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‘It’s like a cat and mouse game’: on the frontline of Belgium’s fight against drug smugglers

Sara Van Cotthem takes a safety knife and precisely slices open the side of a cardboard box to unpack its contents, an aluminium stepladder made in China. Working under harsh fluorescent lights at the border inspection post at the port of Antwerp, Van Cotthem checks the paperwork and taps the ladder with a magnet to check if it really is aluminium and not another metal. It is an everyday operation for customs officers at Antwerp, one of Europe’s main commercial gateways, which handled the equivalent of 13.6m 20ft-long (6 metres) containers last year. Everything is in order and the lorry, jam-packed with identical boxed ladders, can get on its way to Germany. But it’s not always so straightforward. Along with routine attempts to evade duties or import counterfeit goods, customs officers are grappling with relentless efforts by violent criminals to smuggle drugs, especially cocaine, into Europe. Antwerp is one of Europe’s main entry points for cocaine: authorities seized 483 tonnes of the drug between January 2019 and June 2024, the largest amount among 17 ports reporting to the European Union Drugs Agency. The port, Europe’s second largest, has been the victim of a confluence of factors. Cocaine production in South America – above all, Colombia – has soared over the last decade, while Dutch drug gangs that had been prioritising the even larger Rotterdam port shifted their attention to Belgium. Much of the cocaine arriving in Belgium is thought to be taken to the Netherlands for further distribution. But enough stays in Belgium to cause serious harm, while homegrown criminals have established a foothold in the lucrative trade. The power of the drug gangs has prompted judges to warn that Belgium risks becoming a narco-state, with international drug crime threatening social stability. While cocaine seizures at Antwerp fell to 55 tonnes in 2025, from a record-breaking 121 tonnes in 2023, the problem remains formidable. “It is like a cat and mouse game,” says Van Cotthem, a communications officer for Belgium’s customs and excise. “Every time, the smugglers find new ways to smuggle the drugs.” A few metres away from where she is speaking, six brand-new mobile scanners are parked, ready to check a suspect container any time of day or night. Customs authorities bought nine scanners (the other three are deployed elsewhere) to ensure suspect containers will be checked more quickly, minimising the risk of drug gangs extracting any drugs before a control point. In 2025, 65,000 risky containers were scanned at Antwerp, up on the previous year, and the goal eventually is scanning 350,000 to 400,000 containers along fixed conveyer-belt machines. Scanning is getting more sophisticated in response to fiendishly inventive ways criminal gangs have found to disguise drugs. Cocaine was traditionally packed around fruit. In recent years, port authorities have discovered it mixed with orange juice or coal, disguised in fake pineapples, embedded in cardboard boxes and textiles or hidden inside wooden beams and paving stones. Antwerp customs officers spend at least a year training to spot telltale marks on a scanned container – a break in a pattern, or “something off” in the spaces between the official goods. Drug traffickers’ modus operandi is changing in other ways, says Kristian Vanderwaeren, the head of customs and excise in Belgium. Smugglers are shifting routes: for instance, sending South American cocaine to Europe via west Africa. The circuitous route is an attempt to outwit authorities’ risk protocols on whether to check a container, which are based partly on the country of origin. In 2025, Ghana became the third most significant country of origin for drug seizures in Belgium, behind Ecuador and Costa Rica, while Colombia – the traditional source – slipped to fifth place. Smugglers are also trying to avoid major ports altogether by dropping illegal cargo at sea. “Mother vessels” from South America transfer cocaine to smaller boats or toss waterproof bundles with floats and GPS trackers into the sea to be recovered later. Police have identified these practices as far south as the Canary Islands and up to the Kattegat, the strait separating Denmark and Sweden. It may be only a matter of time before drugs can be sent across the Atlantic without any crew. Europol reported this year that semi-submersible vessels equipped with antennas and modems “are likely already capable of crossing the Atlantic without a crew onboard”. Drug traffickers have also been known to take to the skies: Vanderwaeren recalled Brazilian authorities a few years ago intercepting a cocaine-laden private jet that was destined for Belgium. He says his agency is looking at how to intercept aircraft, drones and submarines. “But it’s not an easy job to do. Very often you need the military also to support or help us with this.” Authorities have hired more police, including a specialised unit to fight smuggling in the port. “We are very tough, we have put in many more state capabilities in order to tackle the problem,” Vanderwaeren says. As Antwerp and nearby Rotterdam have tightened controls, he notes, smuggling had shifted to France and Spain, “a waterbed effect”. Spain reported a record 123 tonnes of seizures in 2024, while France reported a doubling of impounded cocaine from 2023 to 2024. “You see more seizures in Spain, you see more seizures in France, because it’s getting tougher and tougher for the Antwerp mob to enter their stuff into the port,” Vanderwaeren says. Letizia Paoli, the chair of criminal law and criminology at KU Leuven, says nobody knows for sure how much cocaine is getting into Antwerp. She believes smugglers are now trying less-protected ports and have changed tactics when targeting Antwerp. “Traffickers more rarely send multiple tonnes in a shipment, but rather they send more shipments with small amounts in order to distribute the risk,” she says. That hypothesis is supported by data showing a rise in seizures of cocaine under 100g and decrease in big hauls between 2023 and 2025 at Antwerp. Paoli considers claims that Belgium is becoming a “narco state” unfounded as drug-related corruption remains “quite rare” and “low-level”, she says, especially when compared with countries such as Mexico and Honduras, where very senior figures have been convicted of taking bribes from cartels. Moreover, she found a low level of drug-related violence in Belgium, while emphasising she had a lot of empathy with the warnings. But cocaine use is widespread. “Cocaine remains widely available at a very high level of purity,” Paoli says. “The drug traffickers here do not even bother to cut the cocaine with other substances, they sell it almost pure at 80%, 90% purity, which didn’t happen in the past. So this suggests that there is really more cocaine that they can get rid of.” With academic colleagues, she estimated in 2021 that EU consumers were using 160 tonnes of the drug, which she says police consider an underestimate. But even were it much higher – say, 250 tonnes – she suggests that could still easily blend into legal trade: 2.1bn tonnes of goods enter EU seaports each year from the rest of the world. Given this, she says: “You have to come to the conclusion that one way or another, the traffickers will find a way.”

