LONDON — Countries focused on reopening the Strait of Hormuz will meet for a security summit in the near future, which the U.K. has offered to host. More than 30 nations including United Arab Emirates, the U.K., France, Germany, Italy and the Netherlands have now signed a joint statement agreeing to work on “appropriate efforts” to safeguard the major trade route. A British official, granted anonymity because they are not authorized to speak on the record, said Tuesday the U.K. wanted to help “build this coalition and develop momentum” in order to “open a route safe through the Strait of Hormuz, and provide that reassurance to merchant shipping.” They added that cooperation between like-minded partners would include a security conference on the topic, which could be hosted in London or Portsmouth, the home of the Royal Navy on the south coast of England. NATO chief Mark Rutte and British PM Keir Starmer now appear to be leading the push to restart traffic through the Strait, despite skepticism from other allies. The same British official discussed options for securing the channel, such as deploying autonomous minehunting systems from a mothership in the Gulf, while conceding this would not be possible while the current level of hostilities continue. They expressed confidence that “we will see different nations coming forwards with different offers to support us”and “we will be able to find in the right conditions a coalition that will be able to provide that assurance to the merchant shipping industry.”

BRUSSELS — The United States wants to engage in a meaningful dialogue with Brussels on reducing European tech regulation, its Ambassador to the EU Andrew Puzder told POLITICO. The U.S. administration and its allies have been vocal critics of the EU’s tech rules, saying they unfairly target American companies and hurt freedom of speech. The European Commission has repeatedly denied such allegations, saying it is merely trying to rein in Big Tech and protect the online space from harmful behavior. In an interview Monday, Puzder said he hoped that this week’s vote in the European Parliament to advance last year’s transatlantic trade deal would set the scene for talks to loosen constraints on business. “I’ve had talks with individuals within the EU about moving this discussion forward. I haven’t, as yet, experienced the concrete steps we need to make that happen,” Puzder said. He was referring to the EU’s tech rulebook — and the Digital Services Act and the Digital Markets Act in particular — that Washington sees as barriers to trade. “Hopefully, we’ll continue to talk. Once this trade agreement is approved, in the spirit of moving forward with these non-tariff trade barriers, we’ll be able to break down some of these walls,” he added.  Discussions are still in their very early stages and “there’s nothing formal,” Puzder clarified. The next steps between Brussels and Washington should be “diplomatic engagement followed by political engagement,” he added.  RECALIBRATION NEGOTIATION The envoy’s comments follow a heated series of exchanges between senior American and European officials over whether the EU’s tech rules should even be part of the transatlantic trade discussion. In November 2025, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick tied a potential easing of U.S. steel and aluminum tariffs to a “recalibration” by the EU of the bloc’s digital regulations. European Commission Executive Vice President Teresa Ribera responded that tying tariff relief to European tech rules amounted to “blackmail.” Ribera, the EU’s top competition official, told POLITICO at the time that the EU would not accept such attempts to strong-arm it on a topic that it considers to be a matter of sovereignty. She is currently visiting the U.S. and is due to meet tech industry bosses in San Francisco this week. Transatlantic ties took another turn for the worse when the Donald Trump administration in December barred former Industry Commissioner Thierry Breton from traveling to the U.S. over his role in creating and implementing the EU’s tech rules.  Puzder explained that Washington doesn’t think “that Europe shouldn’t have regulation,” but that it shouldn’t be “regulating in such an extreme manner that companies feel they can’t innovate — which is why … most of the tech startups in Europe end up moving to Silicon Valley.” European Commission Vice President Teresa Ribera attends a press conference in Brussels on Feb. 25, 2026. | Dursun Aydemir/Anadolu via Getty Images Responding, the European Commission stressed there is “continued engagement” between the EU and the U.S.  “Executive Vice President [Henna] Virkkunen has held several meetings with U.S. Representatives, both in Europe and in the U.S. At technical level, our teams also engage on a continuous basis with their American counterparts,” spokesperson Thomas Regnier said in a statement to POLITICO.  Virkunnen’s remit covers technology policy. Before Trump’s return to the White House, the two sides held held a structured dialogue under the auspices of the now-defunct EU-U.S. Trade and Technology Council.  The occasional forum, launched by former U.S. President Joe Biden, sought to establish a structured dialogue around regulatory cooperation. Yet in the view of observers it under-delivered, failing for instance to resolve a long-running steel dispute. The TTC has not met since Trump returned to the White House in early 2025. 

