Russia’s actions have strengthened European case for boosting defence spending, says Nato chief – Europe live

Holidaymakers will face a nightly levy on hotel and Airbnb-style stays across large parts of England in a move welcomed by many mayors but described as risking “irreparable harm” to the tourism industry.

But, as Angela Giuffrida explains, while a nightly tourist tax may be unfamiliar territory in the UK, countries in continental Europe have been cashing in on these kinds of levies for decades.

“Tourists usually need to pay the tax on the day they check out of a hotel or holiday let, and are often surprised by an extra fee on top of their accommodation costs.

Among the earliest introductions of a tourist tax was in Austria in 1842, specifically targeting those who stayed in spa and wellness retreats.

Similar measures were later implemented in France, Italy, Germany and Switzerland as a way to prevent the inhabitants of towns hosting such high-end resorts from paying for costs incurred by wealthy visitors.

Italy’s tourist tax structure has gone through various changes. During Benito Mussolini’s fascist regime, it was broadened to include any town or city classified as a tourist destination.

The tax was then completely abolished for the World Cup in 1990 as Italy embraced more visitors, only to be brought back in nationally in 2011, with Rome becoming the first city to reintroduce the levy.”

After the AfD’s landslide win in Saxony-Anhalt over the weekend, people in the state capital shared with our correspondent Kate Connolly what they make of the result – and what comes next.

“Asking residents in a city where a seismic political event has just taken place ‘How do you feel?’ demands chutzpah – this struck me as I walked around Magdeburg, Germany on Monday.

The night before, the far-right populist, anti-immigrant, pro-Kremlin party Alternative für Deustchland (AfD) had landslide 44% win in Saxony-Anhalt’s state elections, sending shock waves to Berlin, across Germany and way beyond. Regardless of how people in the capital voted, it felt like a bit of an affront to probe.

Given the radical plans of the victors, a party classified by domestic intelligence as “rightwing extremist”, that is what I wanted to know. But from the 21-year-old Guinean-German paramedic I met at the central bus station, collecting donations for a local hospice, to the elderly couple returning to their apartment after a stroll down the Elbe river, almost everyone I met opened up to me warmly.

Judith, 88, was initially reluctant to talk, but shared some of her life story. Her experience as an eight-year-old refugee, forced to leave Poland in 1946 and eventually ending up move with her family in Magdeburg, had shaped her outlook on life, her successful career as a project engineer – as well as her politics. The news that AfD had not only won the election, but by such a wide margin, was “heartbreaking”, she said.

Huy, from Vietnam, who runs a newsagents in the city centre, was also reticent, but laughed and rolled his eyes as he sold the last copy of that day’s local paper, Die Volksstimme, and pointed to the headline that read: “Landslide in Saxony-Anhalt”. Shaking his head, he said: “44%!” “I don’t want to think what it might mean … but maybe it will all be OK?” His question hung in the air.

A glance at the AfD’s manifesto, in particular its pledge for the first 100 days, focuses the mind. Top of the list: challenging Germany’s postwar memory culture (which it says stands in the way of national pride) – so, “more Bismarck, less Hitler”, as they put it. “From the first minute”, they say, the party will start the deportation of what it refers to as “irregular migrants”.

I met Franz-Josef, a 71-year-old retired mechanic and Green voter, on holiday from a small west German town. He called the election a “catastrophe”, particularly in the light of the country’s Nazi past.

Luisa, a 34-year-old bank teller told me she hopes “those who voted for the AfD thought about what they were doing”. It was one thing, she said, to “deliver a kick in the shins” to Berlin, over its failure to pull the German economy out of the doldrums.

And maybe the AfD would fail to push through its promises in government. “But we cannot know, and I fear the price could be high.””

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The European Central Bank has raised interest rates for the second time this year, as widely expected, at it tries to bring inflation under control.

The decision was supported by a stronger-than-expected economy that suggests businesses can weather the higher borrowing costs, AP noted.

The central bank for the 21 EU member countries that use the euro currency raised its benchmark rate by a quarter percentage point to 2.50% at a meeting held in Berlin, away from the bank’s Frankfurt headquarters, it said.

