As protests and repression intensify inside Iran, Beijing finds itself under growing pressure. China’s long-standing principle of non-interference is colliding with its deep economic entanglement with the Islamic Republic.

When US President Donald Trump warned that Tehran would face “serious consequences” if protesters were killed, China initially stayed silent. When it did respond, it repeated familiar positions, calling for calm, opposing outside interference and restating views it said it had “always” held.

That posture shifted on Tuesday, when Trump announced an additional 25 percent tariff on countries that continue to defy Washington’s policy on Iran. The measure was to take effect “definitively” and “immediately”, and was aimed above all at China, Iran’s most important trading partner.

Beijing said it would “resolutely defend its legitimate rights and interests”, reject foreign military intervention in Iran and act as needed to protect Chinese citizens.

New protests hit Iran as alarm grows over crackdown ‘massacre’

Trade and oil ties

China is central to Iran’s economy. More than a quarter of Iran’s total trade in 2024 was conducted with China, according to the World Trade Organization.

Iran imported around $18 billion worth of goods from China and exported about $14.5 billion in return, figures that underline the scale of the partnership.

Chinese energy companies, including Sinopec, are directly involved in offshore oil extraction in Iranian waters. China was still importing an estimated 1.8 million barrels of Iranian oil per day last autumn.

“These oil flows fluctuate depending on the month,” said Théo Nencini, a researcher specialising in Sino-Iranian relations at the Catholic Institute of Paris and Sciences Po Grenoble.

“They increase with the Chinese New Year. In general, between December and January – not always – the Chinese import a little less, then imports rise just after.”

Nencini said a key shift came in March 2023, when Iran and Saudi Arabia restored diplomatic relations in Beijing.

“From that moment on, we saw a fairly dizzying increase in Iranian oil exports to China,” he said. Until 2022, exports averaged around 700,000 to 800,000 barrels per day. “Then it rose to around 1.5 million in 2025.”

UN sanctions on Iran set to return as nuclear diplomacy fades

Why China can absorb Iranian oil

Estimates suggesting that more than 90 percent of Iranian oil exports go to China are plausible, said Didier Chaudet, an expert in geopolitics, specialising in Persian-speaking regions.

“If we look at Iran’s other potential customers, we see countries that do not have the means for abundant consumption, such as Afghanistan at present, or Syria until the fall of the Assad regime,” Chaudet said.

Others, such as Turkey, “do not have the political will, for fear of provoking American wrath”.

That leaves China as “the only country with the political will, economic need and financial capacity to absorb the majority of Iranian oil”, Chaudet added.

Around a quarter of that oil is processed in so-called teapot refineries, small semi-independent facilities known for handling sanctioned crude from Iran or Venezuela.

China is increasingly assuming responsibility for this trade through forums such as BRICS+ and the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, both of which Iran has joined, Chaudet said.

“It is a way to criticise the latest sanctions imposed on Iran, which are considered excessive and even illegal,” he said.

Buying Iranian oil beyond China’s immediate needs is also “a way of helping the regime to stabilise”, Chaudet said. Many Chinese researchers fear that if the regime collapses, Iran could become “a greater Syria rather than a greater Sweden”.

Is China’s SCO a counterweight to NATO or just geopolitical theatre?

A relationship centuries in the making

China’s engagement with Iran predates recent crises. Beijing supported the 2015 nuclear deal, which Trump later abandoned during his first term.

In 2021, after Joe Biden entered the White House, China and Iran announced a 25-year cooperation agreement promising up to $400 billion in Chinese investment, although the extent of its implementation remains unclear.

For Emmanuel Lincot, professor at the Catholic Institute of Paris and research director at IRIS, the agreement was “unprecedented in the history of bilateral relations”.

He said it was accompanied by military cooperation, most recently joint Chinese, Iranian and Russian naval manoeuvres off South Africa.

The relationship stretches back centuries.

Lincot pointed to the 7th-century Sassanid ruler Péroz, a Persian king, who sought refuge at the Chinese imperial court in Xi’an after Arab-Muslim invasions, a story “regularly repeated by both propaganda machines” as evidence of ancient ties.

In the early 15th century, Chinese admiral Zheng He sailed as far as the Strait of Hormuz during his maritime expeditions.

Iran is now a key link in Xi Jinping’s Belt and Road strategy, connecting Central Asia to the Arabian Gulf. China has also acted as a broker between Iran and Saudi Arabia when strategic, particularly energy, interests align.

China marks ten years of Belt & Road forum, though interest is waning

Support, but with limits

Beijing’s support for Tehran is not unconditional. Chaudet said Iranian perceptions of Russia and China are increasingly diverging.

“Moscow has not lived up to the expected level of support,” he said, despite Tehran’s alignment with the Kremlin over Ukraine.

China, however, “is not in a position of absolute support”, Chaudet said. Chinese analysts are aware of the Iranian regime’s weaknesses and are “not receptive” to Tehran’s calls for greater assistance.

“Iran is a partner, certainly, but not at the heart of China’s national interests,” he said. “China will not go into conflict with Washington to save Tehran.”

What remains central for Beijing is keeping oil flowing through the Strait of Hormuz.

“The Chinese are waiting,” Nencini said. “They are waiting to see how everyone reacts.”

Whether Washington’s threat of secondary tariffs will divert China from Iranian oil remains uncertain, particularly given the fragile trade truce between the two countries.

Much now depends on Trump’s next move. He has said his only limit is his own “moral compass”, alongside domestic political pressure and looming mid-term elections.

This has been adapted from the original article in French by RFI’s Igor Gauquelin.

Mahdieh Esfandiari, 39, was arrested in France in February on charges of promoting and inciting “tterrorism” on social media. The offences carry a maximum sentence of seven years in prison and a fine of up to €100,000.

She’s accused of writing posts for a channel called “Axis of the Resistance” in 2023 and 2024 on platforms including Telegram, X, Twitch and YouTube.

In particular, the organisation’s Telegram account glorified the deadly attack carried out by the Palestinian militant group Hamas on 7 October 2023 in Israel, incited terrorist acts and insulted the Jewish community. 

‘Immense relief’ for families after French couple freed from Iran prison

Court proceedings

Esfandiari was held in pre-trial detention for around eight months before being released in October ahead of her trial. The hearing began on Tuesday and had been scheduled long before protests erupted in Iran.

The prosecutor asked the court to impose a four-year jail term, including three years suspended, but said it would not be necessary for Esfandiari to return to prison.

Esfandiari, who has translated into French works from a publisher linked to Iranian authorities, told the court she had taken part in the “Axis of the Resistance” project but did not write the posts attributed to her.

She said the Hamas attacks in 2023 should not be considered “terrorism”.

“It’s not an act of terrorism, it’s an act of resistance,” she said.

The court is expected to deliver its verdict at a later date.

‘Hostage diplomacy’: longstanding Iran tactic presenting dilemma for West

French pair waiting to return

Kohler and Paris were arrested in Iran in May 2022 and held for more than three years on espionage charges that their families strongly denied. They were released in November.

After their release, French diplomats took them to France’s mission in Tehran, where they remain while awaiting permission to leave the country.

Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said in November that Tehran would allow the pair to return to France in “exchange” for Esfandiari’s release.

France has neither confirmed nor denied that any such deal exists.

But it has reduced staffing levels at its embassy in Tehran following nationwide protests that erupted last week. The unrest is seen as one of the biggest challenges to Iran’s clerical leadership since the 1979 Islamic revolution.

Iran’s ambassador to France, Mohammad Amin Nejad, said late Thursday that he hoped Kohler and Paris would soon be able to return home.

“My wish is for their return as soon as possible after arrangements have been made between the two states,” he said.

(with newswires)

The probe comes after the United States sharply criticised the past week’s drills, which brought vessels from China, Iran, Russia and the United Arab Emirates to waters off Cape Town.

Local media reported President Cyril Ramaphosa had instructed the defence minister to withdraw the three Iranian warships from the drills, which came amid the Iranian government’s deadly crackdown on protesters.

It was unclear to what extent Iran took part, but images emerged of at least one Iranian vessel at sea.

A defence ministry statement on social media on Tuesday listed an Iranian corvette as among the participants, but the post was later removed.

Defence Minister Angie Motshekga had “clearly communicated” the president’s instruction, the defence ministry said in a statement that did not make clear the president’s order, which was also not confirmed by his office.

South Africa’s joint drills a show of influence in the Indian Ocean

A board of inquiry would investigate “whether the instruction of the president may have been misrepresented and/or ignored”, it said.

The defence force said the China-led exercises of nations in the BRICS alliance were to “ensure the safety of shipping lanes and maritime economic activities”.

The US embassy on Thursday criticised Iran’s presence as “particularly unconscionable” given the protest crackdown, which independent monitors say left thousands dead.

The exercises involved nations with major diplomatic differences with the United States, at a time when Pretoria is seeking to improve its battered ties with Washington.

US President Donald Trump‘s administration has accused South Africa of anti-American policies and boycotted a G20 summit it hosted in November, also imposing 30-percent trade tariffs.

In August, Ramaphosa’s office rebuked the defence force for allowing the country’s top general to visit Iran, where he reportedly called for cooperation in defence matters.

The visit was unhelpful as South Africa managed “a very delicate exercise of resetting diplomatic relations with the United States”, a spokesman said.

Partial results released in the capital, Kampala, showed Museveni well ahead of his closest rival, as analysts said the outcome and further pressure on the opposition had been widely expected.

Museveni, who is 81, has ruled Uganda since he seized power in 1986 and is seeking what his party has described as a decisive victory.

The electoral commission announced early results after Thursday’s vote, showing Museveni with at least 76 percent of ballots counted from nearly half of polling stations.

Bobi Wine was on 19.85 percent, with the remaining votes shared among six other candidates.

House arrest

Wine, whose legal name is Robert Kyagulanyi, had called on supporters to protest, although there were no signs of demonstrations.

Late on Thursday, his party, the National Unity Platform (NUP), said security forces had surrounded his home.

“The military and police have surrounded the residence of President Kyagulanyi Ssentamu Robert, effectively placing him and his wife under house arrest,” the party wrote on social media.

It said “security officers have unlawfully jumped over the perimeter fence and are now erecting tents within his compound”.

The popular music star turned politician has emerged as Museveni’s main challenger in recent years and also ran in the 2021 election.

He alleged widespread fraud during the current polls, which were held under an internet blackout after a campaign marked by violence.

Uganda orders internet blackout ahead of presidential elections

Voting problems

Museveni said after casting his ballot that he expected to win with 80 percent of the vote “if there’s no cheating”.

National and international non-governmental organisations, including Amnesty International, have accused him of brutal repression of the opposition in the run-up to the vote.

The government imposed an internet blackout earlier in the week, while election day was marked by technical problems across the country.

Biometric machines used to verify voters’ identities malfunctioned in several areas, including when Museveni voted, and some ballot papers were delivered hours late.

There was also a heavy security presence nationwide during voting.

Succession worries

Analysts say the election was a foregone conclusion given Museveni controls the state and security apparatus and has crushed challengers during his four decades in power.

African affairs expert Jeffrey Smith, of the pro-democracy think tank Vanguard Africa, told RFI this outcome was expected.

“I suspect we’ll see an overwhelming reported victory for Museveni and a concerted government crackdown thereafter,” Smith said.

Concerns were now focused on what comes next for the country, he added – pointing to Uganda’s young population and warning of deeper instability.

“Uganda’s crisis is much bigger than Uganda, and that’s why it’s a crisis that demands urgent, authoritative action from both local and global actors,” he said.

If the results are confirmed, Museveni will begin a seventh term in office. He has said on several occasions that he wants his son, army chief Muhoozi Kainerugaba, to succeed him.

The United Nations rights office said last week the elections were taking place in an environment marked by “widespread repression and intimidation” against the opposition.

Final results from the presidential and parliamentary elections are due by 2am GMT on Saturday.

(with newswires)

The question, “Where were your parents born?”, was added to the census last year.

It was criticised by the Human Rights League (LDH) and other organisations, which questioned why the information was needed.

The census is designed to build a picture of the French population and help shape public policy.

Listen to a history of the census in France in the Spotlight on France podcast:

The LDH said information on people with foreign-born parents was already collected through other statistical studies and did not need to be included in the census.

“The question is not about us, it’s about our parents,” wrote the LDH in a letter published Sunday.