HOUSTON — The Trump administration reached a nearly $1 billion agreement with French energy giant TotalEnergies on Monday to cancel its offshore wind leases off the coasts of New York and North Carolina. The announcement marks the latest blow by the Trump administration against the U.S. offshore wind industry, particularly in the Northeast, after it faced a series of recent legal losses. “The era of taxpayers subsidizing unreliable, unaffordable and unsecured energy is officially over,” Interior Secretary Doug Burgum told reporters at the CERAWeek by S&P Global conference in Houston. As part of the agreement, the Interior Department would terminate the leases for TotalEnergies’ Attentive Energy and Carolina Long Bay projects, worth $928 million, the department said. The lease sales occurred during the Biden administration. TotalEnergies committed to invest the value of those leases into oil and natural gas production in the United States, after which the United States will reimburse the company dollar-for-dollar for the amount they paid for the offshore wind leases, the department said. The company is poised to redirect the funds toward the Rio Grande LNG plant in Texas and the development of upstream conventional oil in the Gulf of Mexico and of shale gas production, according to the Interior Department. Burgum and TotalEnergies signed the agreements Monday from the conference. President Donald Trump has often attacked the U.S. offshore wind sector as unreliable and expensive. He’s repeatedly said he plans to have “no windmills built in the United States” under his tenure. Still, the settlement would suggest a new tack by the administration to target the sector. The Trump administration previously issued stop-work orders for offshore wind projects currently under construction on the East Coast, but judges lifted all five orders earlier this year. “Considering that the development of offshore wind projects is not in the country’s interest, we have decided to renounce offshore wind development in the United States, in exchange for the reimbursement of the lease fees,” TotalEnergies Chair and CEO Patrick Pouyanné said in a statement. Pouyanné previously said the company would halt development of the Attentive Energy project, off the New Jersey and New York coasts, following Trump’s return to the White House. Both the Attentive Energy and Carolina Long Bay projects were in the early stages of development. Pouyanné told reporters that the company continues to invest in solar, onshore wind and batteries. The deal is a major blow for New York’s offshore wind targets, although proposed projects in the lease area controlled by TotalEnergies and its partners never secured final contracts with the state. New York Gov. Kathy Hochul (D) called the prospect of a deal “not helpful” last week. Attentive Energy dropped out of a bidding process for deals with New York in October 2024, even before Trump’s election. The state concluded that process last month with no awards amid the federal uncertainty and officials have struggled to determine next steps for the industry writ large. Hochul has pivoted to an “all of the above” energy strategy in the face of Trump’s opposition to offshore wind — including nuclear and fossil fuels. Further delays to the development of the technology off New York’s coast will likely further the state’s reliance on repowering fossil fuel plants to serve the New York City region. The deal also leaves New Jersey without any workable offshore wind projects at a time when Democratic Gov. Mikie Sherrill is already searching for more clean energy to combat a regional power crunch. The project was supposed to provide more than 1,300 megawatts of power. Sherrill’s predecessor, Phil Murphy, had lofty ambitions for the industry that were all for naught. His administration approved a series of offshore wind projects that all ran into financial or permitting challenges. The state approved Attentive Energy’s project in early 2024 as part of an attempted reset of the industry, which was already facing woe. The new affront could also prove problematic to permitting reform discussions on the Hill, as Democratic lawmakers have linked progress on those negotiations to whether or not the administration continues its attacks on renewable energy. ClearView Energy Partners said in a note last week the deal could also “re-raise concerns about the durability of federal approvals and therefore further erode, but not eliminate, the thin opportunity for bipartisan permitting reform on Capitol Hill.” So far, Senate Environment and Public Works ranking member Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) is staying the course on permitting talks, despite reports of the settlement agreement last week — a development he derided as “just more selling out the public for the fossil fuel industry.” His office did not immediately provide further comment Monday. Some Moderate New York Republicans last week also criticized the reported settlement. Marie French and Ry Rivard contributed to this report.

