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Ukraine war briefing: Kyiv’s SBU cripples shadow fleet tanker in Black Sea

Ukrainian sea drones on Wednesday hit and disabled a tanker involved in trading Russian oil as it sailed through Ukraine’s exclusive economic zone in the Black Sea to the Russian port of Novorossiysk, a Ukrainian official said. The attack is the third sea drone strike in two weeks on vessels part of Russia’s “shadow fleet” of unregulated and often western-sanctioned ships helping Moscow export oil to fund the war. The Dashan tanker was sailing at maximum speed with its transponders off when powerful explosions hit its stern, inflicting critical damage, the official at the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) said. The strike on the Dashan, which is under EU and British sanctions and is sailing without a known flag registry, was also confirmed by three maritime security sources. “The SBU continues to take active measures to reduce petrodollar revenues to the Russian budget,” said the official. Leaders of the “coalition of the willing” group of nations will hold a video call on Thursday as the chaotic American efforts to push through a peace deal to end the war in Ukraine reach a crunch moment, Shaun Walker writes from Kyiv. It comes after the White House attempted to foist upon Ukraine a Moscow-favoured proposal that included giving up even more Ukrainian territory to Russia than the invaders currently illegally occupy. Ukraine on Wednesday said it had sent an updated proposal to Washington that “takes into account Ukraine’s vision – it is a further proposal for adequate solutions to problematic issues … We are not disclosing the details pending the reaction of the American side.” “We discussed Ukraine in pretty strong words,” Donald Trump told reporters on Wednesday after a phone call with the “coalition of the willing” leaders Keir Starmer of Britain, Emmanuel Macron of France and Germany’s Friedrich Merz. “I think we had some little disputes about people, and we’re going to see how it turns out. And we said, ‘before we go to a meeting, we want to know some things,’” Trump added. “They would like us to go to a meeting over the weekend in Europe, and we’ll make a determination depending on what they come back with. We don’t want to be wasting time.” Voldodymyr Zelenskyy, Ukraine’s president, spoke further about Ukrainian elections, saying he had discussed with parliament the legal and other issues involved. “If partners, including our key partner in Washington, speak so much and so specifically about elections in Ukraine, about elections under martial law, then we must provide legal Ukrainian answers to every question and every doubt,” he said. “It is not easy, but pressure on this issue is definitely not what we need.” There is no proof of Russian allegations that western arms sent to Ukraine are being illicitly diverted on a large scale to criminal groups, two NGOs said in a study on Wednesday. The Switzerland-based Small Arms Survey and Ukrainian Center for Security Studies said that while firearms seizures by Ukrainian authorities had increased, “Ukrainian authorities have shown a strong commitment to addressing this issue” – and Russia’s invading forces were driving illicit arms flows in Ukraine by establishing arms caches and losing or abandoning their weapons on the battlefield. “Western hand grenades, shoulder-fired rockets, and portable missiles comprise only a small percentage of all seized weapons.” The war in Ukraine is endangering pregnant women, and maternal mortality has risen sharply, the United Nations Population Fund has warned. The maternal mortality rate among pregnant women jumped by approximately 37% from 2023 to 2024. The war was putting “more women at risk of dying and more pregnancies ending in life-threatening complications” said Florence Bauer, the agency’s director for eastern Europe. “These are not abstract statistics – they are people and families living under unbearable stress and reflect a health system under attack.” On Capitol Hill, the US House of Representatives passed a $900bn defence policy bill on Wednesday that includes $400m for each of the next two years to manufacture weapons to be sent to Ukraine. Despite Trump’s capricious attitude to Ukraine and European allies, lawmakers included several provisions meant to keep up US support for countering Russian aggression. The bill would need to pass the Senate, where it could be amended, and then also would have to receive the president’s signature. It requires the Pentagon to keep at least 76,000 troops and major equipment stationed in Europe unless Nato allies are consulted and there is a determination that a withdrawal is in US interests. About 80,000 to 100,000 U.S. troops are usually present on European soil.