Nato meetings with TV and film-makers prompt claims it is seeking ‘propaganda’

Nato is holding closed-door meetings with film and TV screenwriters, directors and producers across Europe and the US, the Guardian can reveal, prompting accusations the alliance is seeking to use the arts to generate “propaganda” for the bloc. The alliance has held three meetings with film and TV professionals in Los Angeles, Brussels and Paris and is due to continue its “series of intimate conservations” next month in London, meeting with screenwriter members of the Writers’ Guild of Great Britain (WGGB), which represents professional writers in the UK. The planned meeting in London has caused consternation among some of those invited, who felt they were being asked to “contribute towards propaganda for Nato”. The topic of conversation at the meeting, to be held under the Chatham House rule – in which participants are free to use information received, but identities of attenders are not revealed – will be the “evolving security situation in Europe and beyond”. Former Nato spokesperson James Appathurai, who is now deputy assistant secretary general for hybrid, cyber and new technology, is understood to be planning to attend, along with other officials from the alliance. In a WGGB email seen by the Guardian, it was suggested that the meetings had already led to “three separate projects” in development, which were “inspired, at least in part, by these conversations”. It also said that Nato was “built on the belief that cooperation and compromise, the nurturing of friendships and alliances, is the way forward”, adding that “even if something so simple as that message finds its way into a future story, that will be enough”, according to the organisers of the event. Alan O’Gorman, writer of the film Christy, which won best film at the 2026 Irish Film & Television Awards, called the planned meeting “outrageous” and “clearly propaganda”. “I thought it was tone deaf and crazy to present this as some sort of positive opportunity. A lot of people, myself included, have friends and family or themselves come from countries that are not in Nato, that have suffered under wars that Nato has joined and propagated,” he said. He thinks the meetings are an attempt by Nato to “get some of its messaging out there in film and TV”. “I think there’s fearmongering throughout Europe at the moment that our defences are down,” he said. “I see it in an Irish context, where there’s been a push through some of the media and government to present Nato in a positive light and align ourselves more closely with them. I think the Irish people, for the most part, don’t want anything to do with wars on foreign lands.” O’Gorman said other screenwriters invited to the meeting were “pretty offended that art would be used in a way that was supporting war” and felt they were being asked to “contribute towards propaganda for Nato”. Faisal A Qureshi, a screenwriter and producer who has worked in the industry for more than 20 years, applied to attend the meeting “to see what it would be like first-hand” but had to pull out over a scheduling conflict. He said the “risk for any creative who dips into this unattributable world of intelligence or military briefings is that they can get seduced into thinking they now have some secret knowledge. That there exists a world of greys where morality is stretched and human right abuses are acceptable when done for the greater good”. Qureshi questions whether a creative would sufficiently “challenge or interrogate” information passed along to them in such meetings. “They’ve just been given something that has the veneer of truth given to it by an authority that rarely deals with the public and there is a sense of privilege about getting that access,” he said. Supporters of Nato have advocated for greater relations with the arts. The Centre for European Reform thinktank released a report earlier this year calling on governments to engage with cultural leaders, including screenwriters and film producers, to build public support for greater defence spending and to “better tell the story of why these investments in defence are needed”. In 2024, eight screenwriters, including a writer and executive producer on the sitcom Friends, were invited to Nato’s headquarters in Brussels by the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies, to learn about security policy. The group, which also