Use of census data

The census is run by the national statistics institute Insee. Its head of demographics, Muriel Barlet, defended the question.

“Answers will be used to highlight questions about segregations on a local level,” she told RFI.

France has a sensitive history with ethnic and racial statistics. During the Second World War, the French state collaborated with Nazi Germany and census data was used to identify Jews in France, many of whom were later deported.

A 1978 law bans the collection of personal data linked to a person’s origin or race. However, indirect methods are allowed, including questions about parents.

The LDH said it was concerned the data would not lead to concrete anti-discrimination policies and could be misused if accessed by the wrong people.

The group has called on census respondents not to answer the parents’ birthplace question, which is optional, even though completing the census itself is mandatory.

The sources, speaking on condition of anonymity, said authorities raided a farm near the town of Ajdabiya after receiving ​a report of migrants from sub-Saharan Africa being held there.

“We found migrants – men, women and ‍children – bearing signs of torture. They were taken to a hospital where they reported that other migrants had been with them and ​then disappeared,” one of the security sources told Reuters news agency on Thursday.

The mass grave was discovered some ​10km south-east of Ajdabiya, which is around 160km from Benghazi – the second largest city in the North African country and which is under the control of forces loyal to Libya’s army strongman Khalifa Haftar.

The Internal Security Agency confirmed the discovery of the mass grave to broadcaster al-Masar.

The channel, which is aligned with Haftar, said the suspect was detained during a raid on the farm and had admitted the presence of a mass grave on his property.

Inhumane treatment of migrants in Libya: the EU is ‘complicit’ says filmmaker

Cause of death unclear

Unverified pictures posted online showed a number of security personnel and Red Crescent volunteers placing bodies allegedly found on the farm property into black plastic bags.

How the migrants died remained unclear and ‍investigations were underway, said one of the security sources.

Libya remains one of the main departure points for tens of thousands of migrants fleeing conflict and poverty, mainly from sub-Saharan Africa. Many are taking dangerous routes across the desert and over the Mediterranean to reach Europe.

The North African country has been in turmoil since the fall of Moamer Khadafi‘s regime in a NATO-backed uprising in 2011.

It led to rival administrations in 2014: the UN-recognised Government of National Unity in Tripoli and the Government of National Stability, based in Benghazi. 

Libya’s oil-based economy also draws migrants seeking work, ‌but poor security leaves them vulnerable to abuse.

Libya expels over 200 migrants across land borders

Migrant tragedies

In July, more than 100 migrants, including five women, were freed from captivity in ‍Ajdabiya after being held for ransom by a gang, according to Libya’s attorney general.

In September, the UN International Organisation for Migration (IOM) said at least 50 people had died after a vessel carrying 75 Sudanese refugees caught fire off Libya’s coast.

In mid-October, 61 bodies of migrants were recovered on the Mediterranean coast west of Tripoli.

In February this year security authorities recovered nearly 50 bodies from two mass graves in the south-eastern desert.

UN data collected in 100 Libyan municipalities between August and October 2025 showed they were hosting a total ‍of 928,839 migrants from 44 countries.

At a UN meeting ‌in Geneva in ​November, several states including the UK, Spain, Norway and Sierra Leone urged Libya to close detention centres where rights groups say migrants and refugees have been tortured, abused and sometimes killed.

The IOM recorded nearly 1,000 migrant deaths and disappearances in Libya in 2024 alone.

(with newswires)

The footage, widely circulated online, shows black men in Russian military uniforms being humiliated, threatened or described as expendable. The language used has drawn attention to the risks faced by foreign recruits sent to the front line.

The videos have not been formally authenticated. But experts interviewed by RFI said the footage appears credible.

They added that the images match earlier investigations and expert reports suggesting African nationals – often misled during recruitment – have been deployed to some of the most dangerous areas of the battlefield.

‘We come here to die’: African recruits sent to fight Russia’s war in Ukraine

‘Disposable’ troops

One video shows a visibly frightened man who identifies himself as Francis. An anti-tank mine appears to be strapped to his chest. The person filming insults him, threatens him and orders him to run forward, seemingly to draw enemy fire.

A second clip, filmed in a snowy forest, shows a group of men singing a Ugandan military song. The cameraman refers to them as “disposable”.

These scenes echo findings by Thierry Vircoulon, an associate researcher at the French Institute of International Relations, who has written a detailed analysis of Russian recruitment in Africa.

“During our study, we showed that these recruits are very often placed in units sent to the front line in the most dangerous areas,” he said.

“They are frequently used to detect Ukrainian positions. That is undoubtedly what is meant by calling them disposable – the death rate in these units is high because they are involved in the riskiest operations.”

Nairobi sounds alarm over recruiters luring Kenyans into Russian war effort

Bad PR for Moscow

Other videos circulating online show black soldiers in military fatigues being targeted by drones, pleading to be sent back to their home countries or giving interviews after being captured.

The footage has been shared mainly on Ukrainian platforms and serves several purposes, Vircoulon said.

“The first aim is to show that mercenaries are fighting within the Russian army,” he says. “The second is to undermine the Russian narrative that portrays Moscow as standing alongside African countries in their struggle against neocolonialism and in support of development.”

Ukrainian authorities say between 3,000 and 4,000 Africans are currently fighting in Russian ranks. If confirmed, the figure would further complicate Russia’s efforts to present itself as a partner to the Global South rather than a power exporting war.

This has been adapted from the original article by RFI in French

On 1 October, 2025, French military personnel boarded the rust-streaked tanker Boracay just off the Bay of Biscay, after the captain, a Chinese national commanding a largely Chinese crew, ignored repeated orders to stop.

He was detained, and French prosecutors opened an investigation for refusal to obey a “lawful signal” and failing to prove the ship’s nationality – rendering it effectively stateless under international law, and boardable without flag-state consent.

On paper, the ship was registered in Benin, but this registration was marked “false” by the relevant shipping registries – the official records maintained by a flag state that document a vessel’s nationality and ownership, granting it the right to sail under that country’s flag.

The Boracay also appears on several blacklists, including that of the European Union, as a ship that has been caught “transporting crude oil or petroleum products … that originate in Russia or are exported from Russia while practising irregular and high-risk shipping practices”, as set out in resolutions of the International Maritime Organisation (IMO).

Its detention in France was just another stopover on an erratic journey – one that exemplifies the global movements of Russia’s shadow fleet.

EU hits Russia with sweeping new sanctions over Ukraine war

IMO 9332810

Launched in 2007 as Pacific Apollo, from a Japanese shipyard, the vessel is identifiable by its IMO number 9332810, the unique and unchangeable number assigned to every merchant ship for lifetime identification, regardless of name or flag changes.

It became Virgo Sun six years later, then sped through aliases from 2020: P. Fos, Odysseus, Varuna, Kiwala, Pushpa – and finally Boracay, from September 2025.

The vessel’s flags shifted rapidly too: the Marshall Islands, St Kitts and Nevis, Mongolia, Gabon, Djibouti, Gambia, Malawi and Benin – several lacking valid registration, according to Equasis, the database of the European Maritime Safety Agency (EMSA).

‘Name-hopping” is a hallmark of a so-called shadow fleet.

“There is no official definition of the shadow fleet,” according to Elisabeth Braw, a senior fellow with the Atlantic Council think tank.

“Different organisations use different definitions, but the characteristics that most of them include are flag-hopping, obscure ownership, uncertain P&I insurance, and the fact that they transport sanctioned cargo,” she told RFI.

The Boracay’s managers have included India’s Gatik Ship Management, a leading carrier of Russian oil since Ukraine’s invasion, and Turkish firm Unic Tanker Ship Management.​

UK armed forces helped US mission to seize Russian tanker, MoD says

Drone attacks

In April 2025, when it arrived in Estonia after a long journey from India’s Sikka port, Estonian naval forces detained the IMO  9332810, then under the name Kiwala and registered in Djibouti – despite Djibouti cancelling its registry months earlier.

The ship was on the EU sanctions list, and heading for Russia. 

Estonian inspectors found 40 “deficiencies” – issues that didn’t conform to shipping regulations – with 23 of them documentation-related. 

However, they had to release the ship as there wasn’t enough evidence to hold it indefinitely.

It reached the Russian port of Ust-Luga in late April, then Primorsk near St Petersburg in September and changed name, this time becoming the Pushpa. According to Eurasia Daily and other shipping publications, this time it was filled with petrol.

As the Pushpa continued its journey, Danish authorities then linked it to suspicious drone flights over airports, forcing closures, although proof remains elusive.

On it went, through the English Channel and then southwards.

According to data from the Marine Traffic tracking website, the ship had been scheduled to arrive in Vadinar in north-western India on 20 October.

But it was followed by a French warship and local authorities boarded the ship – by now named the Boracay – off the coast near Saint-Nazare, and detained it.

Shadow fleet targeted as EU advances frozen assets plan for Ukraine

With the detention of the Boracay, French President Emmanuel Macron was fulfilling a promise that France and its EU partners would pursue a “policy of obstruction” against such shadow-fleet vessels.

However, it is not always easy to determine when maritime rules permit the physical challenge of these clandestine vessels.

“You can board and you can possibly detain if you have strong suspicions and allegations, but then if you can’t prove beyond reasonable doubt that that ship has been involved in some kind of crime, then you have to release it,” explains Braw.

She added: “Every vessel in the world has the right to sail on the world’s oceans… these shadow vessels don’t sail in the territorial waters of Western countries, they sail in the exclusive economic zone, where coastal states have fewer rights.”

The capture of the Boracay and the more recent detention of ships leaving Venezuela by United States forces are rare examples of national authorities taking action against the shadow fleet.

According to Braw, critics who have called Europe “spineless” in this regard often miss the point that governments follow the UN Convention of the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS,) making “systematic action against the shadow fleet… very difficult without stretching or violating maritime rules”.

Opaque ownership

Since its invasion of Ukraine in 2022 and subsequent sanctions, Russia has stepped up use of this fleet of ageing tankers with opaque ownership and shifting identities to circumnavigate Western restrictions on its oil exports.

When the G7 imposed a $60 per barrel price cap on Russian oil in December 2022, this shadow fleet trafficking of Russian oil exploded.

Today, S&P Global counts 978 tankers totalling 127 million deadweight tonnes – 18.5 percent of global capacity – with 54 of these vessels (9.5 million payload tonnes) being used for Venezuelan crude swaps.

“There is no official definition, no official list and no precise number,” says Braw. The EU’s 18 December, 2025 sanctions hit 605 vessels, nine enablers (including owners and shipping companies) as well as firms in the UAE, Vietnam and Russia; yet port bans are not universally applied.

EU on track to end Russian gas imports by end of 2027

Global reach

The recent US detention of two Venezuelan tankers, thought to be shipping sanctioned oil, exposed the fleet’s global reach.

Roughly 80 percent of Venezuela’s 1 million barrels per day flowed to China, says Eric Olander, co-founder of the China-Global South Project, adding that: “The vast majority of the oil that Venezuela was producing was going to China.” The majority arrived at its destination via the shadow fleet.

For Beijing, this is just a small slice of its total oil imports – some 4 percent.

Venezuelan heavy, sour crude oil is hard to refine. But smaller, independent refineries, mainly located in China’s eastern Shandong province – nicknamed “teapots” – specialise in processing this oil from Venezuela and Iran, and are dependent on it.

“The teapot refineries will be the most impacted because they have tuned their systems to these particular grades of crude from Iran and from Venezuela,” according to Olander.

Unlike Chinese oil giants Sinopec or PetroChina, “teapots” lack diversification. With Iranian oil comprising 14 percent of imports, combined Venezuelan-Iranian pressure could hit 20 percent of China’s barrel basket.

Meanwhile, French authorities released the Boracay after a detention of just a few days. At the time of writing, it was located in Malaysia.

The ship now also appears on the Russian maritime register, under the name Feniks and registered to the Russian port of Sochi – a move that could suggest acknowledgement by Russia of its involvement with this shadow fleet.

RFI: For the opposition, and in particular for Bobi Wine, this electoral campaign has been very difficult. How would you describe it?

Robert Amsterdam: Let’s be really clear: this is a man who faces death each day. I was first brought in years ago as his lawyer when Museveni tried to kill Bobi by shooting into his car. Bobi was then brutally tortured and held in jail, in a town called Arua, Uganda.