Venezuelan Nobel peace prize winner greets crowds in Oslo after nearly a year in hiding

Venezuela’s best-known opposition leader, the Nobel peace prize winner María Corina Machado, has made a dramatic appearance in Norway after slipping out of her authoritarian homeland by boat. The Venezuelan politician and pro-democracy activist stepped out on to the balcony of Oslo’s iconic Grand Hotel at just before 2.30am local time, after spending the past 11 months in hiding in Venezuela’s capital, Caracas. Dozens of supporters chanted “Courageous!” and “Freedom!” in front of the hotel and sang the Venezuelan national anthem as she appeared. “Glory to the brave nation, which shook off the yoke!” they cried out. It was Machado’s first public appearance in almost a year, having been forced into hiding in Venezuela by the country’s dictator, Nicolás Maduro, after he was accused of stealing the July 2024 presidential election. Minutes after appearing on the balcony outside the hotel’s storied Nobel suite, the 58-year-old conservative came down on to the street and climbed over metal barricades to embrace supporters who had gathered outside the 19th-century building’s glimmering facade in the early hours of Thursday. Hours earlier, on Wednesday, the Nobel laureate’s 34-year-old daughter, Ana Corina Sosa Machado, accepted the Nobel peace prize on her mother’s behalf after she failed to arrive in Oslo in time for the ceremony. Speaking at that event, the chair of the Norwegian Nobel committee, Jørgen Watne Frydnes, urged Maduro to step down, having lost last year’s presidential election to Machado’s ally, Edmundo González. “Let a new age dawn,” Frydnes said, hailing Machado’s “struggle to achieve a peaceful and just transition from dictatorship to democracy” in Venezuela. Numerous past Nobel laureates have been unable to collect their awards in Oslo because of the political situation in their home countries, among them the Chinese dissident Liu Xiaobo, the Burmese politician and activist Aung San Suu Kyi and the Polish unionist and future president Lech Wałęsa. Machado was reportedly delayed by bad weather as she attempted to escape Venezuela the previous day, by secretly taking a boat towards the Caribbean island of Curaçao. Members of Maduro’s regime denounced Machado’s award, with the vice-president, Delcy Rodríguez, describing the Nobel ceremony as “a total failure” that her adversary had failed to attend. “They say she was scared,” Rodríguez added, claiming the 2025 Nobel prize was “stained with blood”. Speaking at a rally in Caracas, Maduro urged the Trump administration – which has spent recent months trying to topple his administration – to cease its “illegal and brutal interventionism”. He said citizens should be ready “to smash the teeth of the North American empire if necessary”. Machado appears well placed to lead Venezuela if Trump succeeds in forcing Maduro from power. But his downfall is far from certain. Maduro rode out Trump’s 2019 “maximum pressure” campaign to topple him with a cocktail of sanctions and threats. Some observers suspect the Venezuelan strongman will survive Trump’s latest intervention.

