"Soft diplomacy is part of our security — if people know us, they won't abandon us," says Estonia's long-time cultural attaché in Germany, Merit Kopli.

Nine months before the next parliamentary elections, it appears that Estonian voters are more willing to accept reduced social security and growing inequality than higher taxes or a substantial overhaul of the current tax system, Tõnis Saarts says.

Isamaa and the Center Party remained Estonia's two most popular parties in June, with ratings separated by less than the latest poll's margin of error, Emor said Friday.

The most popular choice for Estonia's next prime minister is Urmas Reinsalu, the latest poll by NGO Ühiskonnauuringute Instituut and the research firm Norstat has found.

Two people were killed Friday afternoon when a truck collided with a car at an intersection in Järva County.

While shrinking future generations face growing pressure, a new report warns worsening mental health is limiting Estonian youths' independence and participation in society.

Pärast USA ja Iraani vahel sõlmitud kokkulepet Hormuzi väina taasavamiseks on maailma ühe tähtsaima energiakoridori laevaliiklus hakanud taastuma.

Ei, mitte USA presidenti Donald Trumpi, kui pealkirjast kinni haarata. Kuigi Türgi sai jalgpalli MMi otsustava kaotuse San Franciscos.

The highly public exchange is an indication that their earlier close ties have frayed since Trump's decision to go to war with Iran.

Ukraine has denounced the move, calling it a "strategic mistake" and "disrespectful".

Sales agreements will be legally binding sooner and making sellers provide more home information up front are part of the planned changes.

The Ryanair boss extends his contract to 2032, in a deal featuring a bonus scheme that could earn him more than €150m (£130m).