And from that time, Bobi’s life has been in danger. And, unlike many, he did not flee his country. He has stood his ground, fighting for Ugandans every day. He is representative of a population that is overwhelmingly under the age of 18 and desperate for change. He is the symbol of change, of youth, not only in Uganda but in Africa. He is an important and emblematic symbol of the fight of this generation to be heard, and for the dinosaurs of previous generations to step out of the way.

The world should start being run by people who have to live in its future, not by those who created a pretty horrendous past in Uganda.

Bobi Wine’s fight for democracy in Uganda continues on the big screen

Many human rights organisations have criticised the repression and brutality they say has been seen during this electoral campaign. In light of this, how do you expect the election itself will go?

Of course, it’s going to impact the vote. The authorities have cut off the internet. They’ve divided Kampala into 14 military districts. There’s a massive, unprecedented mobilisation of the military. It’s absurd and obscene.

I’ve already had calls from people within the government, who are highly confident of the outcome and are already reaching out to me because they’re worried about what the response will be if there is another stolen election. So the government is gearing up to steal another election and deprive Uganda of its vote.

Uganda orders internet blackout ahead of presidential elections

Are there legal mechanisms in place that could ensure Ugandan voters get the result they deserve?

I also represent the opposition in Tanzania, where thousands [of people] were brutally murdered in another stolen election in this part of Africa. So I would be lying if I expressed great confidence in the [possibility of removing] a military dictator.

But at the same time, before a vote, however jaded it may be, I’m not going to make these comments. I’m going to pray for Bobi’s safety and for the safety of those with the courage to vote for him and against Museveni and his dynasty. Because he’s going to try to put his son in after he’s finished.

Do you think Ugandans can see a future where politicians like Wine can emerge? In Uganda and beyond?

He’s an inspirational figure, as is Tundu Lissu in Tanzania, who’s now in solitary confinement, after being shot 16 times in a prior election. I think these martyrs – and Bobi Wine is a martyr, having suffered through torture and false imprisonment – are heroes of real democracy, not failed leaders and tired policies. These are men of vision who are trying to bring their people out of desperate circumstances.

Uganda police surround opposition leader’s party HQ ahead of protests

What is your advice for those parties who may have to wait months, if not years, to be able to represent their voters?

The first thing we have to do is condemn the African Union for living in the past, for making corrupt pacts with unqualified autocrats. We need somewhere in Africa to have a moral stance, and the African Union needs to be a light – not a dim reminder of the past.

And we have great political figures in parts of Africa who are doing their best. Some of them I’ve come to know through a life in Africa. I’m privileged to act for the Democratic Republic of Congo. And there’s just a tremendous amount of inequality and despair that we need to turn around. And all of us who have invested parts of our lives in Africa, we need to not let another Ugandan election be stolen. We need to raise our voices. 

Bobi Wine has promised there will be protests if the election is stolen. But can we be confident that people are going to be safe if that’s the case?

Absolutely not. There’s no confidence. You have a military that’s corrupt and out of control. People have every legitimate right to fear for their lives, in a country that has no claim to democracy and no claim to rule of law when it comes to elections.

After 40 years of the same ruler, is change possible in Uganda? 

I will never bet against a popular vote, no matter how hijacked I fear an election can be. So let’s wait and see. My hopes and prayers are with the people of Uganda in this fateful 48 hours.

The blackout is making it far harder for protesters to communicate and for images and eyewitness accounts to reach the outside world. It has also disrupted daily life in Iran, where banking, payments and many basic services rely on digital networks.

For more than two and a half days, Iran has been largely cut off from the outside world and from itself. The flow of information inside the country and abroad has slowed to a trickle, with most Iranian websites inaccessible from outside Iran.

The nationwide shutdown began late on Thursday and quickly spread across the country. The independent monitoring group NetBlocks said the blackout had lasted for more than 60 hours, with national connectivity stuck at around 1 percent of normal levels.

“This censorship measure represents a direct threat to the safety and wellbeing of Iranians at a critical moment for the country’s future,” the organisation said.

Data published by the US-based internet infrastructure company Cloudflare also showed a massive collapse in online traffic coming out of Iran.

France’s Iranian diaspora divided over deadly protests back home

Protesters targeted

The demonstrations began on 28 December in Tehran, triggered by shopkeepers protesting against the rising cost of living and the collapse of the national currency. In the early days of the movement, the authorities focused their restrictions on urban areas and centres of unrest.

In Tehran, internet cuts targeted neighbourhoods known for protests, including Narmak, Molavi and the Grand Bazaar. The severity of the restrictions varied depending on location and internet provider.

In an analysis published by Filter Watch, a project that monitors online censorship in Iran, Nargès Keshavarznia from the human and digital rights group Miaan described how the shutdowns were closely synchronised with moments of mobilisation.

Internet access dropped sharply during protest gatherings and sometimes eased when streets emptied.

Earlier in the protests, Iran’s National Information Network, a domestic intranet developed since 2016 to allow the country to function while disconnected from the global internet, often remained accessible.

While international traffic was heavily restricted, some internal services continued to operate. That changed on Thursday night.

“Overall, all communication is impossible,” Amir Rashidi, an Iranian expert on cybersecurity and digital rights, told RFI, saying conditions had sharply worsened.

“It’s not just the internet that’s cut, but also phone communications, whether mobile or landline, inside the country and to or from abroad.”

Rashidi said the situation was constantly changing from one region to another, but making a phone call had become extremely difficult. “Sometimes you dial a number, you hear ‘beep, beep, beep’, and then nothing,” he said.

‘We’re fighting a daily battle’: Iranian women dare to shed hijab in public

 Shutdown unprecedented

To get around the restrictions, more Iranians have turned to Starlink, a satellite internet service that allows users to connect without relying on local networks. In recent days, however, these devices appear to have been targeted by jamming attempts.

“Iran seems to have strengthened its ability to control these techniques for restricting internet access,” Valère Ndior, a law professor at the University of Western Brittany and a specialist in digital governance, told RFI.

Iran has repeatedly shut down communications during periods of unrest, notably during the 2019 protests, in 2022 after the death of Mahsa Amini – a 22-year-old woman who died in custody after being arrested by Iran’s morality police – and during the conflict with Israel in June 2025.

But Rashidi said the current blackout goes further than anything seen before. Even the National Information Network is down, he said, a situation without precedent.

“This national internet was one of the key tools of control for the Iran,” Rashidi said. Usually, he explained, people could still move within a closed internal network even if access to the outside world was blocked.

“Normally you can’t leave the building, but you can still move from room to room,” he said. “Now you’re stuck in a single room. You can’t even change rooms.”

The authorities are therefore accepting the paralysis of their own infrastructure to shut down every channel of communication, a sign that they believe “their survival is at stake”, Rashidi added.

South Africa’s joint drills a show of influence in the Indian Ocean

Unseen repression

Despite the blackout, protests have continued. A small number of videos circulating on social media, likely shared via satellite connections, show crowds marching in Tehran, Mashhad and other cities. The images could not be fully verified.

The digital silence has heightened fears of a violent crackdown taking place out of sight.

The Centre for Human Rights in Iran, a US-based non-profit, warned on Sunday that “a massacre is under way in Iran”, saying it had received “direct testimonies and credible reports” of hundreds of protesters killed.

The Norway-based group Iran Human Rights also reported that at least 192 demonstrators had been killed over two weeks of protests.

Other NGOs have warned the true number of deaths may be even higher, with some hospitals reporting more than 500 fatalities and rights advocates warning that the blackout is hindering efforts to document casualties accurately.

Beyond repression, the blackout is hitting daily life and the economy. “Cash machines don’t work, banks aren’t operating normally, people can’t cash cheques or access their money,” Rashidi said.

Ndior said it was still too early to measure the full impact, but warned that “the economic cost could run into hundreds of millions or even billions of dollars”.

Meanwhile, the X account of Iran’s supreme leader, Ali Khamenei, continued to post messages. On Saturday evening, he wrote: “If God wills it, soon God will spread a feeling of victory in the hearts of all the Iranian people.”

This article was adapted from the original version in French by RFI’s Aurore Lartigue

Speaking at the Élysée Palace during France’s annual meeting with ambassadors on Thursday, Macron said French policy towards Africa had undergone a fundamental change since 2017, when he declared in Ouagadougou: “There no longer is a French policy for Africa.”

France, he said, now sought partnerships that were not based primarily on historical or linguistic ties and did not automatically prioritise French-speaking countries.

A central element of this shift has been the overhaul of France’s military footprint in Africa.

Since Macron came to power in 2017, France has ended or drastically reduced its military presence in Central and West Africa, withdrawing troops from Mali, Niger, Burkina Faso, Chad, Central African Republic, Cote d’Ivoire and Senegal. 

Macron said France had “completely changed its mindset” on Africa since his speech in Ouagadougou, insisting that the reduction of its military presence, notably in Mali and Burkina, was a necessary correction rather than a retreat.

“We reviewed, and rightly so, our military bases,” he said, adding that France had “removed the military component that was no longer understood by countries and by younger generations”, while rebuilding “relevant” partnerships, notably in Benin.

Macron returns to Africa with drive for fresh partnerships on five-day tour

Obliged to adapt

Seidik Abba, a Nigerien academic specialising in the Sahel, contests the idea that France drove these changes.

“It is not true to say that it was France that decided to withdraw,” he told RFI, pointing to pressure from African governments and growing hostility among young people who viewed French bases and the CFA franc as relics of colonialism.

For security analyst Emmanuel Dupuy, head of the Institute for European Perspective and Security Studies, Macron’s reference to Ouagadougou obscures how different the context was in 2017. At the time, France’s Sahel strategy was underpinned by the apparent success of Operation Serval and, later, Barkhane – missions that directed French military might against jihadists.

“There was a form of politico-military euphoria,” Dupuy said, with African governments actively requesting French security support. That environment has since collapsed, following coups in Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger, and France’s expulsion from all three.

He describes the current phase as one of reluctant realism, with Paris “obliged to adapt” to a disengagement it did not choose.

‘End of an era’ as France pulls out of Mali. Was the mission a failure?

Boosting economic ties

With its military role curtailed, Paris is now seeking to “play another card”, Abba said, with greater emphasis on economic ties. 

“As Macron himself has said, French companies need to be more aggressive and we need to move away from multinationals such as Bolloré and Total and work more closely with SMEs and French start-ups,” the analyst noted.

Macron said France’s renewed Africa policy would place greater emphasis on entrepreneurship, cultural and creative industries, and sport. Reaching young people and engaging with diasporas is seen as a crucial step.

In particular, France is seeking to expand relations with English-speaking African countries, moving beyond its traditional francophone partners.

“This is driven both by political considerations but above all the desire to gain market share and bring added value to the French economy,” Abba says.

Anglophone Africa

The French president pointed to a planned Africa summit in Nairobi in May 2026 as a milestone, describing it as “a very important meeting that will help embody this genuine revolution in our approach”.

India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Germany’s Chancellor Friedrich Merz have been invited, illustrating what Macron said was a change in mindset.

Dupuy, however, sees the pivot to East Africa as an implicit admission of weakness. France, he argues, failed to consolidate influence in its former spheres and is now seeking opportunities in regions dominated by China, India and the United States.

“France is very poorly equipped – perhaps even completely disarmed – to be credible in this region of the world,” he said, noting intense competition over infrastructure corridors and strategic trade routes linking the Atlantic and Indian Oceans.

South Africa’s joint drills a show of influence in the Indian Ocean

Battle of narratives

Beyond economics and culture, Macron stressed the importance of countering disinformation, warning that France was losing ground in what he described as a “battle of narratives”.

“We must not lose this battle,” he said, arguing that French interests were also defended through countering disinformation and responding to accusations that France represented a new colonial power. Such narratives, he said, often drew on “anti-colonial”, “anti-European” and “anti-French” discourse and required a more robust response.

Dupuy is less alarmist. While acknowledging growing anti-French sentiment, he points to persistent demand for French support in certain security crises. France’s recent intervention in Benin, which helped stabilise President Patrice Talon’s government in the face of an attempted coup, was one such example.

“There is a paradox,” he said. “France is criticised for militarism, yet welcomed when its support proves decisive.”

Double standards?

Macron’s Africa policy has come under scrutiny for its uneven response to military coups.

A recent opinion piece in Benin’s La Nouvelle Tribune accused Macron of double standards in taking a hard line against juntas in Mali, Burkina Faso and Niger, while being more accommodating towards coup leaders in Gabon, Guinea and Chad. The writer said France’s selective approach undermines its democratic discourse and fuels anti-French sentiment.