Former Bolivian president Luis Arce reportedly detained by police

Bolivia’s former president Luis Arce was reportedly detained and taken to police headquarters on Wednesday. His former presidency minister, María Nela Prada Tejada, posted a video on social media saying she had received information from “unofficial sources” that Arce had been “illegally kidnapped” by police. The police have not commented on the alleged detention, but the vice-president, Edmand Lara, posted a video on social media congratulating a specialist police unit “for having apprehended Luis Arce, in compliance with a resolution issued by a prosecutorial authority”. Arce served as Bolivia’s president until last November, when he handed over the sash to the centre-right former senator Rodrigo Paz Pereira, who won the runoff in an election that ended nearly 20 years of dominance by the leftist Movimiento al Socialismo (Mas). Lara added: “We said that Luis Arce would be the first to go to prison, and we are delivering. Everyone who has stolen from this country will return every last cent and be held to account.” The vice-president is a former police officer who became famous on TikTok for making alleged corruption accusations. The state broadcaster Bolivia TV posted that Arce was “giving a statement before” the police “while staff from the office of the ombudsman accompany him”. It noted the involvement of the Special Force to Fight Crime’s department for the investigation of illicit gains. Outside the headquarters of the FELCC in the capital, La Paz, where the former president had supposedly been taken, Tejada told journalists she was trying to enter the building to obtain more information. She said Arce “was alone” in the Sopocachi neighbourhood of La Paz, when he was allegedly “put into a minibus with blacked-out windows” and taken to the FELCC. “I’m arriving now to find out … No, there was no notification of any kind, and I’m coming to see under what procedures they brought him here,” she added. Tejada said she learned from “unofficial sources” that the reason for the detention “would be the Indigenous fund case”, referring to a government fund intended to channel part of hydrocarbon tax revenues into development projects for Indigenous peoples. During the early years of the administration of the former president Evo Morales, under whom Arce served as finance minister, Bolivia experienced astonishing growth, lifting thousands out of poverty – particularly many Indigenous and rural communities – thanks to a natural gas boom. The “Indigenous fund” was shut down in 2015 after a corruption scandal involving the alleged misappropriation of resources. Investigations were revived after Paz Pereira took office – the president established at least 10 commissions to audit and investigate Mas administrations, one of them focused on the “Indigenous fund”. Last Friday, the former Mas deputy Lidia Patty was also arrested by the FELCC. She is accused of having received, in her personal account, funds for the execution of projects that were never carried out. Local media reported that, in the request for Arce’s detention, the public prosecutor Miguel Ángel Cardozo alleged that when Arce was economy minister he had “violated existing regulations by authorising the transfer of public funds into personal accounts”.

Ukraine war: Trump criticises European leaders on eve of crunch coalition meeting

