Honest. No, really.
We mean it now. Those days are over. For real.
Foreign Office in Berlin says Germans still being held in Russia – Germany’s Foreign Office confirmed on Friday that there are a “low double-digit number of people” with German citizenship still being held in Russia. A “single-digit number of Germans” are also being held in Belarus, the Foreign Office said on Friday.
They’re always disrupted.
Berlin train services disrupted, vandalism suspected – Rail service between the German capital’s main railway station and the western district of Spandau has been severely disrupted. Authorities believe the fire was deliberatly started.
Train services in the German capital, Berlin, will be disrupted for days due to a cable fire that authorities believe was deliberately set…
The incident follows an arson attack that caused damage to the train line between Hamburg and Bremen on Monday.
Police said perpetrators deliberately set fire to a cable shaft on the railway embankment near Bremen’s Bürgerpark, disrupting high-speed trains between the western state of North Rhine-Westphalia and Hamburg.
Last week, arson attacks on the French high-speed network severely disrupted rail traffic shortly before the start of the Olympic Games.
An activist linked to a far-left movement was arrested in connection with the French incidents.
The Germans call them “irregular migrants.”
But even the wacky German left is starting figure out that “irregular migration” is maybe sort of not such a good thing. Not that they’ll ever actually do anything about it. But still.
Germany: Scholz says irregular migration must ‘come down’ – First-time claims for asylum in Germany fell by a fifth in the first six months of the year. The chancellor said border checks will continue, to further limit the number of migrants entering through the land borders.
“In general, we intend to continue strictly controlling the German borders,” Scholz told the regional paper. “We want to limit irregular migration, as I have announced. The numbers have to come down.”
But Germany-shaped void?
That tune will never be a hit.
The Germany-shaped void at Europe’s heart – Olaf Scholz’s government is punching below its weight in Brussels.
Last month Olaf Scholz and Emmanuel Macron entered an eu summit with a plan. The German and French leaders agreed that a “strategic agenda” document, drawn up to set the eu’s priorities for the next five years, was inadequate. The passages on climate and migration were weak, and what about defence? But their extensive rewrites, drawn up just before the meeting, sparked a revolt among the other leaders, Italy’s Giorgia Meloni among them. Voices were raised, fingers jabbed, and the pair retreated in humiliation…
She is all gone, señor.
Let’s see what Ukraine’s biggest, not second biggest military donor does next year.
Germany plans to halve military aid for Ukraine – Germany is planning to nearly halve military aid for Ukraine next year, from around €8bn (£6.7bn; $8.7bn) to around €4bn, according to a draft budget approved by the government.
Finance Minister Christian Lindner said Ukraine’s financing was “secure for the foreseeable future” due to a G7 group of rich nations scheme to raise $50bn from interest on frozen Russian assets.
Germany is Ukraine’s second biggest military donor, after the US. In 2024, Berlin’s budget for Kyiv is set at nearly €7.5bn.
That means assassination plot.
German shock at reported Russian assassination plot – German political figures have reacted angrily to a report that Russia had plotted to kill the head of Germany’s biggest arms company Rheinmetall, Armin Papperger...
The company is one of the world’s biggest producers of ammunition and has become key to supplying Ukraine with arms, armoured vehicles and other military equipment.
Rheinmetall recently opened a tank repair plant in western Ukraine. Last month, it signed an agreement with Ukraine to expand co-operation in the coming years, including a joint venture to produce artillery shells.
You didn’t want me to lecture you in person.
So I’ll just have to lecture from here at home.
Diplomatic tensions are escalating between Germany and Hungary after Budapest canceled a meeting between Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó and his German counterpart, Annalena Baerbock, that had been planned for Monday in Budapest.
The unusual last-minute cancellation — tantamount to a diplomatic éclat — comes after German Chancellor Olaf Scholz and other EU leaders strongly criticized a trip by Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán to Moscow, where he met with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Friday.
Baerbock had planned to raise the issue of Orbán’s meeting with Putin during her visit to Budapest on Monday. But “to our surprise, the Hungarian side canceled” the appointment with Szijjártó “at short notice,” a German foreign ministry official told reporters late Friday.
Now “war bunkers” are in. Again.
Germany plans new war bunkers – German cities are calling for new bunkers to be built, to protect the population in the event of war. But critics argue there’s no point.
There might be no better way to gauge a country’s anxieties than by checking in on the companies building panic rooms and private bunkers.
Business has been going worryingly well for BSSD Defence, the Berlin-based company that builds “protection room systems” for private, business and military applications. As well as a range of home security equipment, the company offers everything from “pop-up panic rooms” for around €20,000 ($21,400) to full-scale bunkers for close to €200,000.
Why is it that big German automakers are worried about Chinese retaliation?
Because they voluntarily put themselves in the position to be retaliated against. Think Germany’s voluntary dependency on Russian gas recently. That didn’t work out very well either. But for whatever reason, this is what Germans do.
Germany launches 11th-hour bid to avert trade war with China – Germany wants the EU to set tariffs on electric vehicles at a low level to avoid severe retaliation from Beijing…
Germany’s position was “problematic,” he said: While big German automakers still entertain good ties with Beijing, that’s not necessarily the case for smaller businesses, meaning “the German economy as a whole has an interest in a more assertive policy towards China.”
It’s inexplicable. Why on earth would Europeans by voting for the right?
Something seems to bothering the electorate that we professionals in power have not been able to understand. Oh well. I suppose it’s one of those mysteries we will never be able to solve…
In Germany, the EU’s most populous nation, projections indicated that voters had not been dissuaded by the AfD’s scandals as it rose to 16.5%, up from 11% in 2019. In comparison, the combined result for the three parties in the German governing coalition barely topped 30%.
Observing Hermann 