included a writer on the long-running crime procedural Law and Order, and a producer on the comedy detective drama High Potential, met the alliance’s then-general secretary, Jens Stoltenberg, during the trip. A Nato official said: “The mentioned initiative is the fourth in a series of sessions for writers of fiction in the entertainment industry (including screenwriters, showrunners and authors). “It follows from interest expressed by members of the industry to know more about what Nato is about and how it works. These events include engagement with representatives of Nato, civil society and the thinktank community.” A WGGB spokesperson said: “As a trade union representing screenwriters, we receive invitations from third-party organisations about events that may be of professional use or interest to our members. These interactions do not necessarily represent an endorsement of these organisations. “The invitation we passed on from Nato to our screenwriter members was to an event offering a two-way conversation where attending writers can ask their own questions, talk freely and take whatever they feel is useful from the session. Our members are free thinkers – a valuable and vital skill that they bring to their craft.”

Ukraine war briefing: Russia tries for a foothold in Ukraine’s eastern ‘fortress belt’, continues attacks on civilians

Russian troops are inching towards the city of Kostiantynivka in Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region, trying to establish a foothold close to a heavily defended area, Ukraine’s top army official said on Saturday. Kostiantynivka, along with other cities, forms a so-called fortress belt in the country’s east – an area well fortified by the Ukrainian military. Ukraine’s army chief, Oleksandr Syrskyi, said on the Telegram app that ‘counter-sabotage measures’ were being undertaken in the city. A Ukrainian battlefield mapping project called DeepState shows that Russian troops control an area about one kilometre (0.6 mile) from the city’s southern outskirts. Russia’s Defence Ministry said on Wednesday its forces had taken control of Novodmytrivka, just north of Kostiantynivka. On Saturday, Russia’s Defence Ministry said it had seized the village of Myropillia in Ukraine’s northern Sumy region, where Moscow says it wants to establish a buffer zone. But the Kursk group of the Ukrainian military, writing on Facebook, dismissed the Russian report as a “complete lie” and said its units controlled the area. Also in Sumy, the regional governor said a Russian airstrike near the town of Krovelets had injured six people, including two in serious condition. Two people were killed and seven wounded after a Russian drone attacked a minibus in the southern Ukrainian city of Kherson, local officials said Saturday, in the latest round of attacks on civilians across Ukraine. Hours later Russia attacked another minibus in Kherson, wounding the driver, said regional head Oleskandr Prokudin. On Ukraine’s Black Sea coast, a Russian strike damaged port infrastructure in the city of Odesa but no casualties were reported. In a blow to Berlin, which had pushed for the move as a powerful deterrent against Russia, a planned drawdown of 5,000 US troops from Germany includes a Biden-era plan to deploy a US battalion with long-range Tomahawk missiles to Germany. The US plan should spur Europe to strengthen its own defences, German defence minister Boris Pistorius said on Saturday, but two top US Republican lawmakers expressed concern, saying the troops should not leave Europe. North Korean leader Kim Jong-un met delegates to the ruling party’s youth league congress in Pyongyang, state media KCNA said on Sunday, as the North Korean government has again cast young people as central to both domestic mobilisation and its military role in Russia’s war against Ukraine. The Eleventh Congress of the Socialist Patriotic Youth League is a once-in-five-years political gathering aimed at mobilising citizens aged roughly 14 to 30. In a letter published on Friday, the ruling Workers’ Party explicitly linked youth loyalty to Pyongyang’s involvement in the Ukraine war, telling the congress that young soldiers sent on overseas operations had “become bombs and flames” in defending the country’s honour. North Korea sent an estimated 14,000 troops to fight alongside Russian forces in the Kursk region, according to South Korean, Ukrainian and western officials.