Leaders of the “coalition of the willing” group of nations will hold a video call about the Ukraine war on Thursday as Donald Trump voiced impatience with European allies and put US involvement in further talks in doubt, saying they risked “wasting time”. Amid chaotic American efforts to push through a peace deal, the US president said on Wednesday night: “We discussed Ukraine in pretty strong words”, when asked about an earlier phone call with British prime minister Keir Starmer, French President Emmanuel Macron and Germany’s Chancellor Friedrich Merz The US president added that the Europeans wanted to hold fresh talks this weekend but warned that they risked “wasting time”. “I think we had some little disputes about people, and we’re going to see how it turns out. And we said, before we go to a meeting, we want to know some things,” Trump said. “They would like us to go to a meeting over the weekend in Europe, and we’ll make a determination depending on what they come back with. We don’t want to be wasting time”. A British readout of the call said that all leaders agreed it was a “critical moment” and “intensive work on the peace plan is continuing and will continue in the coming days.” Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, will be on Thursday’s call, along with Starmer, Macron and Merz, who had a meeting in Downing Street on Monday. They will be joined by numerous other leaders of nations supporting Ukraine. Zelenskyy, was expected to hand over a revised version of a peace plan to US negotiators on Wednesday before the call with leaders and officials from about 30 countries. “This week may bring news for all of us,” Zelenskyy wrote on X. “We believe that peace has no alternative, and the key questions are how to compel Russia to stop the killings and what specifically will deter Russia from a third invasion. The European leaders have also been working to draw up security guarantees for Ukraine in the event a peace deal is struck, though it is far from clear any western nations are willing to offer meaningful guarantees against further Russian aggression in the event of a peace deal. Trump has vacillated between appearing supportive and dismissive of Ukraine since taking office at the beginning of this year, but his recent peace drive on terms that seem beneficial to Russia, combined with a new US national security strategy that attacks European nations, has worried allies. In a repeat of previous cycles of Trump-led peace efforts, Zelenskyy has mobilised European leaders to come to his assistance when under pressure from the US president. Trump claimed earlier in the week that Zelenskyy had not even read his draft peace plan. “Russia is, I believe, fine with it, but I’m not sure that Zelenskyy is fine with it,” said Trump. Numerous Russian officials have praised the Trump team’s peace efforts, and Vladimir Putin welcomed the White House envoys Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner for five hours of talks in the Kremlin last week. Russia’s foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, said Trump was the only western leader with “an understanding of the reasons that made war in Ukraine inevitable”. But sceptics say there is little sign that Russia is ready to sign a peace deal, even on the terms proposed by the White House, which include Kyiv giving up control of the entire Donbas region. Putin has instead said repeatedly that Moscow wants a “comprehensive settlement” to the conflict. At home, Zelenskyy is under pressure on several fronts, after a corruption scandal led him to fire his powerful chief of staff, Andriy Yermak, his closest confidant since the start of the full-scale war. On Tuesday, Trump piled further pressure on, claiming Ukraine ought to hold elections and suggesting Zelenskyy, whose official term ended in May 2024, might not win them. “They haven’t had an election in a long time,” Trump told Politico. “You know, they talk about a democracy, but it gets to a point where it’s not a democracy any more.” There has been a consensus in Ukrainian politics that holding a wartime election, which is illegal under martial law, would only play into Russia’s hands, and even staunch critics of Zelenskyy have not called for a vote. But clearly feeling pressured by statements from Trump and others in his orbit, Zelenskyy said on Tuesday evening he was “ready for elections”. He said he would ask the US to supply proposals on how to hold a vote safely and request that MPs prepare legislation to allow an election. “I am asking … the United States to help me, possibly together with European colleagues, to ensure security for the elections, and then in the next 60 to 90 days Ukraine will be ready to hold the elections. I personally have the will and readiness for this,” Zelenskyy said. On the frontline, Russia continued its assaults on the city of Pokrovsk and nearby Myrnohrad on Wednesday. The Ukrainian military said Russia was using “armoured vehicles, cars and motorcycles” to storm the northern part of Pokrovsk from the morning. Russia has already claimed control of the whole city but Kyiv says it holds the northern part. On Tuesday, Russia’s top general, Valery Gerasimov, said Moscow’s forces now controlled 30% of nearby Myrnohrad and that Putin had ordered them to complete the takeover of the town. A Ukrainian military source who had just returned from Myrnohrad confirmed that street battles are going on in the town. “It’s absolute hell,” said the source.

Starmer, Merz and Macron take phone call with Trump on Ukraine peace talks – as it happened

That’s it from us on this live blog. Here’s a recap of the main news of the day: The leaders of France, Germany and the UK spoke with Donald Trump about Ukraine on Wednesday. In similar statements Emmanuel Macron, Friedrich Merz and Keir Starmer said they discussed “the state of talks” on ending the Ukraine war, agreeing that “intensive work on the peace plan is to continue in the coming days.” The leaders also agreed that it was “a crucial moment” for Ukraine and for “common security in the Euro-Atlantic area.” Ukraine’s president Volodymyr Zelenskyy said his team would talk to US negotiators on Wednesday about the process of postwar reconstruction and economic development. This comes a day before urgent talks with 30 leaders in the Coalition of the Willing and amid plans to use frozen Russian assets to provide a $78bn loan to Kyiv. There were unconfirmed reports that another meeting of European leaders on Ukraine is planned for Monday in Berlin, a week on from the latest summit in London. German chancellor Friedrich Merz said he wanted the US to remain a partner of Germany despite a changing nature of their relationship, saying he would also defend his country’s record on migration when he next meets Donald Trump. This comes after Trump attacked Europe as “decaying” because of immigration. Merz said: “We are preparing ourselves for a change in transatlantic relations. But I would still like to see it as a partnership, and I hope that America sees it the same way in its relations with Europe and also with Germany.” Volodymyr Zelenskyy has said he is ready to hold a wartime election within the next three months, if Ukraine’s parliament and foreign allies will allow it, after Donald Trump accused him of clinging on to power. Pope Leo has criticized Trump’s comments about Europe. Without naming the US president the pope said: “Remarks that are made about Europe, also in interviews recently, I think, are trying to break apart what I think needs to be a very important alliance today and in the future.” Venezuela’s opposition leader was awarded the Nobel peace prize in absentia at a ceremony in Oslo, Norway. María Corina Machado, has vowed to continue her struggle to free the country from years of “obscene corruption”, “brutal dictatorship” and “despair”. In a lecture delivered by her daughter, Ana Corina Sosa Machado, the former congresswoman and veteran pro-democracy campaigner pledged to continue leading Venezuela on its “long march to freedom”.