UNDISCLOSED LOCATION, Ukraine — At a secret warehouse, in the darkness of night, masked specialists from Ukraine’s military intelligence service GUR drill and hammer as they assemble a line of 15-foot-long aircraft. These are Ukrainian Liutyi long-range kamikaze drones, carrying explosive payloads of up to 150 pounds and capable of traveling nearly 1,300 miles. Later that night, they will be launched toward targets inside Russia. “They are now our most important card in this war,” says a Ukrainian commander using the call sign “Vector,” as he taps the wing of one of the drones. He leads a unit specializing in so-called deep strikes — attacks conducted far behind Russian lines. A drone campaign that began in early 2024 with only a few dozen aircraft per month has evolved into a large-scale operation. President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s forces are now launching an average of 200 to 300 drones against targets in Russian territory every night. On Thursday, Ukraine unleashed its largest attack yet deep inside Russia, targeting an oil refinery near Moscow. The explosions sent plumes of black smoke billowing above the capital’s suburbs and shut down flights at four airports for hours. Russian officials reported downing hundreds of drones in the skies above Moscow and other cities. A reporting team from the Axel Springer Global Reporters Network, which includes POLITICO, was granted permission to observe one night of mission preparations earlier this month under restrictions aimed at protecting the unit’s security: Mobile phones were prohibited, the faces of intelligence personnel could not be filmed, and their voices must be altered in any video. The intelligence officials explained that the attacks rely on a difficult-to-counter combination of explosive-laden long-range kamikaze drones, decoy drones designed to confuse air defenses and missile-type drones. Their primary targets are military installations and oil facilities — sites crucial to both the conduct and financing of Russia’s war effort. “At the beginning, Russians believed they were conducting a special military operation. Now they understand that this is a war,” Commander “Vector” said. The message to Russia, he adds: “‘This war has now reached your homes as well.’ We hope that message helps Russia bring this war to an end.” Zelenskyy is counting on the drone campaign shifting the war in Ukraine’s favor. He recently published an open letter addressed to Putin, urging him to engage in direct peace negotiations. He repeatedly referenced Ukraine’s drone strikes, including a similar attack on St. Petersburg on June 3 that embarrassed the Russian leader as he convened an economic summit beneath plumes of black smoke. “As you know very well, that distance is not the limit of our capabilities,” Zelenskyy wrote, highlighting the consequences of the attacks for ordinary Russians: fuel shortages, rising prices and, not least, fear. “They do not like our drones and missiles,” Zelenskyy said in the letter. The Ukrainian leader has spent recent weeks cheekily describing the attacks as “long-range sanctions.” Ukraine’s long-range drone campaign is already producing measurable economic consequences inside Russia. During the St. Petersburg summit, Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novak acknowledged publicly for the first time that Russian oil production has declined since the beginning of the year. He attributed the slowdown to unscheduled maintenance work at refineries — a bureaucratic euphemism for facilities damaged by Ukrainian drone strikes. Several major refineries in central Russia have been forced to reduce output or suspend operations altogether after coming under attack. Ben Hodges, former commanding general of the U.S. Army Europe, argues that Russia’s greatest strength through the centuries is now its disadvantage: its vastness. “Now, because of what Ukraine has accomplished in terms of long-range precision strike, what once was Russia’s strength is now a major vulnerability,” he says in an interview. “They cannot protect everything. Every refinery, every shipyard, every factory — everything — is now reachable, including targets [in Siberia].” Military analyst Franz-Stefan Gady, who regularly visits Ukrainian units near the front, argues that Russia faces a structural disadvantage in a drone war because of its continental scale. “The cost asymmetry is turning against the defender,” Gady says. To be sure, Russia’s economy remains a long way from collapse. Yet attacks on refineries are no longer