BERLIN — Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s conservative party is on course to narrowly win an election in the western state of Rhineland-Palatinate, according to preliminary results, giving the German leader a much-needed victory. While the victory is welcome for Merz’s party, there will be plenty of concern at the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party more than doubling its vote share to 19.7 percent, according to preliminary results as of 8.30 p.m. The conservative victory comes at the expense of Merz’s federal coalition partners, the center-left Social Democratic Party (SPD), which came in second in the small state of around 4 million inhabitants which borders France, Luxembourg and Belgium. The SPD’s defeat at the hands of its coalition partner could plunge the party deeper into crisis nationally and make the government in Berlin far more fractious as the left-wing party seeks to retrench and appeal to what’s left of its socialist base. Preliminary results indicate that Merz’s Christian Democratic Union (CDU) is set to come in first with 30.9 percent of the vote, taking control of the state premiership from the SPD after 35 years in opposition. Results as of 8.30 p.m. suggest the SPD’s vote share collapsed by around 10 percentage points, to 25.8 percent. “This is historic for us,” Jens Spahn, the CDU’s parliamentary group leader in Berlin, told public broadcaster ARD on Sunday. “It gives us in the CDU a boost at the federal level. But of course, the credit goes above all to our colleagues on the ground,” he added. The CDU’s lead candidate in Rhineland-Palatinate, Gordon Schnieder, pointed to a combative campaign. “We had that will to win; I’ve felt it over the past few months,” Gordon Schnieder said on ARD television. But the biggest winner in terms of vote-share gained is the far-right AfD, which more than doubled its support to 19.8 percent compared with the last state election five years ago when it got 8.3 percent of the vote. The strong showing comes after the AfD’s third-place performance in a state election in Baden-Württemberg earlier this month, illustrating how the party has been able to gain ground outside its eastern strongholds. The outcome in Rhineland-Palatinate is the AfD’s best-ever result in a western German state. The election in Rhineland-Palatinate was the second of five state races to be held this year in what Germans are calling a Superwahljahr — or “super election year” — that is seen as a key test of the national mood as the AfD seeks to overtake Merz’s conservatives in national polls. The AfD is on track to secure big victories in two eastern states in votes set for September, according to polls. “We have achieved record results,” Alice Weidel, one of the AfD’s national leaders, said on Sunday. “Voters appreciate the work we’ve done as opposition party, and we will continue on this path so that we can join the government in the next election,” she added. To do so, the party would need to tear down Germany’s so-called firewall, which has been in place since the end of World War II and has prevented the far right from governing in a coalition with mainstream parties at state and national level. For the struggling SPD, the result was another big setback. The party had the worst performance in a state state election since the end of World War II earlier this month in Baden-Württemberg, coming in at just 5.5 percent. In Rhineland-Palatinate, the party lost almost 10 percentage points compared with its previous result. These poor results are expected to put increasing pressure on the SPD’s national leadership. “I know this result will spark personnel debates,” said Lars Klingbeil, one of the SPD’s national leaders and the country’s finance minister, on national television. “I want us to talk openly about the question: How can we now achieve the best outcome for the Social Democrats?” “We can expect the SPD to now try to assert its own positions more forcefully within this coalition,” said Sabine Kropp, a political science professor at the Free University Berlin. “That will certainly not make governing easier for Friedrich Merz.” The CDU performed well, though, despite growing anxiety about Germany’s economic future as the country’s key manufacturing sectors decline and the fallout from the U.S.-Israel war with Iran mounts. The party improved on its performance compared to the last election in Rhineland-Palatinate, gaining more than 3 percentage points of vote share compared to its 27.7 percent haul last time. Jens Spahn, the CDU’s general secretary, stuck to his party’s key messages on Sunday. “We need growth again in Germany after three years of recession and stagnation,” he said. “That is the defining issue for the nation. It is also the defining issue for the [federal] coalition … We are very aware of that.” The AfD has increasingly been hitting Merz on that theme, with some success. In two states in the former East Germany where elections are set for September, the AfD is so far ahead in polls that its leaders hope to secure an absolute majority in at least one of the contests, a result that would bring the party to real governing power for the first time since its founding in 2013. “While you go on and on about world politics, German industry is collapsing,” Weidel, the AfD leader, told Merz in the Bundestag earlier this week. “The exodus is in full swing.”