Abortion pill maker asks US supreme court to halt ban on mail-order access

A manufacturer of the abortion pill mifepristone, Danco Laboratories, filed an emergency appeal to the US supreme court on Saturday asking it to halt a court decision that would require an in‑person exam before the medication can be prescribed. The request came hours after the fifth US circuit court of appeals temporarily reinstated the requirement blocking telemedicine health providers from prescribing to patients by mail in response to a challenge from Louisiana. In an emergency filing on 2 May, the mifepristone maker asked the court to immediately pause the lower court’s ruling limiting access. In the filing, Danco said the circuit court’s ruling “injects immediate confusion and upheaval into highly time-sensitive medical decisions”, and would force Danco, providers, patients and pharmacies “all to guess at what is allowed and what is not”. Danco warned that the ruling would cause “chaos”. Louisiana argues that allowing the drug to be dispensed through the mail ignores the threat of complications from mifepristone, such as sepsis and hemorrhaging, and that delivery by mail allows women to get around abortion bans. In its ruling, the three-judge circuit court said it agreed with Louisiana that the looser rule “facilitates nearly 1,000 illegal abortions in Louisiana per month”. The pill is currently used in nearly two-thirds of pregnancy terminations, including in states that have enacted abortion restrictions. The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is reviewing the safety of the drug after nearly two dozen Republican attorneys general requested a review last year. Earlier this year, the Trump administration petitioned a judge to pause Louisiana’s challenge until the review is complete. But the circuit appeals court blocked that ruling and said the in-person dispensing requirement should be reinstated while Louisiana appeals the judge’s decision. Danco, in its emergency appeal, told the supreme court that Louisiana’s lawsuit shares the same problems as the challenge brought by the anti-abortion doctors. In its appeal, Danco said: “Louisiana’s complaint should have been dismissed outright,” adding that “never before has a federal court purported to immediately enjoin a several years’ old drug approval; restrict a distribution system for that drug that manufacturers, providers, patients, and pharmacies have all been using for years; or reinstate conditions that FDA determined do not meet the mandatory statutory criteria”.

Sydney is awash with shared ebikes. Is Australia finally falling in love with Lime?

