The European Commission today unveiled its "technological sovereignty package", a comprehensive and long-awaited plan designed to reduce the continent’s dependence on US tech giants. The assessment is stark: the EU relies on non-European suppliers for more than 80% of its digital products, services and infrastructure. "We should not accept a future in which our critical infrastructure, sensitive data or industrial capacity depend on single, dominant suppliers outside Europe," argued Commission Vice-President Henna Virkkunen.
The package covers four strategic areas: semiconductors, data storage and processing and AI, open-source software, and the energy needed to power it all. Its centrepiece, a law on the development of cloud computing and artificial intelligence, aims to redress the balance of power between European players, such as SAP, OVHcloud and Mistral, and the likes of Amazon, Microsoft and Google, which currently control the vast majority of the European market.
The law sets an ambitious target: to triple European data centre capacity by 2030 and meet all requirements by 2035, at an estimated cost of €200 billion, to be raised mainly from the private sector. But the core of the text lies in a four-tier sovereignty scale, which grades requirements according to the sensitivity of the data. At the bottom of the scale, government data must simply be stored in Europe. Higher up, any possibility of a third country accessing the data or interrupting the service must be ruled out. At the top, reserved for defence, control extends to the entire software chain, and the service provider must be owned by European entities, with the exception of partners deemed reliable such as Japan or the United Kingdom, but not the United States.
The text also entrusts the Commission with a central purchasing role and introduces non-price criteria in sensitive public procurement, which could exclude US giants from the most strategic contracts. On the AI front, it targets robotics, industrial applications and large generative models, with the ambition of creating “the equivalent of a CERN for AI”. The package will need to be negotiated for at least a year by the European Parliament and the Council before it can enter into force.Les Échos
Europe
🇺🇦 Ukraine • A massive Russian drone and missile attack has left at least 23 people dead across Ukraine, including 16 in the industrial city of Dnipro and seven in Kyiv, where a 24-storey building partially collapsed. Moscow, which fired more than 70 missiles and 650 drones, is presenting these strikes as retaliation and referring to a “new paradigm” of warfare. Volodymyr Zelensky has reiterated his call to the United States for more Patriot systems, pointing out that Ukraine’s current stockpiles are insufficient to intercept a significant proportion of Russian missiles. In Kharkiv, the authorities have evacuated more than 7,000 civilians. The Ukrainian army also recaptured some 282 km² from Russian forces in May, for the second consecutive month.
🇷🇺 Russia - 🇺🇦 Ukraine • Ukrainian drones struck an oil terminal in Saint Petersburg and the corvette Boiky, which was in dry dock at the Kronstadt naval base, on the very day of the opening of an international economic forum, the “Russian Davos”, which brings together 20,000 guests from 130 countries. Volodymyr Zelensky, who describes these operations as “sanctions”, confirmed that he had targeted the fuel terminal and military installations. Pulkovo Airport had to suspend flights for several hours. The Kremlin has promised “systematic responses”. Seven civilians died in the occupied east after a Ukrainian drone struck a coach travelling from Moscow to Crimea.
🇱🇹 Lithuania • The unprecedented sounding of air-raid sirens in Vilnius, following the detection of a stray drone on 20 May, exposed the flaws in Lithuania’s shelter network: locked doors, shelters covered in cobwebs, and long waits. Prime Minister Inga Ruginiene apologised and promised a review of procedures. A NATO member bordering Russia and Belarus, the Baltic state has been caught off guard by the drone war, with some Ukrainian drones targeting Russian sites in the Baltic being jammed and diverted by Moscow. By the end of 2024, Lithuania had 6,344 shelters, enough to protect half its population.
🇫🇷 France • The Russian captain of the Tagor, an oil tanker from Russia’s “ghost fleet” boarded by the French navy in the Atlantic, has been taken into custody. He faces up to one year in prison and a €150,000 fine for flying a false flag and failing to comply with orders at sea, as well as the confiscation of the vessel. Measuring 241 metres in length and subject to Western sanctions, the Tagor has changed flags several times and is reportedly linked to the Iranian oil magnate Mohammad Hossein Shamkhani. It is the fourth tanker from this fleet to be intercepted by France since September 2025.
🇩🇰 Denmark • Mette Frederiksen has unveiled her new government, the first in Danish history to have more women than men, with 11 out of 21 ministers. This centre-left coalition, which marks the Prime Minister’s third term in office, brings together the Social Democrats, the Socialist People’s Party, the Radikale Venstre and the Moderates, though it does not hold a majority in Parliament. Its programme aims to strengthen the welfare state, resist US pressure on Greenland, support families in the face of inflation and maintain a restrictive immigration policy.
🇨🇭 Suisse • Swiss voters appear set to reject, in the 14 June vote, the initiative seeking to cap the country’s population at 10 million. According to a GFS Bern poll, 52% of those surveyed oppose it and 45% support it, whereas a previous poll had shown the two sides neck and neck. Backed by the far-right Swiss People’s Party (SVP), the country’s largest political force, the proposal was intended to address the rapid rise in the population, which has grown from 7.3 million to 9.1 million since 2002. The government opposes it, fearing it could harm the economy and free movement with the European Union.