BERLIN — German Defense Minister Boris Pistorus will spend next week touring the Indo-Pacific with a passel of corporate chiefs in tow to make deals across the region. It’s part of an effort to mark a greater impact in an area where Berlin’s presence has been minor, but whose importance is growing as Germany looks to build up access to natural resources, technology and allies in a fracturing world. “If you look at the Indo-Pacific, Germany is essentially starting from scratch,” said Bastian Ernst, a defense lawmaker from Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s Christian Democrats. “We don’t have an established role yet, we’re only just beginning to figure out what that should be.” Pistorius leaves Friday on an eight-day tour to Japan, Singapore and Australia where he’ll be aiming to build relations with other like-minded middle powers — mirroring countries from France to Canada as they scramble to figure out new relationships in a world destabilized by Russia, China and a United States led by Donald Trump. “Germany recognizes this principle of interconnected theaters,” said Elli-Katharina Pohlkamp, visiting fellow of the Asia Programme at the European Council on Foreign Relations. Berlin, she said, “increasingly sees Europe’s focus on Russia and Asia’s focus on China and North Korea as security issues that are linked.” The military and defense emphasis of next week’s trip marks a departure from Berlin’s 2020 Indo-Pacific guidelines, which laid a much heavier focus on trade and diplomacy. Pistorius’ outreach will be especially important as Germany rapidly ramps up military spending at home. Berlin is on track to boost its defense budget to around €150 billion a year by the end of the decade and is preparing tens of billions in new procurement contracts. But not everything Germany needs can be sourced in Europe. Australia is one of the few alternatives to China in critical minerals essential to the defense industry. It’s a leading supplier of lithium and one of the only significant producers of separated rare earth materials outside China. Australia also looms over a key German defense contract. Berlin is considering whether to stick with a naval laser weapon being developed by homegrown firms Rheinmetall and MBDA, or team up with Australia’s EOS instead. That has become a more sensitive political question in Berlin. WELT, owned by POLITICO’s parent company Axel Springer, reported that lawmakers had stopped the planned contract for the German option, reflecting wider concern over whether Berlin should back a domestic system or move faster with a foreign one. That means what Pistorius sees in Australia could end up shaping a decision back in Germany. TALKING TO TOKYO Japan offers something different — not raw materials but military integration, logistics and technology.  Pohlkamp said the military side of the relationship with Japan is now “very much about interoperability and compatibility, built through joint exercises, mutual visits, closer staff work, expanded information exchange and mutual learning.” She described Japan as “a kind of yardstick for Germany,” a country that lives with “an enormous threat perception” not only militarily but also economically, because it is surrounded by pressure from China, North Korea and Russia.  The Japan-Germany Acquisition and Cross-Servicing Agreement took effect in July 2024, giving the two militaries a framework for reciprocal supplies and services and making future port calls for naval vessels, exercises and recurring cooperation easier to sustain.  Pohlkamp said what matters most to Tokyo are not headline-grabbing deployments but “plannable, recurring contributions, which are more valuable than big, one-off shows of force.” But that ambition only goes so far if Germany’s presence remains sporadic. Bundeswehr recruits march on the market square to take their ceremonial oath in Altenburg on March 19, 2026. | Bodo Schackow/picture alliance via Getty Images Berlin has sent military assets to the region for training exercises in recent years — a frigate in 2021, combat aircraft in 2022, army participation in 2023, and a larger naval mission in 2024. But as pressure grows on Germany to beef up its military to hold off Russia, along with its growing presence in Lithuania and its effort to keep supplying Ukraine with weapons, the attention given to Asia is shrinking. The government told parliament last year it sent no frigate in 2025, plans none in 2026 and has not yet decided on 2027. Germany’s current military engagement in the Indo-Pacific consists of a single P-8A Poseidon maritime patrol aircraft, sent to India in February as part of the Indo-Pacific Deployment 2026 exercises.  