producing only dramatic images of towering fireballs and black smoke. They are beginning to create tangible disruptions across parts of the Russian energy sector. Industry data and market assessments suggest that repeated strikes have periodically sidelined a significant share of Russia’s oil-product export infrastructure this year, forcing operators to adjust production schedules and redirect supplies. The effects are increasingly visible beyond industrial facilities themselves. “We know from history that war is a test of will, but it’s also a test of logistics. The Ukrainians are hammering Russian logistics,” Hodges says. Still, Russia has recently benefited from geopolitical developments. The war between the United States, Israel and Iran has pushed global oil prices higher, providing Moscow with an unexpected financial boost. Russia’s increased state oil and gas revenues — which account for roughly one-fifth of total budget income — have helped offset at least part of the economic pressure generated by sanctions and Ukrainian strikes. It is just before midnight inside the warehouse when technicians from Ukraine’s military intelligence service fasten the final bolts onto the long-range drones. Depending on the model, some can now travel as far as 2,000 miles and carry payloads of more than 500 pounds, according to Commander “Vector.” “Be assured that we can reach any location up to the Urals,” he says, naming the mountain range that marks the eastern edge of European Russia and the beginning of Siberia. “And with a bit of luck, perhaps even beyond.” The cost of each drone is estimated at roughly $230,000, although the price varies depending on the configuration. Russia has struggled to stop the attacks because Ukraine has continuously adapted its operational methods. Night after night, under cover of darkness, multiple small teams disperse across the country — often in eastern Ukraine — to launch drones from different locations. “If the Russians destroy some launch sites or a few individual drones, we still have 10 or 20 others. That is very important for us,” Commander “Vector” says. The approach resembles a form of guerrilla warfare that fits Ukraine’s broader strategy of asymmetric conflict and is difficult to counter. A few meters away from the larger aircraft lie smaller decoy drones that carry no explosives. During attack missions, they are often launched first to occupy and confuse Russian air defenses. Ukraine also says it employs so-called missile drones as part of its combined strike packages. These weapons are several times faster than the Liutyi drones. Technicians from the GUR are preparing several of them for launch alongside the larger aircraft. They call the jet-powered model “Peklo” — Ukrainian for “Hell.” “It is extremely precise and extremely fast… Thanks to a special navigation system and a specially developed antenna, it can strike even very small targets with high accuracy,” explains a Ukrainian technician using the call sign “Logist.” Markus Reisner, an Austrian colonel and military analyst, believes Russia’s air defenses are increasingly overwhelmed by the scale and complexity of the attack waves. Drones guided by artificial intelligence are also resistant to electronic jamming, he notes, neutralizing what has so far been one of Russia’s most effective defensive capabilities. How data-driven Ukraine’s drone campaign has become is evident in a side room of the warehouse. There, military intelligence pilots are planning the routes for the drones scheduled to strike targets inside Russia later that night. Their screens display a constant stream of real-time information: weather conditions, Russian positions and flight data. “For every day and every hour, we know how they move their air-defense systems and electronic warfare assets. Every night we use different flight routes. We never repeat them,” says “Vector.” At the heart of the operation is an AI-assisted software platform called Prisma, which integrates battlefield data into a continuously updated operational picture. The experience and data collected during countless missions have become one of Ukraine’s most valuable assets, the commander says. “We can compare routes and operations from different years. We know which corridors work best.” Ukrainian long-range drones have now penetrated even the heavily protected Moscow region. When was the last time he personally planned an attack on Moscow, we ask “Vector.” Unfortunately, he says, he cannot discuss that publicly. For the first time all night, he bursts out laughing.