Venezuelan Nobel peace prize winner misses ceremony but vows to continue struggle

Venezuela’s most prominent opposition leader, María Corina Machado, has vowed to continue her struggle to free the country from years of “obscene corruption”, “brutal dictatorship” and “despair” as she was awarded the Nobel peace prize at a ceremony in Norway’s capital, Oslo. The 58-year-old conservative has lived in hiding in Venezuela since its authoritarian leader, Nicolás Maduro, was accused of stealing the 2024 presidential election from her political movement. Despite fevered speculation that she would make a dramatic appearance at Wednesday’s event, having somehow slipped out of Venezuela, Machado was not present, although she was expected to arrive in Oslo in the coming hours. In a lecture delivered by her daughter, Ana Corina Sosa Machado, the former congresswoman and veteran pro-democracy campaigner pledged to continue leading Venezuela on its “long march to freedom”. “Venezuela will breathe again,” said Machado, who has lived underground since Maduro launched a wave of repression after refusing to accept he had lost last year’s vote, despite compelling proof. “We will open prison doors and watch thousands who were unjustly detained step into the warm sun, embraced at last by those who never stopped fighting for them … We will hug again. Fall in love again. Hear our streets fill with laughter and music,” added Machado, who some call Venezuela’s Iron Lady. Opening Wednesday’s ceremony, the chair of the Norwegian Nobel committee, Jørgen Watne Frydnes, said Machado was “safe” and “will be here with us in Oslo” after “a journey in a situation of extreme danger”, although not in time for the event. In an audio message released by her team, the activist thanked those who had “risked their lives” to get her out of Venezuela and confirmed: “I’m on my way … I’ll see you very soon.” It was not immediately clear how Machado had managed to escape Venezuela but the Wall Street Journal, citing US officials, reported that she had secretly travelled by boat to the Caribbean island of Curaçao on Tuesday. Latin America leaders and celebrities including the rightwing presidents of Argentina, Ecuador, Panama and Paraguay – Javier Milei, Daniel Noboa, José Raúl Mulino and Santiago Peña – travelled to Oslo to offer Machado their support as her movement continued its crusade to force Maduro from power. Also present was Edmundo González, the 76-year-old diplomat who filled Machado’s shoes in last year’s election after she was banned from running and is widely believed to have won. González was forced into exile in Spain by Maduro’s post-election crackdown. The Venezuelan pianist and activist Gabriela Montero flew to Norway to perform at Wednesday’s ceremony inside the redbrick Oslo city hall. Montero said Machado had asked her to play Mi Querencia (My Haven), a song by the Venezuelan composer Simón Díaz that the pianist believed spoke to the exodus of more than eight million people who have fled economic hardship and repression in Venezuela since Maduro took power in 2013. “The song is about coming home,” Montero said before the ceremony. “That has been [María Corina’s] mantra all these years: that we will all be able to return home and that families will come together and the country will rebuild with that enormous diaspora that has spread through the world for so many years.” Montero paid tribute to a politician she called “the most courageous, resilient woman that I know”. “María Corina never abandoned the fight despite her enormous personal sacrifices … She always kept the goal in sight: which has been to liberate a country that she loves and that she has given her life up for,” the musician said. Addressing the audience, Frydnes celebrated Machado’s “tireless work promoting democratic rights for the people of Venezuela and for her struggle to achieve a peaceful and just transition from dictatorship to democracy”. Standing next to a portrait of Machado, Frydnes sent a direct message to Maduro: “You should accept the election