Shared ebikes are enjoying a rapid boom in popularity in Australia in the wake of the fuel price spike, as cities learn to adapt to schemes like Lime. Lime, the largest operator, has outlasted competitors to gain a foothold across cities on the east coast as it seeks government help to grow. Already in Melbourne, Brisbane and the Gold Coast, Lime entered Canberra in April. Australia is now home to almost 25,000 shared ebikes, four times more than it had in late 2024, of which 18,000 are believed to be Lime-operated. Lime has reported higher usage in each city as Australians look for ways to mitigate higher fuel prices following the US-Israel war on Iran. Sign up for the Breaking News Australia email The biggest increases have come in New South Wales, where the government has taken an active role to support the schemes’ growth. “This is good for congestion, the environment and the hip pocket,” the state’s transport minister, John Graham, says. “The rapid increase in shared scheme use in Sydney … [is] bridging the gap between train stations, bus stops and where people live and work.” Sydney’s ebike fleet has surged from 13,000 in January to more than 20,000, according to Transport for NSW. They powered 29,000 trips a day in January but more than 40,000 on average in April, more than half of them in the CBD. Lime has declined to share its data, but analysis of publicly available statistics shows it operates about 14,000 ebikes in Sydney, having doubled its fleet in 2025, then doubled it again in the past four months after the NSW government unveiled new share bike rules in October. It has doubled its operating area in six months, and now has plans to sweep west to Parramatta and across the northern beaches. ‘Behaviour revolution’ Shared bikes have had a mixed reputation with the public and local governments, thanks to the string of providers that dumped thousands of bikes, then collapsed. Councils were left to negotiate with operators, receiving little support from the state government to manage the shared bike explosion, says Sydney’s lord mayor, Clover Moore. “It was immediately clear these schemes were popular and would be here to stay,” Moore says. “We attempted to take matters into our own hands, dealing with operators directly, and … operators and their customers did not always meet [our] expectations.” Chethan Rangaswamy, who led marketing for the operator oBike, says the early companies correctly spotted a hole in Australia’s transport network. Rangaswamy says oBike rapidly attracted customers and grew revenue as it pushed into Melbourne, Sydney and Adelaide, but costs rose faster. Australians dumped the bikes in rivers and in trees or turned them into street art, while local councils began fining operators and impounding stranded bikes. Riders parked poorly and thieves took their helmets, with neither councils nor companies able to effectively penalise or incentivise change. “You can’t force a behaviour revolution,” Rangaswamy says. “You can build an ecosystem and hope that you’re in the right place at the right time.” Rangaswamy left oBike in January 2018, foreseeing its collapse, which arrived five months later. More operators followed. Yet shared bikes had shown they could solve the problem of the “last mile” of a commuter’s trip, connecting them from a train station to their doorstep, Rangaswamy says. “We saw a lot of those short trips getting done,” he says. “Even today, it’s not solved, and it makes … sense for that as a gap still to be explored.” Lime arrived in Sydney months later with 300 shared electric bikes, the first such devices to be operated in Australia. As a string of companies came and went, it gradually grew to Melbourne and the Gold Coast, then Brisbane, operating nearly 6,000 bikes nationwide by late 2024. Rangaswamy believes Lime alone survived six years thanks to investors’ patience and deep pockets: Uber, which lets people book Lime through its app, took a 30% stake in the company in 2020. Lime’s Asia-Pacific head, Will Peters, says it has lasted long enough to see Australia’s bike culture change and learn from other operators’ mistakes. “We weren’t the first ones to launch. I think that’s why we’ve been successful,” he says. Vandalism has steadily declined, Peters says, and Lime’s bikes have grown harder to damage or throw into rivers: the latest model is 43kg. He says helmet use is rising, and theft or loss has fallen since the company replaced its basket-mounted lock. While safety has been a top concern, Lime has reported a steady 99.99% rate of trips without injuries. The company has hired growing crews to service the city, while installing technology that is meant to prevent users leaving bikes outside designated areas, though many are still to be found blocking footpaths or bike paths, creating clutter and safety risks for pedestrians and other cyclists. City of Sydney is among councils calling for stricter parking rules. “This arrangement is not regulated or forced, and has only been possible given negotiation and goodwill from operators,” Moore says. “Regulation is needed.” ‘Generational change’ Fuel prices have helped Lime continue its geographical expansion and experiment with new designs and pricing models, Peters says. “We are seeing a generational change of adoption,” he says. “We want to double down on it, and this is the beginning.” Peters says Lime has become a competitive alternative to Uber, which has recently raised its minimum fare to $10 or more around the country, and attract passengers looking for connections beyond public transport. The company has started offering a fixed price of $2.75 for a 20-minute trip to customers who pay a monthly $4.99 subscription. With most Lime trips lasting less than 20 minutes, Peters says he expects the “Lime Prime” fixed price model to be especially attractive to commuters. A 20-minute trip costs about $13 under Lime’s per-minute pricing, currently more focused on tourists. “We’ve looked at how you become embedded to a city [and] Lime Prime is about getting as many people riding as possible,” Peters says. Other than the CBD, Lime’s highest usage in Sydney is in waterfront regions without rail connections, such as Five Dock, Bondi and Botany. Its dream is to connect to public transport ticketing systems like Opal or Myki, Peters says. The NSW state government is considering the idea and has the power to implement statewide regimes. The ACT also has full control of Lime’s Canberra operations. Other state governments, though, have refused to help boost access to shared bikes. Queensland is pushing an ebike crackdown that shared schemes say could crush them. Victoria has given all power to the councils. Lime has been left in the lurch in areas such as Merri-bek, where the council has shelved its ebike plans in case its neighbours unilaterally switch to other operators in the next 12 months. The Melbourne, Yarra and Port Phillip councils can also set their own caps on Lime’s fleet, capped at 1,200. Ridership has still grown gradually, from 2,700 trips a day on average in 2025 to 3,300 in 2026. Brisbane city council declined to respond to questions but has also capped Lime’s numbers, while the Gold Coast has seen steady growth within a 1,300-bike limit. Peters says operators cannot truly meet growing demand for share bikes unless state governments and councils give them room to grow and certainty contracts won’t be torn up. “We need to be making sure that you’ve got supply and demand, they’re dynamic, and they move with culture,” he says. “We’re providing that cultural norm, encouraging people, but it’s not possible unless you have a city that’s willing.” • This article was amended on 3 May 2026 to more accurately represent Will Peters’ perspective.

