Revelation that subsidiary of Capgemini is to help trace and expel migrants in US provokes outrage in France

French lawmakers have demanded an explanation after one of the country’s biggest tech companies signed a multimillion dollar contract to help the US enforcement agency ICE trace and expel migrants.

The revelation that a subsidiary of Capgemini, a multinational digital services firm listed on the Paris stock exchange, had agreed to provide “skip tracing” – a technique for locating targeted people – with big bonuses if successful, has provoked outrage in France.

Half a million migrants will be ‘regularised’ under plans to boost economic growth that have angered rightwing parties

Not everyone has been enthused by the Spanish government’s decision this week to buck European political trends by announcing plans to regularise 500,000 undocumented migrants and asylum seekers to boost “economic growth and social cohesion”.

Alberto Núñez Feijóo, the leader of the conservative People’s party (PP), described the move as a reward for “illegality” that would bring more people into the country and “overwhelm our public services”.

Apparent pause in Russia-Ukraine hostilities comes amid concern that peace talks set for Sunday in Abu Dhabi will be delayed. What we know on day 1,438

Rising tensions over possible US strikes on Iran have injected fresh uncertainty into the plans for senior Ukrainian and Russian officials to meet in Abu Dhabi this weekend for another round of talks. “The date or the location may change,” Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy said. “From our point of view, something is happening in the situation between the United States and Iran, and those developments could affect the timing.”

“It is very important for us that everyone we agreed with be present at the meeting, because everyone is expecting feedback,” Zelenskyy told reporters in remarks released by his office on Friday. The US secretary of state, Marco Rubio, had said on Wednesday that President Donald Trump’s top envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, who attended the previous round of talks, would not participate in the weekend meeting in Abu Dhabi. In Moscow, two sources told Reuters that Kirill Dmitriev, Putin’s special envoy, would travel to Miami on Saturday for meetings with members of Trump’s administration.

Ahead of the possible talks, there has been a notable reduction in attacks by Russia and Ukraine against each other as Ukraine continues to experience one of its coldest winters in decades, with many people living without electricity and heating. The Ukrainian capital is bracing for an especially cold spell from Sunday, with temperatures forecast to fall as low as -26C. Zelenskyy said he was waiting to see if Russia would observe a proposed pause in strikes on Ukrainian cities and energy infrastructure, saying on Friday there was no formal ceasefire agreement between Ukraine and Russia, Pjotr Sauer writes. But Zelenskyy said Kyiv would halt such strikes if Moscow did the same. Donald Trump on Thursday claimed that Vladimir Putin had agreed to halt strikes on Ukraine’s energy infrastructure for a week. The Kremlin has acknowledged the request but declined to say whether the Russian president had agreed to it. Spokesperson Dmitry Peskov indicated the measure would end on Sunday.

Zelenskky noted on Friday that in all regions, “there were indeed no strikes on energy facilities from Thursday night to Friday”. “Ukraine is ready in reciprocal terms to refrain from strikes and today we did not strike at Russian energy facilities,” he said.

Incoming Dutch prime minister Rob Jetten – whose D66 party struck a minority coalition deal to form a government this week – said he opposed the suggestion by some European Union leaders that the EU should reopen diplomatic channels with Russia so that Donald Trump could not set the tone for talks with Moscow. Jetten pledged that his new government would continue to support Kyiv and said he would not speak to Moscow because there were currently “no indications” Russia wanted to end the war in Ukraine. “And as long as the aggression continues, we will continue our support for the Ukrainian people.” He also said Europeans should have “a much stronger debate about what can Europe do for itself,” and stop looking at the US under Trump.

Meanwhile, Hungary’s prime minister Viktor Orbán has stepped up his opposition to Ukraine joining the EU, claiming the bloc was looking to admit the country in 2027 to help it benefit from the next seven-year financial budget. His comments come after Zelenskyy repeated his target to join the EU in 2027, despite some scepticism in the bloc about the accelerated process that would be required. Orbán’s comments will probably be seen as part of an increasingly fierce campaign ahead of this April’s critical parliamentary election in Hungary, which could see him ousted after 16 years in office.

ICE in Minneapolis, Russian airstrikes in Kyiv, Alex Honnold climbing a Taipei skyscraper and Sabalenka at the Australian Open – the past seven days as captured by the world’s leading photojournalists

Just over an hour from Athens, this Saronic Island idyll offers all the charm of its Cycladic cousins with fewer visitors, says Rebecca Hall

Tenerife offers more than just winter sun and cocktails, writes Aine Fox

With Donald Trump tearing up the world order, governments across Europe are having to confront the fact that most of the technology they rely on comes from US companies. French officials have taken a step this week to reduce their dependence on US digital infrastructure, announcing they have stopped using Zoom, the US-owned video meeting software, in favour of a French-made program. But how viable is this? And what are the risks? The Guardian’s Michael Safi speaks to the tech journalist Chris Stokel-Walker

Rotterdam film festival
A set of shorts by film-makers from Afghanistan, Iran, Ukraine, Syria and Somalia are shocking, funny and mysterious in equal measure

With considerable chutzpah and elan, and in her capacity as producer and UNHCR Goodwill ambassador, Cate Blanchett has achieved a geopolitical film-making coup. In concert with festival authorities in Rotterdam, she has secured cash and commissioned short films on the subject of displacement from five directors – including Mohammad Rasoulof, now in exile from his native Iran due to his pro-democracy activism, in effect making his first public statement since the recent massacres and apparently expressing his fears that he may never go home again.

The films are far from solemnly earnest – this is an anthology of five brilliant miniature artworks. By turns shocking, funny, confessional and deeply mysterious, this is a tremendous collection; the constituent films of which benefit in some enigmatic way from being shown together. What Ealing Studios’s Dead of Night did for scariness, these films may have done for 21st-century exile.

Ukraine president says he will wait to see if Putin complies with Trump request to halt strikes on energy infrastructure

Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, said he was waiting to see whether Russia would observe a proposed pause in strikes on Ukrainian cities and energy infrastructure, as Kyiv endures a spell of bitter winter cold.

Donald Trump on Thursday claimed that Vladimir Putin had agreed to halt strikes on Ukraine’s energy infrastructure for a week after he issued a personal appeal to the Russian leader due to the extreme weather in Ukraine.

Mike White’s show will begin production in April at five-star Saint-Tropez resort known for old-world opulence

Will it be a fatal attack with a pétanque boule under the parasol palms? Some skulduggery in the swimming pool of a €21,000-a-night private villa? Perhaps a poisoned cocktail on the terrace overlooking the luxury yachts in the Mediterranean?

Bienvenue to season four of The White Lotus on the Côte d’Azur; judging by past series, someone is not making it out of the French Riviera alive.