results and step down … because that is the will of the Venezuelan people … Let a new age dawn.” Soon after the ceremony, Colombia’s leftwing president, Gustavo Petro, also turned up the heat on Maduro, tweeting it was time for an inclusive transitional government, an end to repression and an amnesty in Venezuela. The Nobel ceremony coincides with one of the most dramatic and uncertain moments in Venezuela’s turbulent recent history. Since August, Donald Trump has ordered a massive naval deployment in the Caribbean Sea and a series of deadly strikes on alleged narco boats off Venezuela’s northern coast. On Tuesday, two US fighter jets flew within less than 80km of Venezuela’s second biggest city, Maracaibo, in a show of force. While the official justification for the military buildup is Trump’s “war on drugs”, most analysts and diplomats believe his fundamental goal is to topple Maduro by sparking a military uprising. Trump tried – but failed – to remove Maduro during his first term in the White House with a “maximum pressure” campaign of sanctions and military threats. “His days are numbered,” Trump told Politico this week – although allies, including the now secretary of state Marco Rubio, made almost identical claims during the 2019 attempt to unseat Maduro, and were wrong. Speaking to Politico, Trump refused to rule out a ground invasion of Venezuela, although given his non-interventionist policy few expect that to happen. Still, some observers fear bloodshed if Trump intensifies his military campaign, possibly by launching strikes against land targets within Venezuela. Celso Amorim, the chief foreign policy adviser to Brazil’s leftwing president, Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, told the Guardian that a US attack could create a Vietnam-style “war zone”. Other observers remember the chaos unleashed by the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003 to overthrow Saddam Hussein or the 2011 Nato airstrikes that helped bring down Muammar Gaddafi. Montero rejected such comparisons. “They try to compare it to other ‘regime changes’ in history – and it’s nothing like anything else that we have ever seen,” the pianist said. “We have marched, we have voted, we have protested [against Maduro] … We’ve done everything to free ourselves of this terrible, terrible chapter of our history … and it’s very frustrating when we encounter public opinion that doesn’t understand what has happened to us and what we are up against.” In her lecture, Machado said Venezuela had once been “the most stable [democracy] in Latin America” but had been plunged into economic ruin and authoritarian rule in the years after the 1998 election of Maduro’s mentor, Hugo Chávez, as the country’s oil wealth was frittered away and stolen. “From 1999 onward, the regime dismantled our democracy,” she said. “[We have spent] almost three decades … fighting against a brutal dictatorship.” The Norwegian Nobel Institute’s decision to honour Machado is not without controversy. While the committee celebrated her dogged struggle against Venezuela’s “brutal, authoritarian state”, critics pointed to Machado’s past support for military intervention to unseat the country’s dictator. Others have criticised her failure to condemn Trump’s deadly strikes in the Caribbean or his treatment of Venezuelan migrants deported to a notorious prison in El Salvador. After her Nobel prize was announced in October, Machado dedicated the award to Trump “for his decisive support of our cause” and called the US president one of “our main allies to achieve freedom and democracy”. Dozens of protesters took to the streets of Oslo on the eve of the ceremony to denounce the award. “A peace prize must be awarded to actors who genuinely work for peace, dialogue, and justice. When the prize is given to a politician who supports military interference and actions contrary to international law, it breaks with the very purpose of the Nobel peace prize,” Gro Standnes, an activist and member of the Norwegian Peace Council said in a statement.