Dupuy acknowledges the double standard, but argues that not all coups should be treated the same.

He suggests that the succession of Mahamat Déby in Chad in 2021 was a power transfer tacitly tolerated by France, rather than a putsch, and that military takeovers in Gabon and Guinea followed deeply contested electoral processes rather than explicit ruptures with Paris.

Elections, coups and crackdowns: Africa’s mixed democratic record in 2025

Gabon and Guinea have since embarked on transition processes, Dupuy explains, giving their leaders a degree of international legitimacy absent in the Sahel states, “where no credible electoral timelines exist”.

Yet Guinean military leader Mamadi Doumbouya had earlier pledged not to stand, and major opposition parties were barred from running. La Nouvelle Tribune criticised Macron’s decision to congratulate him on his election victory regardless.

“There is a democratic problem, for sure,” Dupuy said, “but you cannot call for elections on the one hand, validate the electoral process by observing the polls and talking about the need for transition, and at the same time fail to welcome the fact that this transition is taking place.”

‘Recognising’ Africa

In his speech, Macron also said France was closely monitoring crises in Sudan, the Horn of Africa and the Great Lakes region.

Dupuy was doubtful about France’s influence in such conflicts. “Everyone knows that France has no weight on the question of Sudan,” he said. And on the Great Lakes, “France has been marginalised by the Washington summit” that produced an historic peace deal between DR Congo and Rwanda.

While France is “in a phase of decline” on the African continent, he says we “shouldn’t  completely bury” France’s presence. In addition to its soft power in sport, culture, the arts, heritage and returning artefacts, France, he argues, needs “to support Africans in their emergence as a power in their own right”.

“As the Americans are leaving the UN, we could take advantage of this to impose an African state as a permanent member of the Security Council,” the analyst suggested.

“President Macron made recognising Palestine his priority for 2025, and it worked. He could make bringing one or two African countries onto the Security Council his objective for 2026.

“It would be a game changer, just like recognising Palestine was.”

Barely one week after being sworn in, Touadéra is confronting an armed challenge in Haut-Mbomou prefecture, where deadly clashes have erupted between government forces and the Azandé Ani Kpi Gbè militia, known as the AAKG.

The security situation remains far calmer than in 2016, when Touadéra first came to power amid a civil war that left most of the country under rebel control. But fresh fighting has flared since the presidential election on 28 December.

Since that day, Haut-Mbomou has been rocked by violence. The AAKG, drawn from the Zandé community, was originally supported by Russia’s Wagner network before rebelling against authorities in Bangui.

No official death toll has been released. The clashes are believed to have killed dozens of people and forced thousands to flee their homes.

Central African Republic President Touadera wins re-election, results show

Violence in Haut-Mbomou

In the town of Zémio, gunfire has been heard almost every night since the start of the year. On Tuesday 6 January, residents again fled to the Catholic mission, which now resembles a makeshift displacement camp, or sought refuge at the local hospital.

The hospital was attacked two days earlier and is no longer functioning. It is now guarded by UN peacekeepers.

“There are about 2,000 people here,” a religious source told RFI. “Others have already crossed the border to join the thousands sheltering in the Democratic Republic of Congo.”

Local officials have been under UN protection since election day. On 28 December, the AAKG launched an offensive on the border town of Bambouti, reportedly with backing from across the border in South Sudan.

The attack prevented voting. A local government official, a gendarme and an electoral worker were abducted. The electoral worker was later executed.

The UN mission Minusma said around 2,500 people, most of Bambouti’s population, have fled into the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Russian mercenaries accused of rights abuses, hindering peacekeepers in CAR

Shift to open rebellion

“The choice of the election date was no coincidence,” explains Fulbert Ngodji, a researcher with the International Crisis Group and author of a report on the AAKG. “By attacking state symbols, the militia is showing its strength. It looks like the beginning of a shift from an ethnic self-defence group to a rebel movement openly opposing the government.”

Haut-Mbomou lies more than 1,300 kilometres from Bangui and has long been neglected by the state. Over the years, it has been targeted by armed groups ranging from Joseph Kony’s Lord’s Resistance Army to the Séléka coalition and later the Union for Peace in the Central African Republic, known as the UPC, led by Ali Darassa.

In 2023, Zandé self-defence groups united under the AAKG banner, a name meaning “too many Zandé have died”. They pushed the UPC out of Bambouti but were later accused of abuses against civilians and of treating Muslims as rebel fighters.

In 2024, around 200 AAKG fighters were recruited, armed and briefly trained by Russian mercenaries before being integrated into the national army. Known locally as the “Wagner Zandé”, they initially scored victories against the UPC.

Discipline soon collapsed amid complaints over unpaid wages and reckless tactics. The militia later turned on government troops, their Russian trainers and civilians, particularly Muslims and Fulani. At least 200 people were killed, including soldiers, Russians and a UN peacekeeper.

Rape, looting and kidnappings followed. In spring 2025, the government’s decision to sign a peace deal with the UPC marked a turning point. The AAKG saw it as a betrayal.

Calls for dialogue

The fighters’ integration into the army was suspended, but some kept their weapons and went underground. Violence escalated and peaked on election day.

According to Monsignor Aurelio Gazzera, the Bishop of Bangassou, dialogue is now essential. “The militiamen must stop this carnage affecting civilians,” he told RFI. “But the authorities must also listen. This region has been abandoned for decades – no roads, no infrastructure. Development is urgently needed.”

Ngodji warned the government is now facing “the monster it created”, as inter-communal and religious tensions deepen.

“Caught between a militia that claims to defend them and loyalist forces that see them as rebels, the people of Haut-Mbomou are trapped,” Gazzera said, warning that the violence could spread across the wider south-east.

This article has been adapted from the original version in French by RFI’s Carol Valade

Tabouret was selected by a special committee to create contemporary windows for Notre-Dame, in collaboration with the Reims-based glassmaking studio Simon-Marq.

Notre-Dame reopened on 7 December 2024 after a five-year restoration following the devastating fire of 2019.

Some heritage groups have criticised the decision to introduce new windows. Among them is Didier Rykner, head of the cultural heritage website La Tribune de l’Art, who opposes the project on the grounds that the original windows were not damaged in the fire.

Tabouret’s designs, expected to be installed by late this year, will replace six of the seven windows on the south aisle of the cathedral, originally designed by 19th-century architect Eugène Viollet-le-Duc.

RFI: What were your thoughts when you were entrusted with this historic project?

Claire Tabouret: I immediately wanted to get to work. It’s true that this is a project that instills great humility, because I’m part of an extremely long timeframe. There was a lot to do.

RFI: What is the theme for the stained-glass?

CT: The theme, already set out in the call for projects, is Pentecost. At this time, magnificent gatherings take place between people, despite their differences. This theme is reflected in six key moments. This is something we discover here at the Grand Palais, in a scenography where we truly see the horizontal dimension of the story unfolding before our eyes.

RFI: The exhibition presented here is called “D’un seul souffle” (“In a Single Breath”). Is this an echo of the Holy Spirit?

CT: Yes, of course, there’s the breath of the Holy Spirit. There’s also the breath of the glass. It’s true that all the glass panes in these stained-glass windows were mouth-blown. And I almost forgot, there’s also the breath of the wind. We can indeed see that tree bending in the wind.

From ashes to innovation: 3D scanning powers Notre-Dame’s restoration

RFI: It seems that you have made the choice of using very bright colours?

CT: These stained-glass windows will be installed on the south side of Notre-Dame, so they’ll be in quite bright light. Therefore, we needed fairly intense colours to allow that light to penetrate and shine through. Another specific requirement of the project was the need to maintain a white light. The colour balance is absolutely perfect.

Each colour is used in equal quantities and on equal surfaces, ensuring that when the light passes through the stained glass, it won’t create a large pool of red or blue on the floor of Notre-Dame, but rather, it will maintain the harmony of the cathedral’s natural light.

RFI: Did you have complete freedom or did you have to work within a framework?

CT: By choosing to take part in this project, I chose to serve a framework. There’s the constraint of the architecture itself, which must be fully considered in the compositions. And then there’s also the need to integrate seamlessly with what surrounds us in Notre-Dame, which predates these stained-glass windows, ensuring a pleasant and harmonious transition.

Each bay window illustrates a phrase at a key moment of Pentecost. They were all gathered together in one place. In the first bay of Saint Joseph, we see his apostles gathered together, holding hands in prayer. But it’s also the interior of the house, the house of God, because we have stained-glass windows within the stained-glass windows.

That’s where the idea came to me to reference Viollet-le-Duc in my own compositions, creating a kind of echo of these ornaments in the background of the composition, making us feel that these figures are within it. And then, that idea came back in every bay window like a leitmotif [recurrent theme] until the end of the story.

Notre-Dame revival drives return to ancient French craftsmanship

RFI: In France, there was a bit of a controversy over the stained-glass windows, which some called the “stained-glass windows of discord”. What do you make of that?

CT: I understand that this is a topic for discussion, and the more I read about this project, the more I wanted to see it happen because it seemed absolutely invigorating. How are we going to continue living here in France, with our heritage, with all these buildings, these historical monuments? We can’t freeze them in time. We have to keep moving forward. And this is about the vitality of the church, but also of our country, of our culture.

This article was based on an interview in French by RFI’s Isabelle Chenu and slightly edited for clarity.

Washington briefly suspended intelligence sharing with Ukraine in March as part of efforts to pressure Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to cooperate with President Donald Trump’s bid to convene peace talks with Russia.

In his New Year’s address to the French military on Thursday, Macron said that France was now providing Ukraine with the bulk of the intelligence capabilities it needed in the war.

“Whereas a year ago Ukraine was overwhelmingly dependent on American intelligence capabilities, today two-thirds are provided by France,” he said at the Istres air base in south-eastern France.

Macron also praised Europe’s role over the past two years in taking over major parts of weapons support for Ukraine since Russia’s full-scale invasion in 2022.

The 34 countries of the Coalition of the Willing are financing “100 percent” of the resources granted to Kyiv, including financial support, Macron said.

He added that this followed Washington’s decision to stop funding or directly supplying weapons to Ukraine.

Brussels lays out €90bn loan for Ukraine with military focus

No confirmation from Ukraine

Macron’s comments contrast with remarks made by Kyrylo Budanov, who was appointed head of Zelensky’s office and previously led Ukraine’s military intelligence.

In December, Budanov said Kyiv remained critically dependent on Washington for intelligence, including satellite imagery and early warning systems for ballistic missile launches.

Ukraine’s GUR military intelligence agency declined to comment.

A French defence ministry official also declined to comment directly on the president’s claims, but said much of the intelligence France provides is technical in nature.

Macron seeks €36bn boost in French defence spending by 2030

US role still significant

Despite strained relations between Washington and Kyiv, there has been no indication that the United States has sharply reduced its intelligence support for Ukraine.

When Washington suspended intelligence sharing in 2025, France’s then defence minister Sebastien Lecornu, now prime minister, said the move would have a significant operational impact on Ukraine.

He added that France’s intelligence support for Kyiv did not rely on Washington.

(with newswires)

The eurozone’s second-largest economy has been bogged down in political crisis since President Emmanuel Macron called snap polls in 2024, in which he lost his majority.

In a bid to survive being toppled by parliament like his two predecessors, Prime Minister Sebastien Lecornu last year pledged to seek parliament approval for a 2026 austerity budget – and not ram it through without a vote.

He managed to get a bill on social security spending approved by year end, but lawmakers have failed to reach a compromise on state expenses.

Lecornu’s office said late Thursday that it would be “impossible to adopt a budget by a vote” and that it would be looking at two alternative options.

One is to use a constitutional power under “Article 49.3” to push the legislation through parliament without a vote, as for previous budgets.

France’s article 49.3 a handy constitutional tool to bypass parliament

That can trigger a no-confidence vote, which could topple the government and its spending bill with it.

Lecornu would have to reach a deal with the Socialists – a key swing group – to avoid this scenario.

The other option is for the first time issuing a decree that forces the budget directly into law.

That too could trigger a no-confidence vote, but the budget would survive even if the cabinet was ousted.

The government has suspended further budget debates until Tuesday.

Deficit to deadlock: why France is borrowing €310bn without a budget

Lawmakers from across the political spectrum have emerged exasperated after months of back and forth, and are looking for to a swift resolution.