U.S. Vice President JD Vance spent the week making a series of high-profile appearances promoting a fragile peace agreement with Iran — and he’s set to head to Switzerland as soon as this weekend to lead negotiations himself. It is one of the highest-stakes gambles of his political career. Vance is generating a robust trail of media content as part of his peace agreement tour — cable news appearances, an on-camera briefing at the White House on Thursday and possible photos of the vice president with Iranian negotiators, such as Iranian Parliament Speaker Mohammad-Bagher Ghalibaf, at a mountain resort overlooking Lake Lucerne. If things go well this weekend and in the weeks to follow, Vance will have played a key role in brokering a peace that could lead to an end to Iran’s nuclear ambitions and clears the way for the economy to quickly rebound. But if things go poorly, Vance, a presumed top contender for the 2028 nomination, will have defended an unpopular war and been the public face of a short-lived peace. “It’s a vulnerability, but it is what it is. He’s the very public face of this,” said one outside Vance ally, who like others in this report was granted anonymity to speak candidly. “His political enemies are trying to make it a binary for him: ‘If one single Israeli dies, it’s because of JD Vance.’ But I do think it will have to be navigated.” Some of the vice president’s outside allies describe the role he is taking with the peace agreement as the best among poor options for the vice president, who was initially skeptical of the strikes against Iran and also has the most politically to lose if the U.S. becomes mired in another forever war. “We’re clearly worried that we’re gonna wear the stain of a war that we didn’t support in the first place,” a second outside Vance ally added. “That’s a problem.” A slice of the GOP already hates the deal, upset that it doesn’t accomplish more, and another slice is angry the war happened in the first place, revealing the difficult political needle the vice president has been trying to thread. But there are unquestionable political upsides to the war ending, gas prices falling and the White House have more bandwidth to focus on domestic concerns. “The ship has to be righted politically by December, so his launch and run feels positive and has a chance. He’s betting that in 12 months people would rather have a humming economy and won’t really care any more about the Iran minutiae, which is probably correct, and is comfortable being attacked from the right on this issue, including by Democrats,” said a former Trump official. “Yes, he also probably believes more strongly ideologically in settling and getting out, but he doesn’t have a choice.” The vice president told reporters Thursday that he plans to lead the U.S. team as the two countries negotiate the finer points of the deal. He said he expects to leave this weekend to begin the talks. Both Trump and Vance have framed the agreement as a series of carrots and sticks. If Iran cooperates, it gets certain concessions from the U.S. and desperately needed economic benefits; if it doesn’t, as the president has said, the U.S. will “go right back to dropping bombs right smack in the middle of their head.” “We don’t trust words, we trust action, we trust conduct,” Vance said Thursday. Others in Vance world argue the public role the vice president is taking is a feature not a bug, hoping to associate him with playing a key role in ending an unpopular war. They see it as inoculating a political liability that otherwise would have hung over Vance, and many of his allies took a victory lap on social media on Thursday, declaring that Vance’s fiercest GOP critics were doing the work for him. “If you want to be the presidential nominee of the Republican Party and the next Republican president, you need to be aligned as closely as possible with President Trump and what President Trump valued as his agenda and his achievements and his objectives,” said Alex Gray, who served in a senior role at the National Security Council in Trump’s first term. “It’s hard for me to think of something that is more consequential than ending the conflict the president has said he wants to see end.” A person close to the White House pushed back on the idea that there is any risk in Vance’s public-facing engagement on the Iran peace agreement. “It’s not a gamble to engage in this peace process, it’s a fantastic opportunity for the President and the Vice President alike,” the person said. “Thanks to the [memorandum of understanding], the United States is on the cusp of ushering in a new chapter of peace for the Middle East, while keeping all of the cards if Iran doesn’t hold up its end of the bargain. The entire negotiating team is focused on verifiable results, not politics.” White House spokesperson Olivia Wales, in a statement, described Vance as the president’s “right-hand man” and “an invaluable member of the President’s talented national security team,” naming him alongside special envoy Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner as those the president trusted to negotiate an Iran deal. “What President Trump and his team achieved on the battlefield and at the negotiating table is nothing short of remarkable and will strengthen American security for years to come,” she said. “Everyone is fully behind President Trump’s efforts to ensure Iran can never possess a nuclear weapon.” Still, Trump was angry with Vance last summer for not echoing the president’s statement that Iran’s nuclear facilities had been “totally obliterated” after the first round of U.S. strikes, according to an excerpt from the upcoming book “Regime Change: Inside the Imperial Presidency of Donald Trump” by Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan obtained by POLITICO. (A senior White House official said the reporting around the “obliterated” quote was “completely mischaracterized.”) Despite Vance’s reservations about intervention in the Middle East, he quickly came on board the president’s position as the White House undertook a second round of strikes on Iran in February. Vance “very much wanted to go to Islamabad” for the attempt at peace talks in April, a senior White House official said at the time. The vice president’s relationship with the Pakistani field marshal has been credited as playing a key role in negotiations. A Republican close to the White House said that the risk to both Trump and Vance was allowing the war to continue and destroying the economy in the process. “The entire political apparatus around the president and virtually all the senior members of his team inside the administration were all largely aligned on ending this war,” the Republican said. “Interestingly, from the most hawkish to the most dovish, there were no major players inside the administration who attempted to stop or torpedo the deal. There was broad agreement that it was time to move on.” Yet the president himself has appeared to acknowledge that the jury is still out on the peace agreement, joking about the front-facing role Vance is taking with it. “If [the Iran deal] works out, I’m going to take the credit. If it doesn’t work out, I’m blaming JD. You better be careful, JD,” Trump told reporters at the G7 summit on Wednesday. “He’s gonna turn his plane around and get the hell out of here. Yeah, I like that idea. I think it’s a good idea.” Vance’s potential 2028 presidential bid raises the political stakes even higher. Vance, in his posture on the Iran war, has run into a quagmire that has befelled many of his predecessors: Any successes are attributed to the president; any failures the vice president is forced to own, as in the case of former Vice President Kamala Harris as border czar. One person close to the vice president’s team noted that Vance has been able to play the role of “good, loyal vice president” despite his reservations about the war. But the person added, “If this thing in Iran goes great, I don’t think he gets some huge upside. If he blows this thing I don’t think he has huge downsides.” A second person close to the White House noted that Vance’s fortunes “are all about President Trump’s successes.” “Peace and prosperity decides elections,” the person quipped. “Already seeing below $4 gas.” There’s plenty that could go wrong between now and then. Israel has continued to launch strikes on Lebanon since the peace agreement was announced on Sunday, Iran is threatening to impose new fees on oil shipping through the Strait of Hormuz, potentially making passage more costly than before the war began — and, to top it off, the end to the war may be coming too late to save Republicans in the midterms. “The vice president will get credit,” a third person close to the White House added. “Whether that’s good or bad remains to be seen.” Adam Wren contributed to this report.

No group has yet claimed responsibility for the attacks.

Israel has repeatedly violated the October ceasefire brokered by the US.

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Collision on the Midland Main Line is the first fatal rail incident in nearly two years

European companies have more to gain by way of recovery if energy shortages caused by the Iran conflict ease