Ethiopia is committed to peace and dialogue in the Amhara region | Letter

We appreciate the Guardian’s coverage of Ethiopia and the Amhara region. Accurate and balanced reporting is essential for informing the global public and supporting peace in the Horn of Africa. However, the government of Ethiopia wishes to clarify aspects of your recent photo essay (Inside Ethiopia’s Fano insurgency – photo essay, 1 December), as some claims do not fully reflect realities on the ground. The article cites the Fano militias’ claim that they control more than 80% of the Amhara region. This is inaccurate. Development projects and security operations continue across the region, with the government maintaining oversight of population centres and institutions. While photo essays capture aspects of life in the region, dramatic images and brief captions can oversimplify complex realities. Full context is essential for a balanced understanding. The article also omits the government’s post-conflict restructuring of armed groups. Former Fano fighters were offered lawful options: integration into the national or regional security forces, or disarmament and civilian reintegration. Many accepted. This reflects the constitutional principle that the state alone holds the monopoly on force. Finally, portrayals of the Pretoria peace agreement and the Fano movement are misleading. Fano, a civilian-turned-fighter group with no mandate to represent the Amhara people, claims the government betrayed them. In reality, federal officials, including Amhara representatives, negotiated with the Tigray People’s Liberation Front to end longstanding conflict and restore stability. The movement lacks democratic legitimacy, and its invocation of “Ethiopianness” misrepresents Ethiopia’s multi-ethnic identity and undermines the wellbeing of ordinary citizens. Ethiopia remains committed to peace, dialogue and accountability. The recent peace agreement between Amhara state and the Amhara Fano Popular Organization illustrates this commitment. We urge media and international partners to support de-escalation, disarmament and constructive engagement, reflecting the region’s complex realities. We hope that this response gives your readers a more complete and accurate understanding of developments in Ethiopia. Biruk Mekonnen Demissie Ambassador of the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia to the UK

‘It’s a breach of trust’: fear and frustration over countries’ push to return Syrians home

