numerous Ukrainian cities and villages have been destroyed, and Russian forces have killed thousands of Ukrainians. The war has displaced one-fourth of Ukraine’s population, and economists predict that it will take $1 trillion to rebuild Ukraine. Simply put, the war has been devastating.

Despite this death and destruction, the Russians have shown no signs of ending the war. As a result, President Donald Trump has decided to take it upon himself to try to end the war. He has previously said that the Russian invasion has been deadly, and that he wants to stop the killing.

Zelensky’s European Army: Killed in the Crib

Sumantra Maitra

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“Ukraine will never accept deals made behind our backs without our involvement. And the same rule should apply to all of Europe. No decision about Europe without Europe,” Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky thundered in the Munich Security Conference in a speech calling for a pan-European army. “The time has come—European armed forces must be created.”

As what could be cautiously termed as a weirdly played “divide and rule” attempt to rally Europe against its primary protector, the United States of America, it had a very crusading feel to it: a pan-European force, marching in unison, spilling European blood, to repel evil and retake occupied land. Weird, as Russia objectively has always been a historic European great power—even under the Marxists, an ideology as European as it could be—so the entire gimmick of repelling foreign invaders was somewhat rhetorically jarring.

Zelensky ended with a TV interview for the American audience, in which he categorically rejected the idea that he would ever accept a U.S.-brokered peace. That meant—he was crystal clear for the American audience—that if the U.S. and Russia negotiated a peace where there are some territorial concessions but overall the line of contact is frozen in a ceasefire and a DMZ is created, and if American funding were consequently to stop, Ukraine will not accept the deal and would continue as-is. A curious warning for the Trump administration to remember and plan for.

Spyware As A Service: Challenges In Applying Export Controls To Cloud-Based Cyber-Surveillance Software – Analysis

Kolja Brockmann and Lauriane Héau

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For all their legitimate law-enforcement and intelligence-gathering uses, cyber-surveillance tools are prone to abuse. Among other things, they can be used by states to target political opponents or to oppress certain ethnic or religious groups, or to steal an adversary’s data or attack critical infrastructure.

States have increasingly sought to use export controls to help prevent transfers of cyber-surveillance tools, including software, that could enable human rights violations or pose a threat to national security. Controls covering transfers of cybersurveillance hardware, software and technology have been introduced through the Wassenaar Arrangement, the European Union and national control lists and by way of a catch-all control in the EU dual-use regulation.

However, the growing use of the ‘software as a service’ ( SaaS) model—in which a software application is hosted and used on a cloud server but not downloaded by the end-user—poses a particular set of challenges. States differ in how they apply export controls to cloud computing, including SaaS, and their interpretation of relevant legal provisions informs their application of licensing requirements and enforcement measures. This divergence opens potential loopholes and gaps that could be exploited for illicit procurement. It also creates a confusing landscape for companies that want to remain in compliance with the controls on cyber-surveillance tools and other software. This blog aims to highlight the export control compliance and enforcement challenges posed by SaaS and offers some thoughts on how states can close these gaps and achieve more effective oversight of the trade in cyber-surveillance tools.