“I’m tired of having the same debate over and over again,” said right-wing Republicans lawmaker Marie-Christine Dalloz.

“I’m really looking forward to the end of this episode.”

Greens member of parliament Steevy Gustave said he felt like a “robot” repeating the same thing every day.

“If only there had been results, some compromises – but no,” he said.

The move followed an emergency defence council convened at the Élysée on Greenland and Iran, after which President Emmanuel Macron travelled to the Istres air base in southern France to deliver his annual address to the armed forces.

Macron confirmed overnight that France was taking part, at Denmark’s request, in joint military exercises in Greenland alongside Germany and Nordic countries.

“The first French military personnel are already on their way. Others will follow,” the president said on X.

The deployment comes amid growing tension within NATO after US President Donald Trump renewed claims on Greenland, an autonomous Danish territory, arguing it is vital for American security.

His remarks have alarmed European allies and unsettled transatlantic relations.

During the address, Macron said a first team of French soldiers was already on the ground in Greenland and would be reinforced in the coming days by additional land, air and maritime assets.

Macron warns of ‘cascading consequences’ if US seizes Greenland

European forces en route

France’s ambassador for the poles, Olivier Poivre d’Arvor, said around 15 French soldiers were already involved.

“They are high-mountain specialists such as the chasseurs alpins,” he told FranceInfo radio, adding they were taking part in a preparation exercise “aimed at deterrence” to “show the United States that NATO is present”.

The mission, known as Operation Arctic Endurance, is running from Thursday to Saturday.

Germany said it was sending a 13-member reconnaissance team to Nuuk over the same period, while Sweden and Norway are also taking part. Denmark’s armed forces said they would continue strengthening their military presence in Greenland with support from European allies.

Greenland’s deputy prime minister, Mute Egede, said NATO soldiers were expected to be “more present” in the coming days, with additional military flights and ships. He described the activities as training.

Political pressure in Paris

The Greenland deployment comes as France struggles to agree a 2026 budget. Macron has asked parliament to increase military spending by 3.5 billion euros next year, citing the war in Ukraine and an increasingly brutal world.

Jean-Philippe Tanguy, a senior figure in the far-right Rassemblement national party, called on Macron to explain France’s position clearly.

He urged the president “to speak directly to the French people” about Greenland and the situation in Iran.

Tensions sharpened after talks in Washington on Wednesday between American, Danish and Greenlandic officials failed to bridge differences over Greenland.

Danish Foreign Minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen said a US takeover of the territory was “absolutely not necessary”.

“We have a fundamental disagreement, but we also agree to disagree,” he told reporters.

Trump later struck a more conciliatory tone, saying he had “a very good relationship with Denmark” while again refusing to rule out any options.

(with newswires)

Scandals over abuse of the elderly in French care homes, combined with growing loneliness among pensioners, are forcing reflection on how – and where – people spend their later years. Three decades after founding the Utopia network of independent cinemas, Anne-Marie Faucon and Michel Malacarnet have turned their energy and experience towards imagining an alternative to traditional retirement homes. Their project, La Ménardiere, is an 18th-century mansion in the small town of Bérat, in south-west France. It operates as a shared-living collective, where residents, known as coopérateurs, are also shareholders. By taking control of their own destinies, they have created a model that also provides services and cultural activities for the surrounding community. Residents describe the approach as ageing together in a house that is “on the offensive”. (Listen @4′)

La Clef, an historic arthouse cinema in Paris, has reopened its doors after a group of residents, cinephiles and activists spent years protesting its closure. Ollia Horton met some of those who took part in a years-long occupation of the theatre that resulted in the activists raising enough money to buy the building from owners who wanted to sell the prime piece of real estate in the centre of the city. (Listen @21’48”)

As census-takers fan out around France to begin the annual counting of the population, we look at a process that started in the 14th century. During World War II the census was co-opted by Nazi occupiers to identify Jews, and while it has since stripped out questions relating to race and religion, it recently added controversial ones about parental origins. (Listen @17’10”)

Episode mixed by Cecile Pompeani.

Spotlight on France is a podcast from Radio France International. Find us on rfienglish.com, Apple podcasts (link here), Spotify (link here) or your favourite podcast app (pod.link/1573769878).

Speaking at the Istres-Le Tubé Air Base in southern France, where he delivered his New Year’s address to the military, Macron said France needed to move faster.

“To be powerful in this brutal world, we must act faster and stronger,” he said.

Macron said an updated Military Programming Law for 2026-2030 would include the extra €36 billion to boost defence spending.

The current 2024-2030 Military Programming Law (LPM) provides €413 billion, which Macron said he wants parliament to adopt “by 14 July”.

France deploys troops as Europe moves into Greenland

Rising defence budget

The delayed 2026 budget sets aside €57.2 billion for the armed forces, up 13 percent. It includes an extra €3.5 billion that was not planned under the current framework.

Macron last summer also called for another €3 billion spending surge in 2027.

He said the additional €36 billion was needed to “preserve the operational credibility of our forces” and to be ready for “a major engagement within three to four years”, amid concern over Russia’s threat to European security.

Macron said the money would fund “three main priorities”.

France’s Macron wants more young volunteers ‘to reinforce’ the army

Military priorities

He said the focus would include increasing ammunition stocks and strengthening troop readiness.

Macron said France also needed to strengthen sovereignty capabilities, including satellite-based early warning systems to detect long-range missile attacks.

He said France would also boost protection and strike capacity, with more air-defence systems, anti-drone measures and long-range drones.

As European nations increase defence spending, Macron renewed his call for defence contractors to raise production.

“We need to produce faster, in greater volume, with lighter and more innovative systems,” he said, warning firms could be “pushed out of the market”.

(with newswires)

NASA said Adenot’s Epsilon mission, originally planned for mid-February, could now launch as early as 8 February from Florida. The space agency also confirmed the mission will last nine months instead of the usual six.

The change tightens an already packed training and launch schedule for the 43-year-old test pilot, who is part of the European Space Agency’s (ESA) astronaut corps.

NASA had previously planned the launch “no earlier than 15 February” 2026 aboard a SpaceX Crew Dragon as part of the Crew-12 mission.

After the early return of Crew-11, US planners are now studying options to move the launch forward by several days to maintain a continuous human presence on the station.

French astronaut Thomas Pesquet sets his sights on the Moon after ISS success

Extended stay

The extension to nine months makes the mission one of the longest stays ever assigned to a European astronaut on the ISS.

Adenot has said she is preparing for “a marathon, not a sprint” in microgravity, with a heavier workload of scientific experiments during the longer mission.

The changes follow the first medical evacuation in the history of the ISS, which has been continuously inhabited for more than 25 years.

Four members of NASA’s Crew-11 mission splashed down in the Pacific Ocean off San Diego after their flight was cut short by about a month because of a health problem affecting one astronaut.

NASA has not identified the crewmember or given details of the diagnosis, saying the condition is stable and that the return was a precaution to allow full medical checks on the ground.

Agency doctors cited a “lingering risk and a lingering question” around the diagnosis, leading to a carefully weighed decision rather than an emergency evacuation.

Crew reshuffle

The early departure left the ISS with just three residents and increased pressure to send Crew-12, including Adenot, to restore a full working crew.

Adenot will launch aboard a SpaceX Crew Dragon with NASA astronauts Jessica Meir and Jack Hathaway and Russian cosmonaut Andrey Fedyaev.

Meir has been named commander of the mission. Hathaway will pilot the capsule, while Adenot and Fedyaev will serve as mission specialists.

The flight will make Adenot the second Frenchwoman in space, more than 30 years after Claudie Haigneré’s missions in the 1990s. She will also be the first French astronaut to visit the ISS since Thomas Pesquet’s Alpha mission in 2021.

During her stay, Adenot is expected to oversee dozens of European and French experiments, including work on plant biology, human physiology and technology tests linked to future Moon missions under NASA’s Artemis programme.

International cooperation

Orbiting about 400 kilometres above Earth, the ISS is used for research that cannot be carried out on the ground, including studies of the human body in weightlessness.

Crews are trained for both scientific work and emergencies, including medical situations like the one that led to Crew-11’s early return.

The station is one of the last arenas of structured cooperation between the United States and Russia since the war in Ukraine, with NASA, Roscosmos, ESA, JAXA and the Canadian Space Agency all contributing modules, cargo ships and crew.

Mixed crews continue to rotate through the station, with US spacecraft carrying Russian cosmonauts and Russian Soyuz capsules still transporting NASA astronauts.

In operation since 2000, the ISS has hosted more than 200 people from around 20 countries.

NASA and its partners plan to operate it until the end of the decade, before guiding it to a controlled re-entry over the remote Pacific “spacecraft graveyard” known as Point Nemo in 2031.​

(with newswires)

Around two-thirds of the funds, about €60 billion euros, will be used to support Kyiv’s military, while the remaining €30 billion euros will cover general budget needs, including public sector salaries and energy subsidies.

The European Commission said it hopes to make the first payment in April, pending approval from the European Parliament and EU member states.

“With this support, Ukraine can bolster its defence on the battlefield while keeping the state and basic services running,” EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen told reporters in Brussels on Wednesday.

She said the funds would primarily finance weapons and equipment produced in Ukraine or within the EU, a move designed to sustain Europe’s defence industry and reduce reliance on the United States.

If certain equipment is unavailable or cannot be delivered quickly enough from European suppliers, Kyiv may be allowed to source it from outside the continent.

However, any such exceptions will require prior notification to an expert group to maintain what officials call a “Made in Europe” principle.

As Europe pours money into defence, reliance on US remains a sticking point

Frozen Russian assets

The loan package, backed by the EU’s common budget, follows months of talks after an earlier plan to finance Ukraine using frozen Russian assets failed to gain unanimous support.

Belgian Prime Minister Bart De Wever had opposed the use of the roughly €210 billion in immobilised Russian central bank funds, most of which are held under Belgian jurisdiction.

The new scheme exempts Hungary, Slovakia and the Czech Republic from underwriting the joint debt to secure unanimous agreement.

Brussels will cover the annual interest costs, estimated at around €3–4 billion, using leftover EU funds, with member states stepping in if those fall short.

“This is a lot of money – billions being invested – and these investments should have a return in jobs, in research and development,” von der Leyen said, linking the loan to Europe’s security and industrial capacity.

According to EU officials, negotiations with G7 partners are under way to ensure other Western donors frontload their financial assistance to Ukraine in the first quarter of 2026, helping plug immediate shortfalls before the EU loan begins to flow.

(with newswires)

A game dominated by the hosts from the outset ended 0-0 after the regulation 90 minutes and 30 minutes of extra-time.

Morocco goalkeeper Yassine Bounou saved shootout strikes from Samuel Chukwueze and Bruno Onyemaechi to furnish Youssef En-Nesyri with the chance to send a national team into a Cup of Nations final for the first time since 2004.

The 28-year-old Fenerbahce striker swept home confidently past the Nigeria goalkeeper Stanley Nwabali and wheeled away before he was submerged by a pile of gleeful teammates.

The Moroccans entered the game on the back of a 23-match unbeaten streak which had taken them to the top of the African rankings.

Nigeria, containing two former African footballers of the year in the shapes of Victor Osimhen and Ademola Lookman, had been the most prolific team of the competition notching up 14 goals in their five games en route to the semi-final in Rabat.

But from the moment referee Dan Laryea blew the whistle, that dynamic duo and the rest of their accomplices were second best.

The passing that had scythed through the likes of Tunisia, Mozambique and Algeria was absent or wayward.

Akor Adams, so vibrant in previous games down the right wing was unable to link up consistently with the roving Lookman or Osimhen’s darts into space.

Starved of possession and angles reduced, the Nigerians sunk into listlessness or clumsiness on the ball.

Egypt dethrone Côte d’Ivoire to reach semis at the Africa Cup of Nations

On a rare sortie forward after 14 minutes, Lookman forced Bounou to beat away a shot.

But it was brief interlude in the Nigerian drama of pain.

The Moroccans kept them under the cosh but failed to inflict the killer blow.

Ayoub El Kaabi could not wrap his foot around a knockdown into the penalty area after 28 minutes to get his shot away.

Brahim Diaz’s curler skimmed past the post and Abdessamad Ezzalzouli twice tested Nwabali.

The pattern remained the same throughout the second-half: Moroccan domination without incision. 

