The day turned on leverage — who trades it away, who cannot cancel it, and where coordinated power simply fails to add up.

European Union

  • COREPER cleared the bloc's 21st Russia sanctions package after Greece dropped its veto; in return Greek-operated tankers may keep shipping Russian LNG outside the EU and the crude price cap is frozen for twelve months, with the measures binding only once the Council adopts and publishes them. more
  • The Commission fined Google €890m under the Digital Markets Act for self-preferencing and app-developer restrictions; as an administrative decision it cannot be undone by threatened US tariffs — only an appeal to the EU's General Court can overturn it. more
  • The ECB held euro-area rates but signalled a possible September hike, with a supply-driven oil spike — not domestic demand — now the swing factor; markets price the odds near even. more
  • Ambassadors deadlocked on sanctioning Israeli settlements, with no option winning a majority even though only a qualified majority is needed — after Belgium banned settlement imports on its own. more

United Kingdom

  • Tighter immigration rules cut international student numbers and cost the UK about $3.9bn, acting less like border control than the shrinking of an export industry — with the graduates those students would have become the deeper loss. more

Middle East

  • Trump said the newly signed US-Saudi civil nuclear deal proceeds only if Riyadh normalises relations with Israel and joins the Abraham Accords — while Israel is reported to be alarmed by the nuclear cooperation itself, not the diplomatic offer. more

The bigger picture

  • Our analysis argues the great powers are abandoning 'locks' on dangerous technology — nuclear fuel, frontier AI, advanced weapons — for integration and home-grown capacity, from US-Saudi nuclear ties to Europe turning to Turkey for drones. more