🇫🇷🇬🇷🇪🇺 France and Greece call for the EU to extend COVID debt repayments!

"We got indebted during Covid. Today some tell us that we need to reimburse fast. It is idiotic," Macron said during a press conference at the Maximos mansion in Athens alongside Mitsotakis. "Let's extend that debt or let's have some new debt issuance," he said.

In the latest sign of the financial hardship which hit the Eurozone, Mistotakis and Macron, who lead the most-indebted and third most-indebted respectively, countries in the EU, are expected to defend their position in tense negotiations around the EU's €1.8 trillion multi-annual budget for 2028-2034.

The option of rolling over the Recovery Fund debt was mentioned by several EU leaders on Friday during an informal meeting in Cyprus as the EU is due to start repaying €25 billion a year from 2028 on the joint debt it issued to tackle the economic fallout from the Covid pandemic.

But frugal countries have pushed back strongly. “This is not going to happen,” one EU diplomat said on the sidelines of the Council meeting. German Chancellor Friedrich Merz on Friday also spoke against more EU debt.

🔗 https://www.politico.eu/article/it-is-idiot-france-and-greece-call-for-delaying-covid-debt-repayment/

🇺🇸❌🇮🇶 The U.S. wants to seize a mansion in the elitist Beverly Hills neighbourhood belonging to Mansour Barzani, a senior Kurdish/Peshmerga official and brother of current prime-minister of the Kurdistan Region of Iraq, Masrour Barzani.

The U.S. Justice Department has filed a civil forfeiture complaint which says that a Virginia-based defense contractor and others obtained more than $700 million from the U.S. Defense Logistics Agency between 2016 and 2020 through fuel delivery contracts linked to Operation Inherent Resolve, the U.S.-led campaign against ISIS.

The Justice Department alleges that the contractor’s officers agreed to pay General Mansour Barzani, a senior Peshmerga official, a bribe of $0.25 per liter in exchange for exclusive access to deliver jet fuel through Erbil International Airport. Competing contractors were allegedly blocked from accessing the airport, while the company received noncompetitive contracts at inflated prices.

Prosecutors say around $30 million from the scheme was transferred to a trust established for Barzani’s private benefit and later used to buy and renovate the Beverly Hills property between 2018 and 2022.

The civil complaint comes after Kurdish/Peshmerga officials resisted American and Israeli pressure to make land incursions into Iranian territory as part of the 3rd Gulf War.

🔗 https://www.theamargi.com/posts/u-s-seeks-to-seize-beverly-hills-mansion-allegedly-linked-to-bribery-of-mansour-barzani

🇱🇾🏴⚔️🇲🇱🇷🇺 Mali: quick map of the situation in Kidal. Following the FLA/JNIM takeover of the city center, Malian Army and Russian Africa Corps troops have withdrawn to the former MINUSMA base outside of town.

They are currently being besieged in the facility.

🔗 Thomas van Linge

🛢 The 1973 oil embargo first had no effect on the market, it even gained ~2% within the first week.

Then slowly reality hit.

Over the next six months the S&P lost ~15% until the embargo was lifted... just to crash another ~40% afterwards.

Everyone anticipates a rally when Hormuz reopens.

But what if the damage to the global economy is already so severe that it kicks off the next stagflationary period?

🔗 Lukas Ekwueme

🇱🇾🏴⚔️🇲🇱🇷🇺🇧🇫 Map of the Azawad Liberation Front (FLA) and Jama'at Nusrat al-Islam wal-Muslimin (JNIM) territory in the wider Sahel region, following the successful Kidal-Gao offensive.

🔗 Clément Molin

🏳️🏴⚔️🇲🇱🇷🇺 Most of northwestern Mali has fallen under the control of the Tuareg separatist FLA and JNIM.

There are several towns still with a Malian military presence in the region but are cutoff from Bamako and support from the Malian capital is unlikely to arrive any time soon.

@CIG_telegram

🇲🇱 ❌️ 🇲🇱 Tuareg rebels inside of the governor's office in Kidal, earlier today.

📎 Thomas van Linge

🇺🇸🇮🇱⚔️🇮🇷 At least 12 U.S. Air Force KC-135/KC-46 tanker aircraft have been deployed to Eilat Airport in southern Israel since the ceasefire began.

Satellite imagery also appears to show two U.S. Navy P-8A Poseidon maritime patrol aircraft at the airfield, visible as white objects.

🔗 Egypt's Intel Observer (@EGYOSINT)

🇺🇸🇦🇪⚔️🇮🇷 The U.S. is amassing forces at Al Dhafra Air Base in the UAE

A total of 12 U.S. Navy F/A-18 fighter jets have been deployed to the base.

Satellite imagery from April 20 also shows 7 U.S. Air Force aerial refueling aircraft, along with a C-17A strategic transport aircraft.

🔗 EGYOSINT

🇺🇸🕊🇮🇷 Trump on Iran Talks: “They Can Call Me. We Have All the Cards.”

President Trump told reporters Saturday he canceled plans to send U.S. envoys to Pakistan for potential Iran talks, hardening his stance as Tehran holds firm on core demands. The Iranian delegation had already left Pakistan before the announcement.

🔹 On canceling the planned visit:
“There’s no reason to wait two days, have people traveling for 16, 17 hours… we’re not doing it that way. We’ll do it when they want. They can call me.”

🔹 On what changed:
Iran sent a proposal he called insufficient. “They gave us a paper that should have been better. And interestingly, immediately when I canceled it, within 10 minutes, we got a new paper that was much better.”

🔹 On Iran’s leadership:
“We knocked out two levels of leaders. They don’t know who’s in charge. They’re probably fighting not to be the leader.” He added: “I’ll deal with whoever runs the show.”

🔹 On Pakistan’s role as mediator:
“Pakistan is terrific. The field marshal is fantastic.” But said U.S. envoys would not be “traveling 15, 16 hours to have a meeting with people that nobody ever heard of.”

🔹 On his core demand:
“Iran cannot have a nuclear weapon. Very simple. That whole deal is not complicated.”

📝Anon: 3/21: “Iran has 48 hours to make a deal!”
3/23: “Iran has 5 days to make a deal!”
3/26: “Iran has 10 days to make a deal!”
4/7: “Iran has 2 weeks to make a deal!”
4/21: “Iran has until Sunday to make a deal!”
4/25: “…uh they’ll call us at some point”

🔗 Dropsite