Germany, according to Ernst, is still “relatively blank” in the region. What it can contribute militarily remains narrow: “A bit of maritime patrol, a frigate, mine clearance.” Pohlkamp said Germany’s role in Asia is still being built “in small doses” and is largely symbolic. But what matters is whether Berlin can turn occasional visits and deployments into something steadier and more predictable. The defense ministry insists that is the point of Pistorius’s trip. Ministry spokesperson Mitko Müller said Wednesday that Europe and the Indo-Pacific are “inseparably linked,” citing the rules-based order, sea lanes, international law and the role of the two regions in global supply and value chains.  The new P-8A Poseidon reconnaissance aircraft stands in front of a technical hangar at Nordholz airbase on Nov. 20, 2025. | Christian Butt/picture alliance via Getty Images The trip is meant to focus on the regional security situation, expanding strategic dialogue, current and possible military cooperation, joint exercises including future Indo-Pacific deployments, and industrial cooperation. That explains why industry is traveling with Pistorius.  Müller said executives from Airbus, TKMS, MBDA, Quantum Systems, Diehl and Rohde & Schwarz are coming along, suggesting Berlin sees the trip as a chance to widen defense ties on the ground. But any larger German role in Asia would have to careful calibrated to avoid angering China — a key trading partner that is very wary of European powers expanding their regional presence. “That leaves Germany trying to do two things at once,” Pohlkamp said. “First, show up often enough to matter, but not so forcefully that it gets dragged into a confrontation it is neither politically nor militarily prepared to sustain.”

BRUSSELS — The European Commission will make a proposal to boost the bloc’s carbon market reserve within “days” and develop a €30 billion decarbonization fund, in response to pressure from EU leaders to limit the CO2 price’s impact on electricity bills. Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said the EU executive would work on a mix of immediate relief and structural changes to bring down high energy prices, with measures to tackle all components of the power bill, from taxes and levies to carbon costs. Two measures to tweak the Emissions Trading System (ETS), which requires factories and power plants to purchase a permit for every ton of CO2 they emit, “will come in the next days,” von der Leyen said at a press conference following Thursday’s EU leaders’ summit. They include an update to the so-called benchmarks that determine how many free-of-charge permits a certain industrial sector receives and a proposal to “increase the firepower” of the Market Stability Reserve governing the ETS permit supply. In what she described as the “medium term,” von der Leyen pointed to the review of the ETS scheduled for this summer, as well as a new “ETS investment booster” providing financial support to industry. This booster, first reported by POLITICO on Thursday, will “have a budget of round about €30 billion, financed by 400 million ETS allowances,” she said. “The aim is to finance projects for decarbonization” under a first-come, first-served scheme with a focus on lower-income EU countries. In their summit conclusions, leaders asked the Commission to conduct the ETS review “by July 2026 at the latest, to reduce the volatility of the carbon price and mitigate its impact on electricity prices … while preserving the essential role of the ETS.” Compared to previous drafts, the final conclusions also “invited” the Commission “to work closely with Member States to design national temporary and targeted measures” to rein in high energy prices. This addition was seen as catering to countries such as Italy and Poland, which had cited their national circumstances — in particular, high reliance on fossil fuels in their power mix — as reasons for more substantial changes to the ETS, two diplomats said. Asked specifically about a controversial Italian decree subsidizing power companies to make up for their ETS costs, von der Leyen said: “Because of different energy mix in different member states you cannot have one-size-fits-all” and vowed to “work closely with the Italian government on the Italian decree.” In general, she said, Thursday’s summit was “positive for the ETS.” The bloc’s bedrock climate measure escaped demands for fundamental changes from leaders and was widely praised as a key lever for accelerating the bloc’s transition to cheaper clean energy.

