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France frets uranium in Niger at risk, German newsweekly alleges CIA knew of Nord Stream2 explosion and France releases Russian shadow fleet ship after cash payment

France frets uranium in Niger at risk, German newsweekly alleges CIA knew of Nord Stream2 explosion and France releases Russian shadow fleet ship after cash payment

Friendship is forged in battle, under duress when what matters in life is at stake. There are those who went and those who didn't. These are the key messages we can take away from a powerful and important 72 hours in Washington with key allies from both sides of the Atlantic.

On the heels of last weekend's Munich Security Conference's "Under Destruction" theme and a devastating year in transatlantic relations, nothing could be more important than to provide a light at the end of the tunnel. This is what the Bern Security Dialogue achieved with its inaugural event at Georgetown University this week.

Despite the fact that our event was held under Chatham House rules for reasons that will be obvious, flying into Washington there was not great cause for optimism. Col. David Butler, whom The New York Times describes as "One of the Pentagon's most seasoned public affairs officials", "the top strategic communications advisor to the Army chief of staff, Gen. Randy George" and also critically, "the spokesman for Gen. Mark Milley when he was serving as Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff" was fired by the US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth. He was in line to be a one-star and now his distinguished military career is over.

Imagine for half a moment that one has spent months organizing an event where Gen. Mark Milley will appear alongside German Lt. Gen. (ret.) Jürgen-Joachim von Sandrart. This news hits mid-air, in flight and this is your responsibility because there is no one else. "Text me on the other side of passport control to let me know you get through," is about all one can send to an aide to the general who is aboard a different flight.

That was Tuesday. By Thursday we were gathered at Georgetown University in a packed house to listen to the two generals, one German and one American, share their reflections on "what the hell is going on," as US President Donald Trump once framed his Muslim ban in the earliest days of his first term a million years and a thousand miles ago. Back in January 2017, we were just babes in the woods.

Despite great pessimism from both sides of the ocean, one reaction sums up the whole of what we achieved: "Surpisingly, I came away believing, like the speakers, that the great disruption might lead to a formation of a new, non-trumpian order." Further, "I never imagined that the participants would speak so candidly (friendly and diplomatically). Most important for me, it stretched my understaning of the possible consequences of our current situation." In a political climate that sensible analysts assess as bleak, it became possible to imagine the impossible: "a positive endgame."

Welcome to the new Alpine Security Monitor! You can subscribe (and become a paid subscriber!) for weekly updates on security and geopolitics as it concerns the Alpine region, namely Austria, Czechia, France, Germany, Italy, Slovenia and Switzerland (ok, little Liechtenstein and Monaco too when merited). If this was forwarded to you, welcome! Questions, complaints, musings, lucrative offers, misguided rants and related ephemera can all be addressed to the management, amanda.rivkin@securitydialogue.org. Now let's get to the week's news from around the Alpine region. 

NIAMEY, NIGER – Russia-backed junta blames France for Islamic State airport attack

  • Radio France International reports Saturday that "French President Emmanuel Macron has dismissed suggestions of any planned intervention in Niger, firmly rejecting claims from the country's ruling junta that Paris is orchestrating destabilisation efforts."
  • Last Friday, Niger junta leader Gen. Abdourahamane Tiani "renewed allegations that France was behind the 29 January attack on Niamey airport," which was claimed by the Islamic State in the Sahel. The "apparent objective—to cripple Niger's air capabilities" was labeled "information warfare" by Col. Guillaume Vernet. Gen. Tiani seized power in July 2023 and has accused France of "financing jihadist groups active in the Sahel". The Financial Times reports what's at stake is nothing less than 1,000 tons of uranium "stranded at a vulnerable airbase in Niamey that was recently attacked by Isis militants" that is said "to be worth some $240mn."
  • France used to lead counterterrorism efforts in the region but "was forced to withdraw troops following a wave of coups across West Africa." The assault on the airport was repelled with assistance from Russian forces. Gen. Tiani nationalized Somaïr, a subsidiary of French company Orano, as "part of a broader push to reclaim sovereignty over natural resources," or at a minimum make them available to other interests like Russia, which back the junta. Orano has challenged the move in court.

