As international relations are increasingly reorganized around the US-China rivalry, the tensions between these two great powers are shaping a growing number of sectors, and the exchange of sensitive technologies in particular. This is a critical issue for European companies today. 

Compared with other European countries, Germany’s management of the COVID-19 crisis has been efficient. Its health system has successfully coped with the challenge of the fight against the pandemic, the impact on employees has been mitigated thanks to allowances dedicated to furlough leave, business aids were important and quickly available, the government has been responsive.

The next few years will be tumultuous ones in the United States. The dependency of foreign policy on domestic policy is unlikely to diminish. Whether in the rivalry with China or the predominance of Israeli interests in Middle East policy, for example, it is hard to imagine Biden taking a big step backward. Many Europeans want to believe that a victory by Obama’s former vice president will signal a return to the good old days of transatlantic consultation and multilateralism.

European buildings are old and too often inefficient, past policies have not delivered and the amount of investment into energy efficiency must be scaled up dramatically to meet the 2030 targets and ultimately, the carbon neutrality objective.

The election of Volodymyr Zelensky as president of Ukraine created very high expectations in the society.

At first glance, China and Turkey have many interests to cooperate. The deployment of the Chinese Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), Turkey's colossal investment and financing needs, as well as President Erdogan's mistrust of the West, appear as many converging interests. Yet economic cooperation between the two countries is struggling to achieve its full potential. Political differences persist, particularly the question of the Uyghurs.

With the resignation of Prime Minister Abe, the future of Japan’s Free and Open Indo-Pacific strategy has been called into question. Abe was indeed one of the key architects of this vision and he devoted enormous energy to flesh it out.

On October 3, 1990, after forty years of division, Germany once again became one state. Less than a year after the fall of the Berlin Wall, on November 9, 1989, the territories of the German Democratic Republic (GDR) became part of the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG) under Article 23 of its Basic Law.