More on that also on our business live blog:

Poland has warned residents in two south-eastern regions that its air force is monitoring the skies amid ongoing Russian attacks on neighbouring Ukraine.

Locals have received three similar alerts in the past 12 hours – a stark indicator of the intensity of Russia’s attacks and the heightened concern across the border.

Malta is vulnerable to “repeated instances of high-level corruption” unless it strengthens the rule of law and protections for journalists, the Labour peer Shami Chakrabarti said at the opening of an inquiry into judicial failures following the death of Daphne Caruana Galizia.

Chakrabarti, a member of the House of Lords and former director of the human rights group Liberty, has been named special rapporteur for a Council of Europe investigation into the fallout from the assassination of the anti-corruption journalist, who died in a car bombing in October 2017.

Malta is in turmoil after the acquittal of a wealthy and politically influential businessman, Yorgen Fenech, of any involvement in Caruana Galizia’s murder. Fenech denies paying a middleman €150,000 to have her killed.

At the inquiry’s first hearing, on Wednesday, Chakrabarti said the verdict had “staggered many throughout Maltese society and beyond.”

“It’s now almost nine years since the assassination that struck at the very heart of Maltese public life but a mastermind has not yet been held accountable,” she added.

Over in France, it looks like Emmanuel Macron is focusing not only on future space endeavours, but also on very down-to-earth issues of European security.

Aside from his space conference (11:01), he met for talks with Finland’s influential president Alexander Stubb on “Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine, European security, and ways to strengthen Europe’s strategic autonomy.”

“Finland and France are closer than ever before. France is an important partner for Ukraine and the whole of Europe,” Stubb said.

Despite its low-key format, the meeting is worth noting given Stubb’s central role to all diplomatic efforts on Ukraine, as he is one of the few European leaders that have a genuinely good rapport with the US president, Donald Trump, and so is closely involved in all relevant discussions on Ukraine, Russia and European security.

Swedes will vote on Sunday in a tight election that will be another litmus test of whether far-right parties should join the government, as the Sweden Democrats, with roots in the neo-Nazi fringe, poll at around 19% of the vote and could join the ruling centre-right coalition led by Ulf Kristersson.

The Guardian’s Ashifa Kassam visited Sweden recently to take stock of the atmosphere in the country ahead of the vote, and look at how migration and religion are being weaponised for political purposes.

“Not far from one of Scandinavia’s biggest shopping malls, Kashif Virk stood on the pavement, handing out flyers and smiling at those who passed by. On a cloudy Tuesday afternoon, the Swedish-born imam had taken to the street to invite people to ask him anything they had ever wanted to know about Islam.

For years, Sweden’s far right has peddled its own, distorted view of Islam, portraying it as being at odds with Swedish values. The Ask-a-Muslim – or Fråga en Muslim – campaign, conceived by Virk in 2017, was his way of fighting back.”

Wadephul also makes a very strong point there, as he says:

“We have to defend our democracy. And, Germany knows from the Weimar Republic, what could happen if Democrats are not ready to defend their system? And now I think we have to show that we have learned our lesson.”

Wadephul talks about his recent experience of visiting Ukraine, and seeing “raid alerts not only by night, but also the whole day over.”

But he says, despite that, you could see high spirits from the Ukrainians who are ready to defiantly keep defending their country.

Rutte says Russia remains to pose long-term threat to Europe, with its entire economy focused on defence and war preparations.

He says “we cannot be naive” about Russia in what feels like a bit of a swipe at suggestions of peace talks with Moscow as he has no illusions:

“I know you will always have people telling you: oh, if you would only sit down with Putin and this and that… This is long-term. It is a threat. We cannot be naive.”

Rutte says “there was a belief that we could continue doing more with less, and that the United States would keep doing the heavy lifting for us,” but this has changed in the last few years.

“I see a real mindset shift. Europeans increasingly understand that taking greater responsibility for our own security is not optional. That rebuilding our armed forces is indeed essential … increasing our defence industrial base is not only good for our security, it is good for our economies too. And that security is not something the US should do for us, but with us.”