 

NEAR BORNHOLM, DENMARK – CIA knew of effort to blow up pipeline

  • Der Spiegel reports Thursday that "the CIA may have spoken to the saboteurs" responsible for blowing up the Nord Stream2 pipeline in 2022 "during the planning stages."
  • According to the German news weekly, CIA agents "met with Ukrainian specialists in covert sabotage operations in the Podil district of Kyiv" who they knew "for years."
  • The Ukrainians "would later tell confidants" that the American intelligence agents "appeared to like the plan".

 

FOS-SUR-MER, FRANCE – France releases Russian shadow fleet ship after fine paid

  • The Guardian reports Tuesday that "France released a tanker suspected of being part of Russia's sanctions-busting 'shadow fleet' called 'Grinch' after its owner paid a fine of several million euros".
  • Last month, "French forces and their allies boarded the oil tanker" prior to "escorting it to a port outside the southern city of Marseille" at the port of Fos-sur-Mer.
  • Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot wrote on X, "The tanker 'Grinch' is leaving French waters after paying several million euros and enduring a costly three-week immobilization in Fos-sur-Mer."

 

PARIS, FRANCE – Two charged over beating of far-right activist in Lyon

  • Reuters reports Sunday that a far right activist named initially only as Quentin Deranque, 23, died on Saturday after he fell into a coma following a beating he sustained outside an event featuring far-left Palestinian-French Member of the European Parliament Rima Hassan on Thursday. France24 reports Thursday that two were charged with homicide and a third suspect identified as Jacques-Elie Favrot, "a parliamentary assistant to lawmaker Raphael Arnault of the hard-left party France Unbowed", was charged with complicity.
  • French President Emmanuel Macron called for calm late Saturday as the incident has become "a political flashpoint". Hassan called for an investigation "and for the perpetrators to be brought to justice" following "a wave of mutual recriminations around the beating." Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni even weighed in, to express "concern about a perceived ideological motive for the violence" calling it "a wound for all of Europe", drawing recriminations from Macron.
  • Quentin was "present to help protect members of the anti-immigration feminist association Nemesis, which was protesting against the event". Prosecutors have "opened an investigation for aggravated manslaughter" but the perpetrators have not yet been identified.

 

PARIS, FRANCE – Knife attacker shot and killed at Arc de Triomphe

  • Le Monde reports late last Friday that a "police shot a knife-wiedling man under the Arc de Triomphe" when "he allegedly threatened officers carrying out a ceremonial duty" and on Saturday, Le Monde reports the attacker, a former inmate who was sentenced to 17 years in 2013 "for injuring two police officers in Brussels" in 2012, had been released on Christmas Day last year and was under an "individual administrative control and surveillance measure".
  • One officer on honor guard duty "sustained slight injuried" after being knived. The suspect, who was known to authorities and "is registered as a resident of the northern Paris suburb of Seine-Saint-Denis", was shot several times by police and hospitalized.
  • The country's anti-terrorism prosecutor's office said it was in charge of the case and an investigation was opened.

 

PARIS, FRANCE – Police raid Arab World Institute over ex-head's Epstein ties

  • France24 reports Monday that police in Paris raided the Arab World Institute over the former director, ex-culture minister Jack Lang's ties to Jeffrey Epstein, the late disgraced financier at the center of a global sex trafficking and abuse scandal of underage girls.
  • Raids were conducted "at various locations".
  • Lang is "a former culture minister under socialist president François Mitterand". He "resigned earlier this month" after leading the Arab World Institute since 2013 once his ties to Epstein were revealed in the US Department of Justice documents dump known as the Epstein files. Lang claims to be "shocked" that his name appears "in the statutes of an offshore company Epstein founded in 2016."