In the last four minutes of extra-time, Nigeria slowed the game down seemingly happy to be still alive after so much time spent chasing shadows.

Following the two fluffed shots, their campaign ended to the delight of the mostly Moroccan fans in the 66,000 crowd at the Stade Prince Moulay Abdellah.

On Sunday night at the same venue, Achraf Hakimi will attempt to become the first Morocco skipper to lift the Africa Cup of Nations trophy since 1976.

His side will face Senegal who beat Egypt 1-0 in the first semi-final in Tangier.

Sadio Mané scored the only goal of the game in the 78th minute to terminate Egypt’s attempt to brandish a record-extending eighth continental crown.

Immigration has become a central political issue in the United Kingdom, as the government seeks to stem a wave of undocumented migrants arriving on British shores after paying smugglers to cross the Channel.

The arrivals have fuelled widespread public concern and rising anger on the British far right, and since last year videos have circulated of anti-migrant vigilantes visiting France to take matters into their own hands.

France’s interior ministry said it responded to reports that members of the “Raise the Colours” movement had conducted anti-migrant activities in France.

On Tuesday, “territorial bans were issued against 10 British nationals, identified as activists within the movement and having carried out actions on French soil”, it said.

“Raise the Colours” on X denounced the ban as “absolutely disgraceful”.

In a written comment to French news agency AFP, it said it understood the ban targeted “specific individuals, rather than the organisation as a whole”.

“Raise the Colours has always maintained that its activities must remain peaceful and within the law. The organisation does not support violence or any unlawful activity,” it added.

Its website on Wednesday included a banner that said the movement did not support “vigilante behaviour” or “anyone travelling to France, approaching migrant vessels, or attempting to intervene in crossings”.

‘Not welcome’

The French ministry said it would not name the 10 people, and did not describe the exact nature of their actions.

French authorities have opened an investigation over an alleged “aggravated assault” on migrants in September in a coastal area near the northern city of Dunkirk.

Four men carrying British and English flags verbally and physically assaulted a group of migrants in Grand-Fort-Philippe on the night on September 9 to 10, telling them they were not welcome in England, a charity working with migrants called Utopia 56 told AFP.

“Raise The Colours”, in a post on X responding to a news report of the probe in November, however claimed it had “only been going over to France in the past month”.

Another of its social media accounts on Instagram late last year posted videos of anti-immigration activists on France’s northern coastline.

UK struggles to reduce migrant crossings after near-record in 2025

In one video posted in November, a man filmed himself on a French beach, saying he had found a small inflatable boat buried in the sand and had slashed it.

“That is not going to England,” said the man, who elsewhere has called himself Ryan Bridge.

In another post published earlier the same month, he waded into the sea shouting at what appeared to be dozens of undocumented migrants boarding an inflatable dinghy on their way to England.

“You’re not welcome in our country,” he said, calling the passengers “potential rapists, murderers and child abusers”.

In a third November video, Bridge filmed himself in the French capital speaking to would-be migrants.

AFP had spotted three such individuals on a beach in the northern area of Gravelines on 5 December.

‘Fan hatred’

Paul Alauzy, from the French NGO Médecins du Monde that helps migrants, welcomed what he described as a travel ban against “far-right activists who fan hatred and sow division by targeting extremely vulnerable people who are simply seeking refuge”.

A spokeswoman from L’Auberge des Migrants, who asked to remain anonymous, said it was a good move from the French authorities, but that it came very late.

Her charity had been signalling a problem since May last year, she said, adding they had received reports of people being tasered and person who had their arm broken.

French aid groups complain of harassment by British anti-immigration vigilantes

The debate about immigration in the United Kingdom last year triggered a new trend of flying English and British flags.

Anti-racism campaigners say far-right activists are behind the main organisers, “Raise the Colours”.

Last year saw the second highest number of undocumented migrants arrive on British shores since such crossings began in 2018.

UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer has struggled to reduce the number of migrants arriving in the country – the vast majority of them legally.

The issue is being exploited by the anti-immigration Reform party led by Nigel Farage.

(with AFP)

Tractors from the FNSEA, France’s main farmers’ union, and the Jeunes Agriculteurs, which represents younger farmers, started leaving the capital around 4am after spending about 24 hours positioned near the National Assembly.

The departure followed overnight talks with the government after days of mobilisation over farm debt, costs and regulation.

FNSEA vice-president Luc Smessaert said a delegation met Agriculture Minister Annie Genevard shortly before midnight.

“The agriculture minister gave us details and commitments on cash-flow loans and restructuring for the most indebted farmers,” he told the French news agency AFP.

Hundreds of tractors roll into Paris as farmers protest EU-Mercosur trade deal

Prime Minister Sébastien Lecornu announced on Tuesday that an emergency agricultural law would be presented to the cabinet in March and examined by parliament before the summer.

He said the bill would focus on water, predation by wolves and production tools.

Farmers say the EU-Mercosur trade deal would expose them to cheaper agricultural imports from South America produced under lower standards, putting French producers at a disadvantage.

The government’s announcements closely match demands made by the FNSEA and Jeunes Agriculteurs, the dominant alliance in French farm unionism whose regional branches around Paris launched tractor convoys into the capital.

Promises to calm the crisis

Lecornu also called for a moratorium on decisions linked to water policy, including a suspension of rules setting water withdrawal volumes until September. He asked for meetings to examine possible exemptions from the EU nitrates directive, which regulates fertiliser use.

These steps add to a €300 million support package promised on Friday, combining budget measures subject to a parliamentary vote with other measures already announced to respond to the agricultural crisis.

While tensions eased in Paris, mobilisation continued elsewhere.

In Toulouse, around 40 farmers from the Coordination Rurale union entered the city centre overnight despite a prefectural ban, parking their tractors close to the prefecture before being blocked by security forces.

EU countries green-light Mercosur trade deal despite France’s opposition

“This is the state’s response when we have been given no answers, apart from the signing of Mercosur,” said Vincent Arbusti, a spokesperson for the Coordination Rurale in the Gers department, who confirmed that five people were arrested.

Police later removed the tractors. Farmers then set up a checkpoint near Toulouse-Blagnac airport, where about 10 tractors disrupted traffic on a roundabout.

Early Wednesday, farmers blocked a major motorway near Toulouse, cutting traffic in both directions and causing serious disruption.

Another slow-moving tractor protest was also under way on a main road in the Var region.

(with newswires)

Designed to protect ice cores from glaciers that are rapidly disappearing due to global warming, the sanctuary is housed in Concordia Station, a French-Italian research base located 3,200 metres above sea level.

The first samples, taken from two glaciers in the Alps, are stored in a purpose-built snow cave.

Buried about 5 metres beneath the surface, the cave maintains a constant temperature of -52C, allowing the ice to be preserved naturally without artificial refrigeration. It also minimises the risks from human or technical failures.

Scientists officially inaugurated the Ice Memory Sanctuary on Wednesday, amid outside temperatures of -33C.

“We are the last generation who can act,” said Anne-Catherine Ohlmann, director of the Ice Memory Foundation. 

“It’s a responsibility we all share. Saving these ice archives is not only a scientific responsibility – it is a legacy for humanity.”

French scientists probe deep into Antarctica for clues on climate change

Preserving climate records

Launched in 2015 by research institutes and universities in France, Italy and Switzerland, the Ice Memory project was conceived after scientists noticed a sharp rise in temperature on several glaciers. 

Since 2000, glaciers have lost between 2 percent and 39 percent of their ice regionally and about 5 percent globally, according to a study published in Nature in 2025.

As they melt, invaluable scientific records are lost.

Preserving ice cores will allow future scientists to study Earth’s climate history, explained Carlo Barbante, vice-chair of the Ice Memory Foundation and professor at Ca’ Foscari University of Venice. 

“By safeguarding physical samples of atmospheric gases, aerosols, pollutants and dust trapped in ice layers, the Ice Memory Foundation ensures that future generations of researchers will be able to study past climate conditions using technologies that may not yet exist,” he said. 

Natural vault

The Ice Memory Sanctuary measures 35 metres long and 5 metres high and wide.

Its stability is ensured by the extreme and naturally constant Antarctic temperatures.  

The natural and low-impact snow cave was approved in 2024 under the Antarctic Treaty, which regulates the use of Antartica for scientific research, and was funded by the Prince Albert II Foundation.

It currently houses ice cores extracted from the Mont Blanc and Grand Combin glaciers in 2016 and 2025 respectively.

Scientists hope million-year-old Antarctic ice will reveal climate secrets

‘Race against time’

Dozens of additional ice cores from glaciers worldwide – such as in the Andes, Pamir, Caucasus and Svalbard mountain ranges – are expected to join the Ice Memory archive in the coming years.

An international governance framework will be established over the next decade to ensure fair and transparent scientific access for future generations.

On Wednesday, European climate monitors and US confirmed that 2025 was the third hottest year on record, pushing the planet closer to a key warming limit. 

“We are in a race against time to rescue this heritage before it will vanish forever,” said Barbante.

The appeal comes after a French court last year barred Le Pen, leader of the far-right National Rally (RN), from running for office for five years over a European Parliament fake jobs scam.

It found her, along with 24 former European Parliament lawmakers, assistants and accountants as well as the party itself, guilty of operating a “system” from 2004 to 2016 using European Parliament funds to employ RN staff in France.

I had “no sense of having committed the slightest offence when, in 2004, 2009, and 2014, we hired our assistants,” the 57-year-old former European lawmaker said as her appeal trial opened in Paris.

The three-time presidential candidate, who has always maintained her innocence, instead sought to shift any blame.

“If indeed any wrongdoing was committed, the European Parliament did not play the warning role it should have,” she said.

It “was aware of the overall elements making up these contracts. We concealed nothing”.

French far-right leader Le Pen in high-stakes trial ahead of presidential race

The appeal hearings are to last a month, with a decision expected this summer.

If the court upholds the first ruling, Le Pen will be prevented from running in the 2027 election, widely seen as her best – and possibly last – chance to win the country’s top job.

Le Pen was also handed a four-year prison sentence, with two years suspended, and fined 100,000 euros ($116,000) in the initial trial.

She now again risks the maximum sentence of 10 years in prison and a one-million-euro ($1.16 million) fine if the appeal fails.

She could, however, still be a candidate if she is sentenced to a shorter ban and has no time to serve under house arrest.

Risk of reoffending

Twelve of the accused, including Le Pen, as well as the far-right party itself, have appealed against the verdict.

Another 12 people, including one of Le Pen’s sisters, have decided to accept their convictions without appealing. Another person sentenced has since died.

The initial verdict dealt a heavy blow to Le Pen and the RN, which has surged in French politics in recent years.

Le Pen walked out of the courtroom during the sentencing, later slamming the verdict as a “political decision”.

The judges defended the decision to bar her from running, saying elected officials should not benefit from “preferential treatment” and citing the risk of reoffending.

The news sparked shock among Le Pen supporters in France, while US President Donald Trump and the Kremlin expressed concern.

Former Trump adviser Steve Bannon said last week he hoped that Le Pen could run for president despite her legal troubles so her election could help “break” the European Union.

Bardella in the wings

Le Pen took over the former National Front (FN) from her father Jean-Marie Le Pen in 2011 and has since sought to clean up the party’s image.

Her father, who died last year, was often accused of making racist and antisemitic comments.

After coming third in the 2012 presidential polls, Marine Le Pen made the run-off in 2017 and 2022 but was beaten by Emmanuel Macron on both occasions.

Yet 2027 could see a different outcome for the far right, with Macron barred from standing again under France’s constitution.

Some 42 percent of French people said they agreed with “ideas defended by the RN”, up from 29 percent before the 2022 vote, according to a poll by consultancy firm Verian for Le Monde published on Sunday.

If she cannot be a candidate, Le Pen has said her top lieutenant Jordan Bardella, the RN party’s president who is not a defendant in the trial, can run in her place.

“Bardella can win instead of me,” Le Pen said in December.

A poll in November predicted that Bardella would win the second round of the 2027 elections, no matter who stands against him.

But Bardella said on Monday that a ruling preventing Le Pen from running “would be deeply worrying for democracy” and insisted he was not so far a candidate for president but prime minister.

Sadio Mané’s strike 12 minutes from time settled the match at the Stade Ibn-Batouta. Senegal will play Morocco who saw off Nigeria following a penalty shootout.