EU efforts to ban Huawei from 5G networks won the backing of a top court advisor Thursday, in a legal opinion that is likely to galvanize security hawks seeking to restrict Chinese tech in Europe. A lawyer for the EU’s top court in Luxembourg said rules blocking telecom operators from using risky suppliers can be set by the EU, not just national governments. They also said telecom operators don’t need to be compensated for the cost of replacing Huawei equipment. It’s a blow for Europe’s telecom giants, which have pushed back against banning China’s Huawei from 5G procurement and have told EU officials that large-scale bans are an “act of self-harm” that could even bring down networks. It is a win for China hawks, who have fought to impose tougher measures against Huawei — with strong backing from Washington. The EU has spent years trying to persuade national governments to voluntarily kick out Huawei and ZTE over concerns that their presence in European telecom networks could enable large-scale spying and surveillance by the Chinese government. It is now working on broader rules that seek to reduce the bloc’s reliance on foreign “high-risk” suppliers and limit foreign government control over its digital networks. The case was brought by Estonian telecom operator Elisa, which is seeking compensation for the costs of removing Huawei and is challenging whether the EU has the competence to ask for restrictions on Chinese vendors. Thursday’s opinion said national security authorities can follow EU guidance when imposing bans on Huawei. The Court of Justice is expected to issue its final ruling on the case later this year, and may take the opinion from Advocate General Tamara Ćapet into account. Laszlo Toth, head of Europe at global telecom lobby association GSMA, said in reaction that “blanket rip-and-replace mandates are an unreasonable approach to what is a highly nuanced situation.” The industry considers national security measures should remain the responsibility of national governments, he said. Huawei said the opinion “recognizes that all restrictive measures with regards to telecom equipment must be subject to judicial review, under a strict standard of proportionality” and that “decisions cannot rest on general suspicion … but must be based on a specific assessment.” “We expect EU or national restrictions to be scrutinized under this principle,” Huawei said. BOON FOR BRUSSELS Progress towards an EU-wide ban has been sluggish, with many national governments dragging their feet, in part due to fears of Chinese trade retaliation. European Commission Executive Vice President Henna Virkkunen told POLITICO in January that she is “not satisfied” with voluntary efforts by EU capitals to kick out Huawei. The EU executive now wants binding rules, laid out in a proposal in January. Large telecom players in Europe have pushed back hard against restrictions on Huawei, arguing that blocking risky vendors is a national security measure — an area handled exclusively by national governments. Efforts to clamp down on risky vendors should respect “the competence of member states for national security matters,” industry group Connect Europe said in January. Thursday’s opinion suggests operators will have a harder time fighting the bans.  It also bodes badly for operators hoping to get compensated for ripping out Huawei equipment. Many have sought financial support and compensation for the measures, which they say add massive unexpected costs to network rollouts. The EU executive previously estimated that phasing out “specific high-risk equipment” would cost between €3.4 billion and €4.3 billion per year for three years. Only if the burden for replacing Huawei is “disproportionately heavy,” could telcos seek compensation, according to the opinion. Elisa said it welcomed the legal recommendation that all decisions made on the grounds of national security should still be subject to judicial review. It said the restrictions in Estonia “amounted to a deprivation of its ownership rights … as the impacted equipment has become unusable” and that Elisa “already swapped the majority of its network equipment to Nokia.” Chinese vendor ZTE, the smaller rival of Huawei, did not respond to a request for comment. Mathieu Pollet contributed reporting.