And we go into Q&A.

In his speech, Rutte repeatedly praises Germany’s role within Nato, and then eventually gets to his stark assessment of the situation in Ukraine – and Europe.

He says:

“Russia’s brutal attacks against Ukraine are unrelenting. Russia is suffering enormous losses, now estimated at more than 40,000 killed or seriously wounded every month. Think about it for a moment. Over 40,000 every month.

Despite those heavy losses, Putin shows no willingness to bring the war to an end.

Instead, Russia repeatedly strikes Kyiv and other parts of Ukraine, often targeting civilians and civilian infrastructure, and at the same time, the list of Russia’s malign hybrid activities across Europe grows longer and longer: cyber-attacks, sabotage, arson, airspace violations, drone incidents.

…

The latest hostile actions by Russia are reckless, dangerous and a threat to life. But we are not intimidated. We know these are the tactics of a desperate regime that is failing to meet its objectives in Ukraine. Putin thinks he can divide us, destabilise us and weaken our support for Ukraine. But he will fail. These malicious actions are having the opposite effect.”

Addressing German ambassadors, Wadephul repeats that the Russian threat “has reached our doorstep and it’s tangible.”

He adds:

“The Russian attempted attack at the airport in Leipzig is only the most recent incident in a string of constantly growing Russian aggression against Europe and against Nato.

Russia and its partners operate with a global network against our interests and in favour of an own imperialist claim to great power status."

He then talks about the need to strengthen Nato, including its European pillar, particularly amid questions about the state of the transatlantic links with the US.

Responding, Nato’s Rutte also references the Leipzig attack, stressing the alliance’s united response.

“That is how Nato works, all for one and one for all.

Russia wants to defeat us, but we are united.

Russia wants to stop us helping Ukraine, but we are going to do more for Ukraine.”

He says “Russia’s actions are a sign of weakness and a symptom of its failure to get its way in Ukraine, but Ukraine shows determination every day.”

He stresses the role Germany plays in the alliance, including through deployment in Lithuania and the strength of its defence industry.

Both leaders take no questions, so that ends the presser.

Germany’s Wadephul and Nato’s Rutte are speaking now.

The German foreign minister welcomes Nato’s secretary general as his guest at this year’s ambassadors’ conference.

He jokes that the nationwide test of alarm systems at 11am was, surprisingly, not a special welcome for Rutte, but then seriously adds that it is perhaps “a demonstration … of the fact that our societies have to prepare and equip themselves and make provisions in every possible way.”

He then references the recent failed drone attack in Leipzig, thanking Nato for showing solidarity with Germany.

“Leipzig has … made the threat that Russia pose more tangible, and it is one of a growing number of aggressions on the part of Russia against Europe and Nato,” he warns.

“We should have no illusions: Russia is not only a threat militarily along the eastern flank, and continues its relentless war against Ukraine, but we increasingly notice hybrid activities, cyber-attacks, sabotage, disinformation and attacks on critical infrastructure.”

He continues stressing the importance of Nato stepping up to the challenges it is facing.

Speaking after Macron, European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen also pledged to build on Europe’s strength to invest in space capabilities.

“But strength today is no guarantee of leadership tomorrow,” she said, as she added that “to remain at the forefront, Europe must act together, invest at scale and turn our market into a competitive advantage.”

Von der Leyen also added that “if Europe is to lead in the space economy of tomorrow, the ability to access and act in our space not only underpins our prosperity; it increasingly determines our security and our independence.”

“We increasingly see it in our union itself. We see navigation signals jammed and spoofed, disrupting civilian aircraft. Cyber-attacks on satellite networks, knocking critical infrastructure offline and drones hovering over our airspace using technologies dependent on navigation from above. The message is clear: our security on Earth increasingly depends on our security in space.”

Meanwhile, French president Emmanuel Macron used his international space summit in Paris to call on Europe to develop its own crewed spaceflight capability as part of a broader push to strengthen the continent’s space sector, AFP reported.