Tears of joy streamed down Abdulhkeem Alshater’s face as he joined thousands of other Syrian nationals in central Vienna last year. The moment they were marking felt like a miracle: after more than five decades of brutality and repression, the Assad regime had fallen. A day later, however, the ripple effects of what had happened 2,000 miles away in Syria were laid bare. A dozen European states announced plans to suspend asylum applications from Syrians, in a show of how western states are increasingly treating refugees as transients. As the fall of Bashar al-Assad collided with politicians’ quest to be seen as taking a hard line on migration, the lives of Syrians around the globe were plunged into uncertainty. In Austria, where Alshater had spent the past decade painstakingly rebuilding his life – learning German, upgrading his professional certifications and raising his family – the government said it had ordered a review of cases where asylum had been granted to Syrians and that a programme of “orderly repatriation and deportation” was being prepared. “It’s alarming and disappointing,” said Alshater, who heads the Free Syrian Community of Austria, a group that supports Syrian newcomers and helps them build bridges with Austrian officials and the wider society. “And it’s a breach of trust, especially for those who have already built a life here.” In September 2024 he was one of dozens of Syrians who spent hours volunteering to help clean up after torrential floods battered the small Austrian town of Kritzendorf. It was a small gesture of gratitude towards their new home, one also aimed at rebutting the far-right’s rhetoric and disinformation on migrants. Months later, Austria became the first country in the EU to temporarily suspend family reunification for refugees, a decision that disproportionately affected Syrians. In July this year it became the first to seize on the fall of Assad to return a Syrian with a criminal conviction to his birth country. Alshater said the government’s actions had caused “significant fear” among the nearly 100,000 Syrians in Austria, leaving some grappling with depression and anxiety. In neighbouring Germany, home to Europe’s largest Syrian diaspora, the chancellor, Friedrich Merz, has said he expects many of the nearly 1 million Syrians living in Germany to voluntarily return home. “There are now no longer any grounds for asylum in Germany, and therefore we can also begin with repatriations,” he said last month. Those who refused to return could face deportation “in the near future”, he said. His view clashed with the many employers, trade unions and business associations who pointed to the vital role that Syrians play in alleviating the country’s deep labour shortages, as well as reservations raised by his own foreign minister. The German Economic Institute said last year that about 80,000 Syrians worked in sectors plagued by shortages. This included more than 4,000 mechatronic technicians in the auto industry, about 2,470 dentists and dental hygienists, 2,260 childcare workers and 2,160 medical carers. The study also found that more than 5,000 Syrian doctors were fully employed in Germany and that their return could lead to “critical shortages” in medical services. The threat of deportations now dominates conversations among Syrians, said Anas Alakkad, a refugee who runs a startup that seeks to train migrants for the job market in Germany. “They are afraid that they will get deported,” Alakkad said. Others question whether it is worth learning the language, starting businesses or settling down. “For the refugees who arrived recently, they don’t know if they will be able to get residency, and even if they do, they’re not allowed to bring their families here. So they’re really frustrated,” he said. Governments’ push to return Syrians home have transformed how many in the community see the fall of Assad, said Ahed Festuk, a Syrian activist who moved to the US in 2015. “It’s really bittersweet,” she said. “It’s true that we got our home back, but we shouldn’t ignore the fact that our home has been destroyed completely.” In autumn, a World Bank report described the challenges of reconstructing Syria as “immense”, estimating that it would cost more than US$200bn (£150bn) Weeks later, Donald Trump’s administration said it had ended temporary deportation protections and work permits for more than 6,100 Syrians in the US. Last month a federal judge blocked the order, leaving these Syrians in limbo. Festuk visited Syria in June and saw first-hand how the infrastructure was severely lacking, leaving the government struggling to provide basic services, such as electricity and potable water. While the situation has improved since then, violence continues to flare up sporadically. “So to add millions of people right now I think would be really challenging for the people, for the government and for the country itself,” Festuk said. She was certain that many Syrians would eventually return, echoing a recent UN survey that found that more than 80% of refugees hoped to return to Syria one day. More than a million people – about 15% of the nearly 7 million refugees forced out of the country by the civil war – had already headed back to Syria in the past year. But Festuk called on countries to give them space to decide. “It’s still too early to force people,” said Festuk, who works for the New York-based Multifaith Alliance, which supports refugees and internally displaced people around the world. M Murat Erdoğan, a migration researcher who has studied the wave of Syrian arrivals in Turkey, said about 500,000 people last year returned to Syria from Turkey, which took in about 4 million Syrians during the war. “So far the voluntary return has been truly voluntary,” he said. “They were relatively ready to go back.” Others, however, had forged deep ties in Turkey: more than 14,000 businesses have been launched or co-launched by Syrians in the country since the war started. “It will not be easy,” Erdoğan said. “They work in Turkey, they have children in schools there or they have access to services in Turkey.” In recent years these roots have come up against a hardening of attitudes towards Syrians in some quarters. A 2023 presidential candidate vowed to send all Syrians home if he was elected. In the German town of Ostelsheim, population 2,500, Ryyan Alshebl listed the topics that dominate his day-to-day life: wind turbines, combating loneliness among elderly people, and land use planning. In 2023, eight years after he had arrived in Germany as a refugee, he was elected mayor of the municipality. It is a hint of the kind of integration achieved by many Syrians in the country, a feat that has been overshadowed by far-right efforts to turn migration into a political talking point. “People told me after the election that they had biased ideas about Syrian refugees, what they might look like or what they could do,” said Alshebl, who stood as a non-party candidate in the elections despite being a member of the German Greens. In the past year, since the fall of Assad, he said, the German government had created a “dangerous” expectation that Syrians would return – a promise that if not kept, he said, could push voters into the arms of the far right and pave the way for forced deportations. The view has left Alshebl calling for an approach that could strike a balance: allowing Syrians who have learned the language and joined the workforce to stay, while eventually deporting the minority who continue to rely on state assistance. “It is not an act of benevolence for Germany to say that those who are well integrated should stay,” he said. “Germany needs these people. But those who for whatever reason have not been able to gain a foothold so far must also be told in no uncertain terms that they cannot stay. That’s a legitimate deal, I would say.”