 

PARIS, FRANCE – Magistrate team assembled to examine Epstein files

  • Deutsche Welle reports Sunday that a team of magistrates is being assembled to examine the Epstein files with the case of modeling agent Jean-Luc Brunel who died of a suicide in Paris' La Santé prison in 2022 "to be thoroughly re-examined."
  • The prosecutor's office told Agence France Presse that the special team was launched "to be able to extract any piece that could be usefully reused in a new investigative framework". The unit "will work closely with police and with prosecutors from the national financial crimes unit".
  • Brunel was alleged to have "raped, assaulted and harassed several minors and adult victims" and "organized transport and hosting of young women for Epstein." Prosecutors allege he "engaged in sexual acts with underage girls in the United States, the US Virgin Islands, Paris and the south of France." In 2023 Paris prosecutors dropped the case against Brunel following his death "and no one else was charged." Several public figures in France feature in the Epstein files, with prosecutors now "looking into senior diplomat Fabrice Aidan at the request of the French Foreign Ministry" and a week ago, financial crimes prosecutors "confirmed a preliminary case against former minister of culture, Jack Lang and his daughter, Caroline Lang".

 

PARIS, FRANCE – Prosecutor probes companies over tainted baby formula

  • The BBC reports last Friday the Paris prosecutor's office has "opened investigations into five baby formula manufacturers," Nestle, Lactalis, Danone, Babybio and La Marque en moins "after several mass recalls over concerns their product contained a toxin."
  • The companies "will be probed over whether there was any criminal wrongdoing" due to the distribution of baby formula that "may have been contaminated with cereulide" which can cause "nausea, vomiting and abdominal cramps." In the recalled batches, the toxin is "linked to an ingredient called arachidonic acid (ARA) oil" supplied by "Wuhan-based Cabio Biotech." Eight people complained to French authorities that their babies "vomited after consuming baby formula."
  • Last week, both Nestle and Danone issued recalls on baby formula distributed in over 60 countries due to "potentially contaminated batches."

 

BERLIN, GERMANY – Germany says it is out of air defense missiles for Ukraine

  • Euromaidan Press reports Tuesday that the German Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul said his country has "run out of air defense missiles for Ukraine".
  • In an interview with Deutschlandfunk, Wadephul told the station "Germany has run out of its own air defense missiles and can no longer transfer them directly to Ukraine from national reserves".
  • At the Munich Security Conference last weekend, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky warned "that Ukraine is running low on interceptor missiles" and that "part of the delay in guaranteed European deliveries is due to depleted German stocks." Wadephul added however that "newly produced missiles are being sent straight to Ukraine through a mechanism financed by European partners, primarily Germany."

 

BERLIN, GERMANY – Germany extends border checks for another six months

  • Politico reports Monday that "Germany will prolong its controversial border checks" for six more months.
  • Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt told tabloid Bild that the policy is "one element of our reorganization of migration policy".
  • Experts say the move is "largely symbolic" and has "little to do with an overall drop in the number of asylum claims" but have succeeded in angering the country's neighbors and "creating traffic headaches at border crossings" causing Warsaw to initiate "tit-for-tat retaliation".

 

MUNICH, GERMANY – Over 200,000 march during Security Conference for a free Iran

  • Neue Zürcher Zeitung reports Sunday that 200,000 people "from all over Europe" took to the streets during the Munich Security Conference in support of a free Iran last Saturday.
  • Reza Pahlavi, the California-based son of the deposed shah, "spoke at the Theresienweise" where he "called on Western governments, especially the USA, to act more decisively and not to abandon the Iranian people."
  • People in attendance waved Iranian flags with the pre-Islamic Republic emblem emblazoned in the center while some red hats and signs demanded to "make Iran great again".