“We want Europe to demonstrate its ambition in the field of crewed spaceflight,” Macron told a space summit in Paris, adding that “our European space programme remains fragile and we must step up our efforts.”

Meanwhile, Russia said it had detained a Russian security guard working at Britain’s embassy in Moscow, alleging he was hired by Ukraine for a false flag attack on the UK ambassador, AFP reported.

The FSB security service said the individual had been recruited by a Ukrainian blogger working with that country’s SBU security agency to track events and people at the British embassy and take note of their security system.

Ukraine then “planned to use this obtained information to prepare and carry out sabotage and terrorist attacks against the head of the British diplomatic mission and other diplomats, and then accuse the Russian side”, the FSB said in a statement, without providing any evidence.

Kyiv and London have not responded to the allegations.

The arrest comes just hours after British prosecutors said on Wednesday they had charged a 31-year-old British man for allegedly making contact with a representative of Russia’s GRU military intelligence agency.

Meanwhile, Reuters reported that Nato allies interrupted a Russian plot training to unleash a secret weapon designed to disable critical undersea cables without leaving any fingerprints.

Two 1,400 km subsea fiber-optic cables linking Svalbard to mainland Norway lie as deep as 2,700 metres below the sea’s surface. They carry ⁠vast amounts of satellite data downloaded at the SvalSat satellite ground station, the world’s largest and part of NASA’s Near Space Network.

The clandestine Russian operation looking to disable them was reportedly discovered and interrupted by Nato allies Britain, Norway and the US earlier this spring, when they tracked and confronted the Russian vessels at sea.

Russia didn’t damage any cables. The exercise focused on simulating the deployment of the technology in the event of a conflict with Nato, the officials said. They declined to detail how the technology works.

Britain and Norway disclosed in April that they had uncovered a covert Russian operation in Arctic waters. But the discovery of the ⁠new weapon, the location of the operation and the US involvement have not been reported.

“Through our joint operation, we sent a clear message to Russia that they cannot operate covertly,” Norway’s defence minister Tore Sandvik said in a statement.

“We have made it unequivocally clear to Russian authorities that any attempt to target our critical infrastructure will be detected and met with consequences,” he said. “It is in no one’s interest to escalate tensions in the High ‌North.”

Russia’s defence ministry didn’t respond to a request for comment on the incident. The Kremlin consistently denies conducting sabotage operations in Nato countries or plotting any confrontation.

At least nine people died in overnight Russian strikes on Ukraine, targeting warehouses and ports across the country.

Five people were reported dead and 24 injured in the Sumy region, with four killed and 19 injured in a separate attack on Ukraine’s Black Sea port of Mykolaiv.

The latest wave of attacks come as president Volodymyr Zelenskyy continues his international diplomacy tour with talks on air defence and winter preparations in Canada.

In a statement this morning, he highlighted Ukraine’s ability to conduct retaliatory strikes against Russia, as he said:

“Over the past 24 hours, our warriors struck eight Russian infrastructure facilities supporting the war. An oil refinery in the Yamalo-Nenets region and a seaport in Dagestan were hit. Sites in the Moscow, Voronezh, Astrakhan, and Bryansk regions were also struck.

Russia continues its daily terror against Ukraine. And every day, it receives a just response. I thank every warrior and everyone who enables our long-range capabilities and precision.”

Late last night, Norwegian prime minister Jonas Gahr Støre said that Zelenskyy’s plane was almost hit by a drone when leaving Moldova for Oslo earlier this week. “That is just the reality he lives in,” he told broadcaster NRK.

The alleged incident happened during a previously reported drone incursion into Moldova and Romania on Tuesday night (Europe Live, Tuesday). The Ukrainian side did not comment on what happened.

Separately, Nato’s secretary general Mark Rutte is meeting with Germany’s foreign minister Johann Wadephul this morning, with the pair set to discuss Ukraine and Germany’s own experience with Russia in recent weeks after an attempted drone attack in Leipzig.

I will bring you the key lines from their talks, and other news across Europe.

It’s Thursday, 10 September 2026, it’s Jakub Krupa here, and this is Europe Live.

Good morning.