Supermarkets with sabotaged refrigeration systems, a blood bank victim of a cyberattack, commercial airplanes threatened with bombs –and now also some media outlets–, banking and personal data of thousands of Moldovan citizens exposed, multibillion-dollar cryptocurrency thefts... Europe has recently been chained by a series of incidents of a very diverse nature that proclaim the same concern: to what extent can a society be destabilized without declaring war on it? Are we European citizens aware of our vulnerabilities, largely derived from the interconnection of our lives?

Novaya Gazeta [The new newspaper] appeared in 1993. The person who provided the money was the now former president Mikhail Gorbachev: he invested in the company the million dollars he had received, in 1990, with the Nobel Peace Prize. The Soviet Union had disappeared. Millions of Russians were going hungry because of the perestroika, the economic reform promoted by Gorbachev himself.

If the midterm elections were an opportunity to curb Donald Trump's "bad ideas" – in the words of American diplomat Daniel Fried – the Democratic victory could be read as a counterbalance to the U.S. president's fluctuations in his positioning regarding Ukraine. And it will be, in part, but possibly not as much as the Ukrainians would like because the New York tycoon will continue to have the final word on foreign affairs. However, paradoxically, an internally weakened Trump could also use foreign policy to project power and seek victories that could also reinforce him internally.

On the 109th anniversary of the October Revolution, Russian communists are facing one of the most delicate moments in their history. The Kremlin has banned several of the party's commemorative events for this Saturday because they fear that the rallies will overflow and turn into protests against Vladimir Putin. This is what happened a month ago in Moscow, when a group of young activists took advantage of a demonstration by the old guard to shout “Down with the Tsar!” and there were about sixty arrests.

Europe has experienced this week two waves of bomb threats on planes and at airports, and also a second cyberattack against supermarkets in several countries where freezers have turned into ovens. No one has claimed responsibility for these incidents and no authority dares to point the finger at anyone. But considering the context in which it is happening, it is inevitable that the idea that Moscow could be behind it will arise. We speak about this with Fredrik Wesslau, an expert analyst on security at the European Council on Foreign Relations (ECFR), one of Europe's leading think tanks in foreign policy and security.

On Monday, dozens of supermarkets in Belgium and Sweden, and to a lesser extent in the Netherlands, Finland, and Estonia, suffered cyberattacks that disabled freezers, resulting in tons of food spoiling. This Tuesday, the attacks were repeated in Portugal. In parallel, over the last 24 hours, up to eight planes have reported bomb threats in Europe, one of them on the Manchester-Murcia route. These are too many coincidences to think that everything is a pure coincidence. "There is no doubt these are not isolated incidents, and we must collectively strengthen our resilience and preparedness in the face of such cyber incidents," asserted the European Commission spokesperson, Thomas Regnier.

At least 33 people died on Monday and 50 are missing in a Russian attack on the town of Komyshuvakha, near the front line, in the Ukrainian region of Zaporizhzhia. The aerial bombardment struck a school, where civilians were receiving humanitarian aid, according to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. Russian forces dropped eight aerial bombs, in a "double tap" strategy, which seeks to strike rescue teams arriving at the scene after an initial attack to save victims. Specifically, a Russian plane dropped remote-controlled FAB-3000 bombs, with an explosive charge of up to 1.5 tons, which are designed to destroy bunkers and underground targets. Ukrainian authorities warn that it is impossible for an attack of this nature to be accidental.

Since the wave of youth unrest in Western Europe began, the suspicion of a Russian hybrid attack has loomed over public opinion. The confusion over coordinated actions through channels specifically created for the occasion and the absence of visible leaders have spurred the shadow of an influence operation by Vladimir Putin's government. The reality, however, is that it is impossible to attribute the origin of the protests to Russia. What has been proven is that Moscow has amplified the disturbances and has tried to present them as the social reaction to the militarism of community elites devoted to Ukraine. A very convenient approach on the eve of an electoral cycle that could catapult the European parties most opposed to support for Kyiv.

“They have killed us.” This is how the statement from Novaya Gazeta, the last opposition newspaper still operating within Russia, begins, announcing the end of its activity due to persecution by the authorities. In the last few hours, the workers have been evicted from their headquarters in the center of Moscow and all their sources of funding have been cut off. That is why the editorial team, fearing that the repression would intensify even further, has explained that they have no choice but to shut down permanently on November 9, after thirty-three years in operation.

Ukraine has attacked Russian oil again despite pressure from US President Donald Trump to stop attacks he considers to be driving up the price of diesel. Kyiv launched a drone attack early this Friday against the Novokuibyshevsk oil refinery in southwestern Russia, which produces fuel for the Russian army. Before the attack, local authorities issued a drone alarm and closed the airport.