BRUSSELS — Europe’s insistence that it doesn’t face an energy supply crisis took a blow Thursday when Qatar warned it would have to scrap contracts with Italy and Belgium following a massive Iranian attack. QatarEnergy CEO Saad al-Kaabi told Reuters on Thursday it would have to cancel long-term liquefied natural gas supply contracts for up to five years after an Iranian ballistic missile knocked out a significant share of its production capacity in the Persian Gulf. The state-owned company, which produces a fifth of the world’s LNG, said the damage could impact deliveries to Italy, Belgium, South Korea and China. “These are long-term contracts that we have to declare force majeure,” al-Kaabi said. On Wednesday Iran bombed the Ras Laffan gas plant in Qatar. The ballistic missile attack, which followed an Israeli attack on Iran’s South Pars gas field, caused “sizeable fires and extensive further damage,” QatarEnergy said in a post on X. The strikes damaged two of Qatar’s 14 liquefied natural gas trains and one gas-to-liquids facility, QatarEnergy said Thursday. The outages will remove around 12.8 million tons of LNG annually from the market, roughly 17 percent of Qatar’s total export capacity and around 3 percent of global supply, for an estimated three to five years. The strikes mark a major escalation in regional tensions. Qatar’s LNG plant had already been offline following a previous drone strike, but the latest damage is expected to significantly prolong the disruption. Gas markets reacted sharply on Thursday, with European futures jumping as much as 35 percent to more than double pre-conflict levels, underscoring the risk of a prolonged supply shock. The outage leaves major buyers in Europe and Asia scrambling to replace lost volumes, raising concerns over energy security and the potential for sustained price pressure as competition for alternative LNG cargoes intensifies. NOTHING TO SEE HERE Earlier on Thursday German Energy Minister Katherina Reiche had downplayed the impact of the war, saying: “What we in Europe don’t have is a physical bottleneck.” She insisted the EU’s gas supplies are still flowing from Norway, the U.S., Kazakhstan and other countries. But Reiche said while she doesn’t believe the current situation is as serious as the 2022 shock following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, “the current situation is also causing us concern,” and that it’s critical for Europe to continue to “monitor this crisis and make careful decisions.” Her comments came as EU leaders met for high-level talks in Brussels on Thursday, with energy one of the top issues. In 2022 Germany depended on Russia for more than half of its gas, but now relies on Norway and the Netherlands for the majority, importing some LNG from the U.S. It is not dependent on Qatari LNG. Other EU countries including Poland, Italy and Belgium depend on the Middle East country for a larger percentages of their LNG. Poland said Thursday its gas supplies “are secured,” adding Qatari LNG only accounts for 10 percent of the country’s total gas supply. “[T]his volume can be gradually supplemented with supplies from other sources, if necessary,” said Grzegorz Łaguna, a spokesperson for Poland’s Ministry of Energy. “Deliveries for March are being made, and there is currently no information indicating any significant risks to meeting current demand for natural gas, including the continued restrictions on supplies from Qatar,” he added. The U.K. government and regulators also played down fears of a supply shock. “The U.K. has very strong energy supplies from a diverse range of sources,” said Energy Minister Michael Shanks on Tuesday. But the country has just two days’ worth of gas supplies currently in storage, according to reports based on National Gas data. U.K. Green Party leader Zack Polanski has demanded the government freeze bills in July, when the cap is set to jump hundreds of pounds. Chancellor Rachel Reeves insists support should be “targeted” only at the poorest families, wanting to avoid a rerun of the eye-watering sums spent by the last government to protect all households and businesses after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022. India and China’s reliance on disrupted Middle East gas supplies has already caused price hikes and questions about European gas reserves.  “Geopolitics continue shaping gas and LNG markets, and despite the industry’s large scale, it lacks flexibility to absorb major disruptions, creating market volatility,” said Kristy Kramer, head of LNG strategy and market development at Wood Mackenzie. “How the industry responds to this event will vary, but we expect buyers to prioritise LNG supply security with a renewed focus on diversity.”

