Nato chief Mark Rutte says there is ‘a lot of work to be done’, as some Danish MPs voice concern at Greenland apparently being sidelined in US president’s talks
Donald Trump’s announcement of a “framework of a future deal” that would settle the issue of Greenland after weeks of escalating threats has been met with profound scepticism from people in the Arctic territory, even as financial markets rebounded and European leaders welcomed a reprieve from further tariffs.
Just hours after the president used his speech at the World Economic Forum to insist he wanted Greenland, “including right, title and ownership,” but backed away from his more bellicose threats of military intervention – Trump took to social media to announce “the framework of a future deal with respect to Greenland” after talks with Nato secretary-general Mark Rutte, and withdrew the threat of tariffs against eight European countries. He later called it “a concept of a deal” over Greenland when he spoke to business network CNBC soon after Wall Street closed.
Unclear if presidents will have anything to sign; Mark Rutte urges Nato to pour out their air defence stockpiles for Ukraine. What we know on day 1,429
Voldymyr Zelenskyy was reported on Wednesday evening to be bound for Davos after Donald Trump appeared to summon him to the World Economic Forum. The Ukrainian president had said a day earlier that he did not expect to attend the conference in Switzerland as Russian attacks had plunged Ukraine into an energy crisis: “Undoubtedly, I choose Ukraine in this case, rather than the economic forum, but everything can change at any moment.”
Trump’s announcement of the meeting appeared to be at short notice, since he said it would take place on Wednesday, when his Ukrainian counterpart was not even in the same country. After Trump spoke, officials clarified that their meeting would be on Thursday. Zelenskyy previously said: “Meetings with America should always end with concrete results to strengthen Ukraine or to move closer to ending the war. And if the documents are ready, we will meet.” Talks between senior Ukrainian representatives and Trump’s envoys have been continuing since Saturday, including in Davos, but late on Wednesday it was unclear whether there would be any documents to sign.
Top Ukrainian negotiator Rustem Umerov said he had met US representatives Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner in Davos. Umerov repeated the familiar refrain that their talks focused on security guarantees and postwar recovery. Umerov said a Ukrainian delegation also met representatives of the US investment firm Blackrock about rebuilding plans.
Vladimir Putin, the Russian president, meanwhile said that he would meet on Thursday with Witkoff and Kushner, who were headed from Davos to Moscow. Interestingly, Putin, quoted by Russian news agencies, said he would discuss with the US envoys the possible use of frozen Russian assets. The EU has been wrangling with how to mobilise Belgian-held Russian assets, about €300bn ($350bn) worth, to help Ukraine defend itself and rebuild. Putin appeared to be attempting to head off the European effort, reportedly saying he wanted to use such funding to restore “[territories] damaged during military actions”. He did not say whether those would be Ukrainian, Russian or Russian-held areas.
The Nato secretary general, Mark Rutte, on Wednesday urged its military chiefs to press their national governments to get desperately needed air defence systems to Ukraine. “Please use your influence to help your political masters to do even more,” Rutte said in a video message to top brass as they met at Nato’s Brussels headquarters. “Look deep into your stockpiles to see what more you can give to Ukraine, particularly air defence interceptors. The time really is now.”
A Ukrainian drone strike set oil terminal tanks on fire at Volna in the southern Krasnodar region on Wednesday, Russian authorities said, claiming that three people were killed and eight injured. There was claim and counterclaim after a fire at residential buildings near the city of Krasnodar in Russia’s south-west. The region’s leader said it was a Ukrainian drone strike and 11 people were injured. The Ukrainian side said it was stray Russian air defence fire. The head of Ukraine’s anti-disinformation centre, Andriy Kovalenko: “A Russian air defence missile struck a residential building in the town of Afipsky [in the Adygea region].”
President Donald Trump’s ambitions for the “Board of Peace” to play a role in global conflicts beyond Gaza appear to be the latest U.S. attempt to sidestep the U.N. Security Council
After President Donald Trump took to the stage in Davos to declare that Western civilization must defend itself, Somali-born activist and author Ayaan Hirsi Ali said, “Trump is right."
Researchers say event described as ‘major tipping point’ for clean energy in era of destabilised politics
Wind and solar overtook fossil fuels in the European Union’s power generation last year, a report has found, in a “major tipping point” for clean energy.
Turbines spinning in the wind and photovoltaic panels lit up by the sun generated 30% of the EU’s electricity in 2025, according to an annual review. Power plants burning coal, oil and gas generated 29%.
President Donald Trump warns European leaders to abandon old political playbooks during World Economic Forum speech in Davos, saying he no longer recognizes Europe in negative way.
Brussels to host emergency summit to discuss options including ‘nuclear deterrent’ of retaliatory sanctions
The European parliament has formally suspended the ratification process on its US trade deal, in protest against Donald Trump’s threat to impose 10% tariffs on EU exports unless the bloc agrees he can take over Greenland.
The pause is the strongest material response the EU has shown so far to what several leaders last week called blackmail.
Opponents say proposal to end sick notes issued over phone would fill up doctors’ waiting rooms unnecessarily
A German proposal to end the right to get short-term sick leave from a doctor over the telephone as a means of cracking down on skiving has met with outcry from labour groups and the medical profession.