Top Republicans express concern over withdrawal of US troops from Germany – as it happened

It has been another unsettling day in the wider military and diplomatic environs of the US-Israel war on Iran. This live blog is closing now and the latest news is here. Here’s where things stand: Two top US Republican lawmakers expressed strong concerns on Saturday about the Pentagon’s decision to withdraw 5,000 troops from Nato ally Germany. “We are very concerned by the decision to withdraw a US brigade from Germany,” senator Roger Wicker and representative Mike Rogers said in a joint statement. Lebanon’s death toll two months into Israeli attacks on its neighbour has reached 2,659, the Lebanese public health ministry said. They were the latest casualty figures since Israel renewed its attacks on Lebanon on 2 March, with a further 8,183 wounded.In the past 24-hour reporting period, 41 people had been killed and 11 others wounded in Israeli raids. Spain’s foreign minister, José Manuel Albares, condemned the “illegal detention” and “kidnapping” of a Spanish activist who was arrested by Israel when a flotilla of boats attempting to take aid to stricken Gaza was stopped in international waters. Albares has called for the immediate release of Saif Abu Keshek, who is under Israeli detention along with Brazilian activist Thiago Ávila. The two activists have been taken to Israel for questioning, the Israeli foreign ministry said. Ávila from Brazil and Abu Keshek “will be transferred for questioning by law enforcement authorities”, the ministry said on X. Nato spokesperson Allison Hart said the alliance was working with the US to understand its decision to pull 5,000 American troops from Germany. Echoing earlier remarks by the German defence minister, Hart said the move “underscores the need for Europe to continue to invest more in defence and take on a greater share of the responsibility” for the region’s security.

Nato seeks to ‘understand the details’ of US decision to withdraw troops from Germany

