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Chances are we're all gonna wake up in an even darker world tomorrow, following whatever secret addendums they'll be signing here today.
Tymofiy Mylovanov

Europe faces a hard choice: sovereignty or dependence on Trump’s America.

Three times Trump pushed Ukraine to concede to Russia. Three times EU leaders scrambled to stop him. The transatlantic relationship is effectively over, writes Martin Sandbu for FT.

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Shanaka Anslem Perera ⚡
@shanaka86
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10h
BREAKING: The €300 Billion Betrayal

Few hours ago, the European Central Bank killed Europe’s last credible plan to fund Ukraine.

The ECB refused to backstop the €140 billion reparations loan. Reason: violates their mandate. Translation: monetary policy cannot become fiscal policy, even to save an ally.

But here is what no one is telling you.

The United States does not want those frozen Russian assets used at all.

According to Politico, citing two senior European diplomats, Washington told the EU’s sanctions envoy “in no uncertain terms” that their plan is to return the assets to Russia after any peace deal is signed.

Read that again.

The Trump administration’s 28-point peace plan proposes unfreezing €300 billion in Russian central bank reserves. One hundred billion goes to a “US-led” reconstruction fund. America takes 50% of profits. The rest gets returned to Moscow.

Europe holds the assets. America dictates their fate. Ukraine gets nothing.

The math is devastating:

Ukraine faces a €90 billion funding gap for 2026 and 2027. The IMF program just ended. US bilateral aid is frozen pending peace negotiations. The EU’s alternative requires unanimous consent from 27 member states, including Hungary.

Belgium refuses to move without “legally binding, unconditional, irrevocable” guarantees covering €185 billion in potential Russian lawsuits. Slovakia has opted out entirely.

December 18. That is the EU summit deadline. Without a deal, Ukraine enters 2026 rationing defense spending while Russia advances daily.

The ECB just demonstrated that institutional mandate trumps geopolitical emergency. Washington just revealed that frozen assets are bargaining chips, not Ukrainian reparations.

Two pillars of Western support, collapsing simultaneously.

This is not a policy dispute. This is the architecture of abandonment being built in real time.

The money exists. The will does not.

Panic indeed. When US controlled NABU (reportedly) opens cases against 70 MPs from the ruling party, that’s not anti-corruption. That’s D.C. executing a controlled demolition. Zelensky’s entourage is fleeing because everyone can smell the verdict: the actor’s run is over.

Neither Trump nor Putin will legitimize him, and Kiev's political class is already sneaking to Moscow for terms because they know the Americans have cut the power. The post-Zelensky transition has begun, the only people still pretending it’s not happening are his corrupt European handlers.

Zelensky outlawed negations with Putin, and is unelected with zero legal mandate to negotiate. Russia and the Trump admin are merely honouring Zelensky's wishes... You didn't want to negotiate with Putin? Great stop whinning, there's the door. Elections will come and a settlement that reflects Russia's legitimate interests and the battlefield reality, will be finalized.

Capitulation, with cosmic humiliation downloaded onto the Europeans. Speaking of corruption — look at Ursula von der Leyen, the Empress of Corruption herself, drowning in scandal after scandal. From the secret-text multimillion-dose vaccine contract with Pfizer (Pfizergate), to the revolving-door influence networks she’s spent her career cultivating, to the latest detonation: her own former High Representative, Federica Mogherini, and top EEAS official Stefano Sannino detained over a rigged Diplomatic Academy tender. Procurement fraud, corruption, conflict of interest, the whole arsenal.

The judge now has 48 hours to decide how deep the rot runs, but the symbolism is already terminal. The very institution meant to train Europe’s diplomats has become a crime scene. And the more the Commission sermonizes about “values” and “rule of law,” the clearer it becomes that the swamp isn’t in Kiev, it’s in Brussels. Kiev is merely a franchise.

Ukraine’s corruption is a mirror, while Brussels keeps smashing the glass in vain so no one sees their reflection.

Europe is exposed, and the West’s entire Ukraine project is entering its terminal hour. The great irony? Moscow may not have to bring it all down. Washington seems to have cut the power, Brussels pretendingthe lights are still on, and Kiev? Too busy stripping the place for copper, to notice the whole grid collapsing.

The era of illusions is over. The settlement is coming, on the battlefield or via the pen. And Europe, drunk on its own propaganda and hypocrisy, is about to wake up with the kind of hangover that ends empires.

MolotovCocktail says

WTF happened with socal2 ?

He's AWOL for a while now.

An explosive leaked transcript from a secret call between top European leaders has exposed a disturbing plot to sabotage President Donald Trump’s efforts to strike a genuine peace deal between Russia and Ukraine.

The leaked call reveals growing fear in the European Union (EU) that Trump is about to finally secure peace by bypassing Ukraine’s maximalist demands and sidelining President Volodymyr Zelensky.

French President Emmanuel Macron reportedly warned that the United States might “abandon Ukraine on territorial questions without providing clarity on security guarantees.”

The comments appeared in a “leaked” call summary published by German outlet Der Spiegel.

https://www.spiegel.de/international/europe/confidential-conference-on-ukraine-peace-we-must-not-leave-ukraine-and-volodymyr-alone-with-these-guys-a-a7b269ed-b6c2-4739-8e83-81552e097c14

However, the leak looks far more like a deliberate shot across Washington’s bow than a genuine accident.

Zelensky’s Government Sabotaged Oversight, Allowing Corruption to Fester

Ukrainian leaders blame independent advisers for failing to prevent graft. A Times investigation found that President Volodymyr Zelensky’s own administration removed guardrails.

When Russian troops invaded Ukraine, Kyiv’s Western allies faced a dilemma: how to spend billions supporting a government fighting Russia without watching the money vanish into the pockets of corrupt managers and government officials.

The stakes were high because Ukraine’s vital wartime industries — power distribution, weapons purchases and nuclear energy — were controlled by state-owned companies that have long served as piggy banks for the country’s elite.

To protect their money, the United States and European nations insisted on oversight. They required Ukraine to allow groups of outside experts, known as supervisory boards, to monitor spending, appoint executives and prevent corruption.

Over the past four years, a New York Times investigation found, the Ukrainian government systematically sabotaged that oversight, allowing graft to flourish.

President Volodymyr Zelensky’s administration has stacked boards with loyalists, left seats empty or stalled them from being set up at all. Leaders in Kyiv even rewrote company charters to limit oversight, keeping the government in control and allowing hundreds of millions of dollars to be spent without outsiders poking around.