Germans enjoy some of the most generous employee illness policies in Europe, a fact the conservative chancellor, Friedrich Merz, says is undermining efforts to kickstart the EU’s biggest economy, whose growth has largely stalled since 2022.
Appeasing Trump has only emboldened him. But European leaders are not as helpless as the US president believes
Georg Riekeles is the associate director of the European Policy Centre
EU leaders’ tough rebukes to Donald Trump in Davos must be followed by concrete action when they convene in Brussels on Thursday night. The US president’s attempt to strong-arm Greenland and Denmark, backed by explicit tariff threats against those who refuse to comply, is not bluster or improvisation. It is economic coercion, openly deployed to force political submission and territorial concessions. The danger lies in the demand itself, but also in how Europe responds.
The EU has reached a moment of truth. If it cannot defend one of its member states whose most basic interests are under direct threat, then the EU is weakened as a geopolitical actor and emptied of purpose.
Georg Riekeles is the associate director of the European Policy Centre
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As Mark Carney, Emmanuel Macron and Ursula von der Leyen decide ‘to live in truth’, what will it take for Starmer to call out Trump?
Donald Trump has told the Davos economic forum “without us, most countries would not even work”, but for the first time in decades, many western leaders have come to the opposite conclusion: they will function better without the US.
Individually and collectively, they have decided “to live in truth” – the phrase used by the Czech dissident Vaclav Havel and referenced by the Canadian prime minister, Mark Carney, in his widely praised speech at Davos on Tuesday. They will no longer pretend the US is a reliable ally, or even that the old western alliance exists.
Alors que Trump continue de menacer le Groenland, le service de renseignement militaire du Danemark aurait demandé aux fonctionnaires de ne pas utiliser les casques et les écouteurs Bluetooth.
Alors que Trump continue de menacer le Groenland, le service de renseignement militaire du Danemark aurait demandé aux fonctionnaires de ne pas utiliser les casques et les écouteurs Bluetooth.
C’est une politique d’immigration claire et assumée qu’affiche l’Espagne. Le Premier ministre Pedro Sanchez la résume d’ailleurs de manière on ne peut plus simple. Il préfère un pays « ouvert et prospère » plutot que « fermé et pauvre ». Deux millions d’immigrés sont arrivés légalement dans le pays en 7 ans. Contribuant à 20% de la croissance du PIB. Il s’agit aussi de compenser une natalité en berne. La nouvelle réforme migratoire prévoit la régularisation de 300 000 personnes d’ici 2027.
Magali Lafourcade says the two envoys were convinced the far-right leader’s corruption trial had been political
A French magistrate has said two Trump administration emissaries approached her seeking to lobby against an election ban on the French far-right leader Marine Le Pen.
Magali Lafourcade, the secretary general of France’s human rights commission (CNCDH), an independent body that advises the government, told Agence France-Presse (AFP) she had reported the content of the meeting to the French foreign ministry immediately, fearing a potential “manipulation of the public debate in France”.
Director of Wien Museum says ‘we all have to economise’ as city temporarily reduces access to cultural sites
It prides itself on its reputation as the world’s home of classical music. But Vienna will temporarily close several museums dedicated to famous composers this year as the Austrian capital cuts its culture budget to meet public spending targets.
The apartment where the Austrian composer Franz Schubert died, the residence of “Blue Danube” writer Johann Strauss, as well as the house where Joseph Haydn lived are to be closed temporarily as cost-saving measures, the director of Vienna’s museums announced on Wednesday.
He lit up Europe with bands ranging from Peachfuzz to Kings of Convenience. But it was the Whitest Boy Alive that sent Erlend Øye stratospheric. As they return, the soft-singing, country-hopping sensation looks back
If you were to imagine the recent evolution of music in Europe as a series of scenes from a Where’s Wally?-style puzzle book, one bespectacled, lanky figure would pop up on almost every page. There he is in mid-90s London, handing out flyers for his first band Peachfuzz. Here he is in NME at the dawn of the new millennium, fronting folk duo Kings of Convenience and spearheading the new acoustic movement. There he is strumming his guitar in the vanguard of Norway’s “Bergen wave”. Then he’s off spinning records in Berlin nightclubs during the city’s “poor but sexy” post-millennial years. By the 2010s, he’s driving a renaissance of Italian chamber pop as part of La Comitiva, his bandmates hailing from the southern tip of Sicily.
It’s hard to think of a figure more musically cosmopolitan than Erlend Otre Øye, connecting the dots across a continent where national scenes rarely overlap – and making magic happen. No wonder his debut solo album, with 10 tracks recorded in 10 different cities, was called Unrest. Of all his reincarnations, though, the one that has best endured (if you go by Spotify) is his four-piece, The Whitest Boy Alive. And this spring and summer, they’re reuniting for a tour of Mexico and Europe to celebrate the 20th anniversary of Dreams, their debut album.
“I do not understand what you are doing on Greenland,” wrote Emmanuel Macron in a private message to Donald Trump this week. Trump posted the text on his Truth Social platform on Tuesday, seemingly to humiliate the French president. But Macron might have been speaking for millions of bewildered European citizens.
Trump claims the U.S. should control Greenland for Golden Dome missile defense, says Canada "lives because of the United States" in heated Davos remarks.
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