Europe wants to break its dangerous dependence on China for the raw materials behind batteries, wind turbines, chips and weapons. The EUISS brief argues that enlargement partners – especially Ukraine and the Western Balkans – could help by supplying critical minerals that Europe badly needs for the green transition, digital industry and rearmament.

Europe is tightening migration policy just as its ageing economies need migrants more than ever. The Internationale Politik essay argues that the continent has trapped itself in a dangerous contradiction: it wants control at the border, but it also needs people to fill labour shortages, support growth and keep welfare systems alive.

France’s unemployment problem is creeping back – and the Institut Montaigne interview makes clear why politicians should stop pretending this is just a statistical blip. For the first time since 2021, unemployment has moved above 8 percent, with 2.6 million people affected.

Europe is facing a new cyber threat that its rulebooks are not built to handle. The Carnegie Europe paper warns that autonomous AI agents are moving into cyberspace as tools that can scan, reason, adapt and act with far less human supervision than traditional software.

France is trying to turn its nuclear arsenal into a wider European shield. The Responsible Statecraft analysis argues that Emmanuel Macron’s new doctrine of forward deterrence may look like Europe finally taking security seriously, but could instead drag the continent into a more dangerous nuclear stand-off with Russia.

Europe is reopening the door to international carbon credits as part of its 2040 climate target. The Bruegel policy brief treats this as a potentially useful tool – but one loaded with old traps that could shred the EU’s climate credibility if handled badly.

Europe has two giant institutions meant to protect it – NATO and the EU – yet the CEPA analysis argues that they still fail to work together with the urgency the threat demands. The problem is not a lack of summits, statements or polite language.