Nato is seeking to “understand the details” of a US decision to withdraw 5,000 troops from Germany, a redeployment ordered by Donald Trump amid a feud with the German chancellor, Friedrich Merz. The German government sought to play down the severity of Trump’s move, describing it as “anticipated”, and a reminder of Europe’s need to invest in its own defence. The US withdrawal, which the Pentagon said would take place over the next six to 12 months, comes after criticism from Merz over Trump’s war with Iran and his handling of subsequent talks with Tehran. The chancellor said on Monday the US was being “humiliated” by Iran’s leaders. Trump quickly responded, saying Merz “doesn’t know what he’s talking about”, and soon after raised the possibility of troop withdrawals. The Nato spokesperson, Allison Hart, said on Saturday that the alliance was “working with the US to understand the details of their decision on force posture in Germany”. The remarks suggested the announcement of the withdrawal was a unilateral act, with little or no coordination with Washington’s European allies. “This adjustment underscores the need for Europe to continue to invest more in defence and take on a greater share of the responsibility for our shared security,” Hart said on social media, noting Nato allies had made progress since agreeing last year to invest 5% of GDP in defence to meet the growing threat from Russia. A German defence ministry spokesperson said the planned US withdrawal from bases in Germany demonstrated “we must strengthen the European pillar within Nato”. “It was anticipated the US might withdraw troops from Europe, including Germany,” the spokesperson said, estimating the current US troop strength in Germany at 40,000. On Saturday, Trump told reporters in Florida: “We’re going to cut way down, and we’re cutting a lot further than 5,000.” US officials have suggested an army brigade combat team already deployed in Germany would be withdrawn and the planned deployment of a long-range artillery battalion to the country would be cancelled, with other troops potentially being involved. According to the US Defense Manpower Data Center, there were 68,000 active-duty military personnel assigned permanently in bases in Europe. Further withdrawals could trigger a conflict with the US Congress which, last year, stipulated that troop strength in Europe must not fall below 76,000. Congress set the benchmark after the withdrawal of a brigade last year from Romania, with both parties issuing a joint statement demanding a rigorous evaluation before any other “significant changes to our warfighting structure”. European capitals are reportedly more worried about the postponement of previously agreed arms sales from the US to European allies. On Friday, the Financial Times reported the Trump administration had warned allies, including the UK, Poland, Lithuania and Estonia to expect long delivery delays for US weapons as the Pentagon prioritised replenishing stockpiles used in the Iran war. Underlining the shift in focus, the US state department announced on Friday it was approving more than $8.6bn (£6.33bn) in military sales to ‌its Middle Eastern allies: Israel, Qatar, Kuwait and the UAE. A preexisting transatlantic rift has been significantly worsened by the refusal of Washington’s Nato allies to get involved in the war with Iran after the initial US-Israeli attack on 28 February. Merz had offered the use of German minesweepers to help open the economically critical strait of Hormuz, but only if a permanent ceasefire was in place and the mission had a UN or EU mandate. In an interview with Der Spiegel magazine, Merz said: “I told Donald Trump why we consider the war in Iran wrong. I am nevertheless trying to maintain a good personal relationship with the American president.” “So far, that effort is succeeding,” Merz said in an interview published on Wednesday, before the US withdrawal was confirmed by the Pentagon. Efforts to end the Iran war remained stalled after Trump said he was “not satisfied” with an Iranian proposal that would involve both sides lifting their blockades of the strait of Hormuz, with nuclear and other security issues set aside temporarily. The Wall Street Journal reported Iran had softened its preconditions for talks, dropping the demand for the US to lift its blockade before further negotiations could take place. However, no time for a new round of talks has yet been agreed. Trump said on Saturday that he was reviewing a new Iranian proposal. “I’ll let you know about it later,” he said before boarding Air Force One, adding that “they’re going to give me the exact wording now.” A resumption of negotiations could be complicated by a fresh wave of Israeli airstrikes on south Lebanon. Lebanon’s state-run National News Agency reported an airstrike in the village of Kfar Dajjal killed two people, while another hit a home in the village of Lwaizeh, killing three people. Two people were also killed in a strike on the village of Shoukin, it said. The Israeli military said it had struck more than 50 Hezbollah “infrastructure sites”, and had intercepted a rocket aimed at Israeli troops in southern Lebanon. In Washington DC on Saturday, a rare statement pushing back against Trump from within his own party came from two prominent Republican lawmakers, senator Roger Wicker of Mississippi and House representative Mike Rogers of Alabama, chairs of the armed services committees in their respective chambers. “We are very concerned by the decision to withdraw a US brigade from Germany,” they said in a joint statement posted online. Even if Nato allies raise defence spending to 5% of GDP, building the capabilities to take over conventional deterrence will take time, and prematurely cutting US forces in Europe “risks undermining deterrence and sending the wrong signal to Vladimir Putin”, they added. They also appeared to criticise Trump’s habit of unilateral action, saying that any significant change to US forces in Europe “warrants” review and consultation with Congress and US allies. Lucy Campbell contributed reporting

‘We love our Americans’: the German town rocked by Trump’s plan to withdraw US troops