 

GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – US and Iran meet for nuclear talks

  • The Guardian reports Monday that the US and Iran are to meet for talks in Geneva Tuesday with US President Donald Trump's special envoy Steve Witkoff representing the Americans and Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi representing Tehran.
  • No one should expect much as Araghchi "will have gameplanned the perameters of what Iran can offer in endless consultations across the spectrum of government," while "Witkoff works to a shifting brief devised by one man." Further, the encounter meets the moment of the Trump administration rewarding brutal behavior with direct access time and again—until it does not—but the ambiguity of the line gives autocrats hope of outsmarting Trump and his envoys.
  • In their profile of the two envoys, The Guardian concludes with a remarkable anecdote about Araghchi and Javad Zarif, the US educated, reformist minded former foreign minister responsible for negotiating the Iran deal with the Obama administration that Trump junked in his first term in office. The two bumped into each other in the elevator of former Iranian president Hassan Rouhani's residence after his 2013 electoral victory at a time when "Zarif had not yet accepted Rouhani's offer to serve as his foreign minister." When "Araghchi asked him why", Zarif is said to have replied, "In the end, we'll be found wanting, and we will be the victims."

 

GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – Ukrainian and Russian officials meet in US-brokered talks

  • The Associated Press reports Tueday that "Delegations from Moscow and Kyiv met" as well for "another round of U.S.-brokered peace talks" in a process most Europeans and analysts have conceded are increasingly unlikely to yield positive results of any kind.
  • It is an understatement that "expectations for any breakthroughs" are "low" while US President Donald Trump called the meeting "big talks" it is highly likely it will amount to much more than that.
  • Despite a June deadline set by the US, there is no movement in "positions on key territorial issues and future security guarantees". Talks were scheduled to continue Wednesday.

 

ZÜRICH, SWITZERLAND – Fifa announces partnership with Trump's Board of Peace

  • Swissinfo reports Thursday football organization Fifa announced a partnership with US President Donald Trump's newly announced Board of Peace which met for the first time Thursday.
  • Fifa President Gianni Infantino said, "Everyone must support peace," even though the Board of Peace exists to undermind the United Nations and has been denounced by Pope Francis.
  • Trump said Infantino promised to "bring stars to the region" and added Fifa will help raise $75 million for "football-related projects in Gaza."

 

LAUSANNE, SWITZERLAND – Football fans damage rail cables leading to cancellations

  • Swissinfo reports Tuesday that "after a football match against FC Lausanne-Sport, Servette FC supporters allegedly threw a pyrotechnic device from their special return train, damaging cables used for train switching" Sunday evening.
  • The incident  rippled across the western Swiss rail network as trains between Lausanne and Renens were cancelled or delayed for two days.
  • The Swiss federal rail provider SBB "filed a complaint for this act of vandalism", however, "this very rarely leads to prosecution, as it is very difficult to identify perpetrators.

 

WIENER NEUSTADT, AUSTRIA – Terror charges against Taylor Swift concert attack suspect

  • Reuters reports Austrian prosecutors filed terrorism charges against the now 21-year-old suspect who was "arrested shortly before a 2024 Taylor Swift concert in Vienna" who plotted an attack in the name of the so-called Islamic State.
  • The prosecutors' office in Vienna "plans to bring a criminal case" against the unnamed suspect who is accused "of producing a small amount of the explosive triacetone triperoxide and attempting to purchase weapons illegally".
  • Austrian media has previously identified the suspect only as Beran A. In a statement, the prosecutors' office said, "If convicted he faces up to 20 years in prison".

 

INNSBRUCK, AUSTRIA – Man found guilty of leaving girlfriend to freeze atop tallest peak

  • CNN reports Friday that "A man has been found guilty of grossly negligent manslaughter after leaving his girlfriend" described as "galaxies" behind him in terms of climbing skills, "to freeze to death on Austria's tallest mountain," Grossglockner, last year.
  • Identified by media only as Thomas P., 37, he left his girlfriend, identified only as Kerstin G., 33, "alone as he sought help" but the court heard "conflicting accounts in court" regarding his efforts to seek assistance.
  • He faces a maximum prison sentence of three years.

 

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