Senegal, the continent’s second best side, hogged possession from the outset and worked more openings for shots at Mohamed El Shenawy’s goal.

Nicolas Jackson’s powerful drive flew well over the bar and El Shenawy was equal to long range drives from Pape Gueye and Habib Diarra.

Egypt’s best chance of the half came from Mohamed Salah’s free-kick from the right wing.

But the skipper’s whipped delivery eluded his strikers in the penalty area and spun out for a goal kick.

Egypt dethrone Côte d’Ivoire to reach semis at the Africa Cup of Nations

Salah’s former Liverpool teammate enjoyed the night’s fortune. His snapshot from a rebound took a deflection to beat El Shenawy and give the West Africans a slender lead. The strike also forced Egypt onto the offensive.

Four minutes after the breakthrough, they had their first corner of the game.

But Senegal repelled that and held firm to book a place in Sunday night’s showdown at the Stade Prince Moulay Abdellah in Rabat.

“We totally deserved this victory,” said Senegal defender Moussa Niakhaté 

“We suffocated them, we didn’t let them play their game, and we also didn’t allow ourselves get caught out either. Finally, by pushing constantly, it went in.”

Skipper Kalidou Koulibaly will miss the final through suspension after picking up a second yellow card of the knockout stages.

Diarrra will also sit out the match after suffering the same fate.

The slowdown comes as appetite for climate action flags and major economies in Europe and elsewhere struggle to make good on their pledges to reduce planet-warming pollution.

France’s emissions were estimated to have declined 1.6 percent year-on-year, said Citepa, a non-profit organisation tasked by France’s ecology ministry with tallying the country’s greenhouse gas inventory.

The reduction of 5.8 million tonnes of CO2 equivalent was “far below the pace needed to reach 2030 targets” which would require cuts nearly three times larger, Citepa said.

“The decrease in emissions is confirmed for 2025. This is an encouraging sign, but it is not enough. We must collectively remobilise with all emitting sectors,” Monique Barbut, France’s Minister for Ecological Transition, said in a press release.

Record surge in CO2 puts world on track for more long-term warming

France, often seen as a leader in transitioning to a low-carbon future, unveiled in December its updated pathway for achieving carbon neutrality by 2050.

To stay on track, greenhouse gas emissions need to fall 4.6 percent on average every year until 2030.

After France slashed its output by 3.9 percent in 2022 and 6.8 percent in 2023, the rate slowed sharply to 1.8 percent in 2024.

Citepa had earlier predicted a decline of just 0.8 percent in 2025 but said fresh data and updated methods of calculation had allowed a “more accurate” estimate for the full year.

Urgency to phase out fossil fuels

Big polluting nations most responsible for climate change are under pressure to make faster and deeper cuts to the emissions driving record-breaking global temperatures and more extreme weather events.

Scientists say the last three years have been the hottest globally on record.

The result in France echoes a slowdown in neighbouring Germany, where emissions fell just 1.5 percent in 2025, the Agora Energiewende expert group said in its annual report last week.

France encouraged energy conservation after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022 but since then has faltered in decarbonising some of its most polluting industries.

EU carbon border tax redraws rules for trade in carbon-heavy goods

While improvements were recorded in 2025 in heavy-emitting sectors such as industry, agriculture and transport, they remained virtually flat in energy and waste treatment, Citepa said.

The latest assessment highlighted the urgency for France to phase out its use of fossil fuels, said Anne Bringault, a director at Climate Action Network France.

“It is high time to take seriously the climate risk but also the geopolitical risk of making us suffer from our dependence on fossil fuels, which are overwhelmingly imported,” she told AFP.

The European Union has pledged to cut its net greenhouse gas emissions by 90 percent by 2040 compared to 1990 levels. It had already achieved a 37 percent reduction by 2023.

(with AFP)

Scandals over abuse of the elderly in French care homes, combined with growing loneliness among pensioners, are forcing reflection on how – and where – people spend their later years. Three decades after founding the Utopia network of independent cinemas, Anne-Marie Faucon and Michel Malacarnet have turned their energy and experience towards imagining an alternative to traditional retirement homes. Their project, La Ménardiere, is an 18th-century mansion in the small town of Bérat, in south-west France. It operates as a shared-living collective, where residents, known as coopérateurs, are also shareholders. By taking control of their own destinies, they have created a model that also provides services and cultural activities for the surrounding community. Residents describe the approach as ageing together in a house that is “on the offensive”. (Listen @4′)

La Clef, an historic arthouse cinema in Paris, has reopened its doors after a group of residents, cinephiles and activists spent years protesting its closure. Ollia Horton met some of those who took part in a years-long occupation of the theatre that resulted in the activists raising enough money to buy the building from owners who wanted to sell the prime piece of real estate in the centre of the city. (Listen @21’48”)

As census-takers fan out around France to begin the annual counting of the population, we look at a process that started in the 14th century. During World War II the census was co-opted by Nazi occupiers to identify Jews, and while it has since stripped out questions relating to race and religion, it recently added controversial ones about parental origins. (Listen @17’10”)

Episode mixed by Cecile Pompeani.

Spotlight on France is a podcast from Radio France International. Find us on rfienglish.com, Apple podcasts (link here), Spotify (link here) or your favourite podcast app (pod.link/1573769878).

Aleppo has seen its worst fighting in years, as the Syrian army moved to oust the SDF from two large, mainly Kurdish neighbourhoods in the north of the city. The clashes began in late December and continued into January, forcing many civilians to flee.

The SDF controls a large swathe of northern and eastern Syria. The offensive comes as efforts to integrate the SDF into the Syrian army stalled.

“This is a warning. It is a kind of pressure on the SDF to come to a conclusion quickly, rather than to kick the can down the road with Damascus,” Aydin Selcen, a former senior Turkish diplomat who served in the region, told RFI.

Turkey’s backing

Ankara, which has recently reopened channels with Damascus after years of strained relations, strongly backs the offensive and has signalled its readiness to provide military support against the SDF.

“Turkey has the military advantage there, and I believe the SDF should take these warnings seriously,” Selcen said. He is now an analyst for the Turkish news portal Medyascope.

Turkey accuses the SDF of links to the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, the PKK, which has fought an insurgency against the Turkish state for decades.

The PKK is designated a terrorist organisation by the United States and the European Union. Turkey is also pursuing a renewed peace initiative with the PKK and sees the integration of the SDF into the Syrian army as key to stabilising northern Syria.

US pushes Israel to accept Turkish role in Gaza stabilisation force

Stalled integration

In March last year, the SDF signed an agreement in Damascus to integrate with the Syrian army. The deal set out broad principles but left key questions unresolved.

“There was a discrepancy from the beginning in what the parties understood integration to mean,” said Sezin Oney, of the Turkish Politikyol news portal.

“In Turkey’s case, they mean integration in such a way that it melts into the Syrian army. But the SDF understands it as integrating while protecting its inner core and identity. Remaining as the SDF, but operating under the umbrella of the Syrian army.

“Unless one of the parties backs down and makes concessions, we are likely to see a bigger military operation.”

International stakes

On Thursday, Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa held telephone talks with his French and Turkish counterparts on the security situation. The discussions focused on containing the fighting and preserving the ceasefire.

Despite its precarious position, the SDF retains influential supporters. Israel, an increasingly vocal critic of Turkey’s regional role, has expressed support for the group. Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar condemned Damascus’s operations in Aleppo.

The SDF remains a key partner of the United States Central Command in operations against the Islamic State group in Syria.

“The SDF lost a lot of troops, at least 10,000 fighters, in the fight against ISIS since 2014,” said Turkish international relations expert Soli Ozel.

“It’s a complicated picture. But from the American side, I do not yet see signs they would allow an attack on the SDF at this moment.”

According to Tom Barrack, the US ambassador to Turkey and Washington’s envoy on Syria, diplomatic efforts are under way to extend the Aleppo ceasefire and allow SDF fighters to withdraw from contested areas.

Turkey fears Ukraine conflict will spill over on its Black Sea shores

Pressure on Washington

The duration of US support for the SDF remains uncertain, especially after last year’s agreement between Washington and Damascus to step up cooperation against the Islamic State group.

The issue has taken on added significance following President Donald Trump’s meeting with Syrian President al-Sharaa in Washington.

Given President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s strong relationship with Trump, time may not be on the SDF’s side, Oney said.

“They want to have the northern part of Syria, at least, but also Syria more broadly, as their backyard,” she added. “Turkey is the most influential country in Damascus. They want the SDF to melt away into the new Syrian state and its army.”

Turkey could face domestic political fallout for targeting the SDF. Protests have erupted in the country’s predominantly Kurdish southeast, which borders Syria, in response to the clashes in Aleppo.

Any further military action against the SDF could jeopardise the fragile peace process with the PKK. 

Hello everyone! Welcome to The Sound Kitchen weekly podcast, published every Saturday here on our website, or wherever you get your podcasts. You’ll hear the winner’s names announced and the week’s quiz question, along with all the other ingredients you’ve grown accustomed to: your letters and essays, “On This Day”, quirky facts and news, interviews, and great music … so be sure and listen every week.

World Radio Day is just around the corner, so it’s time for you to record your greetings for our annual World Radio Day program!

WRD is on 13 February;  we’ll have our celebration the day after, on the 14 February show. The deadline for your recordings is Monday 2 February, which is not far off!

Try to keep your greeting to under a minute. You can record on your phone and send it to me as an attachment in an e-mail to thesoundkitchen@rfi.fr

Be sure to record your greeting from underneath a blanket. Then the sound will be truly radiophonic – I mean, you want everyone to understand you, right?

Don’t miss out on the fun. 2 February is just around the corner, so to your recorders!

Erwan and I are busy cooking up special shows with your music requests, so get them in! Send your music requests to thesoundkitchen@rfi.fr  Tell us why you like the piece of music, too – it makes it more interesting for us all!

Facebook: Be sure to send your photos for the RFI English Listeners Forum banner to thesoundkitchen@rfi.fr

More tech news: Did you know we have a YouTube channel? Just go to YouTube and write RFI English in the search bar, and there we are! Be sure to subscribe to see all our videos.

Would you like to learn French? RFI is here to help you!

Our website “Le Français facile avec rfi” has news broadcasts in slow, simple French, as well as bilingual radio dramas (with real actors!) and exercises to practice what you have heard.

Go to our website and get started! At the top of the page, click on “Test level”, and you’ll be counselled on the best-suited activities for your level according to your score.

Do not give up! As Lidwien van Dixhoorn, the head of “Le Français facile” service, told me: “Bathe your ears in the sound of the language, and eventually, you’ll get it”. She should know – Lidwien is Dutch and came to France hardly able to say “bonjour” and now she heads this key RFI department – so stick with it!

Be sure you check out our wonderful podcasts!

In addition to the breaking news articles on our site, with in-depth analysis of current affairs in France and across the globe, we have several podcasts that will leave you hungry for more.

There’s Spotlight on France, Spotlight on Africa, the International Report, and of course, The Sound Kitchen. We also have an award-winning bilingual series – an old-time radio show, with actors (!) to help you learn French, called Les voisins du 12 bis.

Remember, podcasts are radio, too! As you see, sound is still quite present in the RFI English service.  Please keep checking our website for updates on the latest from our excellent staff of journalists. You never know what we’ll surprise you with!

To listen to our podcasts from your PC, go to our website; you’ll see “Podcasts” at the top of the page. You can either listen directly or subscribe and receive them directly on your mobile phone.

To listen to our podcasts from your mobile phone, slide through the tabs just under the lead article (the first tab is “Headline News”) until you see “Podcasts”, and choose your show.  

Teachers take note!  I save postcards and stamps from all over the world to send to you for your students. If you would like stamps and postcards for your students, just write and let me know. The address is english.service@rfi.fr  If you would like to donate stamps and postcards, feel free! Our address is listed below. 

Independent RFI English Clubs: Be sure to always include Audrey Iattoni (audrey.iattoni@rfi.fr) from our Listener Relations department in all your RFI Club correspondence. Remember to copy me (thesoundkitchen@rfi.fr) when you write to her so that I know what is going on, too. N.B.: You do not need to send her your quiz answers! Email overload!

This week’s quiz: On 22 November, I asked you a question about the world’s most visited museum – the Louvre here in Paris. The museum was back in the news, due to an architectural audit that turned up structural weaknesses in some of the beams in the building. 