Asia-Pacific
🇨🇳 China - 🇸🇧 Solomon Islands • The Solomon Islands’ new Prime Minister, Matthew Wale, elected in May, has announced from Australia that he will review the controversial security treaty signed with China in 2022, the terms of which have never been made public. More critical of Beijing than his predecessor, he intends to strengthen ties with Australia, notably through enhanced police cooperation and the funding of port infrastructure by Canberra and Washington. The archipelago, which severed ties with Taiwan in 2019, receives substantial aid from both powers, and its debt to China doubled last year. Australia is stepping up its treaties in the South Pacific to counter Chinese influence.
🇨🇳 China • This week, for the first time, China has tightened the rules governing trade secrets to protect data and algorithms, a move designed to safeguard its industrial assets against US competition, against a backdrop of an artificial intelligence war and talent poaching. Beijing has also rejected a high-profile OECD report highlighting the unprecedented scale of state aid granted to its strategic sectors and denouncing unfair competition, insisting that it “scrupulously” complies with World Trade Organisation rules.
Middle East
🇮🇱 Israel - 🇱🇧 Lebanon • Israel is continuing its strikes on southern Lebanon, where its army is advancing as it has not done for nearly 30 years. The bombardments have claimed at least nine lives today, including one soldier and two rescue workers. Washington, which is hosting a fourth round of talks between Israeli and Lebanese diplomats, believes a peace deal is possible “as early as tomorrow” without the obstacle of Hezbollah, which opposes the negotiations. Donald Trump, who vetoed Israeli strikes on Beirut so as not to jeopardise negotiations with Tehran, confirmed a heated exchange with Benjamin Netanyahu, whom he reportedly called “completely mad”. In Israel, the Prime Minister is facing fierce criticism from the opposition and within his own coalition, accused of having sold out the country’s sovereignty in the run-up to elections he is expected to lose.
🇺🇸 United States - 🇮🇷 Iran - 🇰🇼 Kuwait • Kuwait has condemned an Iranian drone and missile strike on its airport, which killed an Indian national and injured 63 others, the first deadly attack since a increasingly fragile ceasefire came into force. The emirate, which hosts US bases, said it had been targeted by 13 ballistic missiles and 17 drones, and has expelled two Iranian diplomats. Iran also fired towards Bahrain, targeting the headquarters of the US Fifth Fleet, and the US military retaliated with defensive strikes on the island of Qeshm, in the Strait of Hormuz. These attacks pushed oil prices back up to nearly $100.
🇮🇱 Israel • Exports from the Israeli defence sector surged by nearly 30% in 2025, reaching a record €19.2 billion, marking the fifth consecutive year of growth. Missiles, rockets and air defence systems accounted for 29% of sales, ahead of surveillance and optronic systems. Europe accounted for 36% of these exports, the Asia-Pacific region 32%.
Africa
🇨🇩 DR Congo • The only airport providing access to the epicentre of the Ebola outbreak, in Bunia, reopened yesterday, facilitating the deployment of aid to the east of the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Declared on 15 May, this 17th outbreak in the country has claimed 48 lives from 321 confirmed cases, with 15 cases—including one death—in neighbouring Uganda. The WHO reports a sharp drop in suspected cases, down to 116.
🇹🇿 Tanzania • Tanzanian President Samia Suluhu Hassan has begun a three-day state visit to Russia, where she was received at the Kremlin by Vladimir Putin, who called for increased trade. Her reputation in the West remains tarnished by the bloody crackdown surrounding her re-election, won with 98% of the vote in an election deemed fraudulent: the opposition reports over 2,000 deaths, an official commission 518.
🇫🇷 France - 🇷🇼 Rwanda • Emmanuel Macron and Paul Kagame unveiled a memorial in Paris dedicated to the victims of the 1994 Tutsi genocide in Rwanda, a symbol of reconciliation between the two countries. “It now places the Tutsi genocide at the heart of our capital and our history,” said the French president, referring to a long process of truth-seeking. In the early 1990s, France maintained close ties with the Hutu regime, whose collapse preceded the massacres, and its role during Operation Turquoise had been criticised.
Americas
🇺🇸 United States • The Trump administration is scrapping its ‘anti-abuse fund’ for the justice system, worth nearly $1.8 billion and denounced by its opponents as a ‘slush fund’, announced Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche. A judge had provisionally frozen the fund, which was intended to compensate those who felt they had been persecuted by the justice system, including those convicted of the Capitol riot. The scheme stemmed from an agreement between the Department of Justice and Donald Trump, who had secured retroactive tax immunity for himself and his sons in exchange.
🇨🇴 Colombia - 🇺🇸 United States • Donald Trump has given his ‘full support’ to Abelardo de la Espriella, the right-wing candidate who came out on top in the first round of the Colombian presidential election and will face left-wing Senator Ivan Cepeda in the second round on 21 June. This 47-year-old lawyer and businessman, a political novice with radical views, promises a military crackdown on armed groups and the construction of 10 “megaprisons”. His victory would amplify the rise of the nationalist right in Latin America, following the victories of Daniel Noboa, Nayib Bukele, José Antonio Kast and Javier Milei.
🇺🇸 United States • The Trump administration is considering imposing additional tariffs of 10% to 12.5% on imports from 60 economies, including the European Union, the United Kingdom, Canada, Mexico and Taiwan, accused of failing to effectively combat the trade in goods produced by forced labour.
