HowRu68

A criminal network is behind the fireworks attacks against the police in Amsterdam’s Floradorp neighborhood on New Year’s Eve, National Police Chief Janny Knol said in the television program Pauw de Wit.

On New Year’s Eve, the police intervened multiple times after groups set fires on Dotterbloemstraat in the Floradorp neighborhood. Riot police had to disperse crowds so that firefighters could extinguish the fires. During these confrontations, people in the crowds pelted officers with fireworks. The unrest followed tension in Floradorp after Mayor Femke Halsema banned the city’s annual bonfire due to safety concerns.

1. The Russian Model: Biohazardous Disinformation

The concept of disinformation as a “biohazard” underscores its infectious nature. Like a virus, disinformation spreads invisibly, mutates rapidly, and exploits the vulnerabilities of its host societies. Thus, the NDU Press article notes, Russia’s campaigns are tailored to the sociopolitical fault lines of target countries—race, immigration, economic inequality, and vaccine hesitancy, among others. Meanwhile, this precision targeting is facilitated by data analytics and AI-driven algorithms that allow for hyper-personalized influence operations.

2. Evidence-Based Countermeasures: A Path Forward

• Resilience involves enhancing societal immunity to disinformation. This includes media literacy education, public awareness campaigns, and investment in independent journalism.
• Transparency requires holding platforms accountable for the algorithmic amplification of false content and enforcing robust content labeling standards.
• Deterrence suggests imposing costs on perpetrators through sanctions, cyber countermeasures, and diplomatic censure.

3. However, as the Brill article argues, strategies must also respect democratic values and avoid sliding into counterpropaganda or censorship.

NOTE: Happy New Year and let's be alert together. In light of the ongoing wars, turmoil and new events, I thought this hand-out could be helpfull.

“Under all circumstances, the principles of international law and the UN Charter must be respected. We call for restraint,” she wrote.

Her comments were echoed by European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and European Council President António Costa, with Commission Vice-President Teresa Ribera adding that “we need a rules-based world.”

France went a step further with its foreign minister condemning the American operation on social media. According to Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot, Maduro “gravely violated” the rights of Venezuelans, but the military operation that led to him being grabbed “contravenes the principle of non-use of force, which underpins international law.”

Cross-posted

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Wednesday revealed details of the latest US-backed 20-point plan to end the war in Ukraine, saying it has been sent to Moscow for feedback. Zelensky gave a point-by-point briefing to journalists in Kyiv, including details on the creation of demilitarised zones.

The European Commission and Japan have successfully concluded negotiations on Japan's association to Horizon Europe, the EU's flagship €93.5 billion research and innovation funding programme. The agreement, expected to be signed in 2026, represents the closest form of collaboration offered by the EU to global partners in this field. It will enable Japanese researchers to lead and coordinate their own research and innovation projects under the programme, to apply and receive funding, and to seek closer collaboration with partners in the EU and other associated countries.

The EU has formal security and defence partnerships with Australia, Japan and South Korea, and in 2020 signed a broad “strategic partnership” with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations regional group, which includes co-operation on counterterrorism and maritime and cyber security.(..)

Kallas said the EU was “not the traditional security actor”, but Asian countries had been raising the possibility of working with it on issues such as maritime security, freedom of navigation and cyber security.(..)

“China is telling us that they want to be good partners and they are interested in our partnership,” she said. “If you want to have a partnership, then you also listen to the worries that the other side has.” Arch

Pim De Witte, founder of General Intuition and Medal.tv, turned down a deal reportedly worth $500 million from OpenAl, and instead raised $134 million to build an Al lab rooted in games, not words.

Context; EU AI Startup " While most 2025 AI and robotics rounds reported by EU-Startups have ranged between €3 million and €12 million, General Intuition’s raise underscores a sharp contrast in both scale and ambition – particularly notable given its early stage and cross-continental structure spanning New York and Geneva.

“When you play video games, you essentially transfer your perception, usually through a first-person view of the camera, to different environments,” added de Witte. “You get this selection bias towards precisely the kind of data you actually want to use for training work.”

Note: YT vid is 55 mins instead of 5,5 mins. My bad.

"Almost 6,700 American nationals had applied for a visa to work, be with family or study in the Netherlands by the end of November this year, according to immigration service figures, and that is by far the highest number in the past 10 years.

The total is likely to be higher once December, traditionally a busy month, is taken into account, current affairs programme Nieuwsuur reported at the weekend. (...)

Asylum requests submitted via the IND are also rising, with over 60 since the beginning of this year, compared with around 20 in the whole of 2024. Most are from members of the LGBTQ+ community fleeing repression under Trump."

NOS NL

"Only a more federal Europe can cope with these challenges, ensuring the respect of our fundamental values and rights.(..) To this end, we support the creation of a renewed cross-partisan and inter-institutional pro-European coalition encompassing the most committed Member States in the European Council, the pro-European majority in the European and National Parliaments, the European Commission, and regional and local institutions, over and above the particular inertias of each institution, and the pro-European organized civil society. We call on them all to mobilize locally, nationally, and transnationally to support these requests for a more sovereign and democratic Union."

This text is based on the declaration adopted by the relaunched Action Committee for the United States of Europe, 18 October 2025, Jean Monnet House, Houjarray/ Bazoches-sur-Guyonne, France

Original declaration federalists.eu

The unrest was unlocked by the government’s budget for 2026 which proposed higher taxes on the private sector to fund pay rises for the public sector, a shortcut, critics said, to greater government control over the public administration, military and police.

Despite promises of revisions, the protest wave – led by the pro-EU opposition duo We Continue the Change and Democratic Bulgaria – was not calmed, expressing deep dissatisfaction with Bulgaria’s power structures and a desire for all-around change on the political scene.

Temu's European headquarters in Dublin were raided by EU regulators last week on concerns about potential Chinese state subsidies granted to the online retailer, a subsidiary of China's ecommerce giant PDD Holdings, a person familiar with the matter has said.

Temu did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

The European Commission has proposed new initiatives to address long-standing issues in the planning and implementation of the EU’s energy infrastructure. They aim to ensure that affordable and clean energy flows more efficiently across the EU.

• help lower energy prices
• ensure a secure and reliable energy supply
• help achieve energy independence