Despite Donald Trump’s frequent bluster, Nadine Firmont said the US president’s move to pull American troops out of Germany had hit her town like a bombshell. “I have to tell you I was honestly shocked,” said Firmont, 45, who works at a high school in Landstuhl, south-west Germany, the heart of the largest American military community outside the US. Even with previous drawdowns and discussions of US redeployments, Trump’s angry outburst carried a blunt menace that startled Firmont and her neighbours. Late on Friday, the Pentagon announced it would reduce its troop numbers in Germany by 5,000 personnel – just under 15% of its presence in the country – in part by not deploying a battalion the Biden administration had planned to relocate there later this year. Ever since the march of Gen George Patton’s Third Army into the nearby city of Kaiserslautern in spring 1945, Americans have been woven into the fabric of life here. “We love our Americans – they enrich the community in every sense and make life more colourful,” said Firmont, who spoke before the Pentagon announcement. “Not everyone likes things like the noise of their military planes overhead, but it would be such a pity if the Americans left. It would hurt.” Firmont spoke as Americans and Germans, soldiers and civilians, young and old formed a winding queue to take part in the Landstuhl spring carnival in brilliant late afternoon sunshine. The fairgrounds with children’s rides and stalls selling cheeseburgers and sausages were decorated with images of Uncle Sam and the stars and stripes, as revellers inside a marquee sipped beer and white wine, their pet dogs snoozing at their feet. Beyond the restaurants and shops that live or die by American patronage, Firmont said generations of Germans had formed friendships and even families with their US guests – a singular identity for the region that now felt under siege. Landstuhl hosts the largest overseas US hospital, an integral part of the Kaiserslautern military community of about 50,000 soldiers, support staff and family members. The US had 68,000 active-duty military personnel assigned permanently in its overseas bases in Europe at the end of last year, with just over half – about 36,400 – stationed in Germany. A vast network of German suppliers and staff working for the Americans in the area created a web of economic dependence and cultural cross-pollination that local people such as Marie, 30, a caregiver to elderly people, said made her feel special growing up. “It’s all I’ve ever known, it’s part of us,” she said, waiting with Joshua, her German-American husband, the son of a GI, for their order at Shawingz, a fried chicken chain catering to the US military community. The menu, emblazoned with a mock presidential seal, boasts 50 sauces ranging in spiciness from mild sweet raspberry to “atomic”, with fried Oreo cookies for dessert. Restaurant manager Karl Mazur-Rekowski, 48, who moved to the area as a child from Poland, said Landstuhl drew people who wanted to live with “the American feeling”. “They want contact with the Americans, to improve their English,” he said. “It’s obvious that if they pulled out, they would take a lot of jobs and businesses in a radius of 30km to 40km with them. We would fall on hard times.” Mazur-Rekowski called for a return to the dialogue between Americans and Europeans that had smoothed over rough patches in the past, from the Vietnam war to the Iraq invasion and the NSA spying scandal. “Diplomacy is the most important thing,” he said. “You don’t have to threaten, you can talk. Better to talk than to start something that leads to something terrible.” Americans in the town spoke with affection about their German hosts, describing an unforgettably rich experience abroad that they would hate to leave behind. Jeremy Cole, 31, who arrived with the US army from Kansas last year to work in logistics, said Landstuhl had welcomed his family with open arms. “We’ve met a lot of good friends here – immediately, within like the first 30 days,” he said. “A local family showed us around and really exposed us to the businesses and lingo and food.” Kahlen, his seven-year-old son, looked up from a dinosaur video on his dad’s phone to show off his German skills to a visitor including “danke”, “bitte” and counting to 11. “They do a lot here in the school system to make everyone bilingual,” Cole said. “And he’s a sponge for it.” However, Leon Wilson, 38, from Florida, was less sentimental about the bond between the two countries. Born at a US base in Wiesbaden, Germany – “one of those soldier loves”, he said of his parents’ relationship in the American army – Wilson now fuels military trucks in Landstuhl. He questioned whether all the US investment in Germany was paying off for Americans at home. “I feel no ill will, it’s great, there’s cohesion,” he said of US-German ties. “But it’s not fair that we keep boosting your economy so y’all can make money off us.” Chance Miller, 20, comes from a military family stretching back to the US civil war, when an ancestor from the north fought for the Union. He came to Landstuhl just over a year ago straight out of high school in Colorado to work in logistics, following in the footsteps of his GI grandfather, who was stationed here in the late 1960s. “He loved it too and did the same things I like to do now,” Miller said, especially exploring the region that is just a 30-minute drive from the French border. “I’ve got great friendships with Americans and Germans. I’d be really unhappy to go but would have to follow orders. I wouldn’t want to have to pack up and move and leave all of my friends though, I’d be so bummed.” Asked how he saw the latest friction between the US and Nato, Miller admitted he was concerned. “The alliance is really under pressure now,” he said. “I’d prefer it if President Trump worked to protect the alliance.”