Listen on * Spotify * Apple Music * Amazon Music Der EU-Handelsausschuss hat für den Zolldeal mit den USA gestimmt, doch das Tauziehen ist noch nicht vorbei: Zwei Abgeordnete kämpfen als Delegation aus Brüssel in Washington um letzte Garantien. Joana Lehner und Jürgen Klöckner sprechen über das Finale und beleuchten zusammen mit einem US-Kollegen, ob Donald Trump den Deal als politischen Sieg im Inland verkaufen kann oder ob die deutsche Industrie weiterhin Milliarden an Zöllen verliert. Im Policy Talk begrüßen die beiden VDA-Präsidentin Hildegard Müller. Sie spricht über das „weinende und lachende Auge“ der Branche, die aktuelle Milliardenbelastung durch US-Zölle und die schwindende Wettbewerbsfähigkeit des Standorts Deutschland. Müller warnt: Wenn Europa wirtschaftlich schwach wird, verliert es im Spiel der Großmächte an Relevanz. In Berlin tobt derweil ein Ökonomen-Streit: Neue Studien vom ifo-Institut und dem IW Köln werfen der Regierung vor, große Teile des bisher eingesetzten Sondervermögens für Haushaltslöcher statt für neue Investitionen zu nutzen. Rasmus Buchsteiner berichtet Off the Record über das anfängliche Kommunikationsdebakel im Finanzministerium und die Frage, warum die versprochenen Bagger in den Kommunen noch immer nicht rollen. „Power & Policy“ zeigt jede Woche, wo und wie die Entscheidungen in der Wirtschaftspolitik fallen. ⁠Jürgen Klöckner⁠ und ⁠Joana Lehner⁠ von POLITICO sprechen mit Top-Entscheidern und liefern Off-the-Record-Einblicke aus der Redaktion und Machtzentren. Präzise Analysen, lange bevor Gesetze beschlossen sind. Der Podcast für alle in Wirtschaft und Politik, die einen Wissensvorsprung brauchen — immer donnerstags. Für Policy-Profis: Abonnieren und die Pro-Newsletter ⁠Industrie & Handel⁠, ⁠Energie & Klima ⁠und ⁠Gesundheit⁠. Jetzt kostenlos testen. Fragen und Feedback gern an ⁠powerandpolicy@politico.eu⁠ POLITICO Deutschland – ein Angebot der Axel Springer Deutschland GmbH Axel-Springer-Straße 65, 10888 Berlin Tel: +49 (30) 2591 0 ⁠information@axelspringer.de⁠ Sitz: Amtsgericht Berlin-Charlottenburg, HRB 196159 B USt-IdNr: DE 214 852 390 Geschäftsführer: Carolin Hulshoff Pol, Mathias Sanchez Luna

LONDON — The House of Lords has struck down the government’s controversial proposal to direct where pension schemes invest, handing Rachel Reeves’ Treasury a significant defeat. The government had sought to give itself a controversial “reserve power” in the Pension Schemes Bill, which would allow it to direct where pension schemes invest, in a bid to boost U.K. and private assets. That provision was met with fury by the pensions industry, and Thursday’s amendment shows enough peers feel the same way. An amendment to the Pension Schemes Bill — tabled by Liberal Democrat peer Sharon Bowles, Conservative peers Deborah Stedman-Scott and Thérèse Coffey, and independent peer Ros Altmann — won a vote in the upper chamber Thursday by 217 to 113. It removes the provision on the asset allocation condition in the legislation. The defeat is a blow to Pensions Minister Torsten Bell, who only last week tried to reassure industry and peers by telling POLITICO that he would table “clarifications” to the bill outlining that the power would only align to Mansion House Accord signatories and targets. It means ministers will now be required to reconsider the proposed law. “This power must be removed,” said Stedman-Scott. “It is a massive overstep from the government, and despite the assurances of the minister, no one is yet convinced that this can remai.” The amendment removing the threat of a mandate will now go back to the House of Commons, where Bell will need to decide whether to include new changes to reinstate the power.  Altmann got another victory in the report stage debate on Thursday by winning a vote on her amendment to extend the time limit defining an unused pension pot as “dormant” from 12 months to two years.  Under government plans, all “dormant” small pots worth under £1,000 will be consolidated into larger schemes.