You were to re-read our article “Louvre Museum in Paris shuts gallery over structural safety fears”, and send in the answer to these two questions: What is the name of the gallery that has been closed, and what artworks are in that gallery?

The answer is: The Campana Gallery, which houses nine rooms dedicated to ancient Greek ceramics. 

In addition to the quiz question, there was the bonus question: What are your unique relationship rules?  

Do you have a bonus question idea? Send it to us!

The winners are: RFI Listeners Club member Kashif Khalil from Faisalabad, Pakistan. Kashif is also the winner of this week’s bonus question. Congratulations on your double win, Kashif.

Also on the list of lucky winners this week are Nuraiz Bin Zaman, a member of the RFI Amour Fan Club in Rajshahi, Bangladesh, and RFI Listeners Club member Nasyr Muhammad from Katsina State, Nigeria.

Last but not least, RFI English listeners Murshida Akhter Lata, the co-chairman of the Source of Knowledge Club in Naogaon, Bangladesh, and Miss Shuno, a member of the International Radio Fan and Youth Club in Khanewal, Pakistan.

Congratulations winners!

Here’s the music you heard on this week’s programme: “Barkley’s Bug” by David Grishman, performed by the David Grishman Quintet; Traditional Greek music produced by Visual Melodies; the “Rondo” from Frédéric Chopin’s Piano Concerto no. 1, performed by Krystian Zimmerman and the Polish Festival Orchestra; “The Flight of the Bumblebee” by Nicolai Rimsky-Korsakov; “The Cakewalk” from Children’s Corner by Claude Debussy, performed by the composer; “Happy” by Pharrell Williams, and “Guinnevere” by David Crosby, arranged and performed by Miles Davis and his ensemble.

Do you have a music request? Send it to thesoundkitchen@rfi.fr

This week’s question … you must listen to the show to participate. After you’ve listened to the show, re-read Paul Myers’ article “Nigeria power past Mozambique into quarterfinals at Africa Cup of Nations”, which will help you with the answer.

You have until 2 February to enter this week’s quiz; the winners will be announced on the 7 February podcast. When you enter, be sure to send your postal address with your answer, and if you have one, your RFI Listeners Club membership number.

Send your answers to:

english.service@rfi.fr

or

Susan Owensby

RFI – The Sound Kitchen

80, rue Camille Desmoulins

92130 Issy-les-Moulineaux

France

Click here to find out how you can win a special Sound Kitchen prize.

Click here to find out how you can become a member of the RFI Listeners Club, or form your own official RFI Club. 

“We’re thinking about it very seriously,” Trump said when asked by a reporter about the sale of F-35 fighter jets to Turkey during a visit this week by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

The sale has been blocked for years due to Turkey’s purchase of the Russian S-400 missile system. A recent Bloomberg report suggested Ankara may be prepared to return the missiles, though Turkish officials have denied this.

Political commentator Asli Aydintasbas, a fellow at the Brookings Institution, says that the strengthening relationship between Trump and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan means both sides are working to resolve the impasse.

“He [Trump] himself is working with Turkey through his very effective ambassador, Tom Barrack, to find a solution,” said Aydintasbas. “There will be stiff opposition from the Greek lobby, Israelis and other regional players. But we’ve seen Trump skirt such opposition when it came to the Saudi Arabia F-35 sale.”

Military edge

Israeli security experts warn that Turkey’s acquisition of F-35 jets poses a greater security risk to Israel than the Saudi deal due to the Turkish military’s expertise, which threatens to challenge Israel’s technological advantage.

Currently, Israel maintains a significant edge as the Turkish air force operates decade-old jets, a factor that is increasingly important amid rising regional tensions.

“There was definitely a concern in the spring that there might be a confrontation in the skies of Syria between Israel and Turkey,” said Gallia Lindenstrauss of the Institute for National Security Studies in Tel Aviv.

Syria in crossfire as Turkish-Israeli rivalry heats up over Assad’s successors

She stresses the risk of confrontation has significantly diminished thanks to “de-confliction talks”, brokered by Azerbaijan. A Syria “hotline” now exists between Israel and Turkey to prevent what Lindenstrauss describes as “accidents between the Israeli Air Force and the Turkish Air Force”.

Yet the need for such measures underscores how strained ties are. “The fact that it exists, of course, does point to the fact that things are not necessarily calm,” Lindenstrauss acknowledged.

Provocative alliances

Israel’s conflict in Gaza has heightened tensions with Turkey. On New Year’s Day, hundreds of thousands protested in Istanbul in support of Palestinians.

Tensions escalated further as Israel increased military cooperation last month with Greece and Cyprus. Both Greece and Cyprus have unresolved territorial disputes with Turkey in the Mediterranean and Aegean Seas.

“Israelis are provoking especially Greeks and Greek Cypriots,” said Murat Aslan of Seta, a Turkish pro-government think tank. “The Israeli pilots are educating and training Greek pilots. They are operating [drones] across the Aegean Sea. And they sold many complex missile systems. So that means Israelis are provoking Greece just to challenge Turkey here in the Aegean Sea.”

In his New Year’s address, Erdogan said he was closely monitoring what he describes as threats and provocations against Turkey and Turkish Cypriots. Aslan predicts Ankara will not remain passive. “If there is a pattern in the west of Turkey that Greeks and Israelis are cooperating, for the sake of Turkish security interests, for sure there will be a reaction,” he warned.

Israel talks defence with Greece and Cyprus, as Turkey issues Netanyahu warrant

Greece, which is also acquiring the F-35, has joined Israel in opposing Turkey’s purchase of the jet, warning it would alter the balance of power.

While Trump has expressed support for the Turkish sale, analyst Aydintasbas notes the US president is learning the limitations of his power when it comes to Israel.

“Trump is going through what a lot of US presidents have experienced: frustration, and a question – ‘wait a minute, who’s the superpower here?’” she said. “Because of the power dynamic in the US-Israeli relationship, it sometimes does point to a situation in which Israelis, though the weaker side technically, end up having the upper hand because of their enormous influence in the public space.”

Aydintasbas predicts that, despite Trump’s friendship with and admiration for Erdogan, the US president will be unwilling to pay the political price of securing the Turkish jet sale. “This is an issue on which Trump is not willing to fight the US Congress… and essentially ignore the US law,” she said.

For the self-described master dealmaker, it may prove a deal too far.

Hello everyone! Welcome to The Sound Kitchen weekly podcast, published every Saturday – here on our website, or wherever you get your podcasts. You’ll hear the winner’s names announced and the week’s quiz and bonus questions, along with all the other ingredients you’ve grown accustomed to: your letters and essays, “On This Day”, quirky facts and news, interviews, and great music … so be sure and listen every week.

There’s no quiz this week – check in next week, 10 January, for the answer to the question about the gallery in the Louvre Museum that had to be closed.

Thanks to everyone who sent in their Resolutions – may you make good progress in keeping them! And many thanks to this week’s co-host, my daughter Mathilde Daguzan-Owensby, and for the contributions to the show from Olivia Morrow and Evan Coffey. And of course, hats off to the Magic Mixer Erwan Rome, who made this show sing! 

Here’s the music you heard on this week’s programme: “Be Our Guest” by Alan Menken and Howard Ashman; the traditional “Auld Lang Syne” performed by the Glenn Miller Orchestra; “A House with Love in It” by Sid Lippman and Sylvia Dee, sung by Nat King Cole; “Winter Wonderland” by Felix Smith, performed by the Chet Baker Quartet; “Let it Snow” by Sammy Cahn, sung by Leon Redbone; “Sleigh Ride” by Leroy Anderson, performed by the Sam Bush Ensemble, and “We Wish you the Merriest” by Les Brown, sung by June Christie.

From the entire RFI English service, we wish you a Happy 2026!

Hello everyone!

This week on The Sound Kitchen, you’ll hear a “My Ordinary Hero” essay by listener Rasheed Naz from Faisal Abad, Pakistan.  I hope you’ll be inspired to write an essay for us, too!

If your essay goes on the air, you’ll find a package in the mail from The Sound Kitchen. Write in about your “ordinary” heroes – the people in your community who are doing extraordinarily good work, quietly working to make the world a better place, in whatever way they can. As listener Pramod Maheshwari said: “Just as small drops of water can fill a pitcher, small drops of kindness can change the world.”

I am still looking for your “This I Believe” essays, too. Tell us about the principles that guide your life … what you have found to be true from your very own personal experience. Or write about a book that changed your perspective on life, a person who you admire, festivals in your community, your most memorable moment, and/or your proudest achievement. If your essay is chosen to go on-the-air – read by you – you’ll win a special prize!

Send your essays to thesoundkitchen@rfi.fr

Or by postal mail, to:

Susan Owensby

RFI – The Sound Kitchen

80, rue Camille Desmoulins

92130 Issy-les-Moulineaux

France

I look forward to hearing from you soon!

Here’s Rashid Naz’s essay:

Heroes are not always found in stories or movies. Sometimes they live among us, quietly working to make our world a better place. My “ordinary” hero is a community leader in our town, someone who has taught me that real heroism comes from serving others with kindness and courage.

Our community leader, Mr. Ahmed, is not rich or powerful, but he has a heart full of compassion. He organizes clean up drives, helps poor families, and encourages young people to stay in school. Whenever there is a problem – a sick neighbor, a broken road, or a family in need – he is the first to step forward. His actions remind us that small efforts can bring big changes.

What I admire most about him is his humility. He never seeks fame or reward. When people thank him, he simply says, “We are all responsible for our community.” Those words inspire me. He believes that leadership means service, not authority, and he proves it every day through his actions.

To many people, he might seem like an ordinary man. But to me, he is a true hero – a symbol of dedication, honesty, and hope. Because of him, I’ve learned that anyone can be a hero, not by wearing a cape, but by using their heart to make a difference.

That is why my “ordinary” hero is our community leader Mr Ahmed, a man whose quiet strength and selfless service continue to inspire us all.

Be sure and tune in next week for our annual New Year’s Resolutions program! Talk to you then!

Madhya Pradesh is often referred to as the Heart of India. Located right in the middle of the country, the Indian region shows everything India has to offer through its abundant diversity. The IFTM trade show, which took place in Paris at the end of September, presented the perfect opportunity for travel enthusiasts to discover the region.

Sheo Shekhar Shukla, Managing Director of Madhya Pradesh’s tourism board, sat down to explain his approach to sustainable tourism.

“Post-covid the whole world has known a shift in their approach when it comes to tourism. And all those discerning travelers want to have different kinds of experiences: something offbeat, something new, something which has not been explored before.”

Through its UNESCO World Heritage Sites, Shukla wants to showcase the deep history Madhya Pradesh has to offer.

“UNESCO is very actively supporting us and three of our sites are already World Heritage Sites. Sanchi is a very famous buddhist spiritual destination, Bhimbetka is a place where prehistoric rock shelters are still preserved, and Khajuraho is home to thousand year old temples with magnificent architecture.”

All in all, Shukla believes that there’s only one way forward for the industry: “Travelers must take sustainable tourism as a paradigm in order to take tourism to the next level.”

In partnership with Madhya Pradesh’s tourism board.

Also known as the Land of the Beautiful Islands, Malaysia’s landscape and cultural diversity is almost unmatched on the planet. Those qualities were all put on display at the Malaysian stand during the IFTM trade show.

Libra Hanif, director of Tourism Malaysia, explained the appeal of the country as well as the importance of promoting sustainable tourism today: “Sustainable travel is a major trend now, with the changes that are happening post-covid. People want to get close to nature, to get close to people. So Malaysia being a multicultural and diverse [country] with a lot of natural environments, we felt that it’s a good thing for us to promote Malaysia.”

Malaysia has also gained fame in recent years, through its numerous UNESCO World Heritage Sites, which include Kinabalu Park and the Archaeological Heritage of the Lenggong Valley.

Green mobility has also become an integral part of tourism in Malaysia, with an increasing number of people using bikes to discover the country: “If you are a little more adventurous, we have the mountain back trails where you can cut across gazetted trails to see the natural attractions and the wildlife that we have in Malaysia,” says Hanif. “If you are not that adventurous, you’ll be looking for relaxing cycling. We also have countryside spots, where you can see all the scenery in a relaxing session.”

With more than 25,000 visitors at this IFTM trade show this year, Malaysia’s tourism board got to showcase the best the country and its people have to offer.

In partnership with Malaysia Tourism Promotion Board. For more information about Malaysia, click here.