Russia launched a propeller-driven drone attack on Thursday against the train station in Dnipro, in eastern Ukraine, which has left at least 14 dead and a dozen injured. The direct impact against one of the platforms affected a train full of passengers that was at the station at that moment, according to local authorities. Ukraine's railway services had issued a high-danger warning at the station, but despite this, there were people on the platform. Shortly after this attack, another one took place in broad daylight against the city of Chernihiv, in northern Ukraine, where two teenagers died.

A few months ago, Roberta Pinotti (Genoa, 1961) assumed the presidency of the National Theatre of Genoa, founded in 1951, at a time when Italy, like half of Europe, was trying to rebuild its cultural life after the Second World War. The position might come as a surprise if one considers the most recent stage of her long political career: she was Italy's Minister of Defence from 2014 to 2018, the first woman to hold that portfolio. The scenery has changed abruptly in the last decade and today's Europe, marked by war and the rupture with the United States, bears little resemblance to the innocent Europe of when Pinotti was a minister. Could it also be put another way: is today's Europe a consequence of that innocence? Pinotti is in Barcelona invited by ARA to participate in the’Enfoquem, the forum that will take place this Monday at the Sant Pau Art Nouveau Site in Barcelona.

Last August, a drone loaded with explosives was located at Leipzig airport, near a Ukrainian cargo plane. The German government attributed the attempted attack to Russia, which denies responsibility. Leipzig is a major European logistics hub. The episode shows that Kyiv's ability to sustain the war also depends on factories, warehouses, and transport networks located in Europe that allow weaponry and equipment to reach Ukraine.

“We must seize the opportunity to plunge Ukraine into the Stone Age.” This phrase from a columnist for the pro-government newspaper Moskovski Komsomolets summarizes Russia's approach to Donald Trump’s new turn. While the President of the United States tries to be indulgent with Vladimir Putin to the point of adulation, the Russian leader interprets the tension between Washington and Kyiv as a window to increase his peace demands and press the accelerator on the front. The White House intends to bring the Kremlin to the negotiating table with offers of economic cooperation, which Moscow gladly accepts, but decouples from the talks to end the conflict.

It is difficult to avoid the obvious cinematic reference in the latest episode of the conflict in Ukraine. In recent days, a Russian satellite has been chasing an American one used by the Ukrainian army and, finally, it has abruptly changed direction, in what experts warn could be considered the first example of space warfare in history. However, the real version of Star Wars is not as epic as that of the famous saga, nor is it fought with laser swords. In the midst of the battle for communications, with Donald Trump using Starlink to pressure Volodymyr Zelensky and Vladimir Putin trying to build his own network of satellites, the Russian device could have inaugurated a new form of combat in Earth's orbit.

Ten days after a new crisis erupted between the President of the United States, Donald Trump, and his Ukrainian counterpart, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, Kyiv believes that the New York tycoon is seeking Ukraine's surrender to Russia. This was stated by Zelenskyy in an interview with Bloomberg in which he considers that Washington's delays in sending the anti-ballistic missiles necessary to protect the population and infrastructure from Russian attacks and the lack of cooperation in intelligence, among others, are measures that seek to “convince Ukraine to capitulate”.

Amid the rapprochement between Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin, the Ukrainian army launched a drone attack this Saturday night against Saint Petersburg, Russia's second-largest city with more than five million inhabitants, and the Leningrad region. It is considered one of the largest drone attacks of the entire war, and it has left one person dead and five injured. About 20,000 people were left without electricity due to the damage caused to an electrical substation, and damage also occurred to several residential buildings.

The two worst moments in the relationship between Donald Trump and Volodymyr Zelenskyy have had a common denominator: they have arrived preceded by a telephone conversation between the United States president and Vladimir Putin, in which the Kremlin leader promised him major joint business deals. It happened in February 2025, before the public brawl between the American leader and the Ukrainian leader in the Oval Office of the White House, and it has happened again now, following the agreement for Moscow to sell diesel with Washington's permission, which caught Kyiv off guard. The Russian president has known at all times how to offer Trump what he desired, persuade him with his reasons, draw him to his positions, and pit him against Zelenskyy.

Just one week after the President of the United States, Donald Trump, announced the acquisition of 300,000 tons of Russian diesel, the New York tycoon signed an executive order late this Friday that temporarily suspends the application of a broad package of sanctions against Russia. He argued before Congress that it is a measure that responds to the "national interest," as reported by the White House.